That there is disappointment with our governments is something to be happy about: while, with eyes askant, we say that nothing good can be expected from politicians, walang mahihita, and that nothing really changes, our collective hearts have not hardened beyond repair, have not learned not to hope.

Our jadedness, it appears, has a seasonality; it ebbs when the election storm clouds appear. We elect governments into office with fervor and hoopla, reveling in the power to do so, and then we sigh as we watch them descend, with tortoisian certainty, into unpopularity. We watch as they appear to be overwhelmed by the system, repeating mistakes of the past, donning the clothes, insincere smiles and bloat of traditional politicians. Corruption? Everyday office attire.

The Aquino government though got brusquely shoved down the bumpy slide into SWS low satisfaction ratings with the Mendiola Massacre. In contrast, the Estrada government's decline was more a free-fall than a slide. While Ramos, if it weren't for the Asian Crisis, would have been that rare head of state to end a term loved by the people.

In fairness, the disappointment with Aquino was to be expected. She was our Obama: countrywide and dramatic transformation was a minimum expectation. We all honked car horns that fateful day after the dictatorship was torn off the land by helicopter like a long-standing decayed molar. Tears were shed as hearts runneth over with hope. (In fact, Obama has it easy: Aquino had a suspicious military mindset to dismantle, an entire political and economic structure to demolish and rebuild, a secessionist movement in the South and a communist insurgency to placate. And she was stymied at the onset by drained government coffers and gargantuan debts).

Despite great disappointments, we never learn. And it is a blessing that we never learn. Arteriosclerosis of the veins that provide hope would be the death of the national corpus.