AFTER all is said and done, they still don’t get it. We refer to the sad spectacle unfolding in both  first and developing world, where all sorts of experts are seizing on the promise of recovery in “green shoots,” citing macroeconomic data and indicators of supposed financial stability, even as the most important gauge of stability—the well-being and sense of security of people—hits the ground.

From October 2007 until as recently as June 2009, amid continuing crises of confidence in government fueled by its historic lack of credibility, when we need most to believe in democracy, two constantly provide with leadership we can trust.

On Tuesday, when Sen. Loren Legarda answered not simply political wooing but a timely appeal to serve a higher calling, the equations defining 2010’s tandems of convenience based on “winnability” changed. Suddenly there was substance. Senator and BusinessMirror columnist Manuel Villar chose his running mate correctly. For all the mud thrown his way, in recent history Villar is still credited for heroically rising against presidential corruption. We know that he can be relied upon to do the right thing at the right time.

Lawmakers are pondering whether it is worth the government’s trouble to spend P20 billion or so, with consumers possibly footing the bill, over seven years for a proposed tracking technology that is expected to help improve the collection of excise, income and value-added taxes from cigarette and tobacco manufacturers and importers.

On the part of Cagayan de Oro Rep. Rufus Rodriguez, as one news report indicated, he is concerned that P20 billion is simply too much for smokers to bear. This, I believe, is on his presumption that the cost of the proposed tracking technology is to be passed on by the government to cigarette makers, who will pass it on to smokers rather than they pay for it.