IN a TV interview, the late President Benigno Aquino 3rd's spokesman was obviously whistling past the graveyard when he insisted that 'gravity' would be pulling down presidential candidate Ferdinand Marcos Jr.'s high, over-50 percent ratings as voters' choice in various opinion surveys.

That reminded me of a favorite analogy of a witty political and business analyst in the 1990s. He referred to the taipans who have amassed so much resources that they will practically never go bankrupt since they have achieved 'escape velocity' and are 'in orbit', beyond gravity's pull.