A biography of a politician that graphically illustrates a point when the subjects are still alive becomes itself a political weapon. Such is the now-titillating Jose de Venecia biography launched in the United States.

The biography pointedly narrated a secret side trip of the Arroyo couple to the ZTE headquarters four months before NEDA changed its Build-Operate-Transfer (BOT) policy regarding unsolicited project proposals to accommodate ZTE’s national broadband network (NBN) proposal. In itself, the revelation–assuming it is true–exposes, at the least, an improper behavior on the part of the President. At the most, if the ties are uncovered, the President’s action may constitute an impeachable offense of “culpable violation of the Constitution, treason, bribery, [and] graft and corruption.”

Actual impeachment may be a lesser possibility based on the numbers in the House of Representatives but the political implications are certainly big enough. The revelation guarantees the focus on GMA’s foibles and constitutes further political pressure to make her resign.

The GMA majority in the House of Representatives actually rests on the fragile loyalty that money can provide. It is only feasible as long as the continued stay in power of the powers dispensing the largesse is assured. This is the reason why the current charter change move by Malacañang is being watched by all sides. When it fails, no money can dissuade the congressmen from seeking new patrons among the presidentiables. Their own survival imperative to stay in power will trump the money.

Before then, the pressure on GMA to resign is expected to increase. What is unspoken in this message is the “or else” clause. This is brought about by the interesting anti-GMA positioning of the de Venecias who are still very much a part of the ruling Lakas-CMD coalition party. Malacañang cannot anymore be certain of the loyalty of the majority in the ruling coalition, particularly the non-GMA Lakas-CMD, the NPC, House LPs, and other smaller groups. This was not present before in previous opposition initiatives.

The screw is turning tighter.