They say that power corrupts, and that absolute power corrupts absolutely.

That seriously needs to become the key insight behind the next major advertising campaign for any obscenely expensive, gas-guzzling SUV seeking to make a splash on the market, particularly since things seem to be ramping up already for the next Philippine presidential campaign.

Let me tell you a story about how one shy, well-mannered, meek and mild, incredibly buff and sexy superstar, whom we shall hide behind the nom de plume of “MDJ Superstar” to protect his dignity and spotless, upstanding public image, was corrupted absolutely by the simple act of being handed the keys to a very large, imposing, extremely expensive SUV for a weekend drive out of town.

As a personal policy in deference to the seven beatitudes, MDJ Superstar refuses to do certain things when he’s on the road – NEVER does he counterflow, NEVER does he enter illegal lanes, NEVER does he overtake out of turn.

And yet when confronted with the overwhelming traffictude leading from Nasugbu to Tagaytay, MDJ transformed into a beast*.

He cut in and out of frozen lanes. He kicked up clouds of dust and gravel as he zipped onto the shoulder, scaring schoolchildren, fruit vendors, and numerous cute puppies out of the way. He counterflowed, he dodged, he ducked, he dipped, he dove, he dodged. Patches O’Houlihan would have been proud!

All the while, he would be wailing, “This is so wrong! I feel so guilty!” as he ploughed past an endless parade of Kia Picantos, Honda Jazzes, and Toyota Vios’ locked into a procession of slow-oozing traffic. “I am an evil person!”

“Then why are you doing it!!?” his confused, slightly perplexed passengers would shoot back at him, their knuckles turning bone white from fear and tension.

“The devil is making me do it,” MDJ Superstar would scream. “This runs contrary to my whole being and personal value system, not to mention my 16-year Jesuit education and the Padawan Code of Discipline!”

But he was helpless to resist. When you’re behind the wheel of a mechanical leviathan that could theoretically render a flock of middle-aged goats into a gooey puddle of mashed bone, organs, and sinew in three seconds flat, you feel drugged; you feel invincible. You feel… god-like.

The All-New Toyota Fortuner. Killz bitchez dead, and gets you to Manila in 20 minutes flat!

That’s an advertising line worth keeping.

* This is different from a “sexy beast”, which MDJ Superstar already is on a regular basis anyway.