A Marcos presidency in the Philippines will be a Chinese government wet dream but a nightmare for the US. By continuing the drift to authoritarian, nationalist government in the islands, it would enhance centralized, repressive structures inimical to democracy. China would then have one single point of contact, and could influence just one or a small group of persons to work its ways on all 109 million. The younger Marcos may think himself the equal of the CCP, but like all petty authoritarians he's fooling himself.

One should always recall that the communist revolution of 1917 did not happen in the industrialized countries as Marks and Engels anticipated but in Russia, the most backward, most authoritarian of European countries. Birds of a feather flock together, including the globally distributed Dictatorbird, ever ready to move into its neighbor's nest.