El Pais has asked the same questions I posed the other day – Where on earth are the details of government and opposition policies on key subjects? And are we to be subjected to nothing but ludicrous bribes even when the election campaign officially[!] begins? I think we know the answers. But imagine what the situation would be like if Spain actually had a populist tabloid press. On the other hand, could it possibly be worse?

An angry Russia has asked if Kosovo can be independent, then why not, say, Cataluña, the Basque country and Galicia. Of course, the right-of-centre Spanish press can distinguish these cases with ease. Or at least with a form of logic. As for me – having been educated in Law and having lived in six cultures, I’ve long known there’s no such thing as absolute logic. Or, to put it another way, there are at least a thousand logics. On nationalism, my view is it’s impossible to stop it within a democratic framework and there will always come a point when reality has to be recognised. Maybe we are close to this in the case of the Basque Country and Cataluña but not so with either Galicia or Scotland, where there is nothing like a majority for independence.

Talking of Scotland – The latest announcement from her First Minister gives a perfect example of how nationalists depressingly and divisively define themselves by whom they oppose and constantly seek to stoke fires by shrouding themselves in the mantle of victim - Alex Salmond called yesterday for £150 million worth of Lottery funding that was lost because of the London Olympics to be returned to Scotland. Of course, there’s no suggestion he’ll share with the rest of Britain any profits accruing from the Commonwealth Games in Glasgow in 2014.

Three men have been arrested for raping a 17 year old woman in a park in Elche. I guess this is the same place I spent several uncomfortable hours one fiesta night in 1971, trying to avoid local youths who thought it terribly amusing to hurl lighted firecrackers at the school party I was with. Which, naturally, largely comprised terrified young women. This was after I’d been told off in the cathedral for getting too close to my future wife during the performance of some religious re-enactment in – as a I recall – a boxing ring. Those were the days.

Finally – The latest on-line poll of Voz de Galicia readers:-
Do you think people who illegally download songs and films should be barred [à la the UK] from using the internet?
Yes: 9%
No: 91%

A moral lot, the readers of La Voz. Or the Immoral Majority?