If you’re not yet sufficiently confused about the implications of the bank stress tests recently announced, here’s Charles Butler to explain why Spain has emerged smelling of roses. And here’s another article saying the whole exercise is rather dubious anyway. If you don’t have a good grasp of economics, statistics and physics, you might be well advised just to jump to the conclusion of the latter article.

Spain – as we know – is a noisy country. But right now I’m spoiled for choice as to what to complain about. The construction site near my house is now in its fifth, if not sixth, year and today they’re smashing granite so as to build the approach road up the slope directly opposite me. And, just a bit further along the road, they’re (re)smashing granite paving slabs so as to lay the drains. As if that weren’t enough, my new neighbours next door are having their house gutted before they move in and this naturally involves a good deal of banging. A peaceful summer haven is not what I have right now. At least not here in Poio. Incidentally, the Catalans seem to have sold their house “As is”, which I think is quite common here. Basically, you buy the place with everything in it. And this can be a lot. The evidence from the skip in front of my house is that, in this case, it includes all the toys and dolls collected in her youth by the now adult daughter of the family. Not to mention an awful lot of fitted furniture.

The other thing it’s not today is sunny and warm. For the third or fourth day in a row, Southern Galicia is the hottest place in Spain and it’s stiflingly hot. Temperatures reached 38 to 40 here in Pontevedra yesterday and it doesn’t bear thinking what they were up in the heat bowl that is Ourense. Not comfortable.

I wrote yesterday of myopic Galician nationalists. Which was, perhaps, a bit unfair as Galician nationalism is a broad church and there are those in it who promote Galician culture and language without the idiocies of the extremists. The latter regard an independent nation (‘Galiza’) as the only possible goal and construct all their arguments on the base of this premise. Almost as if it already were the case. Their defining characteristic is an inability to grasp the fact that, whether they like it or not, Galicia is a part of Spain and Spain is not a part of Galicia. So, in the context of yesterday’s theme of educational qualifications, their answer is likely to be “When you make Gallego co-equal with Spanish elsewhere in Spain, we will make Spanish co-equal with Gallego here”. In this, they ignore not only constitutional reality but also the existing law making the two languages co-equal in Galicia. It is, of course, impossible to have a reasoned dialogue with such zealots. You might as well try to have a discussion with a brick. You’d certainly get more intelligence and fewer insults.

Another postscript I need to make . . . I said everything went well in the insurance company offices yesterday but this wasn’t strictly true. Sitting in front of the screen containing the details of the policy and the name and (ex)address of my ex partner, the guy chose to write down my details (including my ID) on a scrap of paper. As the next letter isn’t due until June 2011, it’ll be a while before I know if he remembered to later transfer these to the computer.

Finally from me . . . I was delighted yesterday to read an article in which the author had written “Will this prolong the war in Afghanistan or shorten it? Will more people die or fewer?” Not, you will immediately have appreciated “less people”.

And now, here’s Alfie with a few, quiet, reflective thoughts on today’s momentous news from Cataluña:-

Bravo, Catalonia! Bravo, Bravo, Bravo!!! I humbly bow my head to you and your separatist flag! It takes courage to tell cowards they no longer call the shots. It’s not easy to draw that breath, admit the time has come, and say that all the hollow chitchat in defence of barbarity has no place any more in A.D. 2010. With a snug majority of 68 against 55, and against the howls of every gross and sweaty lamebrain in the land, the Barcelona Parlament has forbidden the bullfight in their autonomous region from this day on. A step’s been taken. A lofty thing done.

Oh, but it’s all Hypocrisy, smirk the Grand Defenders of Art, Tradition, Liberty and National Pride (i.e. those who enjoy chopping up live animals for the fun of callous plebeians). ‘They’re only prohibiting it out of separatist spite against Spain…!’

What can one say against such a truly valid argument? Well, allow me to say that it is, of course, a cheap trick of schoolboys to try to besmudge a Good Thing by calling into question the Motive Behind It. A thing is good or bad in itself. And the motive, frankly, has no bearing on its ethical status. When I hear such fallacies pronounced with a straight face, I always remember the time when judge Garzón tried to get his hands on General Pinochet for mass murder. My friend Igor, who has been a die-hard reactionary since he grew up in Soviet Russia, told me at the time: ‘Well, that Garzón is only doing it because he’s burning with ambition!’ And So What? I asked. I don’t know if personal ambition was behind each of Garzón’s initiatives (Frankly, I’d be surprised, seeing what his taking on everybody Left and Right brought him in the end...) But, even if he was fuelled by dreams of power, I don’t mind that somebody does something good for a bad motive. Just as I don’t believe that something bad becomes less evil if caused by a man with fine motives. See, for instance, the marvellously charitable intentions of good old Fray Bartolomé de las Casas, who came up with the idea of saving the Indians by getting African Blacks to do the slave labour on the American plantations… We all know where that led, don’t we? The Road to Hell . . . Need I finish that sentence?

No: for better or for worse. For lofty or despicable reasons. From ethics or from spite. By a road paved with gold or one covered in muck . . . Something Good has been done today. Something long overdue. One more thin coat of civilisation has been painted over the old barbaric woodwork. And Catalonia, Spain, Europe . . . all of them are today slightly better places than they were a few hours ago. Bravo Catalonia! Today you surely rose not a little in the estimation of one fellow who doesn’t much believe in the virtues of separatism! And he is not alone, I assure you. So keep up the good work and who knows where you’ll go?

Right, and now for battling blood sports in the rest of Spain; for taking on the even sicker village feasts; for kicking it out of France, Portugal and Latin America; and for forbidding barbarities elsewhere as well, such as the idiotic, needless, puerile and most scandalous slaughter of Calderon Dolphins by Danish fuckfaces on the Faroe Islands! (Go google it, dear children, but only if you have a strong stomach!) Another ‘Ancient Cultural Tradition’ that makes decent men puke. There’s still something rotten in the State of Denmark! So let us be no Hamlets and ride unhesitatingly into battle…!

 Alfred B Mittington

Editor’s Note: Having recently seen the film “The Cove”, I suspect there might be something even worse that Alfie’s Danish citation.