Spanish Government: All seems set for another failed attempt at the formation of this. President-won't-resign-to-make-this-possibe Rajoy naturally blames the opposition PSOE party for casting a shadow over democracy. I've post-pasted an article from The Economist on the subject below. And here's an article on a cartoon from the satirical magazine, El Jueves, in which Rajoy is threatening to kill Christ(mas) if he doesn't get invested by next week. The mag refers to him as President by Virtue of his Balls.
How Things are Done in Spain:-
Aug. 16:
- I receive a note from the postman saying he couldn't deliver a registered letter from the Tax Office - sent in the month when everyone is on holiday. Doubtless with a deadline to reply by.
Aug. 29:
- Go to the Central Post Office - the only one in Ponters, a city of 82,000 souls - to collect the letter.
- Am told it was sent back to the Hacienda after 7 days, not the 14 I thought it was.
- Am also told I need to go to the office, not to write to or even call them with a request for a re-send.
Aug. 30:
- Go to the Hacienda tax office to find it's completely empty except for me, a restless security guard and one very bored-looking clerk.
- Am astonished, as the last time I went - admittedly on the last day for submitting tax declarations - you couldn't move in the joint.
- Ask if it's closed.
- Am told by the eager-to-work security guard that it isn't.
- Go through the security hooha, amidst much friendly chat.
- Hand the Post Office note to the clerk.
- Am asked to prove who I am - as if I could be anyone else. Resist the temptation to say I'm an impostor who's stolen not only the note from the Post Office but also the wallet and the ID of the tax payer it was meant for.
- Hand over my (much expired) Residence Card.
- Watch my letter being printed off.
- Listen to the clerk tell me out loud that it's about a fine arising from the infamously villainous Modelo 720 law of 2012 recently held to be prima facie illegal by the EU Commission. As if that matters to Madrid.
- Go home to contemplate spending good money to get inconclusive advice from an 'expert' on whether or not I should pay this.
assets.
Finally . . . Black adhesive tape: In a funny circular doing the rounds right now, there's the suggestion you only need 2 DIY items during your life:- 1. WD40, for things that don't move when they should, and 2. Duct tape, for things that move when they shouldn't. I beg to add a 3rd, said electricians' tape. I've used it for a thousand things, the latest being to mask the tiny scratches on my Kindle, through which a bright light emanates.
This shows the tape before I've reduced it to the perfect size . . . Probably scratching the screen in the process. But only the top one obscures words or part thereof.
BTW . . . Did you know that most people refer to duct tape as 'duck tape'. Which is plain wrong.
THE ECONOMIST ON THE POLITICAL SCENE
Rajoy warns impasse casts shadow over Spain’s democracy.
Delay in forming
government puts country in ‘gravest’ danger, says prime minister
Failure to end Spain’s
protracted political blockade would cast a shadow over the country’s
democracy, Mariano Rajoy warned on Tuesday, as the prime minister
made his case to parliament for a second term in office.
“Spain needs an
efficient government urgently,” Mr Rajoy said, arguing that after
two inconclusive general elections there was no viable alternative to
a new administration led by his conservative Popular party.
He went on to warn that
Spain faced one of the “gravest” situations since its return to
democracy four decades ago. “It is hard to think of anything that
could cause more damage to Spanish democracy than telling citizens
that their vote has been useless on two occasions and that a general
election needs to be held for a third time,” Mr Rajoy said.
The veteran
conservative leader was speaking ahead of this week’s parliamentary
vote that will decide whether his bid to form a minority government
will succeed. Despite recent progress towards a cross-party accord,
Mr Rajoy still lacks the votes that are needed to form a new
administration.
Spain has been without
a proper government since December, raising fears that a country used
to decades of political stability has entered a new era of
fragmentation and drift. Spanish voters have gone to the polls twice
in the past eight months but on both occasions they delivered a hung
parliament with no clear governing majority.
On Sunday, Mr Rajoy
struck a deal with the centrist Ciudadanos party that assures him of
32 additional votes in parliament. Even so, he can for the moment
count on the backing of just 170 out of 350 lawmakers.
Mr Rajoy will formally
put his candidacy to a vote in parliament on Wednesday but is
expected to fall short of the absolute majority required. Spain’s
veteran leader then faces a second round of voting on Friday, when a
simple majority of votes will suffice.
Even that threshold,
however, is expected to be beyond his reach after the centre-left
Socialists made clear on Monday that they were still committed to
voting against another Rajoy-led government. He needs at least some
Socialist deputies to abstain.
If this week’s
political drama plays out as expected, Wednesday’s vote will
trigger a two-month countdown towards another dissolution of
parliament — clearing the way for yet another general election.
As in recent weeks, the
crucial player during that two-month period will be the Socialist
party, which holds the balance of power in the legislature but has
far fewer seats than Mr Rajoy’s PP. Pedro Sánchez, Socialist
leader, could still try to form an alternative government himself —
though to reach a majority he would have to assemble a broad and
highly disparate coalition.
Many analysts expect
the Socialist leader ultimately to change course, and agree to let
the PP govern after another round of voting in parliament in October.
Alternatively, he could force a third election, in the hope that
leftwing voters will reward his refusal to endorse the PP and so
expand the Socialists’ lead over Podemos. The far-left movement has
emerged as a dangerous new rival on the left and has drawn millions
of votes from Mr Sánchez’s party. More recently, however, there
have been signs that Podemos’s support is in decline.
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