Spanish life is not always likeable but it is compellingly loveable.
Christopher Howse: A Pilgrim in Spain
Spain- More on the proposal to end the system of changing European clocks twice a year. It's all up in the air, apparently. Especially in Spain. Which, technically, should be on the same clock as the UK above it and Portugal below/alongside it. But possibly never will be.
- Which reminds me that little has been heard recently on the Spanish government's 'plan' to change the unique (crazy?) Spanish work timetable involving a long break in the middle of the day and late working hours. Probably Vox is against it, meaning that both the PP and Ciudadados parties have followed suit, for fear of losing right-wing support.
- The EHIC card - A timely warning.
- Londoners should get along to see this. One of my own favourite artists.
- So, if it doesn't reflect government-corporate collusion and/or weak consumer protection, why is gas in Spain 30% higher than in the rest of Europe?
- I might have been critical of the web pages of both the national train operator Renfe and Madrid's EMT, but it has to be said that they both provide very good transport systems. At least the equal of those I recently experienced in Germany, and better than those of the UK. When one looks at the latter, one wonders why the privatised systems were created, if they couldn't be as good as public services on the Continent. And then, if one is old enough, one recalls just how bad the public services were in the UK in the 1960s and 70s, and remembers that privatisation was an attempt - in some ways very successful - to improve the situation. The current Labour Party's policy is to re-nationalise at least the national rail system and I guess this might work, if a European model really could be followed. On the other hand, one fears not.
- We've been in the wonderful Retiro park several times. Something that 'gets' me is that people will applaud performers by the lake who, for example, play a tune on glasses of water and walk off without putting as little as 50 cents in the box.
- I say 'wonderful' but the service in at least one of the cafés falls well below normal Spanish standards. Too many tourists, I guess. Plus, I suspect, the waiting staff are not Spanish.
- After witnessing more 'madness' in the British parliament yesterday, Richard North concludes that this week MPs will coalesce around an exit plan labelled - I think - Norway Plus or Common Market 2.0 or just CM 2.0. This he regards as pie in the sky, unacceptable to Brussels. Vamos a ver. We won't have long to wait.
- Meanwhile, the Times this morning reports that: Parliament seized control of Brexit last night as three government ministers quit to give MPs the power to tear up Theresa May’s deal. I wish I knew what that meant, given that, if there's no deal accepted very soon, the parliament won't be able to stop the UK automatically 'crashing out' of the EU in April. For what it's worth, the Times claims it means that: MPs will take control of the Commons agenda tomorrow to begin a process that could result in parliament backing a softer Brexit.
- One observer has scoffed at these parliamentary goings-on and commented that, in the real world, there are still only 2 options: Either Parliament chooses to cancel Brexit, or it accepts no-deal. Everything else is just an attempt to cloud that choice, to try to confuse voters so they do not understand what is really happening. Which I fancy is the truth of the matter. As I recall, I said months ago that, all things considered, it would be best to go with cancellation. I still think that.
- Meanwhile . . . Interestingly, in his history of the English, Roberts Tombs points out that, back in the 1970s, it was the left-wing Labour Party which was very against 'entering Europe'. While the Conservative party - stuffed full of, well, conservatives - was then the most pro European party not withstanding the inevitable loss of sovereignty. Tory Euroscepticism, writes Tombs, is a recent phenomenon, not a hangover from imperial nostalgia. This gives the lie to the claim I've always rejected that an aversion to the European project was born of a desire to retrieve imperial glory. As I've said, my own generation knows little of the empire - and cares less - while my daughters' generation knows nothing about it. And the latest generation has been taught to despise it and feel guilty about it, not yearn for it. Folk who might fit this false bill are now in their 90s or, in the case of the vast majority of them, somewhat incapable of voting. Or doing anything else, in fact.
- In 1973, the EU represented 40% of world trade but by 2018 this had fallen to only 16%. There must be some other big players out there.
- Take this NY Times quiz to determine where you were raised in the UK. Or might have been raised, speaking the way you do. For the record, it was reasonably accurate for me.
- There's a good article on the latest developments below.
- And here's another one from Politico Europe: There are many aspects of Trump’s behavior toward Russia, both as a candidate and as president, that remain baffling.
- Word of the Day: Negocio.
- For getting chewing gum off the back of your jacket, brown paper and a steam iron might still be the best option. Though it's of no help in explaining how it got there in the first place.
- Anyone interested in joining a small group doing a camino of 7-10 days in April or May should write to me at doncolin@gmail.com So far we are but 3.
Democrats can no longer rely on conspiracy theories to explain Donald Trump's appeal: Tim Stanley, the Daily Telegraph.
At first glance, the Mueller affair looks like a pretty odd “exoneration”. Yes, a summary of the report into Russian involvement in the 2016 election says Donald Trump didn’t collude with Vladimir Putin – but the investigation did lead to 34 indictments and seven convictions, and special counsel Robert Mueller draws no conclusion on attempted obstruction of justice.
On top of which, the president faces other probes related to business, charitable and personal conduct. “The best day of Trump’s presidency,” said the BBC. Kennedy had the Cuban missile crisis; Reagan had Reykjavik. Trump’s best day is being told that he’s not a Russian puppet.
But politics isn’t about detail, it’s about grand narratives – and Mueller has almost mortally humiliated the president’s critics.
“It will be a reckoning for President Trump, to be sure,” wrote the New York Times, but also for, “Congress, for Democrats, for Republicans, for the news media and, yes, for the system as a whole”. Blink and you’d miss it: the Times was saying sorry.
Trump’s enemies made three huge mistakes. First, they overshot. They focused on the biggest, most outlandish claim against the president when a mixture of the smaller ones would’ve been enough to damn him in the eyes of the average voter.
Think of that moment in the OJ trial when the prosecution asked Simpson to try on the glove he allegedly wore to kill his wife. “If it doesn’t fit,” said the defence, “you must acquit” – and the glove didn’t.
Never mind that the rest of the evidence appeared compelling, by placing so much emphasis on the glove – or this ridiculous Russia connection – the prosecution walked into its own trap.
Second, too many liberals thought they could make Trump go away by impeachment rather than by beating him at the ballot box. This is turning into a psychological trait of our age.
I note that Cambridge University has backed down from hosting the conservative thinker Jordan Peterson following student opposition – the vice-chancellor has since said that the Divinity Faculty rescinded the offer of a visiting fellowship after it came across a photo of Mr Peterson with his arm around a youth in an offensive T-shirt.
In a sense, what liberals hoped Mueller would do was no-platform the president: don’t engage with him, don’t tolerate him, just find a photo of him in flagrante with a KGB agent and – boom – we can impeach the old man out of office. “America is our safe space; haters not wanted.”
Third, and this is the biggest mistake of all, the American Left has obsessed too much about the past, neglecting to build a winning strategy for the future.
This is understandable. To Democrats, the victory of Trump over Hillary Clinton was so unlikely and so devastating that they assumed he must have somehow stolen the election. Otherwise they’d have to confront the uncomfortable possibility that Mrs Clinton was less appealing to working-class Americans than the most radical Republican since Barry Goldwater. Conspiracy theories abounded: Russia was an easy explanation.
In fact, the Mueller report concludes that Moscow did try to influence the 2016 election, which itself should put Republicans on the back foot: what is it about Trump that, by inference, made him more attractive to the Kremlin as a presidential candidate than Mrs Clinton?
But while any foreign interference is obviously important, Trump has been in the White House now for two years and has a record – some good, some bad – that demands adult scrutiny. At what point are Democrats going to start dealing with Trump as a concrete reality rather than Trump as the existential psychodrama of 2016?
The same error has been made here in the UK. Millions of words have been written about why Britain voted for Brexit. Class war, culture war, or how about those crazy Russians?
It’s an interesting subject: it would make a great PhD. But all the while we’ve been arguing over why Britain voted Leave three years after the fact, we’ve had precious little talk about the more relevant question of “how” we’re going to leave – and that’s why we’re in this present mess.
Politicians are to blame; so is the media. I went on telly shortly after the Withdrawal Agreement was published and got all of about 90 seconds to debate its contents. Most of the rest of the conversation was taken up with personality politics, democracy and treachery, which, as the choice of “no deal” or “no Brexit” comes screeching towards us, suddenly seem relatively unimportant.
It’s as if Britain and America have gone into shock. Something big has happened to us and we can’t get over it. We just stagger about asking if we can replay the past and do it differently.
Can we impeach Trump? Can we have a second referendum? No. Both were democratic choices that we have to learn to live with. Criticise them on the merits, by all means, but don’t retreat into conspiracy theories.
Russian spy fiction is fun, no doubt, but not an acceptable escape from reality.
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