Spanish life is not always likeable but it is compellingly loveable.
Christopher Howse: A Pilgrim in Spain
Spain- Apparently, no one will be surprised if the result of Sunday's general election is a big surprise. The reason is that no one can predict the impact of Vox, the new and 'far right' party. This is expected to gain at least 10% of the seats but this might not prevent a left-of-centre coalition forming the next administration. This is because - unlike similar 'populist' parties around the world - Vox is not gaining much support among working class voters. Essentially, it's cannibalising the right-wing - that of the middle and upper class voters, especially (macho?) males. As someone has written: It looks to be a symptom of further fragmentation rather than a radical shift in the centre of gravity.
- As we await the election result, here's some of the insults traded by the leaders of the 5 parties this last week, demonstrating how 'robust' Spanish politics can be:-
Felón- felon, criminal
Mentiroso compulsivo - complusive liar
Ridículo - ridiculous
Adalid de la ruptura en España - champion of the break up of Spain.
Incapaz - useless
Desleal - disloyal
Ególatra - egotistical
Chovinista del poder - power hungry chauvenist
Rehén - hostage
Okupa - squatter (often used against Sanchez for his role as PM without being elected as such)
Fascista - fascist
Fminazi - extreme feminist
Chaquetero - turncoat
- But did the party leaders get to grips with national and international issues in their TV debates? Matthew Bennett thinks not. . . . The two election debates on TV were little more than overlapping recitals of 4 parties' election manifestos, with a few digs at opposing parties, some props and graphs and - this being Spain - lots of talking loudly over the top of each other. More from MB here.
- A salutary tale about sites offering villas in Spain.
- A month ago I talked about Madrid's 'quaint' metro station names. Yesterday, I decided to research street names. This was because I was walking along a street called The Virgin of the Dangers.
- I think I mentioned my failure last week to persuade all fellow 'pilgrims' to take a riverside diversion of the camino just before entering Pontevedra. Predictably, the owners of the bars along the original stretch are up in arms about the loss of business this causes them. What taxes does the river pay?, they ask. As if that were truly relevant.
- Where the Netherland leads, the UK belatedly follows. 2018 was a record year for cycle lane usage in the UK, thanks to the construction of new, high-quality cycle tracks, the growing popularity of existing routes and good networks that feed into those routes.
- On the incompetence of Fart and his crew, see the article below. Which rather endorses the one I posted yesterday on this.
- I think it's true to say that, when I was younger, society's influencers were the elite. And then 'elite' became a dirty word. And now the 'influencers' are cretins on the internet. So the 'Age of the Elites' has given way to the 'Age of the Dregs with a Bullhorn'. As someone has put it:- Social media has given us all a voice. But it has also generated a profound and alarming misconception that all voices have equal authority. They do not.
- Another apposite comment this morning: We live in an age of intransigence. “Blessed are the peace-makers” has been replaced with “bloodyminded are the base-pleasers”. Political leaders no longer pride themselves on brokering deals with opponents but on applause from loyal followers. To move an inch is to blink first; compromise is collaboration; to change your mind is capitulation, betrayal, failure.
- Is this a perfect case study in the art of character assassination via the internet? The gravamen of the charge: There is now an established pattern. Once an ostensibly reputable source spins a line, the Twittersphere finds its latest object of outrage. As soon as prominent people join the mob (celebrities, activists), the campaign against the individual intensifies. Weak politicians who want to be seen to be reacting fast try not to get caught behind developments. As Henry Kissinger said recently: ‘Information threatens to overwhelm wisdom.’
Spanish
- Word of the Day: Crecer.
- A new verb: To Meghan Markle - A newly current phrase for the act of dumping an old friend or relative without ceremony as one moves up the social ladder. As in, “we were best friends but then she just Meghan Markled me overnight”.
- This isn't a bridal wear shop. Or even a place to buy bridesmaids outfits. It's the Holy Communion section of El Corte Inglés. An event on which Spaniards - very possibly in decreasing numbers - cam spend thousands of euros per child.
ARTICLE
A more competent US President would never have blundered into this mess: Juliet Mills, Daily Telegraph.
US presidents can be rather domineering personalities. Still, even by these standards, it’s unusual for a president to go around carrying a metaphorical “shock collar” in his pocket in order to control his Attorney General. Yet that is how Donald Trump’s closest advisers interpreted his behaviour in May 2017, when he set off on his first foreign trip, to the Middle East, with an unpublished resignation letter from Attorney General Jeff Sessions in his pocket.
It was only the fifth month of his presidency but already an independent special counsel had been convened to investigate the Trump campaign’s alleged collaboration with Russia. To Mr Trump’s displeasure, Mr Sessions had recused himself from the investigation, so the president had demanded his resignation – and then refused it. Keeping hold of Mr Session’s letter, his aides believed, enabled him to deliver a zap to Mr Sessions whenever he wanted to bring him to heel. After nearly two weeks spent flaunting the note to senior advisers, the president returned it to Mr Sessions with a scrawled “not accepted” on the top.
This is just one of the details contained in Robert Mueller’s jumbo 450-page report, published in Washington this week. And as with so many conspiracies, the most damning revelations don’t actually stem from the primary investigation, but from the way the key characters responded to it. “It’s not the crime. It’s the cover-up”, as the Watergate saying goes.
Mr Mueller has indicted 37 people – but Mr Trump is not one of them. Indicting a president, the lawyer decided, is beyond his authority. A US president has a mandate direct from the people, so only Congress can impeach. Since the House is unlikely to do so, especially given that the report falls short of recommending any prosecution, we now know the “impeach him!” brigade have spent three years barking up the wrong tree. The proper way to judge a directly elected president is, of course, in an election. And if American voters care to engage with it, the Mueller report provides plenty of evidence that Mr Trump is utterly unfit to govern.
The president’s main saving grace is that his efforts to wriggle out of scrutiny are more comical than Machiavellian. The evidence paints a picture of a hysterical delinquent raging haphazardly at each development in the investigation, veering between panic and complacency. It documents him repeatedly ordering his aides to take actions they found horribly compromising and the creative ways they found of disobeying him. It was this disobedience that seems to have protected the president from suffering more serious consequences.
A few instances stand out. In June 2017, despite refusing to accept Mr Sessions’ resignation, Mr Trump still harboured resentment against his Attorney General for failing to “protect” him. So he ordered an aide to deliver a message: Mr Sessions would be fired unless he made a speech declaring that Mueller’s investigation was “very unfair”, that it would be narrowed only to examine future meddling, and that Mr Trump “ran the greatest campaign in American history” with “no Russians involved”.
The aide charged with this unappetising mission carefully noted down his brief… and then passed it off to an underling. This second aide recalled to Mr Mueller the request made him “uncomfortable”, so he told his boss it had been “handled” and did nothing. Stonewalled by his own advisers, Mr Trump resorted to criticising Mr Sessions in press interviews and on Twitter, to the point where the attorney began carrying around a ready-to-go resignation letter in his breast pocket. If you must wear a shock collar, after all, best to carry the trigger yourself.
Around the same time, Mr Trump tried another avenue to rid himself of the turbulent Mr Mueller. He told White House counsel Don McGahn to remove him. But Mr McGahn decided he didn’t fancy carrying out the order. He could see quite clearly, he told the investigation, that its likely effect would be a modern-day “Saturday night massacre” – the tipping-point moment when Richard Nixon’s Attorney General and his deputy both quit rather than fire a special counsel. Mr Trump, seemingly forgetting about his command, didn’t follow up. But when reports of the incident emerged months later, he repeatedly suggested that Mr McGahn issue a public denial. Instead, the lawyer, just like Mr Sessions, decided he would quit if push came to shove.
Up until they leave, his advisers prevaricate, persuade, put off and evade carrying out the president’s most absurd requests. The demands, often directly counterproductive to his cause and driven by pique, come and go as and when Mr Trump remembers them. So his aides manage him, as one might manage a difficult teenager, with a careful curl of contempt on their lips, right up until the moment they have to decide whether to lie for him or get the hell out.
Still, however stark it is to see the facts laid out in official legal form, they ultimately line up with most of what we already knew about Mr Trump. What makes him unfit for office is not so much that he’s petty, malicious and bullying. God knows, those aren’t uncommon traits amongst powerful politicians. What’s unusual about Mr Trump is how inept are his efforts to conceal facts and control people.
For one thing, Mr Mueller states plainly that the absence or loss of material by various players in the Russia probe means there simply isn’t enough evidence to conclude that the president entered into a conspiracy with Moscow. Despite 2,800 subpoenas, 500 search warrants and interviewing 500 witnesses, the threshold wasn’t met, and those being indicted were mainly caught out for lying. If the president had simply sat tight throughout the whole investigation, rather than repeatedly meddling, tweeting and trying to fire people, he would come out of it all looking rather good.
As it is, Mr Trump is looking decidedly less vindicated than when his new Attorney General misleadingly declared, a month ago, that the investigation couldn’t identify any “obstructive conduct” by the president. This is probably why he’s back to his old tricks, condemning it all on Twitter as an “Illegally Started Hoax that should never have happened”. Mr Trump might not have committed any crime, but when it comes to their president, voters ought to demand a higher standard than that – in managerial competence if nothing else.
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