Spanish life is not always likeable but it is compellingly loveable.
Christopher Howse: A Pilgrim in Spain
Spain- If you still subscribe to the self-congratulatory myth that Spain is exceptional in not having a far-right party, read the first 2 articles below on the Vox earthquake of the last year.
- But if you just want to know the 5 most important things about Sunday's elections, click here.
- An key demographic change of recent times . . . Nearly 65% of Spanish women under 30 consider themselves feminists today – double the number of 5 years ago. In recent months, politicians have seemed increasingly desperate to win over female voters, presenting the occasionally comic spectacle of male politicians fighting over who is the best feminist.
- It's that time of the year again.
- I was travelling to Madrid yesterday morning, so I couldn't do justice to (i. e, fully plunder from) Lenox Napier's Business over Tapas bulletin. I can now say I'd indebted to him for these 3 items, of which I was only aware of the first:-
- The Galician Xunta has placed limits on numbers sailing to the Atlantic islands of Ons, Cies, Salvora and Cortegada. A group of ship owners and hoteliers has, naturally, claimed that the plans are ‘unjustified’.
- The denizens of Vigo refer to their fellow Galician citizens of La Coruña as 'Turks'. Click here for the theories behind this, if you read Spanish.
- 10 walled towns around Spain. I can heartily recommend the first, Niebla.
- Fart's main crime, asserts a Times writer, is neither collusion nor obstruction of justice but incompetence. See the 3rd article below
- According to the consumer magazine Which?: Amazon is not doing enough to stop shoppers being misled by a “flood of fake and suspicious” reviews. The magazine points out that the percentage of unverified adulatory reviews has risen from 6% of the total last year to nearly 33% this year. And it suggests that a rating of 4.95 is always to be taken with a kilo of salt. Who'd have suspected it?
- Facebook has taken down several networks that were spreading far-right content to nearly 1.7 million people in Spain, days before national elections that are expected to see a surge in support for the far-right Vox party. The networks were uncovered in an investigation by the campaign group Avaaz, and taken down only after it presented Facebook with its findings. More here.
- Word of the Day: Jolín. Polite for Joder (Fuck). A (very) common exclamation, which I suspect will be my half-Spanish grandson's first word.
- Revising the Google translation of a friend's article on Galician wines, I came across a number of words unknown to me, such as horst and sapid. The former is 'a raised elongated block of the earth's crust lying between two faults' and the latter means 'having a strong, pleasant taste. And there you were thinking there was no antonym to 'insipid'. As with 'uncouth'.
- Four days ago, ahead of the major international athletics event in Pontevedra, I wrote to 3 UK organisations offering a free copy of my imminent Guide to Pontevedra to all participants. Answer came there none.
1. Vox is transforming Spain’s conservative political landscape: Financial Times
Surging support for the ultranationalist party has polarised the election campaign
Spaniards will cast their votes on Sunday in the most highly charged general election in four decades: but by one measure there is already a winner. Vox, the ultranationalist party that burst on to the national scene late last year, has transformed Spain’s political terms of trade. The country’s Francoist past was supposed to have inoculated it against the far-right that has spread across much of Europe. But Vox has proved that to be an illusion.
Barely six months ago Pablo Casado, the leader of the centre-right People’s party, scoffed at the idea that Vox posed an electoral threat. It did not have a single local councillor anywhere in Spain, he said in an interview with the Financial Times. At the last general election in 2016, it won a mere 0.2 per cent of the vote and not one seat. But Vox, led by Santiago Abascal, a former PP councillor, is now a whirlwind barrelling through the conservative political landscape. It is polling at about 11 per cent and could win about 30 seats in Spain’s 350-seat parliament. The storm has whipped up so quickly that surveys may be underestimating Vox’s support.
Socialist prime minister Pedro Sánchez argued last week that “Spain has always had a far-right, either inside the People’s party, or outside. Now the far-right has a party of its own.”
Under the tight control of former conservative prime minister José Maria Aznar, the PP held together as a broad church, encompassing social and economic liberals, Christian Democrats and those nostalgic for traditional Catholic values and a unitary state, if not the autocracy of Francisco Franco.
But with the party tainted by corruption and riven by a Spanish nationalist backlash against Catalonia’s illegal independence referendum in 2017, its support splintered under the stodgy, uninspiring leadership of Mariano Rajoy.
First, many of its voters deserted to Ciudadanos, a liberal, free market party fiercely opposed to Catalan nationalism. Now there is Vox.
Squeezed on both flanks, the PP is heading for its worst ever result and could lose up to half its seats. Mr Casado has tried to shore up support by attacking Mr Sánchez in ever more shrill terms, describing him as a “compulsive liar” and the “worst felon Spain has ever seen” supposedly for his willingness to accommodate Catalan secessionist demands.
Arguably, Vox has had a bigger impact on Ciudadanos, which barely a year ago hoped it could eclipse the PP as the biggest party to the right of the socialists. Wrongfooted by these snap elections, Ciudadanos was faced with an exodus of support to Vox. To staunch the losses, the Ciudadanos leader Albert Rivera ruled out a coalition with Mr Sánchez and aligned it with the two other parties to his right.
Catalonia’s illegal secession bid “completely changed the structure of our voting base”, says Toni Roldán, a Ciudadanos MP. “Loads of people came to us from the right wanting revenge but when Vox came along they left.” Polling analysis for Ciudadanos identified 10 times as many potential voters to its right as to its left, Mr Roldán adds.
The surge of support for Vox has polarised Spanish politics into irreconcilable hard left and right blocs, adding to instability in what is now a five-party system. With Ciudadanos vetoing a coalition with the Socialists, Mr Sanchez will probably seek parliamentary support from Catalonia’s independentistas as well as the far-left. If the three rightwing parties secure enough support to form their own government, which seems less likely, then Spain’s system of regional devolution could be under threat.
By the standards of extremist parties elsewhere in Europe, Vox might seem moderate. It does not seem vehemently Eurosceptic or stridently anti-immigrant like Italy’s League or France’s Rassemblement National. It is probably best described as reactionary-populist. Veneration of the Spanish nation and its customs are its hallmark. But what it stands for matters less than its impact on the mainstream parties. Judging by this campaign, the impact has been profound.
2. Rise of the right: how the Vox populists have transformed Spain’s political landscape: Graham Keeley
Santiago Abascal’s fledgling party is on course for an election upset on Sunday
Alberto Asarta, while commander of the UN peacekeeping force, had a tour of duty in Lebanon and fought in Iraq, but he may soon face action in a different theatre of battle: on the floor of the Spanish parliament as an MP for Vox.
The most prominent far-right party since the end of Franco’s dictatorship in 1975, Vox is expected to win up to 30 seats in parliament in this Sunday’s general election.
General Asarta, 68, is among a colourful crop of retired military men, bullfighters and middle-class professionals running for a party poised to deliver the latest populist shock to Europe’s political establishment.
Polls suggest that the Socialists will win the largest share of the vote but it is a close race, and should voters back other parties on the right, Vox could yet play the kingmaker in a new conservative coalition.
Whatever the outcome, the party’s breakthrough on a wave of Spanish nationalism has changed the political landscape in Spain, dragging the mainstream conservative Popular Party (PP) and centrist Citizens to the right.
Vox was born out of frustration with the PP. Santiago Abascal, 43, its pistol-carrying leader, was unhappy at the leadership of the former conservative prime minister Mariano Rajoy and blamed him for failing to act decisively enough to stop the rise of separatism in Catalonia. Inspired by President Trump, Mr Abascal attributes Vox’s success to the frustration among voters with established parties such as Citizens and even the far-left Podemos.
Some voters believe it is giving a voice to ideas previously ignored or suppressed. Enrique Brieda, 34, a consultant from Seville, said he backed Vox because it “dared to say the things which other parties do not”. That includes its proposal to deport illegal migrants and to build a wall between Spain’s North African territories and Morocco. It supports rural pursuits and traditions such as bullfighting and hunting, combats “feminazis” who, it claims, use gender laws to discriminate against men, and wants to reform the European Union.
The party was formed in 2014 and stood that year in European elections but failed to win a seat. It languished in the wilderness until last year when a failed independence declaration in Catalonia in 2017 and the arrival of tens of thousands of migrants across the Mediterranean helped it to find its voice.
The party took a tough line against separatism, launching a private prosecution against 12 Catalan politicians, now on trial for their alleged roles in staging the referendum. At the same time, nearly 60,000 migrants arrived in Spain last year, almost half of all those who tried to cross the Mediterranean to Europe, most along the beaches of Andalusia. In December, Vox shocked the political establishment by winning 12 seats in regional elections in the southern province, ending the Socialists’ 40-year hold on power in the region, and allowed the PP to form a coalition with Citizens with the help of the ultra-conservative party.
Vox claims that its membership rose from 3,000 to 30,000 last year, but it nearly failed to stand in Andalusia because money was so tight. “We did not have the money or resources to cover the campaign. We did not know if it was worth it. But then we rented small mini-buses and drove round. It was like being on tour,” said Rocio Monasterio, 45, an architect and mother-of-four who is the leader of Vox in Madrid.
The same tactic is now being employed in the general election, with Vox candidates travelling in vans to stump for the elections. Otherwise Vox has fought its campaign outside the mainstream media, which it claims “distorts” everything its leaders say. Mr Abascal appeared in a video riding a horse and advocating “the reconquest of Spain”, a reference to the long wars waged against Moorish rulers of Iberia which ended with the victory of Christian monarchs in 1492.
The party leaders only do live television or radio interviews, which can’t be edited, and use social media to get their message across. Vox was barred from two television election debates this week because Spanish election law says that as it does not have any seats in parliament it was not entitled to take part. This played into Vox’s claims of bias against it.
It claims to command a “hidden” vote, with one in four Spaniards yet to make up their minds who they will vote for on Sunday.
Its critics accuse it of stoking racism and anti-Muslims rhetoric. Prosecutors are investigating if Javier Ortega-Smith, 50, its secretary-general, incited hatred when he told a meeting that the party would fight “the Islamist invasion”. Spain’s population of 47 million is less than 4 per cent Muslim, although public perception of the proportion is several times higher than the reality, surveys have show. The party says it actually welcomes legal, orderly migration; Mr Ortega-Smith and Ms Monasterio are descended from Argentinian and Cuban migrants.
With conservative parties veering to the right, this election has been the most divisive for years, with the Socialists trying to position themselves in the centre between the right, and Podemos on the far left. Some mainstream conservatives believe they could yet do a deal with Vox to form a right-wing administration if its wilder radicalism can be tamed. “We would have to calm the inflamed populist side of Vox if we wanted to share power with them,” said Cayetana Álvarez de Toledo, 44, an Oxford-educated marquess who is standing for the PP in Barcelona.
2. Team Trump’s main crime is incompetence: Gerard Baker, the Times
A thorough reading of Mueller’s report reveals plenty to embarrass the administration but nothing that could destroy it
If you thought the results of Robert Mueller’s investigation into Donald Trump’s campaign and Russian meddling in the 2016 US election were going to settle conclusively the issue of the president’s guilt or innocence then you haven’t been following American politics for the past few decades.
It was inevitable that there would be something for everyone when the verdict came down. “No collusion! No obstruction!” was the gist of the president’s response, citing the central finding that no crime was committed by his campaign and the attorney-general’s decision not to lodge any allegations of presidential attempts to interfere with the course of justice after the election.
Elizabeth Warren, a Democratic senator and candidate for the party’s presidential nomination in 2020, was the first in her party to take the opposite view: “The severity of this misconduct demands . . . the House should initiate impeachment proceedings against the president of the United States,” she tweeted.
So which is it? Exoneration or impeachment? I’ve spent the past week reading the 440-page report and checking its findings with lawyers and others. Here I offer the eight key points:
1. No Collusion!
Almost . . . Mr Mueller was careful in his language. He noted that “collusion” has no real legal meaning in this context and prefers to consider whether there was a “conspiracy” or active “co-ordination”. Here, he found there was no crime. Still, the report doesn’t paint a flattering picture. It notes the Trump team were more than happy to benefit from illegal Russian acts, such as the hacking of the Democratic Party’s emails. But Mr Mueller is thorough — there was no conspiracy.
2. No Obstruction of Justice!
This isn’t quite true either. Did Mr Trump use the presidency to impede the investigation into the Russia allegations? Mr Mueller is noncommittal. He does cite ten examples of how Mr Trump’s actions may be construed as attempts to obstruct justice, such as telling the White House counsel to fire Mr Mueller and then to lie about it (the lawyer declined to do so).
Two things prevent him alleging a crime. First, on almost every occasion, Mr Trump’s attempts to obstruct were thwarted by staff who chose to ignore him (see item 5). Second, Mr Mueller took a narrow view of his remit. Under Justice Department guidelines, a sitting president cannot be indicted so in the special counsel’s view it would have been wrong to allege criminal actions because there could be no trial and no chance for the president to defend himself. Instead, Mr Mueller left open the legal remedy to Congress, which alone has the power to charge, convict and remove a president.
3. No Impeachment!
There’s enough material in Mr Mueller’s obstruction findings at least for a congressional inquiry. But there’s enough uncertainty about the president’s actions and intent, about his actual powers as chief executive, to suggest this won’t get far. In any case, there is zero chance that the Senate would vote to remove him.
4. No Witch-hunt!
From the start of the investigation Mr Trump and his allies in Congress and the media sought to discredit it by saying it was started by politically motivated opponents in the deep state who used the infamous dossier by a former British intelligence agent that had its origins in the Clinton campaign. Mr Mueller makes clear there was ample reason to pursue the probe. It wasn’t the Steele dossier that got it started but reports from a foreign government that the Trump campaign had been pursuing dirt on Mrs Clinton offered by the Russians. The many interactions between Trump people and Russians leave no doubt this was a necessary exercise.
5. Team Trump is more incompetent than malevolent.
The report details in embarrassing fashion just how inept the president’s campaign and advisers were. There’s a continuous thread of inexperienced fumbling incompetence, especially in his efforts to block the investigation which mostly failed because staff wouldn’t or couldn’t follow his orders.
The best example may be from Michael Cohen, Mr Trump’s lawyer and fixer. Asked by a colleague to arrange a meeting with Dmitry Klokov, a Russian business figure close to Vladimir Putin, he googled the man and tried repeatedly to get in touch with a former Olympic weightlifter of the same name.
6. Julian Assange is a despicable piece of humanity.
Not news this finding, but more detail to support it. To deflect attention from the fact that he was co-operating with the Kremlin in the publication of Democratic emails, Mr Assange promoted a conspiracy theory that the leak had come from inside the Democratic Party, from a young man who was randomly subsequently murdered on a Washington street. In the process he impugned the man’s reputation and prolonged the agony of his parents over the investigation of his death.
7. The Trump people lie a lot.
OK, you knew that one too. But the scale of the mendacity laid bare is still breathtaking. One blatant example comes from Sarah Sanders, the press secretary. During the controversy over Mr Trump’s firing of FBI director James Comey, she told the press the White House had been contacted by many FBI agents to say they had lost confidence in their boss. Asked under oath about this by Mr Mueller’s lawyers, she said her statement was “not founded on anything”.
8. The system worked.
For all the ritual denunciations on both sides, claims of treason, of a deep-state cabal, the investigation did two things. It exposed questionable behaviour by a deeply flawed man and his team. But by declining to endorse the clamour for his removal and conviction, it confers much-needed legitimacy on a controversial presidency.
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