Spanish General Elections 2008: a prospect of the near future

AS I wrote on Sunday, Socialists won because of the vote of leftist radicals, both from United Left (communists, they lose 3 out of 5 seats in Congress) and the Nationalists from both Catalan Republican Left (lose 5 out of 8 seats) and Basque Nationalist Party (lose one which is summed up by the Basque Socialists). In general they have not increased their votes apart from that change. This can boost to extraordinary heights the radicalization of a Government, in nearly all issues.

Brief prospect for Socialist policy in the next term:

1. Judicial Power: the control over judiciary is going to be increased badly, leading to an accused partiality for the already partial Supreme Court Judges and the members of the General Council of the Judicial Power. We have seen this specially with the gay marriage issue: sanctions for judges who deemed it to be unconstitutional or for the ones who were not convinced of the constitutionality of the gay couples' adopting children (it is a right for the minor to be adopted, not the other way round). But it can be seen also in the fact of the actual disparition of the popular action, a last resource to control legality for citizens when no one was left. This popular action has been deemed out of order if the Official Prosecutor does not maintain the accusation or if the private accusation is not personally damaged by the crime. Very used to pursue justice in anti-ETA processes, it has been deemed not contemplated for those cases, even when neither the Constitucion or the Criminal Process Law state that exemption.
2. Constitucional Tribunal: this is going to be another REAL issue. The awaited modification of its members is going to be done after an election where socialist radicalization is going to be the main issue considering the results. So you see the partitiality of the Tribunal is going to grow in an institution whose impartiality is not only a need of its own existence but a requirement to really ensure its "non-political/only juridical" real essence.
   
3. Religion: the attacks on the Catholic Church and the support of Islam (whose leaders asked expressely to vote for Socialism) are probably going to grow. For example, these last days we have come to know that Socialists and Al-Fatah made an agreement to mutually assess themselves in several issues. Also, the Socialist Government is going to pay with our taxes, a film named "Al Andalus" which tells a "story" between Reza, a Persian Muslim boy, Mirian, a Jewish girl and and an ex-guardsman of the Caliphate. The film has been called by the Spanish stupidest between stupidest FM Moratinos, a "project of enourmous importance for the Civilizations' Alliance and a "very efficient tool" for it. Note there is no Christian as main role in the film: so where are the three cultures' representatives if one of them -Christian- is substituted by an "ex-guardsman of the Caliphate"?
   
4. Abortion: the abortion is only non-punishable in Spain in three cases: rape, very grave genetic defects of the foetus and danger for physical and psychical health of the mother. It's general knowledge that the last of the three causes is abused and perverted by doctors, who instead of considering the cases in which the mother IS really on these cases, they consider in it included every pregnant woman who is not on the other two cases and who arrives to the clinic to ask for an abortion. The scandals over abortion clinics have shown that even 8-month-old foetuses were being aborted and thrown into grinding machines to eliminate proofs. But high quantites of money were being paid to these clinics without, on the other hand, having ANY kind of post-abortion care for the mother of any pre-abortion information about other methods to avoid abortion. The support the Government has given to the clinics, instead of giving it to the pregnant women, is not a good sign, aggravated by the votes' transfer from United Left, which has been supporting free abortion during the first three months, to the Socialists. Meanwhile the number of abortions in Spain has boosted, and the Government has released the figures later than other years for avoiding a lot of criticism just before the elections. Last news are, that the same clinics who were practising abortions to 8-month pregnant women, also practised abortions to 13-year-old girls.
   
5. Euthanasia: nowadays it's totally forbidden in Spain. Anyway, the minister of Sciences, Bernat Soria, who has allegedly forged his CV including in it several non-existent aspects of his carreer life, has made it clear that he wants to discuss this matter (The euthanasia is a "failed subject" of Spanish society"). After receiving all the radical votes, I'm sure this is going to be one of the main issues in the next term, under the chapter of "social rights" that Zapatero mentioned on his first statement after winning the elections.
6. Freedom of expression regarding MSM: there has been repeated attacks on non complacent right-wing MSM (which are a minority) We can expect this to increase in the near future.
7. Internet: with all the considerations made (specially the control over the judiciary), it's easy to see the highly bad influence the victory is going to have over freedom in Internet, the real Anti-Zapatero bastion. As being a blogger means you are not subjected to an editor, or to publicity or censorship issues and considering the practical inexistence of right-wing MSM, the right side of the blogosphere proved from the beginning that it was alive, was powerful and had clear ideas. Sites like Red Liberal, Red Anti-ZP, Red Popular or Red Blogs pro Rajoy and Internet forums like the dead GrupoRisa.com or Monclovitas proved that there were a lot of people with similar ideas and a common reject of Zapatero's policy. And that is not convenient for Zapatero who knows that we are not easily influenced by Government's propaganda.
8. Digital canon: This is another MAIN issue for the next term. Socialists have already imposed (though it can be even worse...) this tax in almost ALL digital memory devices JUST IN CASE you copied protected material (such as films, songs...), to pay for the "alleged" loss of benefits authors and creators have because of pirate copies. There are a lot of young people totally enraged by this mesaure because it considers any citizen as a culprit of piracy, while it's not proved he has actually committed that crime. Secondy, because the tax is going to be payed to a private institution (SGAE - General Society of Authors and Editors), institution which has even been accused of illicit enrichment of public money (no, instead of showing all their benefits and possessions, it has criminally accused the people who was asking them to clarify certain aspects of them). Thirdly because the distribution of the benefits obtained by this tax are not going to be controlled even by Parliament. No presumption of innocence, no transparency and control: magnificent prospect.
9. Terrorism: this has been the most important issue in the last term. It is positive that Zapatero lied to Spanish people about the negotiation process with ETA. He said it himself in an interview that "he continued the negotiation with the terrorist group after the T4 Barajas terminal", after denying in repeated occassions he had, and his Government had called "fascists" to all the people who did not agree with him. It is probable that the negotiation continues after the elections, even after the killing of PSOE ex-councilman Isaías Carrasco. The growth of the Socialists in the Basque country with the votes of the Basque Nationalists is sufficient to consider that as a REAL possibility. A referendum about Basque independence will take place in october, at the same time as the Basque Autonomous Community's elections.
10. Independentism: not only Basque Country has a problem with hard-line independentists. In Catalonia,the socialists have obtained more votes thanks to the fall of Catalan Republican Left, a hardline independentist party, built upon the ashes of the terrorist group Terra Lliure, similar to ETA but which dissolved itself in the 1980s. This means the Socialists have radicalised their own positions so much that the hardline independentists are now voting for them, seeing them as much more useful for that purpose. The unilateral independence of Kosovo can be seen as a magnificent precedent for those purposes, even if the causes and the real situation of both of them differ.
    
11. Economy: the crisis is near, just ahead. The building sector has already collapsed and the elections' result can even get the people to feel more fear about the future, stopping consumption in the near future. As families consumption is the main motor of Spanish economy, the crisis can be deepened. But the oil market pushes the prices up, so instead of lowering the prices, they get higher every day, with inflation reaching heights not known in several years. The crisis has also grow the unemployment rate, even if the way to count the number of unemployed was modified in order to lower it. We have also to consider the Socialist catastrophic energy policy which considers that nuclear power MUST be ended for "ecological" reasons, making Spain even more dependant from the oil and derived products' market. But Zapatero, instead of fighting against the worsened economic numbers, has said that "people who questioned the economy were not patriots", a stupid statement considering he once said that "his country was Freedom".
    
12. Immigration: uncontrolled immigration is one of the worst problems here by now. An issue in which Socialists' policy has been disastrous, after the policy of "papers for all", which means residence papers for all, and which has consisted in the legalization of nearly 700.000 immigrants during the last term. This has produced a huge "calling effect" for immigrants, that every day arrive at Spanish coastal regions. Zapatero said that they were going to send back to his country in an interview by El Mundo newspaper this last Christmas. But this is extremelly difficult as they haven't got any identification papers and normally the only country Spanish authorities know they have been before their arrival is Morocco. The latter denies any entry to illegal immigrants who have arrived to Spain, even if they have entered Spain from Moroccan coasts. But when Spanish authorities know where they have come from, the results are just the same disaster as ever. They have even been paid to return to their countries of origin.
    
13. Education: the first bad data in Spain about education is that it has been transferred to the Autonomous Communities, which have done a real bad work, choosing instead a modern, reflexive and cultivated education to build a paradise for ideological instruction to the major glory of leftism and "progressiveness". But the sucessive Governements have failed to provide a permanent education system, which in general terms should apply to all Autonomous Communities. Instead of that, each change of Government means another change in education laws. The worst came with Zapatero and his "Education for Citizenship" which wants students to be formed in a Zapatero's way of Franco "National spirit".
14. Homosexualism: there are rumours that Zapatero wants the Parliament to pass a law against "homophobia". As Aquiles wrote some weeks ago: This can be easily used as a clear menace for freedom of expression in Spain, and as a true weapon of Zapatero's new police of thought to submit everyone which could not accept his idea of politics. He also would achieve to create the social desestabilization he is searching for.

I maybe forget some other things but these are the main internal problems. The international policy is inexistent, except the Alliance of Civilizations and other "imaginative" ideas, which serve only to spend huge quantities of money with no real good results.

Now for the critics to the oposition.

The mentioned leftist power on MSM is terrible for Popular Party, which is truly critisized enormously in all issues. You can read this case about immigration policy to see the huge manipulation of the statement made by Mariano Rajoy. And the comments I received from someone who accused me of not knowing the law, when later it resulted he had not read what I had written.

But, considering the difficulty, there are some things we can say about the PP's oposition. Voters want politicians who are active in the defence of their ideas, people who are convinced about what they defend and people who are not afraid of acting as they believe it's right.

The problem is that PP politicians are not tough enough when defending their ideas: they are absolutely linked to what "social analysts", very bad "experts on communication" and other busybodies tell them to do. For example, a lot of young people were against the digital canon (more than a million) with a true revolution under the socialists' noises who are firm supporters of it as they are paying the services of artists/singers and other pseudo-intelectuals, specialised in shameful and boring works of "art", which systematically lose money which is paid by Spanish Public Budget. Well, PP has not even excluded the shameful MP Ms. Salmones from its lists who is a very stunt supporter of it, position which confronts the general of the party. And Mariano Rajoy mentioned this issue a little on the first debate and nothing on the second one.

The opposition must not only speak about ETA terrorism, an important issue but not the only one. There are a lot of issues in which it can attack Government's decisions. But it seems they are afraid to do it, because of the pressure of the MSM and of the busibodies I referred to earkier, What they don't get is that they are going to be hardly critisized whatever they do. Aznar precisely was not considering what the press told about him or what the polls suggested. This people are just the opposite.

But the situation can even get worse. Rajoy's loss of the elections can mean than the most "progre"/leftist/stupid people can get to power in the PP. With all his defects, Rajoy has been someone not supportive of the most dangerous of that group: the Madrid's Major Alberto Ruiz-Gallardón. Absolutely proud of himself and in love with power, he is very well perceived by the leftist establishment and voters (who would never vote for him anyway) as he has adopted some of the basic tenets of their commandments (for example, he was with Zapatero in the closing session of the I Forum of the Alliance of Civilizations).

So with the panorama described, what do you think is the main theme over the blogosphere? No, it's not Zapatero, the bad economic figures or the education... NO, it's who is going to be Rajoy's sucessor: trolls, right-wing bloggers and unsuccessful politicians who belong to other parties (very unsucessful ones, but who, of course, are not obssessed with their own succession) are, on the other hand, all obsessed with this consideration. Oh well, and some journalists (specially one of the two) who want to convert themselves into the real influence of the center-right movement...


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