The Pain In Spain

In a few days Spain will vote in its third in just four years but with nationalistic and anti EU feeling sweeping the nation as it is the rest of Europe this vote could produce a very different outcome to the inconclusive results of the previous three. The far-right party Vox is predicted to pick up some parliamentary seats for the first time since the country transitioned to democracy about 40 years ago.

Supporters like the Vox party's tough stances against immigration and feminism, and against the push for independence in the Catalonia region in northeastern Spain. Critics say it has revived Spanish nationalist ideas that had become fringe after the fall of Spain's long dictatorship. In consequence, the usual slurs, fascist, Nazi, racist, Islamophobe, hate merchants, far right thugs etc, which are thrown from the left come as no surprise to Juan José Bonilla, Vox’s lead organiser in the agricultural, ultra - conservative El Ejido region where support for Vox is strongest. Bonilla only joined the fledgling party last November after years of loyally voting for the mainstream conservative Popular Party (PP).

A patriotic man, Bonilla dismiises the fragmentation of the Spanish Right, waving a Spanish flag from as he addresses the media.

Juan Jose Bonilla prouldly displays a Spanish flag on his desk - Picture: Daily Telegraph

“See this? This flag? It is like we are ashamed of it, you cannot hang it outside or it’s looked upon as a disgrace,” he says. “When I wave it they call me a ‘racist’ and ‘fascist’, but at Vox rallies we fly the flag. It is a question of pride.”

His words are clearly nationalistic, but are being echoed all around Europe and further afield as charismatic leaders emerge to galvanise resistsnce to the globalisation of mediocrity.

"They're increasing hate, racism, and a lot of things that were hidden," says María Bayó, 40, who is talking about politics with friends outside a bar in the outskirts of Barcelona, in Catalonia.

Bayó is a supporters of Catalonia's bid for independence from Spain, a divisive issue and a different face of nationalism. But she blames right-wing parties for railing against secessionists and immigration, while distracting from important problems like the lack of jobs and affordable housing. Spain's high unemployment rate, which hovers above 14%, is the top concern for most Spaniards, according to the Center for Sociological Research.

Originally slated for next year, Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez called early elections after his center-left Socialist government failed to get its budget passed in February.

As with both 2015 and 2016 parliamentary elections, no single party is expected to win an overall majority on Sunday. That could mean drawn-out jockeying among parties to form a coalition government. Under its charismatic leader Santiago Abascal, the Vox party - with its slogan ‘Por Espana’, ‘For Spain’ - believes it can form a part of a right wing coalition by outperforming polling predictions. The party has been filling sports stadiums and bullfighting rings with huge crowds waving Spanish flags to rousing patriotic music in a way that the Trump campaign enthused supporters in the USA's 2016 election..

It has been an astonishing transformation. At the last election in 2016, Vox polled just 0.2 per cent of the vote, but polls now show it on course to win 10 per cent nationally, translating to more than 30 seats in Spain’s 350-seat national parliament.

Mr Bonilla gives three reasons for the sudden success of Vox, which was founded five years ago by a breakaway group of disgruntled PP politicians, and scored its first big electoral win last December in the regional election for Andalusia, where El Ejido voted 29.5 per cent for Vox.

The first is the Catalonia independence issue, and the failure of Spain’s mainstream parties to clamp down on regional nationalism; the second is identity and immigration; and the third (and here Mr Bonilla mimes the palming off of backhanders) “corruption, corruption and corruption.”

11 April, 2019

Pablo Iglesias, PODEMOS party leader (Picture source: Daily Telegraph)

Catalonia has the fastest growing Muslim population in Spain – and more Islamic centres than any other region in the country. In spite of a strong separatist movement, the left has total hegemony in regional politics and the patriotic forces are being marginalised by the socialists, their elected politicians are excluded from key positions and known supporters are being fired from jobs and having trouble getting hired elsewhere, Defend Europa reports.

From 2011 to 2015, the number of Muslims in Catalonia has grown by 19.5%. That translates to 83,000 more people than 4 years ago. Not only that, the risk of terrorist attack has tripled in just this year (under the socialist government, almost 30,000 more Muslims, mostly uneducated, illiterate single males, have arrived). From 2011 to this year, the number of immigrants has doubled. They constitute more than one million people in a population of only 7 million.

This “wonderful” multiculturalism, the creation of the EU and being promoted by the socialist government in Madrid exploded in the Barcelona terrorist attacks of 2017. After seeing this, what was the reaction of the Catalan politicians? Well no, with the Catalan separatists hamstrung as the duopoly parties close ranks against them, its graft and corruption as usual in Spanish politics.

Campaigning for Spain’s general election, brought about when the minority socialist government, which gained power in a bloodless coup only last year, lost a confidence vote in the national Assembly. Campaingning for this election, to be held on April 28, begins on Friday this week and accusations of political espionage described as the country’s ‘Watergate', external meddling and breaches of electoral law are flying in all directions.

Last month Spain’s judiciary launched a probe into an alleged conspiracy by secret police and the former conservative government led by Mariano Rajoy to smear the reputation of the left-wing Podemos party founded in 2014.

On April 1 Spain’s Socialist administration claimed to have deactivated the so-called “patriotic brigade” of senior police officers. “The sewers no longer exist,” said Interior Minister Fernando Grande-Marlaska. But Podemos’s leader Pablo Iglesias has since claimed the dirty tricks campaign against his party did not end when the more ideologically-aligned Socialist Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez came to power last June.

Last weekend Mr Sánchez’s deputy press officer, Alberto Pozas, was summoned by a judge in connection with the theft of data from a mobile phone belonging to Mr Iglesias’s former aide. The phone was stolen in November 2015, weeks before the first general election in which Podemos took part, when Mr Pozas was editor of a now-defunct sensationalist news weekly called Interviú.

Investigators found data from the mobile phone among the files of former police officer José Manuel Villarejo, jailed since 2017 while a court probes his role as alleged leading member of the “patriotic brigade”.

Among a series of accusations against Mr Villarejo, the former police commissioner is believed to have staged a phony police probe into alleged financing for Podemos from the Iranian and Venezuelan governments.

And so the smears and corruption, bribery, entrapment and general malfeasance will go on until election day and a vote, which in common with the last three general elections in Spain is likely to throw up an inconclusive result. Did you really think the UK is the only European nation where democracy is in crisis?

The decision of Spain's political leader, the socialist Predro Sanchez to dissolve his government and call a general election appears to have backfired, putting the EU in a panic as Eurosceptic parties look set to take control of the nation that has the Eurozone's fouth largest economy, and govern from an anti - Brussels platform and clamp down on illegal immigration from third world nations. Following the election of a nationalist coalition in Italy last year, this looks like being another blow to the the Globalist establishment.

Il Caudillo, General Franco (centre)with his chief of staff and a general. Picture credit Getty images

As I reported last week, right-wing parties in Spain look set to win enough seats in the national assembly to hold a parliamentary majority in April’s snap election, according to a leading opinion. Since the win for 'Brexit' in the UK referendum, the victory of Donald Trump in the 2016 US Presidential Election and the rise of Lega in Italy, Rassemblement National in France and the AfD party in Germany, as well as a surge of nationalism across the Eu memner nations, we have all learned not to place any faith in polls.

The numbers however show that centre right and right parties PP, Ciudadanos and Vox could gain just enough seats to control the Cortes Generales, Spain's parliament. The poll suggests the three parties will win the biggest share of the seats with around 169 to 179 being secured. Sigma Dos poll, which was published in newspaper El Mundo, concludes this will be enough to get a majority from the 350 seats.

The prime minister Pedro Sanchez’s Spanish Socialist Workers' Party will only gather around 110 seats, the biggest share of seats but some way of gaining power. Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez urged Europeans to fight the “winds of xenophobia” undermining European solidarity on Sunday.

“Across Europe, the winds of xenophobia are blowing,” he said in Argeles-sur-Mer, a seaside town across in southern France, close to the Spanish border, where he was paying tribute to refugees who fled the fascist regime of Francisco Franco which grabbed control of Spain after a brutal civil war in the 1930s. “There is no place for indifference. Don't look the other way. “We cannot think that anti-Semitism, homophobia, xenophobia and nationalism are insignificant winds that will slowly die down,” he told his audience, in an attempt to rally support for the EU's druve towards a federal European superstate.

He also pointed to the attack on a Jewish cemetery in eastern France last week, where some 90 graves were spray-painted with swastikas and anti-Semitic slogans and to the ongoing tensions over migrants arriving to Europe by sea from Africa, denouncing the “ports which refuse to let ships full of sick and hungry people dock. This is the idea of Europe. The idea on which has been built the best period humanity has known,” he added.

Since Mr Sanchez called the snap election last week it has been predicted that a coalition of right wing, Eurosceptic and nationalist parties will win enough seats to form a stable government.

A spokesperson for the Spanish Socialist Workers’ Party told CNN the right-wing group's team up has created difficulties for the party. The spokesperson added: “It’s an agreement between right-wing forces and the extreme right, which is being sanitised.”

The conservative People's Party, the latest poll shows, will get 71-75 seats, while the centre-right Ciudadanos will take 54-58.

The far-right party Vox will win 44-46 seats, according to the poll and are the surprise party in this Spanish election cycle. Five years ago Spain’s break-out party, Podemos became the rising star of Europe’s confused and ineffectual far left. But with a snap election just weeks away the left of centre, but anti Brussels party looks to be among the also rans before a vote has been cast, and appears to be facing a crash as spectacular as its rise. Has the leftwing populist / nationalist appeal of ponytailed rebel Pablo Iglesias and his gang of talented young thinkers proved a failure?

Podemos once topped the polls in the era of frangmentation in Spanish politics that has seen three successive elections produce inconclusive outcomes, it almost snatched leadership of Spain’s left from prime minister Pedro Sánchez’s Socialist party at the 2016 elections, but it is now only the voters’ fourth favourite party.

The far-right populist party Vox is also neck and neck in polling. In April, it is predicted, Vox will target the same working-class city neighbourhoods as Podemos – claiming that immigrants and Catalan separatists, not austerity, are the problem. Mainstream parties will undoubtedly argue that this is merely one version of populism replacing another. That misses the point.

Although major social changes have occurred since Podemos became the principal party of the working class indignado protesters theafter the 2014 European elections, the damage is largely self-inflicted. In the latest of a series of pointless, but typically left wing internal bust-ups, Iglesias’s former No 2, Iñigo Errejón, is leading an alternative coalition into elections for the powerful Madrid regional government in May.

Daily Stirrer

Catalonia separatists celebrate victory against the Madrid government - Picture source: The Independent

We reported earlier this month that spanish Prime MinisterPedro Sanchez had called a general election which will take place on 28 April, after his minority government saw its socialist budget voted down.

The election, which will be spain's third in under four years, is a further sign of an increasingly fragmented political scene in one of the EU's larger states, with the strength of Catalonia‘s independence movement, and the revival of the Basque separatist movement having been given impetus by Calalonia's progress having dominated recent debate.

Mr Sanchez was already under pressure from within his own Socialist party ranks to cut short his term as his government, with only 85 seats in the 350 member Cortes, the Spanish Nayional Assembly, lost his weak parliamentary support this week after Catalan separatists joined opposition politicians to vote down his government’s 2019 national spending plans.

Recent opinion polls suggest no single can win enough votes to rule on its own, which is what we expect in Spain..

Immediately after the coalition’s soft coup last summer, Spain’s immigration policy changed dramatically with Sanchez declaring 'open doors' to all comers. Consequently, as has happened across The West when immigration policies unravel and large numbers of unskilled, uneducated, semi literate third world peasants and labourers start to flood into civilised nations, chaos inevitably ensues and voters turn to the more socially conservative parties for solutions.

This has happened on a consistent basis since Brexit and Trump won the day in 2016 – in Hungary, Czech, Austria, Italy and it is now happening in Spain, too. Even in Sweden and Germany, the once dominant (globalist) Social Democrats have lost their hegemony, while in France the populist yellow vest protest movement, three months after it started, is spawning paramilitary groups in response the President Macron's refusal to listen to his people and heavy handed use of The Gendarmerie to suppress protests.

The latest polls in Spain suggest that a centre-right and nationalist groups will easily regain key regions and large cities, such as Madrid and Valencia, which have been held by left or socialist authorities for four years.

The centre-right PP party would, together with the centrist Ciudadanos Party and the right wing VOX party, win those regions as they did last December in Andalusia, Spain’s most socialist province, giving them enough strength to form a government. Local, regional and European elections are scheduled for the 26th of May, 2019 too. Almost certainly, the leftist-separatist coalition will lose heavily there too indeed Spanish pundits claim the left could face a total wipe out in elections to the European Parliament.

Stories such as that of an 18 year old Spanish girl in Sabadell, Catalonia, who was raped by six Moroccan immigrants are now only too common in Spain, as are reports of sex crimes perpetrated by immigrants in Germany, Sweden, France, The netherlands, Britain, Belgium and Italy. This kind of news story, which is easily authenticated, is toxic to those political groups who campaign for open borders and talk of the cultural enrichment immigration brings. Nobody wants their daughter, wife, sister or friends 'culturally enriched' by men who see nothing wrong in raping a European woman.

This swing to the right seen all over the European Union is a reaction to the lax border controls and welfare-for-all policies pushed on member states by the EU and enthusiastically embraced by the left and globalist centre parties. Spaniards have now started worrying about their security and where their taxed income goes. Far-right lawmakers are set to be elected to Spain's parliament for the first time in nearly four decades.

The far-right party Vox would win up to 46 seats out of 350, according to a GESOP poll published by the El Periodico newspaper, while the GAD3 polling firm for the La Vanguardia newspaper forecast 16 seats. Vox is a newcomer on the Spanish political scene, and pollsters had underestimated its score in a regional election in Andalusia in December, where the anti-immigration party won 12 seats. Memories of the dictatorship of Francisco Franco, who died in 1975, meant Spain had long been been immune to the growing popularity of far-right parties in much of Europe, but these worries have faded as Spain faces new threats to its social stability.

Source: https://nation.com.pk/>

We predicted lasat year when the socialist leader Pedto Sancjez usurped the Spanish government after the collapse of the minority government led by Mariano Rajoy collapsed, could not last. In a widely expected but destabilizing development, Spanish conservatives and pro-independence Catalonians voted to back a slate of amendments to a government budget on Wednesday by a wide margin of 191 votes out of 350, defeating the finnce bill. This is equivalent to a vote of no cofidence, setting the stage for new elections.

If as is likely, elections go ahead it would be Spain's third general election in less than four years, the previous three having failed to produce a coalition capable of holding a majority in the national assembly. Following the vote that led to the formation Rajoy's failed governmemt produced such an intractible outcome the King had to order the defeated government to continue in office, which they did until defeated in a confidence vote. Reluctance to hold another election led to the creation of left wing loony Sanchez's fragile socialist-led minority government last year. Bloomberg reported that Sanchez might wait until his cabinet meeting on Friday to call for the elections, which would most likely be set for April 28, according to local media reports.

Sanchez relied on support from Basque and Catalan nationalists to seize power from Mariano Rajoy's conservatives in a no-confidence vote last year, the Guardian reported, but those separatist, regional parties tend to social conservatinsm (both are Eurosceptic,) and were not likely to support the socialist legislation Sanchez put forward.

Sanchez only has 84 socialist lawmakers in the chamber, making passing any legislation a challenge. And with leaders of the Catalonian separatist movement going on trial this week in Madrid, Catalonian lawmakers are hesitant to be seen backing the government. In a sign that the unique form of gridlock ushered in by the Catalonian separatist movement might not be broken any time soon, the socialists are leading in the polls. But with the Catalonians opposing everything and everyone, it's unlikely that the largest party will be able to claim the majority needed to pass legislation.

Though his party is still leading in the polls, the most likely outcome for Sanchez is defeat, according to BBG. In that case a coalition of center-right parties could form a government if they are prepared to do a deal with the separatists. While the socialists are ahead in opinion polls, which show them on around 30% of voting intentions, but the two main right-leaning parties together poll at more than 30% while the Eurosceptic party Podemos, currently with 67 seats in the assembly are the jokers in the pack.

"Justice will be done with Carles Puigdemont", Zoido told Antena 3 on Tuesday morning, adding that the former First Minister had "fled" from the courts. "He has gone to countries where they're not paying much attention to him but where he can make a lot of noise."

Following the brutal but inept attempts by the Spanish government to suppress Catalonia's independence referendum last weekend, Spain's constitutional crisis is rapidly spinning out of control. Catalan leader Carles Puigdemont is set to make a statement at 9 p.m. (1900 GMT) on Wednesday, after an all-party committee of the region's parliament met to agree a decision on independence. The outcome of that meeting was a forgone conclusion and just moments before this article was posted, CUP, the pro-secession party that is a majority in the Catalan parliament, has announced it will declared independence from Spain in plenary session on Monday, El Pais reports.

As reported last night, Puigdemont told the BBC his government would ask the region's parliament to declare independence when all votes from last weekend's referendum are counted. This is a formality, despite Spanish national police using anti - riot tactics to disrupt the vote and overwhelming majority have voted for independence. The government in Madrid has offered no response except to say the vote was illegal.

Puigdemont’s comments came on the heels of Spain’s King Felipe VI accusing secessionist leaders on Tuesday of shattering democratic principles and dividing Catalan society, as tens of thousands of Catalans took to the streets to protest against a violent police crackdown on Sunday’s vote.

Both Spain and the EU have been rocked by the Catalan vote and the violent response to it from national police, who even clashed with members of the Catalan province's police force as they tried to protect voters from national guard officers in riot gear. Witnesses and amateur video recordings confirm batons and rubber bullets were used in efforts to stop people voting. Hundreds were injured, in scenes that brought international condemnation.

At this moment it is unclear what Madrid's response will be if or when, Catalonia follows through on its threat to declare independence.There are a number of options but it seems likely that any move to stop the breakaway will only deepen divisions. Other spearatist movements in Andalucia, the Basque region and the Baelaric Islands are reportedly encouraged by the result of the referendum in Catalonia.

A week on from the historic Catalan Independence Referendum result opened a new front in the war between the European Union's bureaucratic dictatorship and the general population who are coalescing behind various nationalist and secessionist movements, tens of thousands of people took to the streets of Catalonia’s capital Barcelona on Sunday in what looked like a staged protest by the people of Spain against any unilateral declaration of independence by the already semi-autonomous Catalan region. According to Reuters the protests showed "how divided the region is on the issue."

We should bear in mind of course that Reuters is a press agency and often reports only information contained in official government press releases. There are fears in Brussels and throughout European capitals among politicians who favour political integration of the twenty seven EU member states that should the Catalonia secession movement succeed it will lead to a spate of similar actions in other nations where prosperous regions are being hit by EU immigration policies and the suffocating layers of bureaucracy that are suppressing business growth and hitting living standards.

In fact the region is surprisingly united in its support for the creation of a breakaway state. Government and EU propagandists are in no hurry to admit that however.

Last Sunday, more than 90% of the 2.3 million people who voted backed secession, according to Catalan officials. But that turnout represented only 43 percent of the region’s 5.3 million eligible voters as many opponents of independence stayed away. Many others were prevented from voting by the brutal tactics deployed by police in riot gear as they tried to carry out the wishes of central government by disrupting the vote.

In an interview with El Pais newspaper, Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy said he will consider taking the so-called "nuclear option" - i.e. suspending Catalonia's autonomous status (article 155 of the Spanish constitution,) - as Catalan leaders escalate threats to declare independence from the country, which could culminate with a parliamentary announcement as soon as Monday.

Asked if he was ready to trigger article 155, Rajoy told El Pais newspaper: “ I am not ruling out anything that the law says. What I have to do is do things at the right time, which is the most important thing right now. The ideal situation would be to not have to take drastic solutions, but for that to happen there would have to be rectifications."

Until this weekend, Rajoy has remained vague on whether he would use article 155 of the constitution which enables him to sack the regional government and call a local election.

Reverting back to a hardline stance, the conservative prime minister ruled out using mediators to resolve the crisis - something Puigdemont has said he is open to - and said the issue would not force a snap national election. The Prime Minister also added the government would “prevent any declaration of independence from materializing in anything”. “Spain will continue being Spain,” he said.

Rajoy reiterated that until the regional government abandons its intention to proclaim independence, no talks can take place.

Daily Stirrer, 2 August, 2016

Of all the European nations plunged into political and economic chaos as a result of EU social and immigration policies along with membership of the European single currency system (the Euro), Spain, neither as large nor as economically powerful as France or Italy, but the biggest of the naions to have developed rapidly as a result of injections of EU cash, has been hit the hardest since the Europonzi scheme went wrong. Since inconclusive elections in December 2015 Spain has not had an effective government because political new kid on the block PODEMOS, a left wing, anti - integration, anti - austerity party refused to enter a coalition with either of the groups in the corrupt, Brussels controlled duopoly that has run Spain for decades.

In June 2016, after repeated failures to form a ruling coalition in the Spanish assembly, King Felippe orderd acting Prime Minister Rajoy to hold new elections. Spain’s center-right PP won the most seats in the parliamentary elections, with the Spanish Socialist Workers' Party (PSOE) finishing second. None of the political forces has an absolute majority and thus cannot form a government on their own. Following the elections, Rajoy initiated negotiations to form a government, which have again proved futile.

On July 28, Rajoy accepted the offer of King of Spain Felipe VI to form a new government.

"Socialists should change their position. If the Socialists continue saying no [to the coalition], there will be new elections and everyone knows this, forming the government as soon as possible was a priority for the country." Rajoy said, . Unfortunately not everyone did know it because Rajoy's coalition could not muster enough votes to get their business through the legislature

Spain needs a government due to the economic situation, the need for stable institutions and for the government to put forward a budget, which will fulfill the obligations towards the Spanish people and the European Union. Rajoy led the talks with major Spanish political leaders on his own where he presented the future government program. He repeatedly spoke against holding a new round of parliamentary elections in Spain.

Now however the acting Prime minister appears to have changed his tune. Speaking earlier today Rajoy warned on that the country may have to hold a third round of elections, after his Socialist rival refused to back his efforts to form a coalition government. Rajoy's Popular Party (PP), in power since 2011, won the June 26th vote but fell short of an absolute majority, winning 137 seats out of 350.

The acting Prime Minister has since been tasked by the king to form a coalition or minority government, which he could only do by pushing through a parliamentary vote of confidence. Pedro Sanchez, whose Socialist party came second in June elections with 85 seats and who has the power to block Rajoy, refuses to back him.

"We are not going to back something we want to change ... the left will not back the right," Sanchez told reporters after meeting Rajoy.

With the EU Bureaucrats and Europe's political elites (not to mention the world domination freaks in Washington) in a blind panic over the surge of support for LEAVE in the Brexit campaing, pro EUronazi people in the UK are screeching "Racism", "Xenophobia" and trying to pretend that Britain is the only EU member state dissatisfied with the way the European Union has been run. This is in spite of surges in support across Europe for anti EU parties such as Front National in France, The Sweden Democrats, Alternatif fur Deutschland, the Danish People's Party and the Freedom Party in The Netherlands. Last month we saw victory stolen from the anti EU candidate in the Austraian Presidential Election and last week anti EU, pro - Democracy candidate Virginia Raggi established a comfortable lead in Rome's Mayoral Election.

And then there's this:

Following the inconclusive election outcome in Spain st December, the crisis torn country is preparing to go to the polls again. Already in a panic over the way the In / Out referendum in Britain looks to be heading, the smooth face bureaucrats and crooked deal makers who run the EU will have been further dismayed by a sudden surge in the popularity of Spain’s Eurosceptic Podemos (United We Can) party.

Podemos (Image source)

Center right Popular Party (PP) leader and acting prime minister, due to the refusal of Podemos to enter a coalition with any pro EU party, Mariano Rajoy was expected to gain seats following the failed election in December 2015. However polls shows PP is losing seats to left wing anti-EU party Podemos (the labels left and right have little meaning now) as the graphic below shows, with 22% of respondent declaring undecided; (don't worry if you don't speak Spanish, words are not needed.)

The Financial Times (London) comments Spain’s Once-Mighty Socialists Set to be Eclipsed by Far-Left.

The Spanish left is heading for a wrenching realignment at this month’s repeat general election, with a closely watched new poll suggesting that the centre-left Socialist party will be eclipsed by the far-left Unidos Podemos bloc.

With the official election campaign set to kick off at midnight on Thursday, Unidos Podemos was forecast to win 25.6 per cent of the vote and 88-92 seats in the 350-strong parliament.

The latest poll, by the respected state-funded CIS research institute, gave the once-mighty Socialists just 21.2 per cent and 78-80 seats. If confirmed on June 26, the day of the election, that shift would offer fresh evidence of the deepening crisis facing Europe’s embattled social democrats.

Last month, the anti-austerity Podemos party and the United Left, which includes Spain’s former Communist party, decided to set aside their rivalry and run on a joint list dubbed Unidos Podemos (United We Can). For the Socialists, the traditional standard-bearer of the left, the fallout from that deal appears to be highly damaging.

According to the CIS survey, the Socialists and Unidos Podemos could control as many as 172 seats in parliament, just four shy of an absolute majority. Meanwhile, the PP and the centrist, pro-business Ciudadanos party are predicted to win at most 160 seats between them. But party leaders and analysts alike caution that the Socialists are deeply reluctant to throw in their lot with Unidos Podemos, especially if that alliance were to be led by Podemos chief Pablo Iglesias.

“I don’t see the Socialists supporting Iglesias as prime minister,” said José Fernández-Albertos, a political scientist at the CSIC research centre. “The more likely outcome is that they will abstain and let Rajoy govern [in minority] but will go into the opposition themselves. They will tell their supporters: We cannot support the PP but we also have to be responsible.”

As the polls stand now, mathematically, it appears likely the outcome of the election will once more be inconclusive. Adding to Spain' economic problems a coalition will be difficult because none of the other parties like PP or its corrupt leader, Mariano Rajoy.

A government of national unity, a three-way coalition between Unidos Podemos, PSOE, and Ciudadanos, previously proposed by King Felipe seems the least likely outcome as it was rejected earlier this year by all parties except PP, whose leader Rajov is no fan of democracy and rather than accept that he is the problem and stand down will apparently do anything to hold on to power.

The undecideds will determine the outcome and they are currently breaking towards Unidos Podemos, to give the party its full name which literally translates as “United We Can”, a nice campaign slogan. If Unidos Podemos plus PSOE can achieve an absolute majority, it seems likely that after some cracking together of heads, the socialist parties will unite, if only for the sake of returning Spain to a functioning democracy.

Podemos leader Pablo Iglesias (screenshot)

Spain faces a constitutional crisis as the socialist leader Pedro Sanchez failed to convince the leftist, anti - establishment, anti - EU party Podemos to join his socialist party in a coalition government. The Podemos leader, pony-tailed academic Pablo Iglesias (who sounds more like a Mexican or Colobian drug baron than a Spanish politician, which might be a good thing when it somes to facing down the smooth faced, back - stabbing EU bureaucrats, has already announced his movement will not accept Sanchez's demand. Podemos is now expected to vote against Sanchez if he seeks a parliamentary vote of confidence on his prime-ministerial bid.

 The only party that could join the Socialist Party (PSOE) in backing a Sanchez cabinet is the small center-right group Ciudadanos. This leaves Sanchez with only 90 votes from PSOE plus 40 from Ciudadanos — a total of 130 whereas the majority in Spain's parliament is of 176 votes.

The impasse is opening a deep rift between the country's left-wing parties, which has only grown deeper after Podemos' scathing criticism of Sanchez during a high-octane parliamentary debate last Wednesday. Dialogue now seems a very remote possibility.

Sanchez will have to once again seek a majority vote on his bid to form a cabinet. He would only need a simple majority — that is: more people voting for him than against him — to clinch it. Still, even that prospective seems very unlikely. 

Were Sanchez to fail, negotiations will resume for up to two months. After that, unless the parties reach a deal, new elections will be called. 

Podemos's line is that the new government should result from an alliance among all the leftist forces in parliament. Iglesias has spoken of a "government of progress" that would gather under the same umbrella Podemos, the PSOE, United Left and Compromís. The anti-establishment party's main concern with Sanchez's current proposal is his deal with Ciudadanos.

Sanchez believes that a left-wing coalition would not be able to deliver a government really alternative to the current interim cabinet, led by conservative Mariano Rajoy of the Popular Party. Still, Sanchez' bid to cut deals beyond of the left's boundaries has not panned out so far. 

 Pedro Sanchez, the leader of the Socialists, which came second in the elections with 90 seats, previously said he wanted to form a leftwing government with Podemos on the condition that Podemos abandon its support for an independence referendum in Catalonia and its opposition to austerity measures imposed by Brussels and surrender of national sovereignty to EU bureaucrats.

French, Belgians, Dutch, Italians Follow Britain in Euroskepticism
Europeans want us British to lead them out of Europe. Don't be fooled by project fear, the European Union (aka the Euronazi Federal Superstate) is falling apart. There will not be chaos if we leave, there will be chaos if we stay.

Forced To Defend Her Insane Immigration Policy, Merkel Blames Anti Immigrant Party For Crisis German Chancellor Angela Merkel has blamed opponents of her open doors immigration policy for the rise in crime, particularly rape and sex crimes committed by Muslim immigrants . Hausfrau - Volksfuhrer Merkel said in an interview on the immigration crisis that the anti-immigrant Alternative for Germany (AfD) party, stirs up prejudice and polarises society.

from The Daily Sheeple

‘As the turmoil in Greece slowly yields (for now at least) it’s important to remember that the small Eurozone nation is hardly the only one in the EU that is in trouble, both fiscally and socially. In truth, it seems that Europe as a whole can hardly contain itself, and you can strike sparks just about anywhere. Europe is a fiscal mess with an aging population, ruled by a burdensome continent spanning bureaucracy, and simmering with ethnic and cultural tensions that range in age from ancient to modern.

So while the media is busy dancing around Greece as if the future of Europe lies solely in their hands, stop and take a look around the rest of that continent. I think you’ll find that the Eurozone could unravel just about anywhere. But if I could pick just one vulnerable country, I think Spain would be at the top of my list of the most unstable nations in the EU.

They have numerous of economic problems, including one of the highest debt to GDP ratios in the EU, and an unemployment rate that has exceeded 20% for many years now. In response to their fiscal and social woes, their government is rapidly spiraling into an despotic regime that hasn’t been seen since the days of Franco. Just last month the government handed down some of the most draconian free speech laws in the EU.’

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Spain is now a police state again. On July 1st, its much-protested "gag" law went into effect, instantly making criminals of those protesting the new law. Not since the death of General Franco has free speech been a crime in the country. Among the many new repressive clauses in the new law is a €30,000-€600,000 fine for "unauthorized protests," which can be combined for maximum effect with a €600-€300,000 fine for "disrupting public events."

This horrible set of statutes has arisen from Spain's membership of the Euro single currency system which has impoverished the country, caused catastrophically high unemployment and become a focus for anti-austerity protests, the European precursor to the Occupy Wall Street movement. Fines, fines and more fines await anyone who refuses to treat the authoritairia government with the respect it demands from citizens.

The law also extends its anti-free-speech restrictions to social media, where users can face similar fines for doing nothing more than encouraging or organizing a protest. Failing to present ID when commanded is another fine. And then there's this:

"Showing a "lack of respect" to those in uniform or failing to assist security forces in the prevention of public disturbances could result in an individual fine of between €600 and €30,000."

Spain's legislators thought of everything. To ensure these crackdowns on protests go off with a minimum of public backlash, "respected" police officers are being given a blank check to use as much force as they feel necessary when breaking up "unauthorized protests." The law doesn't directly instruct police to behave badly, but it does provide a very helpful increase in opacity.

A clause in the wide-ranging legislation that critics have dubbed the "gag law" provides for fines of up to 30,000 euros ($33,000) for "unauthorized use" of images of working police that could identify them, endanger their security or hinder them from doing their jobs.

Somehow, the Spanish government has managed to find an expectation of privacy within its public spaces and applied it to its public servants. While the law does make some provision for the public's "right to know," it also defers to law enforcement's judgment when it comes to what is or isn't "authorized use" of photographs/video depicting police performing their public duties.

Obviously, this small nod towards the public's rights is completely insincere. The government wants to clamp down on protests and it obviously can't be embarrassed by award-winning photographs/video of its police officers beating civilians wholly uninvolved with the protests that so angried up the cops' blood.

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On Tuesday, March 10, 19 Spanish citizens were rounded up in dawn raids by the Madrid police, accused of committing a crime against the Spanish state they were arrested and taken to police stations. Their crime? Trying to prevent, through non-violent resistance, the eviction of a local resident. If found guilty, the suspects could face crippling fines.

Welcome to Rajoy’s Spain, where helping out your neighbor in his or her hour of need is now a crime against the government.

In most countries affected by austerity measures as a resukt of the 2008 (and counting) financial crisis, the eviction of neighbors and local residents is usually a quiet, low key affair. Often people don’t realize that their neighbors have gone until the house comes up for auction.

In Spain, however, things are different. The incompetence of government departments, the greed of the banks and the heavy handedness of police combine to make foreclosures a very volatile public spectacle, sometimes drawing the participation and attention of scores or even hundreds of people.

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Has German Finance Minister Goven The OK For A Greex EU Exit Referendum?
Comments by German Finance Chief Wolfgang Schaeuble seemed to indicate that the EU's paymaster is ready to let Greek PM Tsipras put continuing Euro single currency membership for Greece to a popular vote. Any such move could affect negotiations with creditors by allowing Syriza to claim it hasn’t betrayed its support base, but a vote also risks plunging the country into turmoil should the gambit backfire

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Spaniards took to the streets in Madrid on Saturday in support of new anti-austerity party Podemos, a week after Greece elected its hard-left ally Syriza. Tens of thousands of protestors chanting "Yes we can!" made their way from Madrid city hall to Puerta del Sol, the city's main square. Podemos and its anti-austerity message have been surging in polls ahead of elections later this year but have gained additional momentum following the victory of Greece's anti - austerity party.

"There are many people that agree with the need for change. Enough already with stealing - that the corrupt take everything and we can't do anything," Dori Sanchez, a 23-year-old unemployed teacher who came from Manovar in southeastern Spain told reporters after travelling north for the rally.

A Podemos press officer said 260 buses brought supporters to the capital from cities and towns around Spain to swell support for the "March for Change". Hundreds of locals volunteers offered accommodation to the travellers. Demonstrators carried banners that read "Universal Basic Income," "Tick, tock its time for change" and "Together we can".

Syriza beat mainstream Greek parties by pledging to end austerity, as Podemos aims to do in Spain's general election due in November. both might find it impossible to honour that pledge while remaining in the EU and the Eurozone, as their manifesto promises say they will. Podemos was formed just a year ago, but has surged in opinion polls with promises to fight what Iglesias calls the traditional "caste" of political leaders.

Like Syriza, Podemos has found popular support by targeting corruption and rejecting austerity programmes purportedly aimed at lifting the countries out of deep economic crisis but which are in reality much more likely to see the wealth gap between rich and poor widening.

Podemos has also found popularity among Spanish voters enraged by a string of corruption scandals, as well as public spending cuts imposed by the conservative ruling party and previously by the Socialists after the economic crisis erupted in 2008. Spain has now officially exited recession, the country grew by 1.4 percent last year according to provisional data released Friday but this is mostly due to printing money which devalues wages and savings. Nearly one in four workers are unemployed and the figure among the 18 - 24 age group is close to fifty per cent. Salaries for many people have dropped and the number of workers on low-paid short-term contracts or working part time has soared.

Spain's street protest movement has died down since 2013 after the government imposed draconian penalties on protestors but some of the leaders formed Podemos in January 2014. Four months later, the party won five seats in the European Parliament, with more than 1.2 million Spaniards voting for it.

Podemos has overtaken the mainstream opposition Socialist Party in several opinion polls, and in some has topped the list ahead of the conservative ruling People's Party (PP). The Socialists and the PP have ruled Spain alternately since the country returned to democracy after the death of the dictator Francisco Franco in 1975.

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by Ian R Thorpe - 11 September, 2014

Spain's reponse to protestors (Picture source: The Local)

The gov’t of Spain revealed it is to spend nearly €1 billion on police riot gear, in spite of the nation’s sovereign debt rising by €58 billion over the last year. Authorities have been alarmed by widespread protests of increasing intensity and fear a new wave of violence will sweep the nation in the coming months. With well established separatist movements in the Basque and Catalan regions, Spain is no stranger to civil unrest caused by discontent with the increasingly remote and high handed elitism of those who run the country on the Corporate State model. The Guardian ran a report on the extent of the problem recently.

Spain is described as having become the protest capital of Europe. In the first half of 2013 there were approximastely 36,000 protests in Spain, with the city of Barcelona alone accounting for 2,500 of them, according Spanish news sources. This is hardly surprising with unemployment at around tenty-five percent and joblessness in the 16 - 24 age group around fifty percent, that's a lot of discontent. Add to that the usual stories of the hungry big - government monster constant;ly demanding a bigger share of resources and the vampire like EU bleeding Spain's businesses and savers dry, and a population noted for having a more volatile collective temprament that north european states and sooner or later something must explode. But is heavy handed policing by a militarised police force the answer?

The Interior Ministry says they will be purchasing equipment ranging from riot batons to stab proof vests and water cannons to help deal with protestors. Law enforcements said the water cannons are necessary, "given the current social dynamic." The Coordinadora 25-S activist group already has plenty of protests planned for autumn. The next march is planned for September 11, to mark Catalonia Day, while they are also planning a 2-day strike in October to support teachers.

Amnesty International in Spain said the purchase of riot gear was a worrying development. "They say they buy this material to control disturbances, but how exactly will it be used?" said Amnesty's Ángel Gonzalo. "In Greece we have documented how these water cannons, when used a short distance, can provoke severe injuries and commotions."

Social activist group Coordinadora 25-S, which has its roots in the 15-M movement and called a 'day of action' in 2011 that saw tens of thousands of Spaniards take to the streets to call for “Real Democracy NOW”, has labelled the upcoming season of protests event as “the autumn of unconstitutionality”.

The group has announced it plans to carry out protests against Spain’s new monarch King Felipe VI, education cuts carried out by the current government and other social demos falling under the category of “Marches for Dignity”, online daily 20 minutos reported. Read more on the government reaction at Ten New Security Laws That Are Shocking Spaniards.

Protests are expected over gov’t plans to impose heavy fines on those taking part in unauthorised protests and demonstrations against the monarchy with a demand for a referendum as to whether Spain should become a republic. At Felipe VI’s coronation in June, when he took over the throne from his father Juan Carlos, 3,000 anti-monarchy activists flooded the area in central Madrid, EuropaPress reports. Waving the red, yellow and purple flags of Spain’s second republic, protesters demanded the abolition of the monarchy.

There was a heavy police presence with 7,000 riot police controlling the center of the capital with some 120 snipers keeping watch, however the Local reported that people were being detained just for saying the word ‘republic’ or for wearing the color purple, which is associated with the anti-monarchy movement. It is difficult to see how changing the consitution would improve matters but then as long as the greedy fangs of the EU Bureaucracy remain buried in Spain's jugular is is equally difficult to see how anything might help.

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via The Local

Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy on Tuesday begged for forgiveness on behalf of the country's ruling Popular Party a day after police arrested several party members in anti-corruption raids.

"I hear and understand the frustration of the people," he added.

"This behaviour is particularly hurtful when the Spanish people have had to put up with so many sacrifices to get our country out of the economic crisis."

Rajoy's comments came after Spanish police on Monday made 37 arrests as part of an investigation into a kickbacks scheme in which politicians and public officials allegedly received illegal commissions from companies in return for political favours including the awarding of contracts for construction and infrastructure projects.

Among those targeted in the raids were Francisco Granados, the former number two in Madrid's PP as well as the party's head of the provincial authority of León, Marcos Martínez Barazón. Several Madrid mayors from the PP are also being investigated.

All have now had their PP membership suspended.

The arrests had made people mistrustful of politicians, said Rajoy on Tuesday, but he stressed that it was unfair to tar the vast majority of people in Spain's political parties with the same brush.

Those assertion comes on the same day a former secretary general for the PP, Ángel Acebes, appeared in court as part of a long-running investigation into whether the party operated an illegal slush fund.

In 2013, former party treasurer Luis Bárcenas — currently in prison on charges related to another corruption case — alleged he used such a fund to make under-the-table payments to top party figures including Rajoy. The prime minister has repeatedly denied those claims. [ Continue reading ]

SEE ALSO: Spain's legal system is only fit for chicken thieves - top judge

Eurodebt Threatens Portugal, Greece, Spain - Inflation Threatens Your Pocket

from Little Nicky Machiavelli

The European Central Bank (E.C.B.) has stepped in to the financial markets to buy Portuguese bonds on Thursday amid growing fears that the Eurozone's rolling crisis is about to claim its third victim.

Policymakers in Frankfurt intervened for the first time in three weeks as borrowing costs on Portugal's debt remained at a level that proved to be unsustainable for both Greece and Ireland.

Left Bloc, one of the smaller parties in Portugal's parliament, said on Thursday it would table a motion of no confidence in the minority socialist government.

There is a pattern emerging here. Oo - er we have a coalition government with a minority party whose members are not happy.

Roll on The New World Order.



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The law also makes all unauthorized gatherings punishable by fines of up to 600,000 euros ($745,000).

The measure has been fiercely criticized by opposition politicians and activist groups. Several lawmakers tied up their mouths in protest as the bill was debated in the parliament. Opponents say the legislation violates the right to protest, limits freedom of expression and gives more power to police.

Spain has been hit by a wave of demonstrations and strikes over the past months against the government's austerity measures. Grappling with deep economic recession, Spain has adopted harsh austerity measures as part of attempts to deal with the dire situation. The country has been witnessing daily protests in recent years since the country’s economy collapsed into recession in the second half of 2008, taking millions of jobs with it.

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