Well, the people have spoken and I do not like what they said at all. With half the votes counted, the Socialist Party will score over 160 seats, while the PP will drop to around 140. The other big gainer was Esquerra Republicana, who are now a major force in Madrid with about eight deputies. CiU will drop to 10 or so.
What happened? It's clear: the people of Spain are not willing to risk standing up to domestic or international terrorism and would prefer to appease the terrorists in hopes that they will be left alone in the future. Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero will be the next Prime Minister, and one of the first things he will do is pull Spain out of the Coalition. Spain will join the Paris-Berlin axis. I assume Spanish troops will soon be leaving Iraq.
The especially bad news is that Zap doesn't have an absolute majority and will have to form a coalition with the Communists and just maybe Esquerra Republicana, just like here in Barcelona and Catalonia. Prepare yourselves for four years of that. Carod-Rovira as Interior Minister. Good God.
The Madrid bombings changed everything. The people have decided that Islamic terrorists are responsible, though that is in no way determined yet, and they have decided that it is the fault of Jose Maria Aznar and the PP government. Congratulations to the terrorists, whether ETA or Islamic: you've done your job. You disrupted the election. You beat Aznar and Rajoy and the PP, who were way ahead in all the polls before the bombings. And congratulations to the leftist parties, too. They won this election--well, not quite fair and square, more like pretty dirty, what with exploiting the bombing to accuse the government of lying with no evidence. But they won. They won, democratically, a clear victory.
A victory for appeasement. A victory for cowardice. The Spanish people demonstrated today that they have no courage.
Sunday, March 14, 2004
The first exit polls are being reported by the various TV networks. TV 1, TV 3, and Antena 3 all have the Socialist Party as the winner of tonight's elections, while Tele 5 has the PP in front. TV 3's percentages are PSOE 41.4%--PP 36.9%, which the other networks except Tele 5 are also showing. Most of the polls have the PSOE with 154-158 seats and the PP with 150-154. Tele 5 has the PP in the 160s and the PSOE in the 140s. Turnout is extremely high and much of that extra turnout is clearly a protest vote against the government. It looks to me like the PP is going to lose a couple or three percentage points across the board to the Socialists compared to the 2000 elections, and Esquerra Republicana is apparently going to poll big and pull down 7 or so seats here in Catalonia. However, these are just exit polls and we'll see how things look when real results start coming in.
Quick Election Day update: The Spanish secret service still has not been able to authenticate the alleged Al Qaeda video. Voter participation is very high, which is not necessarily a good thing; when extra votes are brought out by a disaster like the Madrid bombing, most of them tend to be emotional and cast by ill-informed people. I'm just going to guess here that what we're going to see tonight will be an even sharper division of Spain into conservative and leftist forces. My bet is that in central Spain the PP will be strengthened and in Catalonia the left will win by a large margin. TV 3 is openly campaigning against the PP. We should have some kind of numbers reasonably soon, and I should be able to tell you who won long before midnight.
Here's the latest at 1:30 on Sunday, election day. Very early this morning, at about 1 AM (after I'd gone to bed), Acebes went on TV again and said more or less the following: The cops got a call saying they should go pick up a videotape deposited in a public wastebasket. On that tape a man dressed Arab-style and speaking Arabic with a Moroccan accent said he was named Abu Dujan Al Afgani and was the "military spokesman" for Al Qaeda in Europe. The man, who showed his face, stated that these attacks were retaliation for "the crimes committed in the world and concretely in Iraq and in Afghanistan". This man had never spoken before in any capacity and was unknown to both Spanish and foreign intelligence.
The five arrested men are apparently the suppliers of the mobile phones and fake phone cards to the bombers. The two men being interrogated, Spanish citizens of Indian origin, have been released.
La Vanguardia's headline, "Al Qaeda confirms on video authorship of massacre", seems to me to be as much of a hasty jump to conclusions as the one that the Government and I both committed.
The five arrested men are apparently the suppliers of the mobile phones and fake phone cards to the bombers. The two men being interrogated, Spanish citizens of Indian origin, have been released.
La Vanguardia's headline, "Al Qaeda confirms on video authorship of massacre", seems to me to be as much of a hasty jump to conclusions as the one that the Government and I both committed.
The death toll in the Madrid bombings has reached 200, and the wounded count is at 1511. 266 people are still hospitalized, with 17 in critical condition, 41 in very serious condition, 138 in serious condition, 42 in good condition, and 28 in an undisclosed condition.
La Vanguardia is running a series of short biographies of the victims, which we are summarizing here as a tribute to the dead.
Carlos Tortosa Garcia, chemical engineer, 26, San Fernando de Henares. Carlos got up at 6:30 every day, drove to the train station, took the train to Atocha, and there picked up the high-speed train to the Repsol plant in Puertollano, south of Madrid. He commuted 400 kilometers a day. Ironically, Carlos had survived last year's accidental explosion at the Puertollano plant that killed nine of his co-workers. He was a pacifist activist; he'd gone to all the demonstrations against the Iraq war. He had just bought a car and was saving up to buy an apartment and marry his girlfriend. Carlos's father is a well-known CC.OO. union leader.
Carlos Fernandez, construction worker, 39, Alcala de Henares. Carlos arrived in Spain from Peru only 24 days before his death. He was a native of Lima. He had been a government bureaucrat there, but could not live on his salary, so he emigrated and found a job working construction in Madrid. His three brothers in Madrid encouraged him to move there; he lived in an apartment with them in Alcala. Carlos leaves his widow, a son, and a daughter in Peru.
Jose Miguel Valderrama Lopez, bank employee, 25, San Fernando de Henares. Jose Miguel lived with his parents and his brother, but soon he was going to move with his girlfriend of five years into an apartment he had bought. He enjoyed traveling and was famous among his friends for his attention to neatness and order. He was politically active and a union member. His 26th birthday would have been today.
Hector Manuel Figueroa Prado, plasterer, 33, Madrid. Hector was a native of Santiago, Chile. He, his wife, and their seven-year-old son arrived in Madrid a year ago. Hector and his father-in-law worked together as plasterers and hoped to open their own business someday. His father-in-law happened to catch an earlier train than Hector on the morning of the 11th and was not hurt. Hector was an evangelical Protestant and his religion was very important to him. He died at El Pozo.
Maria Jose Alvares Ordonez, civil servant, 48, Alcala de Henares. Maria Jose worked in the Education department of the Madrid regional government. Her parents were farmers in Asturias; Maria Jose moved to Alcala for work and married and then separated. She leaves a 23-year-old son, her parents, and a sister.
David Santamaria Garcia, technician, 22, Guadalajara. David was on the train because he was going to have his medical checkup; he was finishing his internship at Alstom, the train manufacturing company. He was going to be a maintenance technician on the high-speed train line. David was traveling along with a friend and co-worker, Guillermo Senent, who was also killed. He was known as a fine soccer player; he had played on the Guadalajara B team. He leaves his parents, sister, and girlfriend. His body was "very much damaged by the shock wave".
Neil Hebe Astocondor Masgo, mover, 34, Coslada. Neil was a native of Lima, Peru. He had been in Spain for two years and had just received his legalization papers; he worked for a moving company. Neil's wife lived with him in Coslada, but their children of 12 and 10 years had stayed behind in Lima. He died in the field hospital at El Pozo.
La Vanguardia is running a series of short biographies of the victims, which we are summarizing here as a tribute to the dead.
Carlos Tortosa Garcia, chemical engineer, 26, San Fernando de Henares. Carlos got up at 6:30 every day, drove to the train station, took the train to Atocha, and there picked up the high-speed train to the Repsol plant in Puertollano, south of Madrid. He commuted 400 kilometers a day. Ironically, Carlos had survived last year's accidental explosion at the Puertollano plant that killed nine of his co-workers. He was a pacifist activist; he'd gone to all the demonstrations against the Iraq war. He had just bought a car and was saving up to buy an apartment and marry his girlfriend. Carlos's father is a well-known CC.OO. union leader.
Carlos Fernandez, construction worker, 39, Alcala de Henares. Carlos arrived in Spain from Peru only 24 days before his death. He was a native of Lima. He had been a government bureaucrat there, but could not live on his salary, so he emigrated and found a job working construction in Madrid. His three brothers in Madrid encouraged him to move there; he lived in an apartment with them in Alcala. Carlos leaves his widow, a son, and a daughter in Peru.
Jose Miguel Valderrama Lopez, bank employee, 25, San Fernando de Henares. Jose Miguel lived with his parents and his brother, but soon he was going to move with his girlfriend of five years into an apartment he had bought. He enjoyed traveling and was famous among his friends for his attention to neatness and order. He was politically active and a union member. His 26th birthday would have been today.
Hector Manuel Figueroa Prado, plasterer, 33, Madrid. Hector was a native of Santiago, Chile. He, his wife, and their seven-year-old son arrived in Madrid a year ago. Hector and his father-in-law worked together as plasterers and hoped to open their own business someday. His father-in-law happened to catch an earlier train than Hector on the morning of the 11th and was not hurt. Hector was an evangelical Protestant and his religion was very important to him. He died at El Pozo.
Maria Jose Alvares Ordonez, civil servant, 48, Alcala de Henares. Maria Jose worked in the Education department of the Madrid regional government. Her parents were farmers in Asturias; Maria Jose moved to Alcala for work and married and then separated. She leaves a 23-year-old son, her parents, and a sister.
David Santamaria Garcia, technician, 22, Guadalajara. David was on the train because he was going to have his medical checkup; he was finishing his internship at Alstom, the train manufacturing company. He was going to be a maintenance technician on the high-speed train line. David was traveling along with a friend and co-worker, Guillermo Senent, who was also killed. He was known as a fine soccer player; he had played on the Guadalajara B team. He leaves his parents, sister, and girlfriend. His body was "very much damaged by the shock wave".
Neil Hebe Astocondor Masgo, mover, 34, Coslada. Neil was a native of Lima, Peru. He had been in Spain for two years and had just received his legalization papers; he worked for a moving company. Neil's wife lived with him in Coslada, but their children of 12 and 10 years had stayed behind in Lima. He died in the field hospital at El Pozo.
Saturday, March 13, 2004
I should point out that the people detained in Madrid are linked to having sold the mobile phone and fake phone card used as a timer in the backpack bomb that didn't go off, so this isn't precisely ironclad proof of an Al Qaeda job.
The left is trying to take full advantage of the situation; there was a "spontaneous" demonstration--some of the signs looked surprisingly professional, but then again they may be left over from some other demo--in front of the PP headquarters in Madrid, that drew at least 500 and maybe 3000 people accusing the Government of lying and of failing to appease Islamic terrorists. Supposedly this demo was organized by mobile phone, which just isn't the good old committee-and-bureaucracy let's-sing-the-Internationale Old Left we all know and love. TV 3 is making a big deal out of this. The other stations aren't paying it nearly as much attention.
Well, we'll see how this affects tomorrow's elections. I personally am going to wager that nearly everyone who is going to vote has his mind pretty much made up, and that this terrorist mass murder isn't going to greatly affect how people vote. It will just make both sides more partisan.
Alfredo Perez Rubalcalba from the Socialist Party just stated at a televised press conference that Spaniards "deserve a government that doesn't lie to them". This is politicizing the massacre, of course, not to mention illegally campaigning on the last day before the election, not to mention calling the Prime Minister and his Cabinet liars with no evidence. (In Spain it's not legal for political parties to campaign on the day before election day, dubbed the "day of reflection".)
The left is trying to take full advantage of the situation; there was a "spontaneous" demonstration--some of the signs looked surprisingly professional, but then again they may be left over from some other demo--in front of the PP headquarters in Madrid, that drew at least 500 and maybe 3000 people accusing the Government of lying and of failing to appease Islamic terrorists. Supposedly this demo was organized by mobile phone, which just isn't the good old committee-and-bureaucracy let's-sing-the-Internationale Old Left we all know and love. TV 3 is making a big deal out of this. The other stations aren't paying it nearly as much attention.
Well, we'll see how this affects tomorrow's elections. I personally am going to wager that nearly everyone who is going to vote has his mind pretty much made up, and that this terrorist mass murder isn't going to greatly affect how people vote. It will just make both sides more partisan.
Alfredo Perez Rubalcalba from the Socialist Party just stated at a televised press conference that Spaniards "deserve a government that doesn't lie to them". This is politicizing the massacre, of course, not to mention illegally campaigning on the last day before the election, not to mention calling the Prime Minister and his Cabinet liars with no evidence. (In Spain it's not legal for political parties to campaign on the day before election day, dubbed the "day of reflection".)
BREAKING NEWS
It is 8:25 PM. Interior Minister Angel Acebes has just given a press conference live on national television in order to announce that five arrests have been made and two more interrogations are taking place. Three of the arrested are Moroccan and two are Indian. The two people being interrogated are Spanish citizens of Indian origin. All the arrests and detentions were made in Madrid by Spanish national police. The clue that lead investigators to these people was the mobile phone used as a timer in the backpack bomb that didn't go off.
The reports floating around, I do not know with what validity, are that at least one of the Moroccans has connections with a Moroccan radical Islamic group, that they are all males under age 30, that at least some of the arrests were made in the Madrid neighborhood of Lavapies, that these men were infrastructure operatives (safe houses, transport, and the like) rather than the material authors of the bombing, and that the police are looking for three men seen wearing ski masks and getting on and off trains at Alcala de Henares.
Looks to me like I am at the very least partially wrong in my insistence on ETA as the terrorist group responsible for the bombings. The arrested people certainly aren't Basques, though we don't know who put the bombs on the trains yet. The operation might have been done in collaboration with ETA or with one of many radical Islamic groups, including Al Qaeda.
This is wonderful news. We are now seven suspected conspirators closer to finding the killers. May they all be caught, tried, convicted, and punished soon.
I maintain that those on the left who accuse the government of covering up the truth are wrong. They, and I, jumped to the conclusion that it must have been ETA, but they continued investigating down various paths and threads and informed us promptly when this latest break in the case happened. Obviously, they are keeping some basic details under wraps, but we have been told the essential news as it has been happening, whether it pointed toward the ETA hypothesis or not.
It is 8:25 PM. Interior Minister Angel Acebes has just given a press conference live on national television in order to announce that five arrests have been made and two more interrogations are taking place. Three of the arrested are Moroccan and two are Indian. The two people being interrogated are Spanish citizens of Indian origin. All the arrests and detentions were made in Madrid by Spanish national police. The clue that lead investigators to these people was the mobile phone used as a timer in the backpack bomb that didn't go off.
The reports floating around, I do not know with what validity, are that at least one of the Moroccans has connections with a Moroccan radical Islamic group, that they are all males under age 30, that at least some of the arrests were made in the Madrid neighborhood of Lavapies, that these men were infrastructure operatives (safe houses, transport, and the like) rather than the material authors of the bombing, and that the police are looking for three men seen wearing ski masks and getting on and off trains at Alcala de Henares.
Looks to me like I am at the very least partially wrong in my insistence on ETA as the terrorist group responsible for the bombings. The arrested people certainly aren't Basques, though we don't know who put the bombs on the trains yet. The operation might have been done in collaboration with ETA or with one of many radical Islamic groups, including Al Qaeda.
This is wonderful news. We are now seven suspected conspirators closer to finding the killers. May they all be caught, tried, convicted, and punished soon.
I maintain that those on the left who accuse the government of covering up the truth are wrong. They, and I, jumped to the conclusion that it must have been ETA, but they continued investigating down various paths and threads and informed us promptly when this latest break in the case happened. Obviously, they are keeping some basic details under wraps, but we have been told the essential news as it has been happening, whether it pointed toward the ETA hypothesis or not.
In order to show the reaction of the Spanish press to the Madrid bombings, we're going to excerpt several articles from today's La Vanguardia. This first one is on page 5 and is by Jaume V. Aroca. It is about the demonstration held yesterday evening here in Barcelona, which may have been attended by as many as 1.5 million people.
Along the march there were moments of silence, but also some shouted slogans could be heard. Of all of them, the most repeated was "No to the war" (in reference to Iraq), which could be read on many banners and signs that the demonstrators carried and which did not form a part of the unitary slogan agreed to...
During the march, Vice-President Rodrigo Rato was insulted, along with the PP members who accompanied him, among them the president of the party in Catalonia, Josep Pique, who verbally confronted some of the demonstrators who were shouting at him and claiming that the Government "was lying" about the authentic authors of the bloodiest attentat in history...
That's why I didn't go to the demonstration. I will not march alongside such people.
Here is a fairly reasonable list of points of evidence pointing to either Al Qaeda or ETA as the murderers, from page 8, which I've summarized:
Pointing toward ETA:
1. They've been trying to pull off a big hit in Madrid for years.
2. They know the Henares area and the etarras arrested in Cuenca on Feb. 29 with 536 kilos of dynamite had a map of the area.
3. They tried to pull off a big hit with a bomb on a train last Christmas Eve.
4. They wanted to disrupt the first elections without their illegalized political arm, Batasuna, at all costs.
5. They often use the types of explosives used in Madrid.
6. They don't always warn before an attentat.
7. The internal debate within the organization may have radicalized them even more.
8. They left booby traps for the bomb squad, a habitual ETA tactic.
9. So far there is no evidence of any suicide terrorist.
Pointing toward Al Qaeda:
1. The van used had a tape with Koranic verses in it.
2. The explosives (do they mean detonators?) found in that van are not habitual with ETA.
3. ETA has never committed such a large mass bombing before.
4. ETA has never used so many people on a hit.
5. This massacre will offend at least some of ETA's base support, who don't mind killing cops but draw the line at civilians.
6. There are parallelisms with 9-11 and this attack is 2 1/2 years later.
7. The police have been watching out for an ETA attack but not an Al Qaeda one.
8. The titadyne is better quality than typical ETA titadyne.
9. Islamic terrorist gangs do not always use suicide bombers.
10. Islamic terrorists already hit Spanish interests in Casablanca "because of our support for Bush".
It seems to me that all these points are fairly reasonable, but I still say those indicating ETA are much stronger than those indicating Al Qaeda or some other Islamic group.
Here's Jordi Barbeta's analysis masquerading as a news story from page 24; I actually generally like Barbeta and I think this analysis is pretty good.
In the end it was impossible to prevent the dead and wounded from the Madrid massacre from being converted into ammunition for the political struggle over the repercussions of the tragedy on the election results on Sunday. The extended belief that the electorate's reaction would be very different in the case that the killers were ETA terrorists or Al Qaeda terrorists caused the Government to make official statements and also caused insinuations from the opposition parties that made the unity of the democratic forces wobble both before and after the mass demonstrations of yesterday.
The Government insisted all day that the suspicion that ETA is behind the attentat is still the most viable, while several opposition parties and also the Basque regional government insinuated that the government was hiding information that would support the hypothesis of an Al Qaeda attack as a reprisal for Spain's support for the war in Iraq.
ETA, which has always had as its primary strategic objective the division of the democratic forces and does not miss any opportunity to exercise a maximum of protagonism, hurried to inform the daily Gara that it "had no responsibility" for the Madrid bombings one hour before the demonstrations in the provincial capitals, and just a few moments after Interior Minister Angel Acebes reiterated that ETA was the principal suspect.
Nevertheless, the controversy had begun early in the morning, since the subject protagonized the radio and TV talk shows and leaders of opposition parties had already denounced the Government's alleged biased attitude regarding the administration of information. With this argument, leftist party militants and members of the pacifist groups that led the movement against the war in Iraq appeared at the demonstrations incorporating their "No to the war" to the antiterrorist slogans. At the Barcelona demonstration, the emblem that the pacifists used against the Iraq war was carried by hundreds of persons.
Along the march there were moments of silence, but also some shouted slogans could be heard. Of all of them, the most repeated was "No to the war" (in reference to Iraq), which could be read on many banners and signs that the demonstrators carried and which did not form a part of the unitary slogan agreed to...
During the march, Vice-President Rodrigo Rato was insulted, along with the PP members who accompanied him, among them the president of the party in Catalonia, Josep Pique, who verbally confronted some of the demonstrators who were shouting at him and claiming that the Government "was lying" about the authentic authors of the bloodiest attentat in history...
That's why I didn't go to the demonstration. I will not march alongside such people.
Here is a fairly reasonable list of points of evidence pointing to either Al Qaeda or ETA as the murderers, from page 8, which I've summarized:
Pointing toward ETA:
1. They've been trying to pull off a big hit in Madrid for years.
2. They know the Henares area and the etarras arrested in Cuenca on Feb. 29 with 536 kilos of dynamite had a map of the area.
3. They tried to pull off a big hit with a bomb on a train last Christmas Eve.
4. They wanted to disrupt the first elections without their illegalized political arm, Batasuna, at all costs.
5. They often use the types of explosives used in Madrid.
6. They don't always warn before an attentat.
7. The internal debate within the organization may have radicalized them even more.
8. They left booby traps for the bomb squad, a habitual ETA tactic.
9. So far there is no evidence of any suicide terrorist.
Pointing toward Al Qaeda:
1. The van used had a tape with Koranic verses in it.
2. The explosives (do they mean detonators?) found in that van are not habitual with ETA.
3. ETA has never committed such a large mass bombing before.
4. ETA has never used so many people on a hit.
5. This massacre will offend at least some of ETA's base support, who don't mind killing cops but draw the line at civilians.
6. There are parallelisms with 9-11 and this attack is 2 1/2 years later.
7. The police have been watching out for an ETA attack but not an Al Qaeda one.
8. The titadyne is better quality than typical ETA titadyne.
9. Islamic terrorist gangs do not always use suicide bombers.
10. Islamic terrorists already hit Spanish interests in Casablanca "because of our support for Bush".
It seems to me that all these points are fairly reasonable, but I still say those indicating ETA are much stronger than those indicating Al Qaeda or some other Islamic group.
Here's Jordi Barbeta's analysis masquerading as a news story from page 24; I actually generally like Barbeta and I think this analysis is pretty good.
In the end it was impossible to prevent the dead and wounded from the Madrid massacre from being converted into ammunition for the political struggle over the repercussions of the tragedy on the election results on Sunday. The extended belief that the electorate's reaction would be very different in the case that the killers were ETA terrorists or Al Qaeda terrorists caused the Government to make official statements and also caused insinuations from the opposition parties that made the unity of the democratic forces wobble both before and after the mass demonstrations of yesterday.
The Government insisted all day that the suspicion that ETA is behind the attentat is still the most viable, while several opposition parties and also the Basque regional government insinuated that the government was hiding information that would support the hypothesis of an Al Qaeda attack as a reprisal for Spain's support for the war in Iraq.
ETA, which has always had as its primary strategic objective the division of the democratic forces and does not miss any opportunity to exercise a maximum of protagonism, hurried to inform the daily Gara that it "had no responsibility" for the Madrid bombings one hour before the demonstrations in the provincial capitals, and just a few moments after Interior Minister Angel Acebes reiterated that ETA was the principal suspect.
Nevertheless, the controversy had begun early in the morning, since the subject protagonized the radio and TV talk shows and leaders of opposition parties had already denounced the Government's alleged biased attitude regarding the administration of information. With this argument, leftist party militants and members of the pacifist groups that led the movement against the war in Iraq appeared at the demonstrations incorporating their "No to the war" to the antiterrorist slogans. At the Barcelona demonstration, the emblem that the pacifists used against the Iraq war was carried by hundreds of persons.
In Memoriam
La Vanguardia will be publishing short biographies of each of the 199 victims of the terrorist bombings in Madrid, much as the new York Times did after 9-11. We will reproduce summaries of each one in their memory.
Ana Isabel Gil Perez, office worker, 28, Torrejon de Ardoz. Ana was married and seven months pregnant. She died in La Paz hospital after suffering five heart attacks. Surgeons performed an operation to extract Ana's baby, but he died too. Ana was looking forward to her son's birth and to her sister's wedding.
Rodolfo Benito Samaniego, industrial engineer, 26, Alcala de Henares. Rodolfo was a pretty sharp fellow. He was an engineer who specialized in thermal energy, and at the same time he was studying to pass the exam to qualify as a math teacher; he really liked teaching more than engineering. He was carrying his math books in his bag. Rodolfo had a lot of friends and had been dating his high school sweetheart for seven years. He was looking forward to walking the Road to Santiago this summer; he had already done it three times.
Ana Martin Fernandez, secretary, 35, Santa Eugenia. Ana had a psychology degree and worked for the Madrid Press Association, where she was very popular. Many journalists knew her personally. She was a small woman with a big smile, her friends say. She was married and had a four-year-old daughter named Paula.
Osama El Amrati, construction worker, 23, Alcorcon. Osama was from Tangier, Morocco, and had lived in Madrid for five years. He spoke good Spanish and was integrated in the community, with many friends both Spanish and Moroccan; he shared an apartment with some Moroccan friends in Alcorcon. He enjoyed soccer and loved talking about it. His aunts said that he was very happy in Madrid. He worked in construction with one of his cousins in El Pozo. Osama's dream was to become a professional chef; that's what he listed as his profession on his passport.
Inmaculada Castillo Sevillano, office worker, 39, Alcala de Henares. Inma was a widow; her husband had drowned when he was 31 and she was 29. She leaves two orphan children, a girl of 19 and a boy of 15. Inma had a hard road, working non-stop to support her children, to whom she was very close. Despite her misfortune, she was a lively and cheerful person, say her friends.
Cipriano Castillo Munoz, metal worker, 55, San Fernando de Henares. Cipriano was a local activist, involved in various causes, and his leftist sympathies were well-known in his neighborhood. Cipriano was married, with a 29-year-old daughter and a 27-year-old son. He enjoyed reading and hiking and had a good sense of humor. His body was damaged so badly it took them twelve hours to identify it.
Sara Centenera, student, 18, Alovera. Sara had been an excellent high school student with the Salesians in Guadalajara, and was in her first year as a university student of physical therapy in Madrid. She came from a small town where her family had always lived, and leaves her parents and a 22-year-old brother. Sara was a shy girl who nonetheless was the "mother hen" of her group of friends.
Juan Pablo Moris Crespo, student, 32, Alcala de Henares. Ironically, Juan Pablo was well-known for his anti-terrorist activism; he once traveled to Bilbao to take part in a demonstration. He was studying engineering while working part-time as a technical translator from English. Juan Pablo leaves his parents and two sisters.
David Vilela Fernandez, librarian, 23, Alcala de Henares. David worked in the archives at the National Library in Madrid. His friends remember him as a nice guy with a good heart; they nicknamed him "Wrinklehands" because his hands were enormous and rough. He will be buried in his family's hometown of Yebra. Two of his co-workers were killed along with him.
Federico Sierra Seron, military officer, 37, Alcala de Henares. Federico had reached the rank of "comandante" in the Spanish Army. He had studied for the General Staff and was an expert in tanks, and for some time was part of an airborne unit. He had served in Bosnia as part of the NATO general headquarters representing the Spanish peacekeeping forces there, where he was awarded two medals. His wife is Bosnian, from Gorazde; they have a three-year-old son. Federico's father is a general, currently the military governor in Navarra.
Part of the tragedy here is that the people killed were all solid citizens, among the best and the brightest, family people, people on the train before 8 AM to get to work or school. These were people with prospects, responsible and dedicated people, people who made a difference in the lives of those around them.
If a bit of tasteless levity is permitted, this is the kind of victim biography we are NOT going to see:
Paco Hurganariz Sobacofetido, town drunk, mid-fifties, cardboard box under the highway underpass. Paco was well-known in the bars of his neighborhood, most of which he was banned from. Every weekend night he would get especially lit up on box-o-wine and pick a fight with someone; his friend Manolo, the other local drunk, points to this as a sign of Paco's sociability, pointing out that Paco's fights were nearly always preceded by an intellectual discussion of some sort. Manolo remembers that Paco's favorite humorous expression, repeated to everyone around him, was "Me cago en la puta madre que te pario!", followed by Paco's trademark laugh. Paco was possibly best known to his neighbors as "that crazy guy who's usually passed out on the church steps." Perhaps he was best-known and most popular among the members of the local police force; they remember that Paco used to spit on them "in a friendly sort of way". Paco leaves two ex-wives and six neglected children, most of whom fondly remember the way he used to affectionately beat and rape them every time he got liquored up.
La Vanguardia will be publishing short biographies of each of the 199 victims of the terrorist bombings in Madrid, much as the new York Times did after 9-11. We will reproduce summaries of each one in their memory.
Ana Isabel Gil Perez, office worker, 28, Torrejon de Ardoz. Ana was married and seven months pregnant. She died in La Paz hospital after suffering five heart attacks. Surgeons performed an operation to extract Ana's baby, but he died too. Ana was looking forward to her son's birth and to her sister's wedding.
Rodolfo Benito Samaniego, industrial engineer, 26, Alcala de Henares. Rodolfo was a pretty sharp fellow. He was an engineer who specialized in thermal energy, and at the same time he was studying to pass the exam to qualify as a math teacher; he really liked teaching more than engineering. He was carrying his math books in his bag. Rodolfo had a lot of friends and had been dating his high school sweetheart for seven years. He was looking forward to walking the Road to Santiago this summer; he had already done it three times.
Ana Martin Fernandez, secretary, 35, Santa Eugenia. Ana had a psychology degree and worked for the Madrid Press Association, where she was very popular. Many journalists knew her personally. She was a small woman with a big smile, her friends say. She was married and had a four-year-old daughter named Paula.
Osama El Amrati, construction worker, 23, Alcorcon. Osama was from Tangier, Morocco, and had lived in Madrid for five years. He spoke good Spanish and was integrated in the community, with many friends both Spanish and Moroccan; he shared an apartment with some Moroccan friends in Alcorcon. He enjoyed soccer and loved talking about it. His aunts said that he was very happy in Madrid. He worked in construction with one of his cousins in El Pozo. Osama's dream was to become a professional chef; that's what he listed as his profession on his passport.
Inmaculada Castillo Sevillano, office worker, 39, Alcala de Henares. Inma was a widow; her husband had drowned when he was 31 and she was 29. She leaves two orphan children, a girl of 19 and a boy of 15. Inma had a hard road, working non-stop to support her children, to whom she was very close. Despite her misfortune, she was a lively and cheerful person, say her friends.
Cipriano Castillo Munoz, metal worker, 55, San Fernando de Henares. Cipriano was a local activist, involved in various causes, and his leftist sympathies were well-known in his neighborhood. Cipriano was married, with a 29-year-old daughter and a 27-year-old son. He enjoyed reading and hiking and had a good sense of humor. His body was damaged so badly it took them twelve hours to identify it.
Sara Centenera, student, 18, Alovera. Sara had been an excellent high school student with the Salesians in Guadalajara, and was in her first year as a university student of physical therapy in Madrid. She came from a small town where her family had always lived, and leaves her parents and a 22-year-old brother. Sara was a shy girl who nonetheless was the "mother hen" of her group of friends.
Juan Pablo Moris Crespo, student, 32, Alcala de Henares. Ironically, Juan Pablo was well-known for his anti-terrorist activism; he once traveled to Bilbao to take part in a demonstration. He was studying engineering while working part-time as a technical translator from English. Juan Pablo leaves his parents and two sisters.
David Vilela Fernandez, librarian, 23, Alcala de Henares. David worked in the archives at the National Library in Madrid. His friends remember him as a nice guy with a good heart; they nicknamed him "Wrinklehands" because his hands were enormous and rough. He will be buried in his family's hometown of Yebra. Two of his co-workers were killed along with him.
Federico Sierra Seron, military officer, 37, Alcala de Henares. Federico had reached the rank of "comandante" in the Spanish Army. He had studied for the General Staff and was an expert in tanks, and for some time was part of an airborne unit. He had served in Bosnia as part of the NATO general headquarters representing the Spanish peacekeeping forces there, where he was awarded two medals. His wife is Bosnian, from Gorazde; they have a three-year-old son. Federico's father is a general, currently the military governor in Navarra.
Part of the tragedy here is that the people killed were all solid citizens, among the best and the brightest, family people, people on the train before 8 AM to get to work or school. These were people with prospects, responsible and dedicated people, people who made a difference in the lives of those around them.
If a bit of tasteless levity is permitted, this is the kind of victim biography we are NOT going to see:
Paco Hurganariz Sobacofetido, town drunk, mid-fifties, cardboard box under the highway underpass. Paco was well-known in the bars of his neighborhood, most of which he was banned from. Every weekend night he would get especially lit up on box-o-wine and pick a fight with someone; his friend Manolo, the other local drunk, points to this as a sign of Paco's sociability, pointing out that Paco's fights were nearly always preceded by an intellectual discussion of some sort. Manolo remembers that Paco's favorite humorous expression, repeated to everyone around him, was "Me cago en la puta madre que te pario!", followed by Paco's trademark laugh. Paco was possibly best known to his neighbors as "that crazy guy who's usually passed out on the church steps." Perhaps he was best-known and most popular among the members of the local police force; they remember that Paco used to spit on them "in a friendly sort of way". Paco leaves two ex-wives and six neglected children, most of whom fondly remember the way he used to affectionately beat and rape them every time he got liquored up.
Friday, March 12, 2004
199 people are dead from 11 countries. I made a mistake before; many bodies, more than 70, have not yet been identified.
Zap, Ibarretxe, Carod, Jose Blanco (the Madrid Socialist party boss), and that lot are all accusing Prime Minister Aznar and the People's Party of holding back information and not telling the citizenry all they know. Without the slightest lick of evidence, of course. Aznar was forced to go on TV and rotundly deny such absurd and baseless allegations.
Gaspar Llamazares, the scum who is the leader of the Communists, has called upon all Communists and "people of the left" to carry "No to the war" signs at the official anti-terrorist demonstrations to be scheduled for seven o'clock this afternoon. Of course I am repulsed and horrified by the Madrid bombings, in case you hadn't noticed. But I will not participate in a demonstration that is supposed to be against terrorism which the Communists are going to hijack to broadcast their puerile anti-Americanism, and I will not participate in a demonstration that is going to be manipulated by the same crew of leftists as always for their own electoral purposes. So I'll be watching it on TV and, I suppose, blogging it.
According to TV 3, the Corriere della Sera is reporting that a group of some 80 Basque terrorists made their way to Iraq after May 20, 2003, in order to join the Saddamite resistance. Most of them have left, but some have stayed under the cover of NGO workers. Two of them were those arrested in Cuenca with more than 500 kilos of explosives. If this is true, and I want to see a lot of evidence that it is before I believe it, then ETA is a full member, and one in good standing, of the Terror International.
Trevor from Kaleboel has a pretty shocking photograph you ought to check out, which shows how stupid the local high school kids are. He's also got a link to this article from the Guardian, which is a pretty good analysis piece that ought to answer a good few of the questions you might have.
Josep Lluis Carod-Rovira, a notable piece of dogshit in human form and leader of Esquerra Republicana, the Catalan independentistas, had this to say, according to Libertad Digital:
In the climate of mistrust, Carod-Rovira has taken advantage of the opportunity to make accusations: "Aznar," he emphasized, "is leaving the Government with 200 dead and more than 1400 wounded. His Government has not been capable, either in international politics or within the state, to take adequate measures so that within its territory one can live tranquilly, safely, at peace, and with basic freedoms guaranteed."
At a press conference, according to the Europa Press agency, the secretary-general of Esquerra Republicana said that the Government is "holding back and covering up information" about the Madrid bombings, and he demanded that the Executive make clear to the citizens before the elections whehter Al Qaeda perpetrated the massacre. In Carod's opinion, the only objective of the Government is "not to modify the line of argumentation of its campaign one millimeter." To Carod, maintaining the line of investigation regarding ETA seems to be an attempt to "continue the media punishment and political criminalization of democratic Basque nationalism and of ourselves as a peaceful independentista option."
Wait a minute. If I get this right, Carod is saying that the Government is investigating ETA involvement in the Madrid massacre in order to screw him and his party over personally. This is paranoia, self-victimization, and conspiracy-mindedness to an extreme degree. Carod and his followers are literally mentally ill.
Zap, Ibarretxe, Carod, Jose Blanco (the Madrid Socialist party boss), and that lot are all accusing Prime Minister Aznar and the People's Party of holding back information and not telling the citizenry all they know. Without the slightest lick of evidence, of course. Aznar was forced to go on TV and rotundly deny such absurd and baseless allegations.
Gaspar Llamazares, the scum who is the leader of the Communists, has called upon all Communists and "people of the left" to carry "No to the war" signs at the official anti-terrorist demonstrations to be scheduled for seven o'clock this afternoon. Of course I am repulsed and horrified by the Madrid bombings, in case you hadn't noticed. But I will not participate in a demonstration that is supposed to be against terrorism which the Communists are going to hijack to broadcast their puerile anti-Americanism, and I will not participate in a demonstration that is going to be manipulated by the same crew of leftists as always for their own electoral purposes. So I'll be watching it on TV and, I suppose, blogging it.
According to TV 3, the Corriere della Sera is reporting that a group of some 80 Basque terrorists made their way to Iraq after May 20, 2003, in order to join the Saddamite resistance. Most of them have left, but some have stayed under the cover of NGO workers. Two of them were those arrested in Cuenca with more than 500 kilos of explosives. If this is true, and I want to see a lot of evidence that it is before I believe it, then ETA is a full member, and one in good standing, of the Terror International.
Trevor from Kaleboel has a pretty shocking photograph you ought to check out, which shows how stupid the local high school kids are. He's also got a link to this article from the Guardian, which is a pretty good analysis piece that ought to answer a good few of the questions you might have.
Josep Lluis Carod-Rovira, a notable piece of dogshit in human form and leader of Esquerra Republicana, the Catalan independentistas, had this to say, according to Libertad Digital:
In the climate of mistrust, Carod-Rovira has taken advantage of the opportunity to make accusations: "Aznar," he emphasized, "is leaving the Government with 200 dead and more than 1400 wounded. His Government has not been capable, either in international politics or within the state, to take adequate measures so that within its territory one can live tranquilly, safely, at peace, and with basic freedoms guaranteed."
At a press conference, according to the Europa Press agency, the secretary-general of Esquerra Republicana said that the Government is "holding back and covering up information" about the Madrid bombings, and he demanded that the Executive make clear to the citizens before the elections whehter Al Qaeda perpetrated the massacre. In Carod's opinion, the only objective of the Government is "not to modify the line of argumentation of its campaign one millimeter." To Carod, maintaining the line of investigation regarding ETA seems to be an attempt to "continue the media punishment and political criminalization of democratic Basque nationalism and of ourselves as a peaceful independentista option."
Wait a minute. If I get this right, Carod is saying that the Government is investigating ETA involvement in the Madrid massacre in order to screw him and his party over personally. This is paranoia, self-victimization, and conspiracy-mindedness to an extreme degree. Carod and his followers are literally mentally ill.
Top Ten Jobs Zap Is Fit To Hold
10. The guy who bites the heads off chickens for a dollar at the carnival
9. Bathhouse attendant
8. Sex phone customer service
7. Cubicle mopper at the peep show
6. Understudy for The Joker
5. Local news weatherman
4. Porno film soundtrack composer
3. Mahout
2. Liza Minnelli's husband
1. Drivers-ed teacher
10. The guy who bites the heads off chickens for a dollar at the carnival
9. Bathhouse attendant
8. Sex phone customer service
7. Cubicle mopper at the peep show
6. Understudy for The Joker
5. Local news weatherman
4. Porno film soundtrack composer
3. Mahout
2. Liza Minnelli's husband
1. Drivers-ed teacher
You will want to read this. Tim Blair's blog will shortly host our friends from HispaLibertas, Franco Aleman and Golan, commenting in English on the Madrid bombings. I assume they are preparing the text right now. So check it out.
The official death toll is 198, with 1463 wounded. Some 15 corpses have not been identified yet.
The technique used by the bombers was quite simple. They got on commuter trains heading for Madrid at the Alcala de Henares station, placed backpacks loaded with explosives on the luggage racks, and slipped out of the train during the two minutes the trains stop at Alcala.
The Interior Ministry is looking for nine suspects, six men and three women. According to La Vanguardia, they've even got photographs of at least some of them. It seems to me that when these people get caught the "mystery" of who planted the bombs will be solved.
Why I am convinced ETA did it
1) It fits their MO. The bombs were made with small quantities, 8-12 kilos, of titadyne and what they're calling "compressed dynamite", which is the standard ETA technique.
2) The operation was within their capacity. To pull this one off you would need a bombmaker, who obviously never got anywhere near the trains; a couple of spies to spend a couple of weeks scouting the ground; a couple of people to transport the bombs; somebody running a safe house or two; and the actual bomb planters. While ETA is weakened and on its last legs, they've got the capability to pull off an operation of this size. They didn't need any specially trained pilots or suicide fanatics or the ability to beat airport security or huge amounts of money or international connections to commit such a massacre. All they needed was a hundred kilos of explosives, a skilled bombmaker, and 15-20 conspirators who may well have been working in several different cells.
3) It fits their recent history. The most significant clue is that on Dec. 24, 2003, they planted a bomb on a train in San Sebastian that was timed to go off when the train reached Chamartin Station in Madrid. Fortunately, the bomb planters were caught and the train was stopped at Burgos, where the bomb was discovered. The MO was exactly the same as in the Madrid bombings except that the bomb was larger, 50 kilos of titadyne, and hidden inside a suitcase rather than backpacks.
On Feb. 9 of this year, an ETA caravan was stopped by the French police near Bordeaux. They were carrying all sorts of weapons and explosives to be passed to a new commando inside Spain.
Then, on the last weekend of February 2004, the police stopped another ETA caravan at Cuenca with more than 500 kilos of explosives that were to be used for terrorist attacks in Madrid.
4) It fits in with the election campaign; general elections are to be held on Sunday, March 14, in two days. ETA has tried to disrupt general elections every time Spain has had them. Most famously, during the 1995 election campaign (April 19), they tried to assassinate Jose Maria Aznar, then PP candidate for Prime Minister. Aznar survived the bombing because of his armored limousine. A passer-by was killed.
5) The story that ETA "always gives a warning" before planting a bomb is simply false. They didn't give a warning when they loaded that bomb on the train in San Sebastian, for example. Or on July 14, 1986, when a bomb killed 12 people and wounded 50 in Madrid. Or on December 11, 1985, when a bomb in Madrid killed six people and wounded 19. Or on October 30, 2000, when a bomb killed three and wounded 66 in Madrid. Or on June 21, 1993, when a bomb killed seven people and wounded more than 30 in Madrid. Or on June 19, 1987, when a bomb killed 21 and wounded hundreds at the Hipercor department store on Avenida Meridiana here in Barcelona.
6) The behavior of Arnaldo Otegui, "leader" of Batasuna, the political branch of ETA. He denied ETA involvement in the bombings and blamed a group of "Islamic activists". Otegui was the first person to publicly float the hypothesis that this was an Al Qaeda bombing, though he didn't say Al Qaeda. Now, I personally don't believe anything Arnaldo Otegui says. You can believe what you want.
7) The facts are that the only other clues linking Islamic terrorists to the Madrid bombings are a) an e-mail from somebody saying he was from the Martyr Abu Hafs Al Masri Brigade, who has claimed to be behind everything from the UN bombing in Baghdad to the Marriott Hotel bombing in Jakarta to the blackout in the US Northeast, falsely, and b) a cassette tape with Koran verses on it found in a van linked to the bombing. That's awfully slim evidence. Also, the fact that Reuters jumped all over circumstance a) makes me extremely suspicious. Reuters is not at the top of my list of most trusted international news services.
Zap crosses the line
Just minutes ago Socialist party candidate Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, speaking live on television, for the first time tried to use the bombings as a political issue. He was able to maintain his decency for about 26 whole hours before diving into the gutter. Zap said that the Aznar government should share everything it knows with the citizens, thus implying that was exactly what Aznar and the PP were not doing. Now, accusing the Prime Minister of holding back information from the public based on absolutely no evidence is, uh, not exactly mature, professional, reasonable, or responsible. Question number one was a direct, "Are you accusing Aznar of a coverup?", and Zap evaded the question. Number two was "Do you see a connection between the bombings and the Iraq war?", to which Zap responded "Time will tell."
This man is not fit to be truant officer, dogcatcher, or even the guy in charge of sweeping my street.
The technique used by the bombers was quite simple. They got on commuter trains heading for Madrid at the Alcala de Henares station, placed backpacks loaded with explosives on the luggage racks, and slipped out of the train during the two minutes the trains stop at Alcala.
The Interior Ministry is looking for nine suspects, six men and three women. According to La Vanguardia, they've even got photographs of at least some of them. It seems to me that when these people get caught the "mystery" of who planted the bombs will be solved.
Why I am convinced ETA did it
1) It fits their MO. The bombs were made with small quantities, 8-12 kilos, of titadyne and what they're calling "compressed dynamite", which is the standard ETA technique.
2) The operation was within their capacity. To pull this one off you would need a bombmaker, who obviously never got anywhere near the trains; a couple of spies to spend a couple of weeks scouting the ground; a couple of people to transport the bombs; somebody running a safe house or two; and the actual bomb planters. While ETA is weakened and on its last legs, they've got the capability to pull off an operation of this size. They didn't need any specially trained pilots or suicide fanatics or the ability to beat airport security or huge amounts of money or international connections to commit such a massacre. All they needed was a hundred kilos of explosives, a skilled bombmaker, and 15-20 conspirators who may well have been working in several different cells.
3) It fits their recent history. The most significant clue is that on Dec. 24, 2003, they planted a bomb on a train in San Sebastian that was timed to go off when the train reached Chamartin Station in Madrid. Fortunately, the bomb planters were caught and the train was stopped at Burgos, where the bomb was discovered. The MO was exactly the same as in the Madrid bombings except that the bomb was larger, 50 kilos of titadyne, and hidden inside a suitcase rather than backpacks.
On Feb. 9 of this year, an ETA caravan was stopped by the French police near Bordeaux. They were carrying all sorts of weapons and explosives to be passed to a new commando inside Spain.
Then, on the last weekend of February 2004, the police stopped another ETA caravan at Cuenca with more than 500 kilos of explosives that were to be used for terrorist attacks in Madrid.
4) It fits in with the election campaign; general elections are to be held on Sunday, March 14, in two days. ETA has tried to disrupt general elections every time Spain has had them. Most famously, during the 1995 election campaign (April 19), they tried to assassinate Jose Maria Aznar, then PP candidate for Prime Minister. Aznar survived the bombing because of his armored limousine. A passer-by was killed.
5) The story that ETA "always gives a warning" before planting a bomb is simply false. They didn't give a warning when they loaded that bomb on the train in San Sebastian, for example. Or on July 14, 1986, when a bomb killed 12 people and wounded 50 in Madrid. Or on December 11, 1985, when a bomb in Madrid killed six people and wounded 19. Or on October 30, 2000, when a bomb killed three and wounded 66 in Madrid. Or on June 21, 1993, when a bomb killed seven people and wounded more than 30 in Madrid. Or on June 19, 1987, when a bomb killed 21 and wounded hundreds at the Hipercor department store on Avenida Meridiana here in Barcelona.
6) The behavior of Arnaldo Otegui, "leader" of Batasuna, the political branch of ETA. He denied ETA involvement in the bombings and blamed a group of "Islamic activists". Otegui was the first person to publicly float the hypothesis that this was an Al Qaeda bombing, though he didn't say Al Qaeda. Now, I personally don't believe anything Arnaldo Otegui says. You can believe what you want.
7) The facts are that the only other clues linking Islamic terrorists to the Madrid bombings are a) an e-mail from somebody saying he was from the Martyr Abu Hafs Al Masri Brigade, who has claimed to be behind everything from the UN bombing in Baghdad to the Marriott Hotel bombing in Jakarta to the blackout in the US Northeast, falsely, and b) a cassette tape with Koran verses on it found in a van linked to the bombing. That's awfully slim evidence. Also, the fact that Reuters jumped all over circumstance a) makes me extremely suspicious. Reuters is not at the top of my list of most trusted international news services.
Zap crosses the line
Just minutes ago Socialist party candidate Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, speaking live on television, for the first time tried to use the bombings as a political issue. He was able to maintain his decency for about 26 whole hours before diving into the gutter. Zap said that the Aznar government should share everything it knows with the citizens, thus implying that was exactly what Aznar and the PP were not doing. Now, accusing the Prime Minister of holding back information from the public based on absolutely no evidence is, uh, not exactly mature, professional, reasonable, or responsible. Question number one was a direct, "Are you accusing Aznar of a coverup?", and Zap evaded the question. Number two was "Do you see a connection between the bombings and the Iraq war?", to which Zap responded "Time will tell."
This man is not fit to be truant officer, dogcatcher, or even the guy in charge of sweeping my street.
Update from Spain, post-nap, tranquilizer, and a few spliffs. Interior Minister Angel Acebes is still certain this is the work of ETA, but he stated that other hypotheses are being investigated. Somebody sent an e-mail to an Arabic-language newspaper claiming responsibility in the name of Al Qaeda. Also, a van which had been stolen at the end of February was found in Alcala de Henares with six detonators and, among a pile of other things including various cassette tapes, a tape with verses from the Koran.
This is pretty flimsy ground to base a conspiracy theory on, but it's already happening. Investigations eavesdropping at the local bars determined just minutes ago that for male Spaniards who hang out in crappy bars in Barcelona, 100% are convinced of the ETA-Al Qaeda-PP-Aznar-Bush-Illuminati conspiracy to do dirt to the world in general and themselves in particular. The "Aznar fucked up and got us on America's side and now Al Qaeda has bombed us and it's America's fault" theme is rather a constant.
I understand that most Barcelonese not under the influence of what we call vino peleon around here are likely to have somewhat calmer heads.
Here's the paranoid conspiracy theory that is cropping up in my mind. ETA plants the bombs, and this was clearly an ETA-style job, but tries to make it look like Al Qaeda, or at least bring up the suspicion as best they can--and note that the first person to link the alleged "Arab resistance" group and the massacre in Madrid was none other than ETA mouthpiece Arnaldo Otegui. Their strategy: Piss off the people against Aznar and the PP, their sworn enemies, for getting us in the sights of Al Qaeda. That's a terribly narrow and selfish attitude to have--"Aznar and Bush got these people killed" for daring to use force to stop terrorism. Enough people might have that very attitude, though, that there's a backlash at the polls on Sunday against the PP and they lose the election. That's something ETA would very much like to see.
I remain convinced that ETA carried out these bombings.
This is pretty flimsy ground to base a conspiracy theory on, but it's already happening. Investigations eavesdropping at the local bars determined just minutes ago that for male Spaniards who hang out in crappy bars in Barcelona, 100% are convinced of the ETA-Al Qaeda-PP-Aznar-Bush-Illuminati conspiracy to do dirt to the world in general and themselves in particular. The "Aznar fucked up and got us on America's side and now Al Qaeda has bombed us and it's America's fault" theme is rather a constant.
I understand that most Barcelonese not under the influence of what we call vino peleon around here are likely to have somewhat calmer heads.
Here's the paranoid conspiracy theory that is cropping up in my mind. ETA plants the bombs, and this was clearly an ETA-style job, but tries to make it look like Al Qaeda, or at least bring up the suspicion as best they can--and note that the first person to link the alleged "Arab resistance" group and the massacre in Madrid was none other than ETA mouthpiece Arnaldo Otegui. Their strategy: Piss off the people against Aznar and the PP, their sworn enemies, for getting us in the sights of Al Qaeda. That's a terribly narrow and selfish attitude to have--"Aznar and Bush got these people killed" for daring to use force to stop terrorism. Enough people might have that very attitude, though, that there's a backlash at the polls on Sunday against the PP and they lose the election. That's something ETA would very much like to see.
I remain convinced that ETA carried out these bombings.
Thursday, March 11, 2004
The most recent figures are 175 dead and 898 wounded in Madrid. Prime Minister Aznar just spoke to the country, encouraging calm and security and emphasizing that the terrorists would be defeated through legal means. There will be no military coup. If this had happened in 1979, say, there might have been at the very least a declaration of martial law. Aznar emphasized that he is in control here, as Al Haig once wisely said. Aznar, in his speech, made a reference to Franklin Roosevelt's Pearl Harbor speech, saying that March 11 was a day of infamy. Aznar explicitly referred to the "international struggle against terrorism", and made all of our feelings very clear when he said, "We will defeat them".
I suppose that the elections scheduled for Sunday, March 14, will be held; we can't let the terrorists dictate the timing of the most basic process in our democracy.
Some of the film is really, really awful. Antena 3 showed a very badly damaged human torso, and there is apparently a good deal of film that is being held back, at least for now, and I certainly undestand why.
I suppose that the elections scheduled for Sunday, March 14, will be held; we can't let the terrorists dictate the timing of the most basic process in our democracy.
Some of the film is really, really awful. Antena 3 showed a very badly damaged human torso, and there is apparently a good deal of film that is being held back, at least for now, and I certainly undestand why.
They've announced the modus operandi of the bombing operations: what the killers did was simply get on a train, unobtrusively leave a pre-set backpack, and leave through another door before the train even left the station. This "rudimentary" technique, as they called it, worked perfectly, and it fits in with ETA capabilities now: three or four kids could have pulled this off, assuming the bombs were pre-manufactured for them in some ETA hideout near Hernani or whatever. There's absolutely no reason to suspect this was anything but an ETA job. It might be interesting to find out exactly what connection ETA has with international terrorist gangs like Al Qaeda, though.
Interior Minister Angel Acebes just gave a press conference. He stated that there were at least 173 dead and some 600 injured. There were 13 bombs; 3 went off at Atocha, 4 in the neighborhood of the Calle Tellez, one at Santa Eugenia, and 2 at El Pozo. 3 booby traps were disactivated by the bomb squad. In response to a direct question, Acebes placed the responsibility on ETA. He pointed out that ETA frequently acts without warning and does not usually immediately claim responsibility. Evil scum Arnaldo Otegui, the "leader" of ETA's political branch, Batasuna or whatever they call themselves now, made a speech in which he denied ETA responsibility and blamed some unnamed Islamic group, a strategy which Acebes termed "miserable".
Well, here's CNN's report on the Madrid terror attack. Note that they call ETA the "Basque separatist group" when identifying them, but then they point out that the US and the EU both list ETA as a terrorist group, so I guess that's fair enough. I'd still prefer to see the word "terrorist" rather than "separatist", though. As idiotic as they are, Esquerra Republicana and Pepelu Carod-Rovira are merely separatists--they want Catalonia to separate from Spain--and not terrorists. Same with Eusko Alkartasuna. Terrorists are non-lawful bearers of arms who use violence and murder people for political ends. That definition sure fits ETA in my book, and not these other legitimate though wrongheaded political parties.
Attention Americans: They just interviewed a guy on Antena 3 named Michael from the United States. He said he had Spanish and American nationality, and lives and works in Madrid. His spoken Spanish was not very good. He was on one of the trains and two different bombs went off in his car. He suffered fairly mild injuries and was taken to the hospital in a police van.
So far the death toll is given at between 142 and 170. The number of wounded must be at least several hundred. At the Hospital Gregorio Maranon, they received 250 wounded. Their "catastrophe plan" is in effect, with all shifts on duty. They have performed 35 operations; six died on the table. Among the badly wounded are five children.
All of the wounded have apparently been evacuated and now they are removing the dead from the trains. At El Pozo they are lining up the body bags on the station platform. Many of the people on board the trains were university students and immigrant workers. There are four investigating magistrates on the scene, including Ruiz Polanco and Garzon. These are the people responsible for the death count of 142.
What we know so far: There were thirteen backpack bags, each loaded with fifteen kilos of titadine. Eleven of them went off in four different trains, two at Atocha, one at El Pozo, and one at Santa Eugenia. The police say that because of the explosive used it's a 90% probability ETA did it. They also say that a new technique was used in the making of the bombs.
Anyone needing information should call 112. The other numbers we gave are only for family members of possible victims, so don't call them unless you have reason to believe that one of your relatives might have been on one of those trains.
The government is saying relax and keep calm. That sounds like good advice.
So far the death toll is given at between 142 and 170. The number of wounded must be at least several hundred. At the Hospital Gregorio Maranon, they received 250 wounded. Their "catastrophe plan" is in effect, with all shifts on duty. They have performed 35 operations; six died on the table. Among the badly wounded are five children.
All of the wounded have apparently been evacuated and now they are removing the dead from the trains. At El Pozo they are lining up the body bags on the station platform. Many of the people on board the trains were university students and immigrant workers. There are four investigating magistrates on the scene, including Ruiz Polanco and Garzon. These are the people responsible for the death count of 142.
What we know so far: There were thirteen backpack bags, each loaded with fifteen kilos of titadine. Eleven of them went off in four different trains, two at Atocha, one at El Pozo, and one at Santa Eugenia. The police say that because of the explosive used it's a 90% probability ETA did it. They also say that a new technique was used in the making of the bombs.
Anyone needing information should call 112. The other numbers we gave are only for family members of possible victims, so don't call them unless you have reason to believe that one of your relatives might have been on one of those trains.
The government is saying relax and keep calm. That sounds like good advice.
Figures for the number of dead range from a low of 62 to a high of 155. At least a dozen people were killed at each of three stations. There are still bodies inside the trains. 350 wounded people have been admitted to hospitals. Two more bombs were found, one at Atocha and the other at El Pozo, and were blown up in controlled explosions by the bomb squad. Madrid is completely snarled up. If I were in Madrid, I'd just stay home. You'll be one fewer person in the way. They don't want any more blood donations, so don't worry about that.
To Americans and Brits who know people in Madrid: If they're tourists just passing through it's highly unlikely they'd have been in any of the trains or commuter stations involved; same if they live in the city, because the victims seem to have been mostly working people taking the train into town from Guadalajara, Alcala de Henares, and Torrejon. If you should know someone from that area who works in Madrid, though, I'd be a little worried, but don't panic. Chances are he or she is OK; give him a chance to get hold of you when he can. Cell phone service in much of Madrid is out, so don't freak out if you can't get hold of him or her. If you have reason to think that one of your FAMILY MEMBERS was on one of the trains, call the police at 91 586 70 00 or RENFE, the train company, at 900 200 222. Don't just call there looking for general information.
There will be a demonstration tomorrow at 7 PM everywhere in Spain. I'm going, for whatever it's good for.
To Americans and Brits who know people in Madrid: If they're tourists just passing through it's highly unlikely they'd have been in any of the trains or commuter stations involved; same if they live in the city, because the victims seem to have been mostly working people taking the train into town from Guadalajara, Alcala de Henares, and Torrejon. If you should know someone from that area who works in Madrid, though, I'd be a little worried, but don't panic. Chances are he or she is OK; give him a chance to get hold of you when he can. Cell phone service in much of Madrid is out, so don't freak out if you can't get hold of him or her. If you have reason to think that one of your FAMILY MEMBERS was on one of the trains, call the police at 91 586 70 00 or RENFE, the train company, at 900 200 222. Don't just call there looking for general information.
There will be a demonstration tomorrow at 7 PM everywhere in Spain. I'm going, for whatever it's good for.
There are some semi-official statements being made. The official provisional death count is 62, but the Tele 5 reporter says he can see several bodies inside or near the train that the police are leaving alone, either because they suspect another bomb or because they are giving all their attention to the living.
Well, they've shown the dead-body pictures, and damn, are they grim. Not much is being hidden from our eyes.
The bombs went off between 7:40 and 7:45 Madrid time. There were four: one on a train that went off at the El Pozo commuter station, another on a train that went off at the Santa Eugenia commuter station, a third on a train that went off at the Atocha commuter station, and a fourth on platform 2 at the Atocha commuter station. The Atocha long-distance and high-speed train stations were unaffected. All three trains bombed were on the Guadalajara-Alcala de Henares-Linares commuter line. In addition the cops blew up a suspicious Ford Fiesta outside the Atocha station in a controlled explosion. There are reports of another explosion, possibly controlled, at the El Pozo station. All train service through these three stations has been stopped, of course, including the long-distance and high-speed trains running through the main Atocha station.
Well, they've shown the dead-body pictures, and damn, are they grim. Not much is being hidden from our eyes.
The bombs went off between 7:40 and 7:45 Madrid time. There were four: one on a train that went off at the El Pozo commuter station, another on a train that went off at the Santa Eugenia commuter station, a third on a train that went off at the Atocha commuter station, and a fourth on platform 2 at the Atocha commuter station. The Atocha long-distance and high-speed train stations were unaffected. All three trains bombed were on the Guadalajara-Alcala de Henares-Linares commuter line. In addition the cops blew up a suspicious Ford Fiesta outside the Atocha station in a controlled explosion. There are reports of another explosion, possibly controlled, at the El Pozo station. All train service through these three stations has been stopped, of course, including the long-distance and high-speed trains running through the main Atocha station.
This is just awful. Death estimates range from "dozens" to 100 to 150. They're still evacuating Atocha; we're quite clearly not being shown the very worst film, but what we're seeing is bad enough. They're not showing any dismembered bodies or uncovered dead people. I'm not complaining at all. It's damned obvious what we're seeing. There was a girl lying face down with blood everywhere while she was being attended to and a young boy who was completely covered with his own blood dazedly leaning against a traffic sign and a guy sitting on a stretcher while they carried him away with his shirt off and blood all over the place.
Rajoy has said that the election campaign is over for him right now, and I assume the same is true for Rodriguez Zapatero. TV 3 interviewed Carod-Rovira and he was speechless; the men he shook hands with did this, and he knows he was played for a fool. Ibarretxe has strongly condemned the bombing. He seems to mean it. I bet he fears an anti-Basque backlash, which I want to warn everybody about right now. The ETA did this, not the Basques. Most Basques are against ETA, and this has probably changed a few minds around there. I can only hope. Anyone who continues supporting Herri Batasuna or whatever it's called now is a cynical lover of assassins.
Note to Americans: This is NOT an Al Qaeda job. It's the ETA. Please make sure that CNN and company stop calling these murderers "separatists" or "guerrillas". Hey, if they get lucky and there are 160 deaths today, they'll have scored more than a thousand all-time.
Rajoy has said that the election campaign is over for him right now, and I assume the same is true for Rodriguez Zapatero. TV 3 interviewed Carod-Rovira and he was speechless; the men he shook hands with did this, and he knows he was played for a fool. Ibarretxe has strongly condemned the bombing. He seems to mean it. I bet he fears an anti-Basque backlash, which I want to warn everybody about right now. The ETA did this, not the Basques. Most Basques are against ETA, and this has probably changed a few minds around there. I can only hope. Anyone who continues supporting Herri Batasuna or whatever it's called now is a cynical lover of assassins.
Note to Americans: This is NOT an Al Qaeda job. It's the ETA. Please make sure that CNN and company stop calling these murderers "separatists" or "guerrillas". Hey, if they get lucky and there are 160 deaths today, they'll have scored more than a thousand all-time.
They're showing film on TV 3. The Atocha train's third car has an enormous hole blown in its side and you can see the workers carrying away body bags. There are at least fifty dead and a hundred seriously injured. There's film of the walking wounded being attended to in the field hospitals. This is not the first time ETA has murdered during an election campaign, but never so big and never so close to election day. Central Madrid is paralyzed. The trains have been stopped and so have at least several subway lines.
Earlier reports of a bomb at the Madrid parliament building were wrong; the bomb was planted at the nearby Santa Eugenia station.
Nobody's claimed responsibility yet but this is clearly an ETA job. Prime Minister Aznar is meeting right now with his emergency cabinet. Rodrigo Rato is apparently on the scene, and Rodriguez Zapatero is supposed to be there at any time. The Basque lendekari Ibarretxe has condemned the bombings. The PP and PSOE are suspending all political campaigning.
Earlier reports of a bomb at the Madrid parliament building were wrong; the bomb was planted at the nearby Santa Eugenia station.
Nobody's claimed responsibility yet but this is clearly an ETA job. Prime Minister Aznar is meeting right now with his emergency cabinet. Rodrigo Rato is apparently on the scene, and Rodriguez Zapatero is supposed to be there at any time. The Basque lendekari Ibarretxe has condemned the bombings. The PP and PSOE are suspending all political campaigning.
TV 3 is reporting fifty dead at Atocha. The explosions at the Santa Eugenia and El Pozo commuter stations east and northeast of downtown, respectively, also caused fatalities. The bombs were set to go off at rush hour and kill as many people as possible. Field hospitals have been set up outside each of the three stations. They have the first film images from outside Atocha and there are a good few walking wounded being attended to while more seriously injured people are being taken away by ambulance. One correspondent has seen the train that exploded at Atocha; it was a train of a locomotive and four cars. The last three passenger cars were completely destroyed and there were bodies on the tracks. There is at the very least a rumor that there is a carbomb set outside Atocha to go off in the middle of the chaos.
Our greatest sympathies toward and condolences for the people of Madrid. We will never forget this morning. Now all there is to do is let the emergency workers and police and doctors do their jobs.
Our greatest sympathies toward and condolences for the people of Madrid. We will never forget this morning. Now all there is to do is let the emergency workers and police and doctors do their jobs.
BREAKING NEWS
It is 8:25 AM here. Less than an hour ago somebody, most likely ETA, planted three bombs in the Madrid train stations of Atocha, Santa Eugenia, and El Pozo. Preliminary sources say five dead and a whole lot of injured. We'll come back to this story when we get some more information. Here's the link in Spanish from Libertad Digital.
It is 8:25 AM here. Less than an hour ago somebody, most likely ETA, planted three bombs in the Madrid train stations of Atocha, Santa Eugenia, and El Pozo. Preliminary sources say five dead and a whole lot of injured. We'll come back to this story when we get some more information. Here's the link in Spanish from Libertad Digital.
Tuesday, March 09, 2004
The Iraqis did actually sign the transition Constitution yesterday after presumably a good bit of arm-twisting and united by the knowledge that whatever the Americans want, it's better than Saddam. The Kurds demanded a veto and got it; I imagine the most sensible thing in the long run would be to create a tripartite Shiite Arab-Sunni Arab-Sunni Kurd federal state, with Baghdad perhaps as a federal capital district since it's in Sunni Arab territory but a lot of Kurds and especailly Shiites live there. You'd have to give a veto to each of the three communities, making it impossible for the government to do anything that one of the groups strongly opposed. The Shiites will agree to a federal state, says La Vanguardia. A formula for weak government, agreed, but some weakness may be what the Iraqis need right about now. They've had far too many years of the iron hand and it's time to let a hundred flowers bloom.
The constitution includes a minimum of 25% women in the elective assembly, a bill of rights including freedom of expression and religion, Islam as only one of various sources of law, civil control of the military, elections before January 2005, and the recovery of Iraqi sovereignty on June 30. So how could anybody in his right mind not be jumping up and down and celebrating the freedom of 23 million people? These people are going to get a democratic government with the rule of law! I thought all of us were pro-democracy.
Beirut Bob Fisk says the new constitution "is full of questions with no answers", though. Bob has spoken. I therefore conclude that this document will turn out to be a huge success.
Vanguardia headline: "US and France need to send more troops to Haiti to restore order." That's on page 6 in the news section. Notice how big they are on us invading some country when France is in favor of it? Because we sure the hell have invaded Haiti with a lot less reason on our side than when we went into Saddam's Iraq. We provide the muscle, two-thirds of the troops and the logistics, and we give them the credit. Good. America doesn't need any ego-strokes of glory. We're not going to win anyone over; the buzzards are already circling. Seems that the Vangua is already implying that Ricardo Ortega, the dead Spanish journalist, was only allegedly killed by bullets fired by pro-Aristide gunmen. There were Americans firing too, and one of the Aristide gunmen was killed. So doubt is already being cast on the official story on how Ortega met his death.
I've changed my position on gay marriage. The epidemic has spread to New Jersey, Seattle, and Portland. This is one of these issues in which there's a minority--and gays are maybe five percent of men and two percent of women, maximum, according to a reliable sex survey done in the '90s; the old Kinsey 10% figure is way high and the Kinsey study is now considered bogus anyway because the people surveyed weren't a cross-section of the population--that is very insistent on an issue, and the rest of the population really doesn't care that much. There's no fight to the anti-gay marriage movement like there is with the anti-abortion movement, and like there wasn't much fight to the pro-gays in the military movement, which is why it didn't happen during the Clinton administration.
Well, when civil disobedience becomes this widespread, maybe it's time we sat down and tried to see it from the disobeyers' point of view. They really feel that they're not considered equal to heterosexuals because they can't get married. Well, once they figure out that that cute butt is gonna turn to lard within six months after he/she/it gets the gold ring, that there'll be no slipping out to the bareback bars when hubby starts getting in your space, and that she's going to take you for the Manhattan studio and Fire Island beach house when the inevitable divorce comes, not to mention the endless bitching and lawsuits over who gets the couple's beagle, maybe they'll change their minds back. I don't know. But they're taking this damn seriously and I can't see any important reason to object to it if they think this is such a big deal regarding their dignity and the respect they deserve.
The constitution includes a minimum of 25% women in the elective assembly, a bill of rights including freedom of expression and religion, Islam as only one of various sources of law, civil control of the military, elections before January 2005, and the recovery of Iraqi sovereignty on June 30. So how could anybody in his right mind not be jumping up and down and celebrating the freedom of 23 million people? These people are going to get a democratic government with the rule of law! I thought all of us were pro-democracy.
Beirut Bob Fisk says the new constitution "is full of questions with no answers", though. Bob has spoken. I therefore conclude that this document will turn out to be a huge success.
Vanguardia headline: "US and France need to send more troops to Haiti to restore order." That's on page 6 in the news section. Notice how big they are on us invading some country when France is in favor of it? Because we sure the hell have invaded Haiti with a lot less reason on our side than when we went into Saddam's Iraq. We provide the muscle, two-thirds of the troops and the logistics, and we give them the credit. Good. America doesn't need any ego-strokes of glory. We're not going to win anyone over; the buzzards are already circling. Seems that the Vangua is already implying that Ricardo Ortega, the dead Spanish journalist, was only allegedly killed by bullets fired by pro-Aristide gunmen. There were Americans firing too, and one of the Aristide gunmen was killed. So doubt is already being cast on the official story on how Ortega met his death.
I've changed my position on gay marriage. The epidemic has spread to New Jersey, Seattle, and Portland. This is one of these issues in which there's a minority--and gays are maybe five percent of men and two percent of women, maximum, according to a reliable sex survey done in the '90s; the old Kinsey 10% figure is way high and the Kinsey study is now considered bogus anyway because the people surveyed weren't a cross-section of the population--that is very insistent on an issue, and the rest of the population really doesn't care that much. There's no fight to the anti-gay marriage movement like there is with the anti-abortion movement, and like there wasn't much fight to the pro-gays in the military movement, which is why it didn't happen during the Clinton administration.
Well, when civil disobedience becomes this widespread, maybe it's time we sat down and tried to see it from the disobeyers' point of view. They really feel that they're not considered equal to heterosexuals because they can't get married. Well, once they figure out that that cute butt is gonna turn to lard within six months after he/she/it gets the gold ring, that there'll be no slipping out to the bareback bars when hubby starts getting in your space, and that she's going to take you for the Manhattan studio and Fire Island beach house when the inevitable divorce comes, not to mention the endless bitching and lawsuits over who gets the couple's beagle, maybe they'll change their minds back. I don't know. But they're taking this damn seriously and I can't see any important reason to object to it if they think this is such a big deal regarding their dignity and the respect they deserve.
Here's a nice little Straight Dope piece about storks and babies. Storks are cool. For some reason you don't see too many around Catalonia but they're not uncommon in Castile and the rest of central Spain. I remember some especially handsome nesting storks all over the bell towers and castle in Segovia last time I was there. By the way, in Spain the stork doesn't bring babies; they come from Paris. And the English-language meme about storks bringing babies must have come from England a long time ago, because it's the expression used in American English and there are no storks in America.
CELEBRITY SLUT HOOKERS!
Spanish sleazo journalist Antonio Salas has written another book; his last one was called Diary of a Skinhead. This one is supposed to denounce white slavery, but it's gotten more attention for its naming of celebrities who moonlight as high-class 'ho's. He has actually only published initials, and the local parlor game is deciding who they refer to. So far the betting leans toward Mar Saura, Sofia Mazagatos, Yola Berrocal, Marlene Morreau, Malena Gracia, Nuria Bermudez, and an alleged cousin of Penelope Cruz, among others. If you want lots of slutty pictures of all these bimbos, just google any of their names. Most of these people are celebrities due to their many bouts with plastic surgery and cocaine, and they constantly appear on the trashiest programs on Spanish TV, what Murph calls "fags and slags" shows. The American equivalent of these people would be American Idol rejects, ex-boy band members, Richard Simmons, and Anna Nicole Smith.
The programs basically consist of a TV presenter like Xavier Sarda and then all these trashy celebrities who spend the rest of the program slagging one another off, calling each other whores and sluts and liars and homos and other nice things. If you want to improve your vulgar low-life Spanish slang, just spend a few evenings with Cronicas Marcianas or with one of the afternoon "Maruja" programs. (A Maruja is a typical fiftyish Spanish lower-class housewife; the term is pejorative.)
Spanish sleazo journalist Antonio Salas has written another book; his last one was called Diary of a Skinhead. This one is supposed to denounce white slavery, but it's gotten more attention for its naming of celebrities who moonlight as high-class 'ho's. He has actually only published initials, and the local parlor game is deciding who they refer to. So far the betting leans toward Mar Saura, Sofia Mazagatos, Yola Berrocal, Marlene Morreau, Malena Gracia, Nuria Bermudez, and an alleged cousin of Penelope Cruz, among others. If you want lots of slutty pictures of all these bimbos, just google any of their names. Most of these people are celebrities due to their many bouts with plastic surgery and cocaine, and they constantly appear on the trashiest programs on Spanish TV, what Murph calls "fags and slags" shows. The American equivalent of these people would be American Idol rejects, ex-boy band members, Richard Simmons, and Anna Nicole Smith.
The programs basically consist of a TV presenter like Xavier Sarda and then all these trashy celebrities who spend the rest of the program slagging one another off, calling each other whores and sluts and liars and homos and other nice things. If you want to improve your vulgar low-life Spanish slang, just spend a few evenings with Cronicas Marcianas or with one of the afternoon "Maruja" programs. (A Maruja is a typical fiftyish Spanish lower-class housewife; the term is pejorative.)
Murph reminded me that I had promised to go through my predictions for 2003, made at the end of 2002 in response to a survey by John Hawkins from Right Wing News. I was too lazy to do it so he went and did it for me and scored the exam, too. I think he was pretty rough scoring number 1 wrong, but he's the independent proctor so it's up to him. Also, the prediction for the Democrats was a joke, but I certainly had no idea of what the real answer would be. Actually, I think I did pretty well.
1. War in Iraq before March 2003? Yes. WRONG
2. Saddam still in power Jan. 1, 2004? No. CORRECT
3. Terrorist attack in the US killing more than 100 people? No. CORRECT
4. Casualties on our side in Iraq war? Maximum a few hundred, maybe zero from enemy fire. CORRECT
5. Syria still support Hezbollah? Really don't know. Doubt it. UNKNOWN
6. Large battle in Afghanistan? No. CORRECT
7. Independent Palestinian state? No. CORRECT
8. Revolution in Iran? No. CORRECT
9. US-North Korea sign deal to put end to NK nuke program? No because NK state will collapse, Bush wouldn't bargain with them anyway since they can't be trusted. WRONG
10. Yasser still in power? Yes, of the PLO, not as leader of a real state. CORRECT
11. Anthrax case solved? Domestic or foreign terrorism? Unsolved, "lone nut" rather than conspiracy. CORRECT
12. Osama? Already dead. UNKNOWN
13. Dem pres candidate 2004? Nader-Barbara Mikulski 3% of vote. Independents McCain-Lieberman 41%, Bush-Rice 56%. WRONG
14. Bush end year above 60% in popularity? Yes. WRONG
15. Dow Jones above 10,500? No, with at least two more years of a slow economy, rather early 90s-ish; then another long growth period. Just guessing. CORRECT
16. Human baby cloned? It's possible now. Won't be done, though, till the Chinese get hold of the technology in ten-twenty years. UNKNOWN
SCORE
9 CORRECT
4 INCORRECT
3 STILL UNKNOWN
1. War in Iraq before March 2003? Yes. WRONG
2. Saddam still in power Jan. 1, 2004? No. CORRECT
3. Terrorist attack in the US killing more than 100 people? No. CORRECT
4. Casualties on our side in Iraq war? Maximum a few hundred, maybe zero from enemy fire. CORRECT
5. Syria still support Hezbollah? Really don't know. Doubt it. UNKNOWN
6. Large battle in Afghanistan? No. CORRECT
7. Independent Palestinian state? No. CORRECT
8. Revolution in Iran? No. CORRECT
9. US-North Korea sign deal to put end to NK nuke program? No because NK state will collapse, Bush wouldn't bargain with them anyway since they can't be trusted. WRONG
10. Yasser still in power? Yes, of the PLO, not as leader of a real state. CORRECT
11. Anthrax case solved? Domestic or foreign terrorism? Unsolved, "lone nut" rather than conspiracy. CORRECT
12. Osama? Already dead. UNKNOWN
13. Dem pres candidate 2004? Nader-Barbara Mikulski 3% of vote. Independents McCain-Lieberman 41%, Bush-Rice 56%. WRONG
14. Bush end year above 60% in popularity? Yes. WRONG
15. Dow Jones above 10,500? No, with at least two more years of a slow economy, rather early 90s-ish; then another long growth period. Just guessing. CORRECT
16. Human baby cloned? It's possible now. Won't be done, though, till the Chinese get hold of the technology in ten-twenty years. UNKNOWN
SCORE
9 CORRECT
4 INCORRECT
3 STILL UNKNOWN
Monday, March 08, 2004
A Spanish journalist named Ricardo Ortega, who had been Antena 3's correspondent in Washington and Iraq and whom I did not consider a good reporter, was killed in a shootout in Haiti. Some Aristide supporters opened up on an opposition demonstration and killed six people and wounded some twenty. Ortega took one in the chest and another in the abdomen and died in a Port au Prince hospital. De mortuis nil nisi bonum.
John Kerry put his foot in it big-time, in my opinion, when he said he agreed with the Americans and French going into Haiti but that they should have supported Aristide rather than overthrowing him. The only reason I can figure Kerry said something so stupid is to pander to American black political leaders, who were strongly pro-Aristide. Now, I don't think that ordinary American black people care more than any other American about what's going on in Haiti.
Caveat on Haiti: While the going is good and there's an atmosphere of international cooperation on the issue, let's get together with the French and Canadians and CARICOM and set up a plan for some Iraq-style Marshall Plan stuff for Haiti, which is by far the crappiest place in the Americas except maybe for Cuba. A well-spent couple of billion dollars there might work wonders IF we round up the top several hundred bad guys in the country and send 'em to Guantanamo, too. And we can let the French be in charge. They'd love that.
Now, what's essentially different between the Haiti operation and the Iraq war? Both of them got rid of obnoxious dictators. In both of them there was a wide-ranging international commitment. Agreed, it was a good bit bloodier in Iraq. I can see only two big differences. The first is that in this case the French are in favor, so there's nobody going around whipping up anti-Yankee feeling. And the second is that there's no oil in Haiti so the gringo-haters can't diffuse the Iraq Big Lie: that the United States did not go into Iraq for its oil. Oil is less than 2 percent of the world GDP and the United States has more than plenty of fossil fuel energy: we're the world's second producer of oil and first in both coal and natural gas, and anything we don't have our three nearest important neighbors, the Canadians and Russians and Mexicans, will be thrilled to sell us. As for proven reserves, that doesn't matter a damn. There's enough of a supply to keep us going for hundreds of years no matter at what rate we use the stuff. The question is at what point do fossil fuels become so expensive that it becomes more economical to switch to another energy source, and that point is not coming until they have enough laser power to make nuclear fusion work or figure out how to make solar energy efficient. And when that point comes, the market will let us know.
The thing about oil is that it's instantly convertible into lots of fast, easy money, and that makes it a rather special commodity on the world market, so any tinhorn dictator who is lucky enough to take over a country with oil can instantly convert that oil into weapons. The reason the Americans keep getting mixed up in the oil-rich Middle East is that we can't allow any of those guys to use their vast fortunes gained through no merit of their own in order to do some serious damage to the world. They've already done enough and this has got to stop. (Hugo Chavez: are you listening?)
The conservatives won in the Greek elections, making Sweden, Britain, and Germany the only EU15 countries with left-of-center governments. The reason the French and Belgians have been so damn bolshy recently is due to nationalism, not leftist ideology.
Four major newspapers came out with election polls over the weekend: remember, the election is next Sunday. Estimates of the results range from a La Vanguardia low of 162 seats for the PP and a La Razon high of 176. The PSOE has a low of 134 seats in El Pais and 147 as the high in La Vangua. Everybody seems to agree that CiU will pull 10-12, the Communists 9-12, the PNV 7-8, Esquerra 5-7, and other parties 5-15. All these results are less favorable to the PP than the government survey we posted a few days ago.
Here's my list of possible scenarios, from most likely to least likely:
1. PP scores absolute majority of 176+ seats.
2. PP scores 172-175 and governs from the minority with the Canary Coalition's support and maybe that of Union Valenciana.
3. PP scores 162-171 and makes a deal with Convergence and Union along with CC and maybe UV.
4. PP scores fewer than 170 seats and everybody else makes an alliance against them.
Zap has looked goofy a couple of times recently. He posed for a photo in Marie Claire, for some reason, and they did an atrocious makeup job on him, slapped it on really thick. The universal reaction was that he looked just like the Joker from Batman. Yesterday he came out wearing a black turtleneck and Manuel Trallero said in the Vangua, "He looks like a cross between a blue-eyed working-class priest, the student leader at a university assembly, and the lead singer in a 'ye-ye' band."
Says Alfred Rexach in the Vangua, who went to an "ecosocialist" (i.e. Communist) rally on International Women's Day, whatever that is, "The ecosocialists, that is those guys who have the endless acronyms, because they always have schisms and those things and then it's a pain in the neck getting them back together (this year they're IU-ICV, but ICV is really ICV-EUiA here in Catalonia), come from the PSUC (the Partit Socialista Unificat de Catalunya, the old Seventies Commies, very romanticized in these parts), but now at the rallies they don't play the "Internationale" or the "Cantata for the 20th anniversary of the October Revolution" by Prokofiev, but some elevator music, which isn't exciting at all and doesn't give you the urge to take the Winter Palace or nationalize Iberdrola and Fecsa (the electric companies)."
Barcelona is actually a big convention city; the food fair is just starting up and there are lots and lots of exhibitors and the like all over town. One thing the Vangua says is that the most-eaten dish in Spain is not gazpacho or paella, but the humble fried egg. So much for Catalan culinary pretentions. Spaniards do eat an awful lot of fresh fruit, almost always of high quality, and the stats bear this out. This may be a major dietary factor that helps them live longer. So eat more fruit and ditch the damn fried eggs! Another thing the Spaniards don't do a lot is eat between meals. The light breakfast, light midmorning snack, heavy lunch, and medium dinner is a standard. They eat an average of 4.3 times a day. This keeps them fairly close to a reasonable weight, in general. You see plenty of chubby people here, and guys with beer guts and chicks with big butts, but very few huge fat tubs of goo like you see in the extra-wide aisles at Sam's Club buying these mattress-size bags of tortilla chips while chowing down on every single free sample out there. So quit the between-meal snacks if you want to lose weight.
FC Barcelona won its seventh straight league game against Mallorca, not much of a team. 3-2 in the Camp Nou, two goals by Luis Garcia and one from old hack Luis Enrique. Mallorca has one real star, Samuel Etoo, who I think is from Cameroon, and that's about it. I like Etoo; call up your local team president and tell them to buy him, because he wants out of there after this year. Barca is on 49 points, one behind Depor and five behind Valencia. Real Madrid has a eleven-point lead over Barcelona and that's just too much to overcome with nine games to play, but what was a horrible first half of the season is now starting to look pretty good. Difference: Edgar Davies. Luis Garcia has been playing well. Xavi is free to play his game. Van Bronckhorst is playing very well at left defense, frequently moving up to midfield behind Garcia at left wing. Cocu's not what he used to be, but he is doing pretty well now. Oleguer, from the youth squad, looks like he's won a job at left fullback. Of course, even when Ronaldinho doesn't have a great game, he's still one of the best players out there. Kluivert is toast. He's gone and so is Overmars. They don't get to play anymore. They might as well put their houses on the market now.
Vanguardia headline: "Wave of US puritanism hits radio". The story from EFE starts with these words: "The wave of puritanism that began when Janet Jackson showed a breast during a live TV broadcast may finish off several radio programs..." The story goes on to report on Howard Stern's self-centered whining. Does any person with more than a few grams of sense give a crap if Howard Stern gets fired? And isn't it time for the Vangua to give up on the Janet boob Super Bowl hooha? That story has been dead for weeks in the rest of the world.
There's an ugly story from La Manga, a resort complex near Murcia. The Leicester City soccer team from the English Premier Division went down to train for a few days at the Hyatt. While there nine of their players got themselves into extremely serious trouble. Seems that three German girls were staying at the hotel and these guys broke into their room, raped one of them, and sexually molested the other two. The girls reported this to the cops and nine arrests were made. One of them, who apparently was just there and didn't do anything, has been let off with no charges. Five others have been charged with breaking and entering and/or "sexual aggression" and are out on bail; the other three are in jail, no bail, and might not get out for the next ten or so years. They're all international players; one's Northern Irish, one's Scottish, and the third is Jamaican. It looks like the girls' story is true; somebody sure the hell broke into their room and assaulted them. The players say the sex was consensual, which doesn't match up with the bloody panties the cops have as evidence. This lad culture shit is just pathetic, immature punks with big money and no sense who think they can get away with whatever they want because they're rich jocks.
John Kerry put his foot in it big-time, in my opinion, when he said he agreed with the Americans and French going into Haiti but that they should have supported Aristide rather than overthrowing him. The only reason I can figure Kerry said something so stupid is to pander to American black political leaders, who were strongly pro-Aristide. Now, I don't think that ordinary American black people care more than any other American about what's going on in Haiti.
Caveat on Haiti: While the going is good and there's an atmosphere of international cooperation on the issue, let's get together with the French and Canadians and CARICOM and set up a plan for some Iraq-style Marshall Plan stuff for Haiti, which is by far the crappiest place in the Americas except maybe for Cuba. A well-spent couple of billion dollars there might work wonders IF we round up the top several hundred bad guys in the country and send 'em to Guantanamo, too. And we can let the French be in charge. They'd love that.
Now, what's essentially different between the Haiti operation and the Iraq war? Both of them got rid of obnoxious dictators. In both of them there was a wide-ranging international commitment. Agreed, it was a good bit bloodier in Iraq. I can see only two big differences. The first is that in this case the French are in favor, so there's nobody going around whipping up anti-Yankee feeling. And the second is that there's no oil in Haiti so the gringo-haters can't diffuse the Iraq Big Lie: that the United States did not go into Iraq for its oil. Oil is less than 2 percent of the world GDP and the United States has more than plenty of fossil fuel energy: we're the world's second producer of oil and first in both coal and natural gas, and anything we don't have our three nearest important neighbors, the Canadians and Russians and Mexicans, will be thrilled to sell us. As for proven reserves, that doesn't matter a damn. There's enough of a supply to keep us going for hundreds of years no matter at what rate we use the stuff. The question is at what point do fossil fuels become so expensive that it becomes more economical to switch to another energy source, and that point is not coming until they have enough laser power to make nuclear fusion work or figure out how to make solar energy efficient. And when that point comes, the market will let us know.
The thing about oil is that it's instantly convertible into lots of fast, easy money, and that makes it a rather special commodity on the world market, so any tinhorn dictator who is lucky enough to take over a country with oil can instantly convert that oil into weapons. The reason the Americans keep getting mixed up in the oil-rich Middle East is that we can't allow any of those guys to use their vast fortunes gained through no merit of their own in order to do some serious damage to the world. They've already done enough and this has got to stop. (Hugo Chavez: are you listening?)
The conservatives won in the Greek elections, making Sweden, Britain, and Germany the only EU15 countries with left-of-center governments. The reason the French and Belgians have been so damn bolshy recently is due to nationalism, not leftist ideology.
Four major newspapers came out with election polls over the weekend: remember, the election is next Sunday. Estimates of the results range from a La Vanguardia low of 162 seats for the PP and a La Razon high of 176. The PSOE has a low of 134 seats in El Pais and 147 as the high in La Vangua. Everybody seems to agree that CiU will pull 10-12, the Communists 9-12, the PNV 7-8, Esquerra 5-7, and other parties 5-15. All these results are less favorable to the PP than the government survey we posted a few days ago.
Here's my list of possible scenarios, from most likely to least likely:
1. PP scores absolute majority of 176+ seats.
2. PP scores 172-175 and governs from the minority with the Canary Coalition's support and maybe that of Union Valenciana.
3. PP scores 162-171 and makes a deal with Convergence and Union along with CC and maybe UV.
4. PP scores fewer than 170 seats and everybody else makes an alliance against them.
Zap has looked goofy a couple of times recently. He posed for a photo in Marie Claire, for some reason, and they did an atrocious makeup job on him, slapped it on really thick. The universal reaction was that he looked just like the Joker from Batman. Yesterday he came out wearing a black turtleneck and Manuel Trallero said in the Vangua, "He looks like a cross between a blue-eyed working-class priest, the student leader at a university assembly, and the lead singer in a 'ye-ye' band."
Says Alfred Rexach in the Vangua, who went to an "ecosocialist" (i.e. Communist) rally on International Women's Day, whatever that is, "The ecosocialists, that is those guys who have the endless acronyms, because they always have schisms and those things and then it's a pain in the neck getting them back together (this year they're IU-ICV, but ICV is really ICV-EUiA here in Catalonia), come from the PSUC (the Partit Socialista Unificat de Catalunya, the old Seventies Commies, very romanticized in these parts), but now at the rallies they don't play the "Internationale" or the "Cantata for the 20th anniversary of the October Revolution" by Prokofiev, but some elevator music, which isn't exciting at all and doesn't give you the urge to take the Winter Palace or nationalize Iberdrola and Fecsa (the electric companies)."
Barcelona is actually a big convention city; the food fair is just starting up and there are lots and lots of exhibitors and the like all over town. One thing the Vangua says is that the most-eaten dish in Spain is not gazpacho or paella, but the humble fried egg. So much for Catalan culinary pretentions. Spaniards do eat an awful lot of fresh fruit, almost always of high quality, and the stats bear this out. This may be a major dietary factor that helps them live longer. So eat more fruit and ditch the damn fried eggs! Another thing the Spaniards don't do a lot is eat between meals. The light breakfast, light midmorning snack, heavy lunch, and medium dinner is a standard. They eat an average of 4.3 times a day. This keeps them fairly close to a reasonable weight, in general. You see plenty of chubby people here, and guys with beer guts and chicks with big butts, but very few huge fat tubs of goo like you see in the extra-wide aisles at Sam's Club buying these mattress-size bags of tortilla chips while chowing down on every single free sample out there. So quit the between-meal snacks if you want to lose weight.
FC Barcelona won its seventh straight league game against Mallorca, not much of a team. 3-2 in the Camp Nou, two goals by Luis Garcia and one from old hack Luis Enrique. Mallorca has one real star, Samuel Etoo, who I think is from Cameroon, and that's about it. I like Etoo; call up your local team president and tell them to buy him, because he wants out of there after this year. Barca is on 49 points, one behind Depor and five behind Valencia. Real Madrid has a eleven-point lead over Barcelona and that's just too much to overcome with nine games to play, but what was a horrible first half of the season is now starting to look pretty good. Difference: Edgar Davies. Luis Garcia has been playing well. Xavi is free to play his game. Van Bronckhorst is playing very well at left defense, frequently moving up to midfield behind Garcia at left wing. Cocu's not what he used to be, but he is doing pretty well now. Oleguer, from the youth squad, looks like he's won a job at left fullback. Of course, even when Ronaldinho doesn't have a great game, he's still one of the best players out there. Kluivert is toast. He's gone and so is Overmars. They don't get to play anymore. They might as well put their houses on the market now.
Vanguardia headline: "Wave of US puritanism hits radio". The story from EFE starts with these words: "The wave of puritanism that began when Janet Jackson showed a breast during a live TV broadcast may finish off several radio programs..." The story goes on to report on Howard Stern's self-centered whining. Does any person with more than a few grams of sense give a crap if Howard Stern gets fired? And isn't it time for the Vangua to give up on the Janet boob Super Bowl hooha? That story has been dead for weeks in the rest of the world.
There's an ugly story from La Manga, a resort complex near Murcia. The Leicester City soccer team from the English Premier Division went down to train for a few days at the Hyatt. While there nine of their players got themselves into extremely serious trouble. Seems that three German girls were staying at the hotel and these guys broke into their room, raped one of them, and sexually molested the other two. The girls reported this to the cops and nine arrests were made. One of them, who apparently was just there and didn't do anything, has been let off with no charges. Five others have been charged with breaking and entering and/or "sexual aggression" and are out on bail; the other three are in jail, no bail, and might not get out for the next ten or so years. They're all international players; one's Northern Irish, one's Scottish, and the third is Jamaican. It looks like the girls' story is true; somebody sure the hell broke into their room and assaulted them. The players say the sex was consensual, which doesn't match up with the bloody panties the cops have as evidence. This lad culture shit is just pathetic, immature punks with big money and no sense who think they can get away with whatever they want because they're rich jocks.
Sunday, March 07, 2004
There have been two minor stinks about campaign advertisements in the US presidential race over the last few days. First the Bush campaign rolled out its advertisements showing scenes from 9-11. The Democrats complained. Now, I figure if the Bush campaign wants to run advertisements reminding people what the "root cause" of the Afghanistan and Iraq wars was, fair enough. This comes down to freedom of speech. The First Amendment guarantees the Republicans' right to make any political argument they want to make. If people are offended by their argument, it'll cost the Republicans votes. But "don't change horses in the middle of a stream" is a serious campaign issue and a legitimate pro-Bush argument--we're in this war, don't elect somebody who might radically change the current policy--that was brought up in the 1864 and 1944 elections.
Then Move On, a leftist political activism organization, came out with its own advertisements criticizing George Bush. The Republicans complained, and in addition threatened to get lower court injunctions prohibiting the anti-Bush adds from running on the ground that they violate federal campaign spending laws, a completely different issue. The Republicans say that Move On's ads are the equivalent of Democratic Party ads paid for by a different front organization, and that's not legal. Democratic Party ads have to be paid for by the Democratic Party or nobody else, and the legal question is whether the Move On ads should be considered Dem Party ads or not. The Republicans say yes, the Democrats say no.
The Spanish TV media has managed to conflate the two different issues, neither of which is of any particular importance, and come out with the impression that the Supreme Court had prohibited using footage from 9-11 in campaign advertisements, which would be major news if it weren't completely impossible.
Just to put the kibosh on a couple of common media rumors around here, Number One is that it is in no way prohibited nor censored nor nothin' to show bodies from 9-11 on American TV, as the Vanguardia has repeatedly stated. There weren't many, of course, since most of them had fallen a thousand feet with an enormous burning building (weighing thousands, if not millions, of tons) in flames falling on top of them, and then the site smoldered for weeks. Not many dead body pictures were shown because there were very few whole dead bodies. The Spanish press immediately accused the Americans of censoring dead bodies. The Vanguardia has repeated this one various times. It's simply not true. Want some evidence? Here's a quote from the New York Daily News:
One (ad), titled "Safer, Stronger," also features a one-second shot of firefighters removing the flag-draped remains of a victim from the twisted debris.
So the Bush campaign advertisements are using a one-second shot of a dead body being carried off from the World Trade Center. Some censorship.
The second is that reporters are forbidden from covering the funerals of the dead soldiers' bodies that come back from Iraq. Completely false. The family of the dead soldier makes whatever arrangements it wants. Those arrangements do not normally include an invitation to the foreign press. The Vanguardia has repeated this one several times, too, to its everlasting discredit.
Then Move On, a leftist political activism organization, came out with its own advertisements criticizing George Bush. The Republicans complained, and in addition threatened to get lower court injunctions prohibiting the anti-Bush adds from running on the ground that they violate federal campaign spending laws, a completely different issue. The Republicans say that Move On's ads are the equivalent of Democratic Party ads paid for by a different front organization, and that's not legal. Democratic Party ads have to be paid for by the Democratic Party or nobody else, and the legal question is whether the Move On ads should be considered Dem Party ads or not. The Republicans say yes, the Democrats say no.
The Spanish TV media has managed to conflate the two different issues, neither of which is of any particular importance, and come out with the impression that the Supreme Court had prohibited using footage from 9-11 in campaign advertisements, which would be major news if it weren't completely impossible.
Just to put the kibosh on a couple of common media rumors around here, Number One is that it is in no way prohibited nor censored nor nothin' to show bodies from 9-11 on American TV, as the Vanguardia has repeatedly stated. There weren't many, of course, since most of them had fallen a thousand feet with an enormous burning building (weighing thousands, if not millions, of tons) in flames falling on top of them, and then the site smoldered for weeks. Not many dead body pictures were shown because there were very few whole dead bodies. The Spanish press immediately accused the Americans of censoring dead bodies. The Vanguardia has repeated this one various times. It's simply not true. Want some evidence? Here's a quote from the New York Daily News:
One (ad), titled "Safer, Stronger," also features a one-second shot of firefighters removing the flag-draped remains of a victim from the twisted debris.
So the Bush campaign advertisements are using a one-second shot of a dead body being carried off from the World Trade Center. Some censorship.
The second is that reporters are forbidden from covering the funerals of the dead soldiers' bodies that come back from Iraq. Completely false. The family of the dead soldier makes whatever arrangements it wants. Those arrangements do not normally include an invitation to the foreign press. The Vanguardia has repeated this one several times, too, to its everlasting discredit.
Friday, March 05, 2004
Well, there's finally plenty of news to talk about. The government polling agency, and don't ask me why there's a government polling agency, the grandly named Center for Social Research (CIS), has issued their most recent election poll. It gives Mariano Rajoy and the conservative People's Party an absolute majority by the minimum--176 seats out of 350 in the Congress of Deputies. There's nothing to worry about here, folks. If the polls are showing such a big PP win, the real numbers will be even larger.
63.4% think Rajoy will win though only 38.5% approve of current PP policies, and the voters say they would prefer Zap to Rajoy as the next PM 34.1%-33.0%. Then, on a scale of 1-10, they give Rajoy a ranking of 5.02 and Zap 4.95. Don't ask me to explain this. Duran Lerida of Convergence and Union got 4.3 and Gas only 3.96, demonstrating that most Spaniards don't think too much of Gas and his Communists.
Here's what I thought was the most important question; "How would you grade the general situation of Spain: very good, good, average, bad, very bad?" Well, 30.6% said good or very good, which means that they are almost certain PP voters. Only 20.3% said very bad or bad, and those are the people who won't vote PP in any circumstances, but they're divided among Socialists, Commies, and various nationalist groups. Only 1.6% didn't answer, and those other 47.5% said average. Those are the swing voters, but even if Zap manages to win over more of them than Rajoy, Rajoy's base is ten percentage points firmer than Zap's and he should win with no problem. If I were a betting man, I'd bet right now on a PP win with 176 seats or more, especially if you'll give me three to one.
Here's the geographical background: the numbers following each political party are the number of seats they're going to win in each Spanish autonomous region. PP is the People's Party, PSOE is the Socialist party, IU are the Communists, PNV are the Basque Nationalists, EA are the Basque non-violent independentistas, ChA are the Juntas Aragoneses, CiU are Convergence and Union, ERC are the Republican Left of Catalonia, PSM is the Mallorcan Socialist Party, not affiliated with the PSOE, UV is Unio Valenciana, CC is the Canarian Coalition (both of these have good relations with the PP), and BNG are the Bloc Nacional Galego, lefty Galician nationalists.
Asturias: PP 4, PSOE 3, IU 1
Cantabria: PP 3, PSOE 2
Basque Country: PNV 7, PP 7, PSOE 4, EA 1
Navarra: PP 3, PSOE 2
La Rioja: PP 3, PSOE 1
Aragon: PP 8, PSOE 4, ChA 1
Catalonia: PSOE 17, CiU 12, PP 10, ERC 6, IU 2
Balearics: PP 5, PSOE 2, PSM 1
Valencia: PP 19, PSOE 12, UV 1
Murcia: PP 6, PSOE 3
Canaries: PP 8, PSOE 4, CC 3
Andalusia: PSOE 32, PP 27, IU 2
Ceuat and Melilla: PP 2
Castile-La Mancha: PP 12, PSOE 8
Extremadura: PP 5, PSOE 5
Madrid: PP 18, PSOE 14, IU 3
Castile-Leon: PP 22, PSOE 11
Galicia: PP 14, PSOE 7, BNG 3
So the PP wins the most votes everywhere except Catalonia, the Basque Country, and Andalusia, in all of which the PP will do very well. Barring disaster--as former Louisiana governor once said, "The only way they can beat me is if they find me in bed with a dead girl or live boy"--Rajoy wins handily.
63.4% think Rajoy will win though only 38.5% approve of current PP policies, and the voters say they would prefer Zap to Rajoy as the next PM 34.1%-33.0%. Then, on a scale of 1-10, they give Rajoy a ranking of 5.02 and Zap 4.95. Don't ask me to explain this. Duran Lerida of Convergence and Union got 4.3 and Gas only 3.96, demonstrating that most Spaniards don't think too much of Gas and his Communists.
Here's what I thought was the most important question; "How would you grade the general situation of Spain: very good, good, average, bad, very bad?" Well, 30.6% said good or very good, which means that they are almost certain PP voters. Only 20.3% said very bad or bad, and those are the people who won't vote PP in any circumstances, but they're divided among Socialists, Commies, and various nationalist groups. Only 1.6% didn't answer, and those other 47.5% said average. Those are the swing voters, but even if Zap manages to win over more of them than Rajoy, Rajoy's base is ten percentage points firmer than Zap's and he should win with no problem. If I were a betting man, I'd bet right now on a PP win with 176 seats or more, especially if you'll give me three to one.
Here's the geographical background: the numbers following each political party are the number of seats they're going to win in each Spanish autonomous region. PP is the People's Party, PSOE is the Socialist party, IU are the Communists, PNV are the Basque Nationalists, EA are the Basque non-violent independentistas, ChA are the Juntas Aragoneses, CiU are Convergence and Union, ERC are the Republican Left of Catalonia, PSM is the Mallorcan Socialist Party, not affiliated with the PSOE, UV is Unio Valenciana, CC is the Canarian Coalition (both of these have good relations with the PP), and BNG are the Bloc Nacional Galego, lefty Galician nationalists.
Asturias: PP 4, PSOE 3, IU 1
Cantabria: PP 3, PSOE 2
Basque Country: PNV 7, PP 7, PSOE 4, EA 1
Navarra: PP 3, PSOE 2
La Rioja: PP 3, PSOE 1
Aragon: PP 8, PSOE 4, ChA 1
Catalonia: PSOE 17, CiU 12, PP 10, ERC 6, IU 2
Balearics: PP 5, PSOE 2, PSM 1
Valencia: PP 19, PSOE 12, UV 1
Murcia: PP 6, PSOE 3
Canaries: PP 8, PSOE 4, CC 3
Andalusia: PSOE 32, PP 27, IU 2
Ceuat and Melilla: PP 2
Castile-La Mancha: PP 12, PSOE 8
Extremadura: PP 5, PSOE 5
Madrid: PP 18, PSOE 14, IU 3
Castile-Leon: PP 22, PSOE 11
Galicia: PP 14, PSOE 7, BNG 3
So the PP wins the most votes everywhere except Catalonia, the Basque Country, and Andalusia, in all of which the PP will do very well. Barring disaster--as former Louisiana governor once said, "The only way they can beat me is if they find me in bed with a dead girl or live boy"--Rajoy wins handily.
Thursday, March 04, 2004
I am going to throw a party on Saturday, April 10, to which I am going to invite my friends in real life and those who read the blog. So, if you're reading this and you're going to be in Barcelona on the night of April 10-11, start making plans because this is going to be a good one. As the Irish say, there'll be some good craic (conversation and generally a good time). There will even be unattached persons of the female sex here. Well, at least one or two. You're invited, no matter what.
Since my birthday will be April 11 and we've got a four-day weekend here in Catalonia--Good Friday, Saturday, Sunday, and then Easter Monday--the night of Saturday the 10th seems to be a perfect time for a large bash, so that everybody can sleep late Sunday and then enjoy their Monday off sans hangover. If you're from out of town, I can book you an inexpensive room in a decent pension near here if you let me know in advance. If we get started at nine or ten then, apres-party, we, or rather y'all, can hit the justly famous Barcelona nightlife; I'm likely to crap out at around 2 AM, which is just about when the discos begin to rock.
So keep the night of Saturday, April 10, free on your schedules. And, yes, Joan, even you are invited, should you dare show your face. (If you do, we'll hand you a beer, point out the big bowls of guacamole, chili con carne, and fresh salsa, one picante recipe and one not, and argue you into submission after feeding you into tranquility.)
For details, e-mail me at crankyyanqui@yahoo.com or leave a message in the Comments section.
Since my birthday will be April 11 and we've got a four-day weekend here in Catalonia--Good Friday, Saturday, Sunday, and then Easter Monday--the night of Saturday the 10th seems to be a perfect time for a large bash, so that everybody can sleep late Sunday and then enjoy their Monday off sans hangover. If you're from out of town, I can book you an inexpensive room in a decent pension near here if you let me know in advance. If we get started at nine or ten then, apres-party, we, or rather y'all, can hit the justly famous Barcelona nightlife; I'm likely to crap out at around 2 AM, which is just about when the discos begin to rock.
So keep the night of Saturday, April 10, free on your schedules. And, yes, Joan, even you are invited, should you dare show your face. (If you do, we'll hand you a beer, point out the big bowls of guacamole, chili con carne, and fresh salsa, one picante recipe and one not, and argue you into submission after feeding you into tranquility.)
For details, e-mail me at crankyyanqui@yahoo.com or leave a message in the Comments section.
In case you hadn't noticed, my wife and I are ailurophiles. We have five cats, the Siamese Twins, Chang and Eng, Lisa, Bart, and Oscar. Chang and Eng are beautiful cats; they are pretty obviously a mix of red tabby and Siamese. They're identical twins except Chang came out with only half a tail, while Eng's is luxurious and fluffy. They have blue eyes and the Siamese meow, and they look just like red point Siamese. Most of their fur is a creamy beigey white, and then the ears and the like are red. The thing about these two is they behave more like sheep than cats. They insist on being where you are, and if possible on top of you, ALL THE TIME. I've never seen more affectionate animals. Lisa is our only female, sweet and just a little shy. They're all neutered, but Eng likes to hump Lisa every now and then and she lets him, which is why the back of her neck always smells like cat spit. Her fur is interesting: it's white with black or gray tips, so when she lies down and curls up she's stippled with white. Bart is the boss now; he's a male in the prime of life, red tabby and white, and he likes to throw his weight around the house just a bit. He likes to sit on the top of the computer monitor, so he's often a witness to my typing here. Right now he's decided he prefers my lap. Oscar is jet-black and loves to sit on my lap too. When I wake up in the morning there are five cats between me and Remei, and Oscar is the one who'll be right under my chin. He's the most playful of all of them and the most curious; he's interested in almost anything and you can see his little kitty brain trying to figure out, say, how running water or mirrors work. The nastiest trick you can play on him is to use a hand mirror to project the sunlight onto the wall. If you move the mirror around a little the spot the sunlight makes moves too, and little Oscar just does not get the concept. We don't do that to him very often because it is kind of cruel to confuse the poor little guy. All of these are adopted off the street; we got Chang and Eng as adults and found the other three as kittens.
That's why I love posts with cat pictures. Check out this one from Snopes.com, the Urban Legends Reference Pages website and one of my very favorites. You ought to check out Snopes at least once a week to see what new rumors are going around; it's educational and entertaining, and they know their stuff and manage to be amusing too. Anyway, they confirm that these cat pictures are genuine. If you're a cat person check it out.
That's why I love posts with cat pictures. Check out this one from Snopes.com, the Urban Legends Reference Pages website and one of my very favorites. You ought to check out Snopes at least once a week to see what new rumors are going around; it's educational and entertaining, and they know their stuff and manage to be amusing too. Anyway, they confirm that these cat pictures are genuine. If you're a cat person check it out.
Wednesday, March 03, 2004
Here's a Gregg Easterbrook blog piece from the New Republic on the possibilities that there may be life on other planets. Easterbrook is much more doubtful than, say, Carl Sagan was. Check it out.
As you know, some two hundred people were killed in anti-Shiite terrorist attacks in Baghdad and Karbala yesterday, and forty more Shiites were killed in Quetta, southwest Pakistan, in an intersectarian sniper attack; fighting in Pakistan between Sunni and Shiite terrorists has killed thousands of people since the early Nineties. Yesterday was the Shiite holy day and more than a million pilgrims met in Karbala only to be attacked by suicide bombers. The Americans believe that Abu Musab Zarqawi, Osama's man in Iraq, is behind the two Iraqi bombings. Of course Al Qaeda had connections with Saddam, and of course they're one of the organizations spreading terror in Iraq.
Beirut Bob Fisk has a piece in today's Vanguardia called "Toward a dark, sinister Iraq." The thing about the Vangua is that it sells 200,000 copies a day, well more than twice what the Independent does, and so the Vangua is probably the largest diffusor of Mr. Fisk's peculiar ideas in the world. The thing about the Independent is that regional American newspapers like the KC Star, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, the Rocky Mountain News, and the Dallas Morning News have at least five times its readership, and even minor Midwestern papers like the Wichita Eagle-Beacon and the Topeka Capital Journal outsell the Inde-fuckin'-pendent.
No, I don't believe the Americans were behind the butchery yesterday in Baghdad and Karbala, despite the accusing cries of the Iraqi survivors of the massacre.
Gee, thanks, Bob, that's generous of you. You know, I don't think the Americans planted bombs that killed 200 Shiite Iraqi civilians who were practicing their religion, either.
However, I am very worried that Iraqi exile groups think that this might set off what the Americans want: a fear so intense regarding the possibility of a civil war that the Iraqis will sign on to whatever plan the United States might lay out for Mesopotamia.
Oh, so the bombing serves American interests, does it? Coulda fooled me. I thought the object of the bomb was to scare the shit out of the Shiites, who have always felt oppressed by the Iraqi Sunnies, and warn them away from cooperating with the Americans.
Anyway, Bob is reminded of the actions of the French in Algeria; he claims they incited the different Algerian factions to fight among themselves and so half a million people died--and Ireland, where Bob claims that the Brits, through the Protestant terrorists, pulled off three terrorist attacks in 1974 in order to divide and conquer. Now, why do these terrorist bombings remind Beirut Bob of these horrible things the French and British allegedly did? Beats the shit out of me, unless of course he IS saying the Americans were behind them for the same reasons that motivated the French and the British.
Nevertheless, the attacks yesterday in Baghdad and Karbala show a clear coordination. The same brain is behind both. But is it a Sunni brain? When the spokesman for the occupation forces suggested yesterday that it was an Al Qaeda job, he must have known what he was saying: Al Qaeda is a Sunni movement and the victims were Shiites. It isn't that I don't think Al Qaeda is capable of perpetrating such a bloodbath, but I wonder why the Americans are so insistent about the Sunni-Shiite theme and why they are interested in emphasizing the possibility of a civil war.
Oh, so the Americans ARE trying to foment a civil war, says Bob. Well, let's see then: Bob insinuates that the bomber might not have been Sunni. Now, these things do occasionally happen: some Shiite terrorist gang might have decided to pull of the killing in order to make themselves look live victims and gain international sympathy. That would be damned cold-blooded of them, though, to blow up their own faithful. And, if the Shiites weren't behind it, then, who was? Cui bono? The Americans, says Bob.
We are entering a dark and sinister phase of the history of Iraq in which dark and sinister events will take place.
WHAT THE FUCK??!! Saddam Hussein is in prison and Iraq is free. A few recent events at random: Oil production is up to 1990 levels. The schools are open. The markets and shops are open. There's plenty of food. The hospitals are open. People's wages have been dramatically increased. They've unblocked the irrigation canals that Saddam let silt up. The Shiites can freely practice their religion. And 25 Iraqi Fulbright Scholars, including women, are off to study in the United States. Oh, yeah, you don't have to be worried about being arrested or tortured or killed anymore. And with Uday cold meat, when the soccer team loses an international match, the players don't have to be worried about being beaten bloody anymore. We are entering a time of hope now that son-of-a-bitch Saddam has been overthrown. How can the end of one of the most brutal dictatorships ever in world history be the entrance to a "dark and sinister" time? Only in Fiskland.
Nevertheless, the occupation authorities, who really should contemplate a civil war as the worst-case scenario, keep screaming "Civil war!" in our ears. I can't but be worried. Above all, when the attacks make this idea reality.
I used to know a girl who when offended or angered would look at you scornfully and snarl, "Eat my fuck!" If I ever meet Beirut Bob, that's what I'm going to tell him. Then I'll ask him how he paid for his house.
Beirut Bob Fisk has a piece in today's Vanguardia called "Toward a dark, sinister Iraq." The thing about the Vangua is that it sells 200,000 copies a day, well more than twice what the Independent does, and so the Vangua is probably the largest diffusor of Mr. Fisk's peculiar ideas in the world. The thing about the Independent is that regional American newspapers like the KC Star, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, the Rocky Mountain News, and the Dallas Morning News have at least five times its readership, and even minor Midwestern papers like the Wichita Eagle-Beacon and the Topeka Capital Journal outsell the Inde-fuckin'-pendent.
No, I don't believe the Americans were behind the butchery yesterday in Baghdad and Karbala, despite the accusing cries of the Iraqi survivors of the massacre.
Gee, thanks, Bob, that's generous of you. You know, I don't think the Americans planted bombs that killed 200 Shiite Iraqi civilians who were practicing their religion, either.
However, I am very worried that Iraqi exile groups think that this might set off what the Americans want: a fear so intense regarding the possibility of a civil war that the Iraqis will sign on to whatever plan the United States might lay out for Mesopotamia.
Oh, so the bombing serves American interests, does it? Coulda fooled me. I thought the object of the bomb was to scare the shit out of the Shiites, who have always felt oppressed by the Iraqi Sunnies, and warn them away from cooperating with the Americans.
Anyway, Bob is reminded of the actions of the French in Algeria; he claims they incited the different Algerian factions to fight among themselves and so half a million people died--and Ireland, where Bob claims that the Brits, through the Protestant terrorists, pulled off three terrorist attacks in 1974 in order to divide and conquer. Now, why do these terrorist bombings remind Beirut Bob of these horrible things the French and British allegedly did? Beats the shit out of me, unless of course he IS saying the Americans were behind them for the same reasons that motivated the French and the British.
Nevertheless, the attacks yesterday in Baghdad and Karbala show a clear coordination. The same brain is behind both. But is it a Sunni brain? When the spokesman for the occupation forces suggested yesterday that it was an Al Qaeda job, he must have known what he was saying: Al Qaeda is a Sunni movement and the victims were Shiites. It isn't that I don't think Al Qaeda is capable of perpetrating such a bloodbath, but I wonder why the Americans are so insistent about the Sunni-Shiite theme and why they are interested in emphasizing the possibility of a civil war.
Oh, so the Americans ARE trying to foment a civil war, says Bob. Well, let's see then: Bob insinuates that the bomber might not have been Sunni. Now, these things do occasionally happen: some Shiite terrorist gang might have decided to pull of the killing in order to make themselves look live victims and gain international sympathy. That would be damned cold-blooded of them, though, to blow up their own faithful. And, if the Shiites weren't behind it, then, who was? Cui bono? The Americans, says Bob.
We are entering a dark and sinister phase of the history of Iraq in which dark and sinister events will take place.
WHAT THE FUCK??!! Saddam Hussein is in prison and Iraq is free. A few recent events at random: Oil production is up to 1990 levels. The schools are open. The markets and shops are open. There's plenty of food. The hospitals are open. People's wages have been dramatically increased. They've unblocked the irrigation canals that Saddam let silt up. The Shiites can freely practice their religion. And 25 Iraqi Fulbright Scholars, including women, are off to study in the United States. Oh, yeah, you don't have to be worried about being arrested or tortured or killed anymore. And with Uday cold meat, when the soccer team loses an international match, the players don't have to be worried about being beaten bloody anymore. We are entering a time of hope now that son-of-a-bitch Saddam has been overthrown. How can the end of one of the most brutal dictatorships ever in world history be the entrance to a "dark and sinister" time? Only in Fiskland.
Nevertheless, the occupation authorities, who really should contemplate a civil war as the worst-case scenario, keep screaming "Civil war!" in our ears. I can't but be worried. Above all, when the attacks make this idea reality.
I used to know a girl who when offended or angered would look at you scornfully and snarl, "Eat my fuck!" If I ever meet Beirut Bob, that's what I'm going to tell him. Then I'll ask him how he paid for his house.
Here's some fun Republican Party oppo research on John Kerry and his large mouth and their penchant for conspiracy theories. I am assuming the quotes are legit; they sure look like they are. Should they be legit, this guy is too paranoid to be president, Either that or he doesn't believe what he's saying, which is also possible. (Link from James Taranto.)
Geez, this is turning into a sports blog. That's a trend I am going to terminate for the rest of the week except for this link. It's another NBA.com blog, this one by the basketball writer for the Spanish sports newspaper Marca. If you want the straight dope on European basketball, check it out. One comment: He's a little optimistic about some European players' chances to make it in the big league. Juan Carlos Navarro of Barcelona, though, is a pretty sure bet to be on an NBA team in the next year or two.
Oh, yeah, note this guy's mediocre English. Hey, he gets his point across, so the function is working just fine. (And, of course, he knows a hell of a lot more abut basketball than I do.) It's the form that has its faults here. In case you were wondering what are the most common errors that Spaniards make when writing in English, just take a gander at our pal Rafael's texts. I'm not putting him down, he's doing fine and a hell of a lot better than most Americans do with Spanish. I'm just saying that what he wrote can be analyzed and pattern errors can be picked out.
Geez, this is turning into a sports blog. That's a trend I am going to terminate for the rest of the week except for this link. It's another NBA.com blog, this one by the basketball writer for the Spanish sports newspaper Marca. If you want the straight dope on European basketball, check it out. One comment: He's a little optimistic about some European players' chances to make it in the big league. Juan Carlos Navarro of Barcelona, though, is a pretty sure bet to be on an NBA team in the next year or two.
Oh, yeah, note this guy's mediocre English. Hey, he gets his point across, so the function is working just fine. (And, of course, he knows a hell of a lot more abut basketball than I do.) It's the form that has its faults here. In case you were wondering what are the most common errors that Spaniards make when writing in English, just take a gander at our pal Rafael's texts. I'm not putting him down, he's doing fine and a hell of a lot better than most Americans do with Spanish. I'm just saying that what he wrote can be analyzed and pattern errors can be picked out.
Tuesday, March 02, 2004
One subject we had no plans to comment on was the Mel Gibson Jesus movie. (Full disclosure: I am an agnostic from a Protestant family.) Here, however, is an article from National Review on the Jesus movie and the novel The Da Vinci Code. You might want to check it out.
Here's one for you sports fans. Sports Illustrated has on their site (I can't figure how to link it--click here for SI and then look at the lower left part of your screen where it says "MLB Photo Gallery: Sizing up the sluggers from SI photos, then and now." Viewers are then treated to "before and after" photos of power hitters Bret Boone, Barry Bonds, Jason Giambi, Gary Sheffield, and Sammy Sosa, one from several years ago early in their careers and one recent. Now, SI doesn't say they're on steroids. They just post the photos. And, to my knowledge, taking steroids is not now against the rules of baseball, though I have a feeling that it's going to be very soon.
However, the breaking baseball news is that Bonds, Giambi, and Sheffield have just been nailed. Federal investigators have announced that these three players bought steroids. Does this matter? Not in the global scheme of things, but sports are one of the most popular forms of mass entertainment, and the main illusion that fans have is that it really DOES matter whether Barca or Real Madrid comes in first when, of course, it doesn't.
Do players take drugs? Sure they do. It's the market at work. If you make the fans happy by hitting lots of home runs and helping your team win, then the fans love you, every team wants you, and you can sign a multimillion-dollar contract. If you take steroids, your muscles are much bigger, you're much stronger, and you can hit the ball much harder. Now, you have to know how to hit in the first place; steroids aren't going to help you if you can't hit the curveball. but steroids can be the difference between a guy who earns a million bucks a year and a guy who earns eight million.
Health problems? Forget it. These guys are young men with a young men's attitude about their health--party now and don't even think about later. Steroids don't seem to have done these guys any damage yet, as far as we know, and the immediate payoff--take roids, and fame and fortune can be yours now--is enormous compared to the cost--you might die five or ten years earlier, we don't know.
How do you stop it? Very simple. Random mandatory drug testing. If the players don't like it, they can look for a job somewhere else. Part of the payback for those enormous salaries, and I do mean enormous--the highest-paid baseball player, Alex Rodriguez, earns more than $25 million a year, star players get $5-10 million, and in my little town, Kansas City, there are several players (Beltran, Sweeney, Gonzalez, Santiago, maybe Randa) making well more than $2 million a year--is that you have to give up this part of your privacy in order to maintain the fans' illusions. See, if we pretend that sports are really important, then we have to treat them like they are, and one thing we don't allow is any sort of cheating or unfair advantage.
How about Spain? Well, in the last Winter Olympics Spain bought itself a German cross-country skier, Johann Muehlegg, to win us some medals. Muehlegg came through; he won golds in all three cross-country races. Then it hit the fan. He tested positive after the third victory and was disqualified; they've just gotten around to stripping him of the other two medals.
Soccer? Yeah, almost certainly. The Barca admits using creatine as a "nutritional supplement" for its players. That's probably better than what Maradona used to take before games (and at most other times) when he was playing here.
Here's one for you sports fans. Sports Illustrated has on their site (I can't figure how to link it--click here for SI and then look at the lower left part of your screen where it says "MLB Photo Gallery: Sizing up the sluggers from SI photos, then and now." Viewers are then treated to "before and after" photos of power hitters Bret Boone, Barry Bonds, Jason Giambi, Gary Sheffield, and Sammy Sosa, one from several years ago early in their careers and one recent. Now, SI doesn't say they're on steroids. They just post the photos. And, to my knowledge, taking steroids is not now against the rules of baseball, though I have a feeling that it's going to be very soon.
However, the breaking baseball news is that Bonds, Giambi, and Sheffield have just been nailed. Federal investigators have announced that these three players bought steroids. Does this matter? Not in the global scheme of things, but sports are one of the most popular forms of mass entertainment, and the main illusion that fans have is that it really DOES matter whether Barca or Real Madrid comes in first when, of course, it doesn't.
Do players take drugs? Sure they do. It's the market at work. If you make the fans happy by hitting lots of home runs and helping your team win, then the fans love you, every team wants you, and you can sign a multimillion-dollar contract. If you take steroids, your muscles are much bigger, you're much stronger, and you can hit the ball much harder. Now, you have to know how to hit in the first place; steroids aren't going to help you if you can't hit the curveball. but steroids can be the difference between a guy who earns a million bucks a year and a guy who earns eight million.
Health problems? Forget it. These guys are young men with a young men's attitude about their health--party now and don't even think about later. Steroids don't seem to have done these guys any damage yet, as far as we know, and the immediate payoff--take roids, and fame and fortune can be yours now--is enormous compared to the cost--you might die five or ten years earlier, we don't know.
How do you stop it? Very simple. Random mandatory drug testing. If the players don't like it, they can look for a job somewhere else. Part of the payback for those enormous salaries, and I do mean enormous--the highest-paid baseball player, Alex Rodriguez, earns more than $25 million a year, star players get $5-10 million, and in my little town, Kansas City, there are several players (Beltran, Sweeney, Gonzalez, Santiago, maybe Randa) making well more than $2 million a year--is that you have to give up this part of your privacy in order to maintain the fans' illusions. See, if we pretend that sports are really important, then we have to treat them like they are, and one thing we don't allow is any sort of cheating or unfair advantage.
How about Spain? Well, in the last Winter Olympics Spain bought itself a German cross-country skier, Johann Muehlegg, to win us some medals. Muehlegg came through; he won golds in all three cross-country races. Then it hit the fan. He tested positive after the third victory and was disqualified; they've just gotten around to stripping him of the other two medals.
Soccer? Yeah, almost certainly. The Barca admits using creatine as a "nutritional supplement" for its players. That's probably better than what Maradona used to take before games (and at most other times) when he was playing here.
Since we're reproducing lists from La Vanguardia today, here's another couple. When looking through these lists, think about this: Where do you think those surveyed are getting their ideas from? Home, school, their peer group, the media, church (ha, ha)? What sort of society produces this set of opinions?
This survey was done more than a year ago by the Barcelona city government. Don't ask me why it took them so long to release it. Those surveyed are "Barcelona young people" between the ages of 15 and 29.
The first question is, "How much confidence (trust) do you have in the following institutions?" The percentages of those who answered "a lot" or "quite a bit" are as follows:
Family 95%
University 79%
NGOs 60%
City government 53%
European Union 45%
Regional government 41%
Catalan parliament 40%
Police 39%
Press 36%
United Nations 34%
Courts 33%
Banks 33%
Monarchy 28%
Spanish parliament 27%
Army 26%
Unions 26%
Central government 23%
NATO 21%
Television 19%
Catholic church 18%
Political parties 10%
US President 7%
Question number two is "How much do you agree with the following concepts?" Not very well-phrased, I don't think. The numbers are those who agree very much or agree quite a bit.
Sexual freedom 93%
Artificial insemination 85%
Disarmament 80%
"Traditions" (presumably castells, sardanas, etc.) 80%
Private property 77%
Homosexuality 75%
Euthanasia 74%
Decriminalization of abortion 73%
European Union 71%
Decriminalization of cannabis 60%
Socialism 59%
Feminism 54%
Catalan autonomy 53%
Nationalism (presumably Catalan) 38%
Catalan independence 33%
Federalism 30%
Capitalism 28%
Communism 27%
Decriminalization of all drugs 22%
Nuclear energy 19%
Death penalty 16%
Human cloning 14%
This survey was done more than a year ago by the Barcelona city government. Don't ask me why it took them so long to release it. Those surveyed are "Barcelona young people" between the ages of 15 and 29.
The first question is, "How much confidence (trust) do you have in the following institutions?" The percentages of those who answered "a lot" or "quite a bit" are as follows:
Family 95%
University 79%
NGOs 60%
City government 53%
European Union 45%
Regional government 41%
Catalan parliament 40%
Police 39%
Press 36%
United Nations 34%
Courts 33%
Banks 33%
Monarchy 28%
Spanish parliament 27%
Army 26%
Unions 26%
Central government 23%
NATO 21%
Television 19%
Catholic church 18%
Political parties 10%
US President 7%
Question number two is "How much do you agree with the following concepts?" Not very well-phrased, I don't think. The numbers are those who agree very much or agree quite a bit.
Sexual freedom 93%
Artificial insemination 85%
Disarmament 80%
"Traditions" (presumably castells, sardanas, etc.) 80%
Private property 77%
Homosexuality 75%
Euthanasia 74%
Decriminalization of abortion 73%
European Union 71%
Decriminalization of cannabis 60%
Socialism 59%
Feminism 54%
Catalan autonomy 53%
Nationalism (presumably Catalan) 38%
Catalan independence 33%
Federalism 30%
Capitalism 28%
Communism 27%
Decriminalization of all drugs 22%
Nuclear energy 19%
Death penalty 16%
Human cloning 14%
La Vanguardia is kind enough to publish a list of the 48 people killed by ETA since 2000. Here it is.
2000
Jan. 21--Army Lt. Col. Pedro Antonio Blanco Garcia, Madrid.
Feb. 22--Socialist politician Fernando Buesa and regional police officer Jorge Diez Elorza, Vitoria.
May 7--Journalist Jose Luis Lopez de Lacalle, Andoain, Guipuzcoa.
June 4--PP city councilman Jesus Maria Pedrosa Urquiza, Durango, Vizcaya.
July 7--PP city councilman Jose Maria Martin Carpena, Malaga.
July 29--Former civil governor of Guipuzcoa, Juan Maria Jauregui, Tolosa, Guipuzcoa.
August 8--Guipuzcoa employers' association president Jose Maria Korta, Zumaya, Guipuzcoa.
August 9--Army Lieutenant Francisco Casanova Vicente, Berriozar, Navarra.
August 20--Guardias Civiles Irene Fernandez and Jose Angel de Jesus, Sallent de Gallego, Huesca.
August 29--PP city councilman Manuel Indiano, Zumarraga, Guipuzcoa.
Sept. 21--PP city councilman Jose Luis Ruiz Casado, Sant Adria de Besos, Barcelona.
Oct. 9--Judge Luis Portero, Granada.
Oct. 16--Army Col. Antonio Munoz Carinanos, Sevilla.
Oct. 22--Prison employee Maximo Casado Carrera, Vitoria.
Oct. 30--Supreme Court judge Jose Francisco Querol Lombardero, police officer Jesus Escudero Garcia, chauffeur Armando Medina Sanchez, and passer-by Jesus Martinez Sanchez, Madrid.
Nov. 21--Former Health Minister Ernest Lluch, Barcelona.
Dec. 14--PP city councilman Francisco Cano Consuegra, Terrassa, Barcelona.
2001
Jan. 26--Navy cook Ramon Diaz Garcia, San Sebastian.
Feb.22--Workers Josu Leonet Askune and Jose Angel Santos Laranga, San Sebastian.
March 9--Regional policeman Inaki Totorika Vega, Hernani, Guipuzcoa.
March 17--Regional policeman Santos Santamaria Avendano, Roses, Gerona.
March 20--Vice-mayor Froilan Elespe Inciarte, Lasarte-Oria, Guipuzcoa.
May 6--President of Aragonese PP Manuel Gimenez Abad, Zaragoza.
May 24--Newspaper employee Santiago Oleaga Elejabarrieta, San Sebastian.
June 28--Army Gen. Justo Oreja Pedraza, Madrid.
July 10--National policeman Luis Ortiz de la Rosa, Madrid.
July 14--Regional police subchief Mikel Uribe Aurkia and PP city councilman in Leiza Jose Javier Mugica Astibia, Navarra.
Nov. 7--Judge Jose Maria Lidon, Getxo, Vizcaya.
Nov. 23--Regional police officers Ana Isabel Arostegui and Javier Mijangos, Beasain, Guipuzcoa.
2002
March 21--Socialist city councilman Juan Priede Perez, Orio, Guipuzcoa.
Aug. 4--Passers-by Silvia Martinez, aged 6, and Cecilio Gallego Alarias, Santa Pola, Alicante.
Sept. 24--Guardia Civil corporal Juan Carlos Beiro, Leiza, Navarra.
Nov. 17--Guardia Civil Antonio Molina Martin, Madrid.
2003
Feb. 8--Municipal police chief Joseba Pagazaurtundua, Andoain, Guipuzcoa.
May 30--National policemen Bonifacio Martin Hernando and Julian Envit Luna, Sanguesa, Navarra.
Multiple choice question:
The organization that killed these 48 people, ETA, could be best described as:
a) freedom fighters
b) separatist guerrillas
c) nationalist patriots
d) terrorist murderers
If you answered D, you might want to sign the petition demanding that CNN use that very description rather than any of the others.
2000
Jan. 21--Army Lt. Col. Pedro Antonio Blanco Garcia, Madrid.
Feb. 22--Socialist politician Fernando Buesa and regional police officer Jorge Diez Elorza, Vitoria.
May 7--Journalist Jose Luis Lopez de Lacalle, Andoain, Guipuzcoa.
June 4--PP city councilman Jesus Maria Pedrosa Urquiza, Durango, Vizcaya.
July 7--PP city councilman Jose Maria Martin Carpena, Malaga.
July 29--Former civil governor of Guipuzcoa, Juan Maria Jauregui, Tolosa, Guipuzcoa.
August 8--Guipuzcoa employers' association president Jose Maria Korta, Zumaya, Guipuzcoa.
August 9--Army Lieutenant Francisco Casanova Vicente, Berriozar, Navarra.
August 20--Guardias Civiles Irene Fernandez and Jose Angel de Jesus, Sallent de Gallego, Huesca.
August 29--PP city councilman Manuel Indiano, Zumarraga, Guipuzcoa.
Sept. 21--PP city councilman Jose Luis Ruiz Casado, Sant Adria de Besos, Barcelona.
Oct. 9--Judge Luis Portero, Granada.
Oct. 16--Army Col. Antonio Munoz Carinanos, Sevilla.
Oct. 22--Prison employee Maximo Casado Carrera, Vitoria.
Oct. 30--Supreme Court judge Jose Francisco Querol Lombardero, police officer Jesus Escudero Garcia, chauffeur Armando Medina Sanchez, and passer-by Jesus Martinez Sanchez, Madrid.
Nov. 21--Former Health Minister Ernest Lluch, Barcelona.
Dec. 14--PP city councilman Francisco Cano Consuegra, Terrassa, Barcelona.
2001
Jan. 26--Navy cook Ramon Diaz Garcia, San Sebastian.
Feb.22--Workers Josu Leonet Askune and Jose Angel Santos Laranga, San Sebastian.
March 9--Regional policeman Inaki Totorika Vega, Hernani, Guipuzcoa.
March 17--Regional policeman Santos Santamaria Avendano, Roses, Gerona.
March 20--Vice-mayor Froilan Elespe Inciarte, Lasarte-Oria, Guipuzcoa.
May 6--President of Aragonese PP Manuel Gimenez Abad, Zaragoza.
May 24--Newspaper employee Santiago Oleaga Elejabarrieta, San Sebastian.
June 28--Army Gen. Justo Oreja Pedraza, Madrid.
July 10--National policeman Luis Ortiz de la Rosa, Madrid.
July 14--Regional police subchief Mikel Uribe Aurkia and PP city councilman in Leiza Jose Javier Mugica Astibia, Navarra.
Nov. 7--Judge Jose Maria Lidon, Getxo, Vizcaya.
Nov. 23--Regional police officers Ana Isabel Arostegui and Javier Mijangos, Beasain, Guipuzcoa.
2002
March 21--Socialist city councilman Juan Priede Perez, Orio, Guipuzcoa.
Aug. 4--Passers-by Silvia Martinez, aged 6, and Cecilio Gallego Alarias, Santa Pola, Alicante.
Sept. 24--Guardia Civil corporal Juan Carlos Beiro, Leiza, Navarra.
Nov. 17--Guardia Civil Antonio Molina Martin, Madrid.
2003
Feb. 8--Municipal police chief Joseba Pagazaurtundua, Andoain, Guipuzcoa.
May 30--National policemen Bonifacio Martin Hernando and Julian Envit Luna, Sanguesa, Navarra.
Multiple choice question:
The organization that killed these 48 people, ETA, could be best described as:
a) freedom fighters
b) separatist guerrillas
c) nationalist patriots
d) terrorist murderers
If you answered D, you might want to sign the petition demanding that CNN use that very description rather than any of the others.
Monday, March 01, 2004
This is kind of interesting for sports fans. Seems that there's going to be an expansion NBA franchise in Charlotte next year, called the Bobcats, since the Hornets skedaddled off to New Orleans. Bernie Bickerstaff, one of their executives, is touring Europe watching basketball games and keeping a blog--well, it's really a diary since he doesn't link to anything. He's in Spain now. Should you want to see how an NBA exec views Europe and European basketball, it's worth a look. It's off NBA.com, so there's nothing too controversial.
Comment: I think this guy Bickerstaff is fairly typical in his attitudes toward Europe, for a reasonably intelligent American business guy. He prefers to accentuate the positive, he admits he doesn't know much and is willing to learn, and he enjoys the differences between Europe and America without being too critical. I'm going to make a generalization here: American business guys who are successful tend to have pretty open minds. Now, there are a hell of a lot of closed-minded business guys, of course, but not many of those guys manage to adapt when the market changes. Ironically, Americans often get slammed for being ignorant of other places; really, I think that Americans who make it in business are those who are willing to accept, adopt, and adapt the best of other systems.
There, that's a pretty good title for a business book: Accept, Adopt, and Adapt; Making It in the New Globalized Business World. If anybody wants to do the writing, all I want in exchange for the title is the same the agent gets. In cash.
As you undoubtedly know, the Americans and French have sent 450 men into Haiti and Aristide has already left for exile. If this is serious, there are going to be a few hundred guys with guns and machetes from both sides sent to Devil's Island or the Dry Tortugas or somewhere nice like that. There are between 500 and 2200, depending on which Spanish source you're referring to, more American marines either on the way or just off the coast. Now, we don't have UN permission or anything for this (quite justified) military takeover of a Third World country in chaos, but nobody seems to be complaining. Except Jesse Jackson. I do not get the attitude of many American black politicians regarding Haiti.
The Guardia Civil, as you also already know, arrested two vans driving down from France in Cuenca. Each van was driven by one guy; they were both arrested. Turned out they were etarras carrying 536 kilos of explosives in van number two, a huge police haul since ETA isn't known to possess a whole lot of weapons anymore and that loss is a big one. The second van was loaded and ready to go; all the etarras had to do was push the button. It seems that ETA is very weak; they simply don't have enough active terrorists to pull off a whole lot of what they're trying to do. These two guys, for example, were rank amateurs.
Angel Acebes, Minister of Justice, said that Pepelu Carod-Rovira must be happy because the bomb was directed at Madrid rather than Catalonia. Everybody else fired away; Pepelu said Acebes was "miserable" and "shameless", Jose Montilla called him "a liar" and "unscrupulous", Perez Rubalcaba called the whole thing "indecent", and so on. I dunno. Looks to me like Carod got exactly what he wanted out of the Perpignan meeting. You don't have to agree with me. But that's what I think.
We had snow flurries here yesterday; it's been chilly for the past week or so. Yippee skippee. That happens every few years around here.
Well, FC Barcelona is legitimately on a roll, with their sixth consecutive win last night, 2-3 against Deportivo in Riazor. Ronaldinho scored twice and Saviola once. Davids and Cocu are doing very well at funneling enemy attacks into the center of the field where they can be easily stopped by Barca's defense. Youth squadder Oleguer looks like he might have won one of the jobs at central defender, along with Marquez, who is now playing up to snuff. This was another solid win against a good team; Barcelona has beaten, consecutively, Atletico Madrid, Valencia, and Depor, none of which is precisely a pushover. Barca is in fourth place on 46 points, only four behind Depor in third and Valencia in second. Madrid, on 59, is unreachable, of course. Second place is, however, a possibility. Trailing Barca are Athletic Bilbao with 41 and Atletico Madrid with 40.
Comment: I think this guy Bickerstaff is fairly typical in his attitudes toward Europe, for a reasonably intelligent American business guy. He prefers to accentuate the positive, he admits he doesn't know much and is willing to learn, and he enjoys the differences between Europe and America without being too critical. I'm going to make a generalization here: American business guys who are successful tend to have pretty open minds. Now, there are a hell of a lot of closed-minded business guys, of course, but not many of those guys manage to adapt when the market changes. Ironically, Americans often get slammed for being ignorant of other places; really, I think that Americans who make it in business are those who are willing to accept, adopt, and adapt the best of other systems.
There, that's a pretty good title for a business book: Accept, Adopt, and Adapt; Making It in the New Globalized Business World. If anybody wants to do the writing, all I want in exchange for the title is the same the agent gets. In cash.
As you undoubtedly know, the Americans and French have sent 450 men into Haiti and Aristide has already left for exile. If this is serious, there are going to be a few hundred guys with guns and machetes from both sides sent to Devil's Island or the Dry Tortugas or somewhere nice like that. There are between 500 and 2200, depending on which Spanish source you're referring to, more American marines either on the way or just off the coast. Now, we don't have UN permission or anything for this (quite justified) military takeover of a Third World country in chaos, but nobody seems to be complaining. Except Jesse Jackson. I do not get the attitude of many American black politicians regarding Haiti.
The Guardia Civil, as you also already know, arrested two vans driving down from France in Cuenca. Each van was driven by one guy; they were both arrested. Turned out they were etarras carrying 536 kilos of explosives in van number two, a huge police haul since ETA isn't known to possess a whole lot of weapons anymore and that loss is a big one. The second van was loaded and ready to go; all the etarras had to do was push the button. It seems that ETA is very weak; they simply don't have enough active terrorists to pull off a whole lot of what they're trying to do. These two guys, for example, were rank amateurs.
Angel Acebes, Minister of Justice, said that Pepelu Carod-Rovira must be happy because the bomb was directed at Madrid rather than Catalonia. Everybody else fired away; Pepelu said Acebes was "miserable" and "shameless", Jose Montilla called him "a liar" and "unscrupulous", Perez Rubalcaba called the whole thing "indecent", and so on. I dunno. Looks to me like Carod got exactly what he wanted out of the Perpignan meeting. You don't have to agree with me. But that's what I think.
We had snow flurries here yesterday; it's been chilly for the past week or so. Yippee skippee. That happens every few years around here.
Well, FC Barcelona is legitimately on a roll, with their sixth consecutive win last night, 2-3 against Deportivo in Riazor. Ronaldinho scored twice and Saviola once. Davids and Cocu are doing very well at funneling enemy attacks into the center of the field where they can be easily stopped by Barca's defense. Youth squadder Oleguer looks like he might have won one of the jobs at central defender, along with Marquez, who is now playing up to snuff. This was another solid win against a good team; Barcelona has beaten, consecutively, Atletico Madrid, Valencia, and Depor, none of which is precisely a pushover. Barca is in fourth place on 46 points, only four behind Depor in third and Valencia in second. Madrid, on 59, is unreachable, of course. Second place is, however, a possibility. Trailing Barca are Athletic Bilbao with 41 and Atletico Madrid with 40.
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