Feijóo takes refuge in ETA

ETA dissolved in April 2018, eight years ago, and had abandoned armed activity in October 2011, fourteen years ago. Fortunately, it's history. But for the Spanish right, it remains the last resort when sensible and reasonable arguments run out. It doesn't matter that the violence of the terrorist group is a thing of the past and that Basque society, and Spanish society as well, have turned the page. But in the mental universe of the right, increasingly veering towards the extreme, it remains a recurring weapon. Will this unpleasant game ever end? And, turning to another issue, less scandalous but politically just as, if not more, profitable, will the trump card of the most primitive, simplistic, and demagogic anti-Catalanism ever disappear?

The point is that the leader of the PP, Alberto Núñez Feijóo, once again opened ETA's yellowed handbook this Monday to try to escape, with strong language, responsibility for his role during the Valencian floods as the political guarantor of the man who finally resigned – a year after the events. The best defense is always a good offense, even with obsolete weapons, Feijóo must have thought, clearly unwilling to have to explain himself in the Congress of Deputies about the dramatic events of the Valencian Community tragedy, in which 229 people lost their lives.

What will the families of the victims think of such a bitter tone and belligerent attitude from the leader of the main opposition party in Spain and the governing party in the Valencian Community? To conflate, even in passing, the deaths caused by ETA with those of the DANA storm simply demonstrates Feijóo's frivolous lack of sensitivity. In constant competition with the far-right Vox party and the Trumpism of his party colleague and Madrid president, Isabel Díaz Ayuso, the leader of the national PP has once again turned his weak defense into a boundless spectacle. Because, while he was at it, in addition to the ETA victims, he also dragged in the railway chaos, with the Adamuz tragedy and the Gelida accident.

This kind of political showmanship, which seeks headlines and arguments to ignite social media, and which only convinces the already convinced, contributes little to public debate and further alienates citizens from institutions and political parties. It fuels the demagoguery of the far right, a path Feijóo is embracing. Far from assuming responsibility, far from non-aggression pacts on such dramatic issues as the DANA storm or Adamuz, far from seeking consensus and, above all, solutions, the easy way out is to seek the applause of the friendly media by sliding down the slippery slope of aggression. It is the paradigm of anti-politics, the kind that shuns explanations in favor of grandstanding, that spreads suspicion and avoids constructive criticism and honest self-criticism. Perhaps it does wear down Sánchez's government, but it also erodes his own credibility. How far removed is the supposed moderation of his early days.

This is the confrontational and radicalized approach that has taken hold in politics, especially that practiced in Madrid, but not only there. The trend is general, global. Catalonia, of course, is not exempt.