FLATTER
A well-known banker in this country explains the suggestion an advisor gave him before his first meeting with a well-known president of this country: "Fuck up on him a lot, and when you're done, start again." Perhaps no one is immune to the effects of flattery, but in the current political scene, it has become a genre in itself. The effect of flattery is proportional to the vanity of the flattered, which in the case of Donald Trump borders on pathology. When the environment isn't obsequious enough, he is the one who congratulates himself on his big, beautiful policies and his vast encyclopedic knowledge.
We don't know if NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte intended to corrupt the judgment of the powerful US president by sucking up to him to get him to join the Atlantic comedy or if he actually believes it. In this case, it doesn't matter. Rutte needed a successful summit, to keep all the square Atlanticists in the path of the commander-in-chief, and that's all it will take, because practically no one will be able to meet the 5% spending target. The data is overwhelming. While Germany's spending is 2.12% of GDP, France's 2.6%, and Denmark's 2%, Belgium and Spain are around 1.3%, two-tenths less than Italy. In the East, on the other hand, physically closer to Russian imperialism, the three Baltic states exceed 3%, and Poland, 4%.
Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez made a virtue out of necessity and saved the continuity of his government by wrapping himself in a social-democratic rhetoric defending the welfare state. In fact, Spain is a more strategic partner due to its geographical location than its weapons capacity, and Sánchez had more advantages in distancing himself than in following suit and then figuring out how to default, which seems to be what will happen in extraordinarily indebted countries like France or Italy.
AMNESTY
The Constitutional Court's ruling (it all began with you) upholding the amnesty law passed in Congress doesn't close the Catalan question because it neither returns the exiles nor does it yet bring an end to the Catalan independence crisis, as some enthusiastically claim. The objective was twofold: to resolve a political impasse that threatened the legislature and to provide a tangible response to a decade of repression and judicialization. The Constitutional Court has validated the ruling, but the battle continues between the courts. There is a Spain—established in the aesthetics of permanent indignation—that has seen this ruling as yet another capitulation. It is Spain itself that has for years confused unity with immobility, and the law with revenge. But there is also a Catalonia that needs to reexamine its own epic: not every reparation is a victory, and not every concession is humiliation.
The amnesty is the result of a pact of mutual survival. Pedro Sánchez pushed for it in order to govern, and the independence movement pushed for it in order to breathe. The upcoming debate is no longer about legality. It's about politics. Can the independence movement reinvent itself without the constraints of judicial persecution? Can Catalonia explain itself, beyond symbolism, and truly advance self-governance? Can the PSOE deliver on its promise of a diverse Spain without falling into the state anxiety of Felipe González's administration? This isn't the first time—nor will it be the last—that the former president has crushed Pedro Sánchez and accuses him of having abandoned his founding values. He calls reconciliation with Catalonia a surrender and interprets the Constitution as his own work to which he retains the key. González represents the Transition, that obsolete founding pact. Today's amnesty bothers him not because it is illegal, but because it alters his work and his idea of Spain.
FUNDING
Sánchez's idea of a federalizing Spain will be put to the test with the negotiation of the Catalan financing system. Once again. The Cerdán case has set the Socialists and Republicans working, fully aware that the countdown to the legislative period has begun after weeks of impasse without any progress on the key figure. That is, the increase in resources to be injected into the new system; in the 2009 system, it was 11 billion euros. The bilateral meeting on the 14th will result in an agreement on the foundations of the financing model and an agreement to specify the progressive collection of personal income tax by the Catalan Tax Agency, with deadlines that could technically exceed the legislative period.
The negotiations focus on strengthening the ordinality in a clean manner; incorporating specific transfers from the Generalitat into the system and, therefore, ensuring its updating; improving the regulatory scope of the Generalitat; and reforming the laws necessary to make this possible. The complexity of the negotiations has multiplied, but at the same time, the negotiators share a more pragmatic vision, and both sides believe they are more trustworthy. The difficulties include not only the crisis within the PSOE (Spanish Socialist Workers' Party) and the candidacy of the Minister of Finance for the Andalusian presidency, when an early election by Juan Manuel Moreno Bonilla could derail it. There is also a majority from the Sánchez administration, which is increasingly difficult to regain and is necessary for the approval of the legal framework. As always, the big Catalan issue is none other than financing.
