´óÏó´«Ã½

" As they surged onto the street last night they were all for Spain, and they were met by the entire staff of a Pakistani-owned pizza shop called Al Capone's, who surrounded me shouting (in English): "We are Spanish, we are Spanish. We Love Spain!". On the streets where the Catalan flag and language were once repressed, people used both to celebrate the Spanish victory. IN a landscape shaped by inquisition-era Catholicism, gay men leapt around in the fountains wearing only bathing trunks bearing the word "Espana".

Basically, as in the Facebook profile option, "it's complicated" - and there is no going back." (Paul Mason)

What do you expect from a Pakistani-owned pizzeria in Barcelona called Al Capone, Paul .. had you in contrast gone into the Catalan anarchist
pizzeria off Las Ramblas along from Liceu Opera House you'd have got a very different story perhaps .... I remember going in there once and it was made very clear that I would have to wait 90 minutes for my pizza as there was a match in progress ....

Watch that space!

Hope we in Scotland are going to see this report .... seems Newsnight is all about healthcare in England which is of course devolved in Scotland!

Bring on the football .... book Mason into Barcelona for another night -
and research this story more thoroughly before broadcasting it tomorrow?

I recommend a late-night OB live-link to La Paloma - wonderful Catalan barrio community dancehall with 10-piece live jazz band off Las Ramblas.

Hope you find it .... if not ask someone Catalan in your local fountain!

I think you will find that the UK economy has also been based on two decades of cheap credit, property speculation and growth.

It still is.

In fact, as the Chinese housing bubble is now mid-pop, the UK is left alone of all the property bubble nations in not popping its bubble.

In UK shops you can now no longer get past a check-out again without someone asking you if you want a credit card.

Meanwhile, the near zero interest rates on savings means that the Govt and BOE are trying to force anyone with cash to go out and spend or speculate.

With typical Anglo-Saxon superiority, and latitude, we love to look down on those in the Med and put down all their problems to the heat, their Mediterranean background and their need to cover most of their food in olive oil and garlic. But Spain's economic problems are the same as our economic problems - the only difference is that most of us don't realise it yet.

Oh, and they know how to play football.

'IN a landscape shaped by inquisition-era Catholicism, gay men leapt around in the fountains wearing only bathing trunks bearing the word "Espana".

Basically, as in the Facebook profile option, "it's complicated" - and there is no going back.'

-------------------------

Steady on Paul!....do you still follow Jordan (aka Katie Price) on Twitter?

Meanwhile, back in 'a landscape shaped by episcopalian England' we in Newsnight Scotland land were treated to an earnest discussion between
the philosopher John Haldane from St Andrews, the former Labour spin-
doctor John McTernan, and a lady from the Catholic press in Scotland
to a riveting discussion of The Act of Settlement .... instead of the
gay vicars and fountain story so thoughtfully prepared from Catalonia.

There were some interesting points raised: eg the irony of Westminster
discrimination against Catholics marrying into the British royal family
not having been repealed by the Labour Government (despite the promises)
even though other legislation affecting Catholic institutions was pushed
through by the last Government on grounds of equal opportunities for all;
and a wry suggestion from historian Tom Devine that the discussion would
go tabloid if either of the 2 English princes 'fancied a Catholic girl'.

But having watched Queen Sophia of Spain jumping up and down at the cup final the revival of English football demands that the sooner someone in
Buck House finds a Spanish princess to play the role of James Cordon the
better ....

Curiously though no one mentioned the Declaration of Arbroath which allows us in Scotland to fire the manager if she doesn't perform ..
That of course took the form of a letter to The Pope - in Avignon!

As Paul Mason says: 'it is complicated'!

/history/scottishhistory/independence/features_independence_arbroath.shtml

"It's complicated": as in new (out of the religious closet) Catholic convert Tony Blair lecturing Pope Benedict on gay rights, whilst ignoring his own breaches of "Thou shalt not kill."

''There is something wierdly consistent.... I can't work out what it is.

And you never will, I suspect you have not recognised the sentiment correctly, the word is not 'consistent' it is probably something more like 'progressive', it possibly feels 'consistent' because it instills a sense of 'rightness' in you which is often associated with feelings of 'home' and stability.


That is my theory anyway, swap 'consistent' for 'progressive' and you have your answer...and yes that does include the catholic thing too.


Howard webb has been hard done by in the criticism of him, he has a track record of being reluctant to send people off early in major finals so as not to spoil the contest, the players who have spent time in the premiership would have been well aware of that, which makes their display all the more cynical and desperate to use Howards good intentions against him and the game itself. Thank goodness they lost and good riddance.

As for the Spanish economy, as you say, they are a net exporter of food and are reasonably self sufficient with the potential to be much more so,have a solid manufacturing base, a reasonable population level and lots of nice beaches, weather and tourists too.

In other words it does not matter what the banks do..ultimately Spain is in a far better position than the UK. A past blogger on here and expat living in Spain (Vegetable Patch) once mentioned that the unemployment figures were a bit deceptive for Spain. In hard times many people just go back to the land, pull out the weeds from the family plot and let the world get on with its own recession while they grow tomatoes to eat (or throw at each other for fun), make a little wine... re-invogorate a local festival.

In football as in Economics we are the ones in trouble here.

Nobody mention the 20% unemployment - an inconvenient fact amidst all the EUphoria. A period of sober reflection on Spain's true economic prospects will hopefully soon follow.

#8

A great deal of the offcial 20% are actively employed on the black market. Never mind waiters and the like, even for semi professional posts the preference is often for a full time job on a 'nod and a wink' reduced salary while still claiming state support...good for everyone...except the banks who want the money they lent to the government back...but who cares about that bunch of greedy irresponsible gits?

Also as mentioned in #7 above many 'unemployed' simply go back to working their own or their parents small holdings. They can sustain themselves and what the state provides is a bit of disposable income only.

in Spain officially 20% unofficialy probably more like 10% or much less in the summer

as oppose to the UK

officially 7% unofficially, taking into account state supported 'economically inactive, incapacity benefit and students on 'non' courses' more like 20%...

Who is in trouble here again watriler?

Perhaps the Catalans were cheering the team on because 7 of them on the pitch play for Barcelona, and perhaps some of the others might have been locals.

In footballing terms, it is historically very difficult to have a successful team if the town/region is doing economically badly. Generally a depressed town has a depressed team. Spain's success bucks the trend. Italy, Portugal, England, Greece, (Ireland/France) all had a bad tournament and have lousy prospects. Maybe Spain are living in denial just now.

freedom for Catalan...that will be the cry and has been for years, you only have to walk down the Ramblas to have numerous petitions thrust into your face to realise that the seven Catalans who helped win the World Cup for Spain(and richly deserved) the wounds of the Spanish Civil War are still very real and although you can argue 'we must move on' you cannot move on while great wrongs have still to be addressed. They may have unemployment going through the roof but today and for the next weeks they celebrate and I wish them well and hope they can still play the best football in the next tournament unlike the thuggish Dutch and boring English...Viva Espana

Oh wake up, grow up or whatever.

Yawn

Never thought I would find myself doing this but....

to quote jaunty cyclist from another blog.

...California is tightening faster than Greece. State workers have seen a 14pc fall in earnings this year due to forced furloughs. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger is cutting pay for 200,000 state workers to the minimum wage of $7.25 an hour to cover his $19bn (£15bn) deficit.

Can Illinois be far behind? The state has a deficit of $12bn and is $5bn in arrears to schools, nursing homes, child care centres, and prisons. "It is getting worse every single day," said state comptroller Daniel Hynes. "We are not paying bills for absolutely essential services.

Republicans on Capitol Hill are filibustering a bill to extend the dole for up to 1.2m jobless facing an imminent cut-off. Dean Heller from Nevada called them "hobos". This really is starting to feel like 1932. ..

I would think that this sort of thing would welcome a bit of the Paul Mason treatment and analysis once you have finished your rather convenient trip to Spain to comment on ahem....'spanish banking'.

The baltic dry is still dropping like a stone as well and even UK estate agents are predicting house prices to GO DOWN !!!, but global stockmarkets are up up up.

What the heck is going on???

What is that 'volatility index' thingy saying at the moment?

This is funny:

☺

âš¡âš¡âš¡âš¡ But this is serious, although it shows that however bad things are here, they could be worse. Few of our politicians are quite so stupid or dishonest:









⚡⚡⚡⚡ ☹

A nations footballing success is unfortunately very transient and has little or no bearing on a countries long-term economic growth as is shown by Spains' Euro 2008 win two years previous or Greece back in 2004.

..at best it provides brief emotional respite and enjoyment from the misery.

Spain 'relying on short-term funding' as councils go bust


"I am deeply ashamed to know that I won't be able to pay our staff. They have got mortgages, children. What am I supposed to do?" said Jesus Manuel Ampero, mayor of Cenicientos, near Madrid. "We were not able to cover our payroll in June. Neither I nor our councillors have received anything for two years. I've had two heart attacks. My health is cracking. If we cannot solve this, I'm resigning."

I am still waiting to hear of a single UK Council firing just ONE person let alone the thousands that, supposedly, each and every Council will have to get rid of between now and the end of 2011.

I know 400 jobs have gone from the QUANGO BECTU but what about the other 599,600? Or is that, according to today's figures, another 719,600?

It is 'great' here in Wales at the moment.

The Welsh Assembly is going into a slow-motion melt-down and it is turning into more fun than watching the bi-annual event of England playing Germay in a major football tournament. More popcorn. They were refusing to make any cuts this year but the penny has now dropped, seemingly only this week, that there is an Assembly election next year - and firing tens of thousands of people in 2011 is not good for votes! Doh!

Meanwhile, ´óÏó´«Ã½ Wales is seemingly solely focussed on whether there will be a referendum in next May's election for more powers for the Assembly to force the Welsh language, whether they want it or not, onto private sector businesses.

So, in the midst of what is Great Depression II a country which has virtually no private sector business, and which should be bending over backwards to bring in business and jobs, is obsessing on something that will inevitably only alienate and drive away the private sector. You couldn't make it up!

It is truly like living in some La-La Land banana republic situated somewhere between Oz and Wonderland. But then Wonderland only had one Mad Hatter!

Welsh nationalists have often looked dreamily at Catalonia wishing that Wales had the same level of independence. Oddly enough, many in Wales often look at the Welsh nationalists wishing that we had the same level of independence from North West Wales.

At least Catalonia has the works of Picasso, Gaudi and Dali. Oh, and a great football team.

Moving on...

This BP - Megrahi lobbying thing. Tis a great example of how low down and filthy the whole geopolitical thing often is beneath the smiling faces and photo opportunities the G20 and the like engage in. It makes your skin crawl.

Firstly BP probably did whisper in a few peoples ears with a commercial interest in mind for contracts in Libya, pretty disgusting in itself..if you believe Megrahi is guilty while you are doing it.

The actions of the UK (Scottish) government at the time with their dubious diagnosis from a non specialist doctor to get Megrahi out, rather than have to conceed defeat in an appeal..also pretty disgusting.

Megrahi still lives.....


Megrahi was due an appeal, from the evidence I saw presented in the media he would probably have won. There is, in fact, serious doubts over his conviction and the involvement of Libya even. Megrahi being freed was probably an impalatable option for the US (even if he is innocent) one suspects. They would then have to look into who really did it, you always get the sense from the rhetoric that comes out of the US on this that they do not want to look for anyone else.

Iran are actually the favourites to have carried out the Lockerbie atrocity, but a war in the middle east at that time (which would surely have been the result) was not something the US wanted.. where would it get its Crude oil from to feed its petro addiction? Libya was very convenient in that respect.

Perhaps aligning all this to the mysterious shooting down of an unarmed Iranian passenger jet over the persian gulf by a high tech US warship 'by accident' a year or so after lockerbie is a step too far but ..who knows?

A nation which can drop nuclear bombs on people to make a point (a single demonstaration off-shore would have been enough) may not be averse to shooting a passenger jet out of the sky to send a message to the real perpetrators of the lockerbie crime?..An eye for an eye..but let Libya take the fall for the sake of security of oil supply.

Fast forward to 2010 and US senators are pusuing BP for lobbying for megrahi's release.

Shakespear in his darkest mood could not have come up with a more riveting compelling and inciteful storyline examining the darker side of humanity than the potential story given above.

Except the story above well, could it have some truth in it?

Lets face it, with complicity in torture, the whole premise for the iraq invasion and hiroshima and nagasaki to consider as a track record is it really that 'ridiculous' a theory?

I wonder what the senators in the US baying for BP's blood (or assests anyway) would make of it. Is anyone lobbying them I wonder?


It would be a good one for Michael Moore to pick up on.


I am going to hug my kids and actively make an effort to convince myself that the above is all just fantastical crazy conspiracy theorist type mumbo jumbo.

Jericoa: -

You have got it mixed up. The wrong way around.

Iran Air Flight 655, also known as IR655, was a civilian airliner shot down by US missiles on 3 July 1988, over the Strait of Hormuz.

Pan Am Flight 103 was Pan American World Airways' third daily scheduled transatlantic flight from London Heathrow Airport to New York's John F. Kennedy International Airport. On Wednesday 21 December 1988, the aircraft flying this route—a Boeing 747-121 named Clipper Maid of the Seas—was destroyed by a bomb, killing all 243 passengers and 16 crew members.

Both were/are tragedies.

Tragedies for the lost lives on board both aircraft. Tragedies for the families and loved ones left behind.

I think the US intelligence agencies regularly screw things up and are notorious for causing more problems than existed before they stick their oar in - and it usually ends up in vast numbers of lost lives from Vietnam to Chile to, well, stick a pin on a map.

Are they inherently evil? No, of course not.

Are they often misguided, sometimes incompetent? Sadly, yes.

I think the question that needs to be asked is why the British feel the need to go it alone in talks, presumably about oil and gas, with Libya when, for 60 years, the Anglo-American deal has been for the US and Britain to share oil resources?

Is it perhaps that, in Iraq, the Americans have basically shut the British out completely?

Or is it, like Hollywood does in Cinema, easier to have a go at and put blame on your closest ally as your friend will not plant bombs on your planes, will not plant bombs on your trains and tubes? Will not cause you the harm that you fear from the wacky and evil regimes?

In 1988 the Soviet Union was still in existence. The US military was nearing its post-WW2 height after 8 years of spending by Ronald Reagan but, with a Soviet Union on the Caspian Sea, how the great powers looked at Iran was entirely different to today.

What happened in 1998 was towards the end of a huge war in the Middle East, of war in Lebanon, of US Marines being killed in their hundreds in Beirut, of hostages being taken, held and killed. Of a prominent CIA operative being kidnapped and repeatedly tortured over many months - tapes of his torture being sent to the US almost monthly - in Beirut. Of mines being laid in the Gulf and of speed-boats machine-gunning oil tankers.

For some reason, people seem to have forgotten what was going on in those years.

#19

Hmmm, I should rely on my memory less. Thanks for taking the time to put me right.

Apologies for that..im not a pro (obviously) I feel a bit embarrased ...serves me right...will be more careful in future.

That said, chronological order aside the sentiment remains the same, just in reverse order.

There is something not right about the Megrahi thing, from the initial conviction through to the extraordinary circumstances of his release and the US seemingly orchestrated over reaction to it feels like an attempt to stop anyone looking for anyone else.

It seems pretty obvious that his release was more to do with the pending appeal and what the likely result of that would be rather than any health issues he had and compassion for him, the longer he lives the more obvious that becomes.


I suspect some interests in the US will not be happy that politicians are opening this up again as part of the BP witch hunt, an unexpected outcome of an earlier witch hunt of their own.


What goes around comes around.

Jericoa and Tawse57

After years of investigation, in 2001 Private Eye published a special report into the Lockerbie bombing, concluding that the culprit was Syria and not Libya, but that for diplomatic reasons partly connected to the middle-east "peace" process, it was more convenient to blame Gaddaffi et al.

It's available as a (paid) digital download from their website.

Here are some references to it:

.

BTW @17 I sympathise. I'm from Middlesbrough originally, but now live in Pembrokeshire. Like my steel-worker grandad from up north I sing in the local male voice choir. However, my biggest mistake politically, was voting for the Welsh Assembly in the referendum, something a majority of my native-born Pembs neighbours did not.

Our secondary schools are £300 per pupil worse off than in England, because the Assembly Government retains the difference to spend, at least partly, on cultural coercion.

Recently a local Gog (Northwalian) junior school headmistress wrote to the parents: "At this school we are proud of our Celtic heritage..." many of these parents have old Pembrokeshire Viking surnames, and live in places which also have Norse names.

Of course, as in the Arab world, there's difference between language/culture and genes. In Gwynedd in particular, the language is P-Celtic, but the genes are predominantly pre-Celtic, more akin to Basque. There are plenty of Celtic genes in England. What unites most of the indigenous inhabitants of Britain is that, predominantly, we speak a language developed from that of those who conquered our ancestors at some point, whilst contributing rather less to the gene pool than is generally believed.

Yes "It's complicated" :-)

A "small" correction: I am reliably informed that my figure of a £300 per capita disparity in funding between English and Welsh secondary schools was too low. In the last financial year, the figure was just under £500, making a difference of £600 000 to my local secondary school.

Teaching of Welsh has expanded, but other modern languages have declined, in fact, German has disappeared. Separate sciences for the most able at GCSE have also gone.

But when the school makes unpopular spending decisions, the regional Plaid AM is always available to be photographed with parents protesting at the consequences of her own party's policies. As journalistic legend Sir John Junor used to say: "Pass the sick bag Alice!"

Sasha: -

Wales is a slow motion car crash happening before our eyes. There is little to do now other than relax and hope the impact will not be as bad as we all think it will be.

We have had 28 years of massive amounts of money - billions - being targeted at Welsh language QUANGOs with a very small number of the same old faces, IMPO, becoming very wealthy in Wales as a result.

There has been no way to speak out against this because the Broadcasters in Wales, IMPO, are so dominated by Welsh speakers. It is cultural apatheid. It does not get even noticed in England, especially within the ´óÏó´«Ã½ at London where they ludicrously believe that the vast majority of Welsh people speak Welsh - which is far, far, from the reality - and that the ´óÏó´«Ã½ is somehow being 'hip' in its cultural diversity. In fact, it is, I strongly believe, oppressing the vast majority of Welsh people who only speak English and who are fed up to the back team with the Taffia and the Welsh language.

I strongly believe that if what has gone on in Wales since 1982 had been going on in a region of England then both Newsnight and Panorama would have been knocking down doors to expose things.

Each and every one of us could probably write a long list of believed abuses revolving around the Welsh language and the perceivement of Welsh speakers gaining favour in the workplace. Several Welsh speaking friends of mine also think it is digusting, divisive and a huge waste of money - but then they are not part of the Taffia. It is an exclusive club is it not?

In plain economic terms, Wales is now backed into a corner where there is virtually no private sector industry within Wales, where Wales can no longer afford to pay companies to come to Wales via grants and where we have about 70% of the work-force in a hugely bloated public sector. It is reaching the point of economic check-mate.

30 years of angsting over whether there are Welsh words for jalfrezi, korma, taxi, bus etc, etc. Never mind, throw loads of money at it - public money.

30 years of spending billions - yes, billions - on TV programmes that have audiences so small that they are technically zero (Nice, very well paid work if you can get it.) and in sending out every publc sector document in Welsh even to parts of Wales with little or no history of spoken Welsh has just been, depending on your point of view, one giant folly... or one giant gravy train.

It has not created a dynamic, vibrant private sector for Wales. It has not created a Welsh financial sector. It will not create a Welsh Microsoft or Google or even has that on the radar. It has not even made people elsewhere on the planet even aware of the existence of a country called Wales.

Meanwhile, house prices in many parts of Cardiff, Swansea, the Vale of Glamorgan and Pembs now rival the prices paid in the commutting belts around London. All buoyed up by public sector workers believing that they have a job for life, then a massive pay-off before a fat pension.

Wales is in doo doo land - which makes a change from Laa Laa Land. I genuinely fear for the economic future of the Welsh people.