Corruption in the Catalan government

El País eleva a 1,4 millones los pagos que hizo la Generalidad en 2007 a personas afines.

Libertad Digital (29/03/2008)

It seems that andalusian and extremeno people are not the only ones that know how to waste the money hardly earned by the Spanish workers and enterpreneurs.

As explained in the article above in Libertad Digital, the Catalan government also accomplishes successfully what the political class does better: wasting and misappropriating the money of the taxpayers. Please read and open your eyes to how corrupt all governments are if citizens give them any opportunity.

As I know that lots of you will simply ignore whatever appears in the "right-wing" papers, please do not hesitate to check out the mentioned article in El Pais. Since it is a socialist paper, it is much more forgiving with the offenders (former friends!!) and it does not explicitely recognise that the problem starts with the overgrowth of the government, but at least its ironic beginning is a step in the right direction.

La Generalitat de Cataluña tiene 140.000 funcionarios, más de 200 empleados eventuales y otros tantos altos cargos. Sin embargo, tanto personal parece insuficiente para que el Ejecutivo logre organizarse y proyectar su imagen externa. El Pais (29/03/2008)

We should fight our corrupt governments and the most efficient way is by reducing the burden of a government to the strictly necessary. I shall do it.

Love and freedom.

Atonement

When I am dead, and the Marshalls are dead, and the novel is
finally published, we will only exist as inventions. Briony will be as much of a fantasy as the lovers who shared a bed in Balham and enraged their landlady. No one will care what events and which individuals were misrepresented to make a novel. I know there's always a certain kind of reader who will be compelled to ask, But what really happened? The answer is simple: the lovers survive and flourish. As long as there is a single copy, a solitary typescript of my final draft, then my spontaneous, fortuitous sister and her medical prince survive to love.

Ian McEvan, Atonement (2001)

I have not written for a good couple of weeks, since the new disappointment
at the Spanish elections, half because I have been pretty busy at work and
half because I have no easy access to the internet during the Holy Week.

Nevertheless, I had time to read and I got round to finish Atonement by Ian McEwan at Easter. It is a truly moving story.

I’ll wait for you was elemental. It was the reason he had survived. It was the ordinary way of saying she would refuse all other men. Only you. Come back.

Reading Atonement has shown me that I still have a long way to go to become a good novelist. And that it is very unlikely that I ever be a great writer. However, that doesn't mean that I should give up writing. Gift, dedication, patience and luck are all necessary. In Briony's words:

How can a novelist achieve atonement when, with her absolute power of deciding outcomes, she is also God? There is no one, no entity or higher form that she can appeal to, or be reconciled with, or that can forgive her. There is nothing outside her. In her imagination she has set the limits and the terms. No atonement for God, or novelists, even if they are atheists/. It was always an impossible task, and that was precisely the point. The attempt was all.

Love and freedom.

My favourite book

My favourite book is The Never-Ending Story by the great German writer Michael Ende.

I have the Spanish version of the book at home, I have read it 5 or 6 times; I prepared a work on it at high school; I have laughed, cried, feared and loved with it. It sparked my love for the world of the thought and unseen (Fantasy, ideas, dreams); it put the foundations for the philosophy of a very curious yet introspective boy.

However, I wish I could read it in German: Die Unendliche Geschichte. Sounds deep, doesn't it?

Love and freedom.

Vote for Sahara, kick PSOE out

The Saharawi people don't want Morocco supporters to win the Spanish elections. I can't believe I have found a post on the very same first reason that sparked my antagonism towards PSOE. PSOE sold their values as soon as it reached the government in 1982. They said that "One hundred years of honesty" backed them (I'd put it in doubt), but definitely when they got the power they thought: "but not a single one year more!".

I would be glad to see that the Saharawi people realised that Spanish left won't help them as PSOE is just a follower of France policy (which defends its colony Morocco) and IU supported RASD while USSR stood (now that the Saharawi cause is of little use in the fight against capitalism, all the support that United Left (IU) provides consists barely of a couple of food-loaded trucks a year).

Spain still is the responsible for the sovereignity and management of Western Sahara. Spain should enforce the referendum for Western Sahara and the Saharawi people should be given the option to resume their union with Spain as Autonomous Region. They are our brothers.

Love and freedom.

Vote today, kick him out

Spaniards thought that former Prime Minister Aznar lied or got it wrong 4 years ago when the 11-M blasts and his party (PP) was ousted. Incumbent Prime Minister Zapatero lied and got it wrong these years with regards to the ETA killings: his party (PSOE) should be kicked out of government. Don't you think it's fair?

Love and freedom.

ETA kills again

My condolences to late Isaias Carrasco's family. Requiescat in pace.

ETA is a terrorist band of coward bastards, their members should all be in prison for the rest of their lives and the Spaniards should rise and fight them to the victory of

Love and Freedom.

Conversation of two classmates

From: myaccount@hotmail.com
To: myclassmate@hotmail.com
Subject: Election time
Date: Tue, 4 Mar 2008 22:09:56 +0100

Dear All,

If you are mad enough to re-read the ZP-Rajoy debates in English:

http://abrevaderos.blogspot.com/2008/02/notas-del-debate-round-1.html
http://abrevaderos.blogspot.com/2008/03/notes-of-debate-round-2.html

No, I'm not bored. I work, eat, drink, read, play football, go clubbing, watch films, and enjoy my time. In fact, I barely sleep the days I blog. The only things I don't do is watching TV (excluding the debates) and wasting my time with computer games.

Love and freedom!
Borja


++++++++++++++++

From: Jose Julio Caparros (myclassmate@hotmail.com)
To: myaccount@hotmail.com
Subject: Election time
Date: Saturday, March 08, 2008 9:06:29 AM

¿A quién vas a votar Lopo? Eres un líder de masas. Ilumínanos! ¿Ni siquiera lo del matrimonio gay te ha convencido? Mira que nunca se sabe...


+++++++++++++++


I'm no mass leader, my friend. I don't know whether you read my post on Russia's ideologies: I am against any sort of Warlordism ("caudillismo") or demagogy (style quite commonly used by politicians who try to win support by using arguments based on emotion rather than reason and which converts them - people with no particularly great ideas - into mass leaders).

I am a libertarian ("liberal" in the sense given in Spanish from Spain - rather than 'libertario' as explained here). I support a somewhat limited form of government (further information here), leaning towards minarchism.

There are no proper libertarian political parties in Spain with which I fully agree, though there are sort of libertarian currents in some parties, such as in Union, Progreso y Democracia (UPyD), Ciudadanos-Partido de la Ciudadania (C's), Partido Popular (PP). That is why I don't ask people to vote for a specific party, but I do ask you not to vote for the anti-libertarian parties, such as PSOE, IU, CIU, PNV, ERC, BNG, Falanges (the last 4 are are national-socialists), Los Verdes, Partido Comunista, Partido Antitaurino, Partido Carlista, Partido Humanista, etc.

JJ, what does your "does not even the gay marriage convince you?" mean? PSOE and Zapatero have done hundreds of things wrong, and just a few of them well. I am in favour of a gay civil partnership in the UK style (enacted with far less scorn for the dissenters). Fortunately in Spain gays and other minorities can now live with no great risk for their lives just for the fact of being a minority (although physical and verbal attacks still occur and I condemn/fight them).

However, lots of citizens who defend Spain still need bodyguards and PSOE's dealings with ETA have not helped them. No negotiation should be held with ETA other than to decide how they are going to destroy all their weapons after ETA having surrendered with absolutely no economical, political or juridical concession by Spain.

Furthermore, PSOE have shown an anti-libertarian or disgusting behaviour in any other field. There is a list of reasons not to vote PSOE (some of which I'd re-phrase).

For these National elections, among the list of options, there are two new parties (UPyD and C's) with some libertarian characteristics and chances to reach the Congress. I think that lots of PSOE voters in the last elections would do better voting any of those two parties.

I'd like to see the anti-libertarian power (socialists and anti-freedom nationalists) reduced.

Hope this answers your question, JJ.

Love and freedom.