šŸ‡ŖšŸ‡ø The Pain In Spain

Weā€™ll be in Seville on Fridayā€¦donā€™t think Iā€™ll need a hard hat but might take one just in case they donā€™t appreciate my Barcelona footie shirt.

The Civil War wasnā€™t a regional war so location didnā€™t have any real bearing.

Technicallly correct LITSL but if most areas of Catalonia were communist and the other areas of the country facist this may have some bearing on what we are seeing today.

Or not as the case may be.

ā€¦ meanwhile in my idealist brain I once again question this the whole issue of borders - all of which are artificial and pointless in the grand scheme of thingsā€¦ Its only our small brainā€™s inabilty to percieve time in more than 2 or 3 generations that makes us all about the ā€˜nowā€™ as opposed to recognising how these issues stem for maybe 500 years of shit created by arseholes on a planet that is 4.5bn years old. Even 1000 years is too small a unitā€¦ so much shit, pain, fuck ups, hate, obession with nationality for what? seriously? So that a few selfish cunts get to lord it up over others for s few years and think of themselves as special.

Where are the fucking cool as fuck aliens teaching us how ridiculous we are when you need em?

Selfish alien cunts and their foreign cultureā€¦ not coming down here, telling us what to doā€¦

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Iā€™ve been trying to tell everyone about this for the 500 years Iā€™ve been here.

Nobody listens. :lou_facepalm_2:

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Not going to comment on the scenes, more an observation that is important and worrying.

People are fed up with ā€œPolitical Eliteā€ across the enture planet. Equally, regions, zones, districts do not believe they get fair representation or at worse feel their resources are being ā€œrapedā€.

The issue in Spain is long standing, Catalunya is a wealthy ā€œstateā€ on their own.

But then we had Scotland pushing for Independence, we had the Basques in Northern Spain, rumbles in Italy from the northern powerhourses, obviously the disintegration of the former Yugoslavia.

There is also a parallel problem ongoing in Northern Iraq. With ISIS being pushed out, and with the Peshmerga initially leading the fightback, the authorities in Erbil felt emboldened to hold their own (Illegal) referendum on independence. That has led to a blockade, has drawn Turkey and Iran into the mix (with massive Kurdish minorities)

Nation States and the Elite MUST face up to their failings (they wonā€™t) these ā€œcausesā€ will continue to spread, The Elite will say that the Democratic Vote was illegal.

Personally I cannot see this going away anywhere soon. Next on the list comes Ethnic Cleansing (as we see in Myanmar) where any popssoble enclave is dealt with before they become a problem.

It is VERY bad to see this violence, it is stupid to have got into this situation, but then when has any member of the Elite shown intelligence in recent times?

This is going to get worse, not better.

And anyway, IF they cede from Spain, who the hell are Barca going to play every week?

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Next up. Liberate Cornwall!

There is a real danger in labels - ā€˜political eliteā€™ is not a term I feel is appropriate, because as we see in the US, simply removing one set of the more established political bench, the void is typoically filled with a different elite - one fuelled by even more self interest and yet without more traditional checks and balances as they convince the ignorant of their anti-establishment credentials. Trump is just another side of the same industrial/political coin, only more of a cunt.

Its the biggest con yet and we play into their hands by using their terminology, whether in ā€˜smashing the political elite or systemā€™- when its no such thing.

labels such as this present the public with a ā€˜falseā€™ target - an aim in removing the ā€˜establishmentā€™ or people (to be replaced by another established bunch of fuckers) as opposed to focussing on policy. Its a deception by those who know that if they can get electorate to believe that everything shit in their lives is down to a set group of people including the stuff that they themselves are responible for, its an easy victory, and one in which tehir own agenda and policy can be introduced with little opposition or indeed focus on itā€¦ Trump can just dismiss attacks on his policy, racism and prejudice with ā€˜false newsā€™ and the ignorant lapit up, because they now see him as not part of the establishmentā€¦ when he is. Its the same elsewhere and one of the scariest things in 21st century politics as we are just replacing self interested politicians with thsoe that are even more self interested yet without the political and diplomatic skills to deal with the the ever increasing complexities and challenges between nations and idology.

I just dont see this as anything to celebrate

  1. I donā€™t celebrate it.

  2. Any better definition?

The obnoxious lying self serving shits that believe we need to be ruled? would that do? Or do I label them the Neo Libs or Rothschilds or Masons? But basically the cunts who care only about their interests and not the wealth or wishes of the people.

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Really horrifying, upsetting scenes.

I spend a fair amount of time in Barcelona. Iā€™ve been there 2 - 5 times every year since 2011. Itā€™s come to feel like a second home, where I often work, travel, relax and have made friends both in and out of work.

As a result, there was a lot of images and videos been shared on my social media that were 1st hand. People I know, and their relatives were caught up on the troubles, itā€™s really not nice.

The Spanish govt. have made a fucking borls up of this whole thing. The point of the vote was not to gain Independence, it was to secure and strengthen the autonomy the existing Catalunya govt had.

The rivalry between Catalunya and Madrid is centuries long, and the populist local govt of Catalunya has been at odds with the Central Govt for a while.

If the govt in Madrid had not caused such a stink about this, it would have been no where near as big a problem. There actually isnā€™t (perhaps wasnā€™t may be a better word for this now, recent events may have shifted the needle a bit) that great an appetite for independence in the region. That wonā€™t be shown in the ballot boxes, for obvious reasons, but if everyone were to vote, it would be a comfortable No.

As has been mentioned, the Catalunya region is very wealthy, it has an economy about the same size as the whole of Portugal. A large part of the push for independence is coming from those that feel they donā€™t want to pay for the poorer parts of Spain.

The focus here should be on the actions of the Spanish governement, which have been shocking. National leaders should be queueing up to condemn Spainā€™s treatment of itā€™s own citizens. Jumpin on this as a stick to beat the EU with is daft, and shows a pretty transparent agenda.

Itā€™s particularly rather odd to see those that criticise the EU for being too meddlesome and overbearing with National matters now criticising that same body for not being quick enough to meddle.

And as for welcoming the police brutality as some sort of sick burn on the libs, all that does is demonstrate what a mewling, dithering fucking idiot you are. And a hypocrite to boot.

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@krg_ Catalan regional leader Carles Puigdemont has said they had a 42.3% turnout with 90% of those who did vote voting for independence.

More than 2.2 million people were reported to have voted, according to Catalan authorities, out of 5.3 million registered voters. Just under 90% of those who voted backed independence, they said.

A Catalan spokesman said more than 750,000 votes could not be counted because polling stations were closed and urns were confiscated.

One does wonder if, given the circumstances, only those wanting independence made the effort to voteā€¦

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The EU canā€™t support a split, what next Corsica? Thats the next real large independence movement in Europe, but also Soith Tyrol, the Basque region and a few others, the EU is a large bloc movement so canā€™t have or support splits at all regardless of readmission.

Absolutely.

That is sort of what I was getting at, but I can see I wasnā€™t very clear in that.

As you say, with the horrifying scenes that were taking place, if you didnā€™t wish to register your displeasure at the system (in a vote that is extremely unlikely to make much material change) why would you risk going out to a polling station?

Letā€™s see.

A club with a massive fan base that would make any league richer.

Why were Las Palmas granted permission to put put Spanish flag patches on their tops for this match? Thatā€™s deliberate provocation, endorsed by the league.

Dodgy documents and secret political police. I feel there is a lot more about to come out.

ā€œFernĆ”ndez DĆ­az had, during his tenure as Spainā€™s interior minister, created a covert police unit tasked with obstructing corruption investigations into the conservative Peopleā€™s Party, which has been in government in Spain since 2011. According to the congressional probe, the political police also worked to investigate FernĆ”ndez DĆ­azā€™s opponents, among them people involved with the rising leftist-populist movement in Spain and the independence movement in Cataloniaā€.

Article 7 of the European Union Treaty ā€œSuspension of any Member State that uses military force on its own population.ā€

Now one could argue that using the police in the way that they did they arenā€™t a ā€œmilitary forceā€ butā€¦

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So do the Pro EU people feel about the right to self determination?

Iā€™m not sure that Iā€™d view the EU supporting those Spanish Citizens brutalized by Police as ā€˜meddlingā€™. Nor would I consider the EU to be meddling if they pressurized the Spanish Government into a more diplomatic dialogue with the Catalans.

Sorry to agree with Bazza :lou_wink_2: but the EU are always going to side against this sort of campaign for regional independence. It goes against their whole drive towards a Federal superstate.

As for the rights and well being of EU citizens? IMHO they give not one fuck unless itā€™s politically or economically expedient.