Posted on 11/24/2012 2:43:25 AM PST by Cincinatus' Wife
In Madrid, the central government of Mariano Rajoy has pledged to fight any move towards independence. There are fears that fellow separatists in the Basque region and even Galicia will follow suit, provoking a constitutional crisis. One association of retired and active members of the military even warned that war should be declared on Catalonia if the region broke away and others have suggested Mas [ Artur Mas, the incumbent regional president and leader of the centre-Right Convergence and Union Party (CIU)] should be tried for treason.
Something is missing at the top of the flagpole outside the town hall in Arenys de Munt. Despite a law requiring it, the red and yellow of la Rojigualda - Spain's national ensign - is nowhere to be seen. Something else is missing inside the building itself. On the walls of Josep Manuel Ximenis's office a blank space marks the spot where a portrait of King Juan Carlos would normally hang.
But both these absences are a badge of honour for Mayor Ximenis. Instead he proudly displays a certificate declaring his town to be a "free and sovereign territory of Catalonia", independent of the Bourbon crown and the symbols of the Spanish state.
It may not be legally binding or even recognised outside of the municipal limits but it represents the strength of the desire for nationhood that is growing across Catalonia and has set the wealthy region on a collision course with Madrid this weekend.
Three years ago last September, Arenys de Munt, a picturesque town of 8,500 people 28 miles north of Barcelona, held an informal referendum on whether Catalonia should secede from Spain. Forty-one per cent of residents turned out to vote and an overwhelming 96 per cent of them said yes.
"At the time we simply wanted to start the debate, to show it wasn't just a minority of extremists calling for the impossible," explains Mr Ximenis. The plebiscite - emblematic, partial and unofficial - was repeated in the months that followed in 553 towns and villages across Catalonia. Although marked by a low turnout, it showed overwhelmingly the appetite for independence.
"We started the ball rolling, it gained momentum, and just look at where we are now. An independent Catalonia isn't just an impossible dream, it's going to happen and it's going to happen soon."
On Saturday, Catalans goes to the polls to choose a new parliament, but with the expectation that a referendum on independence for the region will be swift to follow. Artur Mas, the incumbent regional president and leader of the centre-Right Convergence and Union Party (CIU), called the snap elections with the promise that if re-elected, he would see it as a mandate to hold a vote on secession within his term of office.
Emboldened by a pro-independence demonstration that saw 1.5?million people take to the streets on Catalonia's national day on September 11, Mas shifted his party's official position on independence and said, "Let the people decide".
His speeches at campaign rallies across the region in the lead-up to the vote have been greeted by supporters with feverish choruses of "Independence! Independence!" It is music to the ears of Ximenis, who says such separatist sentiment has been simmering in the hearts of Catalans for centuries.
"Catalonia is a nation, we have our own language, our own culture, our own history," said the 50-year-old as a preamble to a brief precis of the repression of the Catalan people from the 1714 War of Succession to the years under Francisco Franco, when just speaking Catalan could result in a jail term. "Yet still we are treated as an occupied colony by Madrid and our resources exploited," he said.
Indeed, it is the current economic climate that has fuelled the independence movement and the conviction that Catalonia would fare better on its own. The long-held bone of contention is that Catalonia, the wealthiest of Spain's 17 semi-autonomous regions, whose industry accounts for a fifth of Spain's GDP, is taxed unfairly by Madrid.
The Generalitat, as Catalonia's government is known, calculates that it pays about euros 15billion more than it gets back from the national treasury every year. Catalonia wants to collect its own taxes, to control how they are spent and it seems prepared to break away from Spain to do so.
But with a clear road map yet to be outlined, the process of separating from Spain promises to be burdened with hurdles. While Catalans prize their role as citizens of Europe, EU officials have warned that membership of the union would not be automatic.
Instead, Catalonia would have to gain admission, joining the queue of a list of new European nations seeking membership, and the process would likely be blocked by a vengeful Spain.
There are also fears that big businesses and multinationals within the region could relocate, unprepared to risk a change in trade terms. Critics warn of a damaging boycott of Catalan goods by Spain if independence were to go ahead. For the Catalans, like the Scots, who will vote on independence in 2014, it's unchartered territory.
In Madrid, the central government of Mariano Rajoy has pledged to fight any move towards independence. There are fears that fellow separatists in the Basque region and even Galicia will follow suit, provoking a constitutional crisis. One association of retired and active members of the military even warned that war should be declared on Catalonia if the region broke away and others have suggested Mas should be tried for treason.
Sunday's vote comes at a time when Rajoy is trying to show stability and fiscal responsibility in his fight to keep Spain in the euro currency zone and avoid an international bail-out, while the nation suffers a double-dip recession and a 25% unemployment rate. But the trials of central government are its own problem according to many in Arenys de Munt, where scarlet and gold striped flags of Catalonia flutter from balconies.
Sonia, a 35-year-old meeting a group of other mothers for a coffee before picking up their children at the school gates, summed it up. "We're sick of being robbed. We'll be better off on our own."
There is some dissent. One middle aged man would not allow his name to be used when interviewed. "The independence issue is a nonsense and a distraction," he said. "We should be discussing how we are going to stop the flood of unemployment, survive deep spending cuts and promote economic growth."
But his is not a popular voice here. That of Jeroni Mayne, 63, a retired financial consultant pushing his nine-month-old twin granddaughters, is. "In my heart I've always felt Catalan, never ever Spanish," he said. "We are on the verge of an important and proud moment in our history." Nodding towards the sleeping girls he added: "They will grow up in Catalonia, an independent country recognised across the world, and it will be great."
How is the Catalan language different from Spanish ?
“If the United States political split was more geographically represented, we would have already split up.”
The oddest thing in the US is that the areas with the highest taxes consistently vote Democrat. I understand those areas are filled with permanent parasites voting for the hand that feeds (or at least the government hand that moves assets from the hands that make to their hands that take), but the fact is wealthy liberals in high cost, high tax area are much more susceptible to the Alternative Minimum Tax (which wipes out deductions) on top of the high sales, state income and property taxes they already pay.
Not an official source, if there were one, but the attached Wikipedia entry contains lots of detail and links.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catalan_language
Prove to me liberals PAY tax.
Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton (D). Washington DC congressional rep in perpetuity.
From 1981-82, Norton served as a fellow at the Urban Institute. The following year, she was hired as a law professor at Georgetown University, a post she has held ever since.
In 1990 the District of Columbia’s non-voting Delegate to the U.S. House of Representatives, Walter Fauntroy, resigned to run (unsuccessfully) for city mayor. Norton narrowly won the Democratic primary race to replace Fauntroy, and then won the Delegate seat in the general election by a wide margin. She has been re-elected every two years since then, always by wide margins.
During Norton’s 1990 political campaign, it came to light that she and her husband had paid no D.C. income taxes since 1981.
http://www.discoverthenetworks.org/individualProfile.asp?indid=1955
This story “accidentally” broke through the MSM/propaganda front . Even if the Left is not paying taxes at this point, I’d bet somebody is preparing each a “return”
I don’t know the particulars of the District of Columbia; I know that in NY and NJ property taxes are high in areas that vote strongly Dem, while they are lower in Repub areas (”the sticks”).
Spain SHOULD break up, as should Belgium.
The “Spanish” that you hear around the states is actually Castillian (Castellano). There are many other languages around Spain. Catalan, the language of Catalonia, appears to non-natives as closer to French than to Castillian.
I have family and friends from all over Spain (mostly refugees of the Franco dictatorship who moved to San Juan), and their elders speak all kinds of stuff: Euskara (Basque), Catalan, Aragonese, Galician, etc. But Castillian is the dominant and common language and the one that was exported to the Americas.
Alberta should leave Canada too, they could very easily be independent. Actually, most of the west of Canada could form a new republic and be rid of the free loaders from the east. I am tired of this socialist experiment and tired of working hard for 150 days a year so that others in have not places can have “free” healthcare, and “free” money and other nice “free” things.
The more they take the more we wake up it seems.
The funny thing is that if Catalonia becomes independent and an EU member, they’d likely end up a net payer to Brussels instead of Madrid. And that excess wouldn’t be spent in their neighboring regions, but in places like Bulgaria and Romania...
I took Spanish in high school and took a six week course at the Tech in Monterrey. My third year of Spanish in high school was with a teacher who spoke Spanish as in Spain.
Seemed to me there were more than a few differences in Spanish in Mexico vs. Spain.
The old R&B song, "Catalonia, What Makes Your Big Head So Hard?"
Not odd, but rather causal; like the houses with the most termites having the highest number of structural problems. They have the highest taxes precisely because they are such committed commies.
The wealthy either leave or lose their wealth. Those areas then become blighted socialist hell holes that have forgotten where and how the original wealth was created.
Detroit is their model. Parasites killing the host.
Yes, there are both subtle and significant differences in the way people from different regions or countries speak Castillian Spanish, but it is all mostly Castillian with a lot of local slang. I can speak freely with anyone from Central or South America or Spain in “Spanish”. might have to ask for clarification of certain items, but when that obstacle is reached everyone just reverts to Castillian. If someone were to speak to me in, say, Catalonian, I probably wouldn’t be able to understand the half of it. Heck, I understand Portuguese or Italian a lot better than I do any of the other “Spanish” languages. And then, there’s the Puerto Rican Spanglish, which is another ballgame...
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