The last person who was able to deal with the Catalonians was Franco. There aren’t any leaders like him in Spain (or for that matter, most of Europe) these days.
Catalonia, like Pais Vasco, was very leftwing and was completely under control of the Soviets during the Spanish Civil War. It had been destabilized by Marxists and anarchists even in the 1920s, and there had been political assassinations and attacks that contributed heavily to bringing the crisis that led to the rebellion by the government troops, led by Franco, in opposition to the attempted Marxist takeover of Spain.
That said, if Franco had backed off on a couple of things, such as prohibiting the use of Catalan, he would have deprived the left of its talking points. However, in other ways, he was responsible for Catalonia’s post-war prosperity, because in an attempt to win them back as well as provide employment for Spaniards from the seriously depressed areas such as Andalusia, he gave them huge breaks and incentives.
Franco is still dead....haha.
But seriously I think the Never Trumpers like Glenn Beck want globalism, more centralized and supernational governments.
Left or Right, this puts in monkey wrench in globalism and that’s OK.
Violence is horrible but it looks like the government is the perp here.
Franco was a great thing for Spain - despite how the left paints him.