Category Archives: Living la vida española

Last Saturday, my Bro and I partook in Safe Democracy’s International Conference, Three Years after March 11: Regional Challenges for a Globalizing World. I was part of a round table discussing immigration in Europe and my Bro was on the one discussing Africa. Afterwords, my Bro and I reflected on some of the “cultural” differences we noticed between the United States’ worldview and that of the mainly European and Latin American experts present at the event.

My Bro mentioned two. First, in a similar conference in the U.S., a significant majority of those present would have been female; and second, that people were much more left-wing than he would have imagined (and he is VERY left wing). Here are my general impressions: Continue reading →

As a U.S. trained lawyer living in Spain and following Spanish politics, I am often frustrated by Spain’s political debates and constitutional system. In the US, there is a very clear cut definition of the roles of each of the three branches of government and a richly defined and well conceived division of powers amongst each. In the US, we are quite proud of our system of checks and balances, whereby each branch of government is allotted certain, separate and distinct powers with counter-balancing powers alloted to the other branches. This concept is known as the Balance of Powers.

In recent weeks, though, a debate in Spain has risen as to whether politicians should critique the decisions of judges. In other words, whether the Executive or Legislative Branches have the right to criticize the Judiciary Branch and whether, if so, politicians are in fact questioning the very independence of the Judicial Branch. This entire debate has come about due to certain judicial decisions (and pending decisions) with respect to members of ETA. PSOE, the ruling political party, has denounced the PP, the opposition party, for second guessing judges. Although, in my mind, PSOE is only arguing for total deference to judicial independence to keep from getting its own feet wet, PSOE is completely mistaken in it logic because of the very nature of the Spanish constitutional system which is actually in need of either restructuring or greater Executive, and Legislative oversight. Allow me to explain:

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You got to be kidding me!!! How ridiculous is it that someone is denied the right to citizenship because a country does not accept an individual’s right to have their own name? I just read this Reuters news release on how the Spanish government has rejected a Colombian woman’s citizenship application because her first name “Darling” is unacceptable. I could understand rejecting one’s application for a name change to a vulgar word or term. The Spanish law permits rejecting names that may cause a person to be “exposed to ridicule or do not clearly indicate gender.” But “Darling”? Come on, in Spain it is very common for males to have the name “Jesus” or for women to have the names of females saints but, after dropping the “María”, are of the masucline gender such as “Pilar”, “Rocío” or “Camino”. Women can also go by (as translated into English) “Immaculate Conception”, “Ascencion”, “Incarnation”, “Sea”, “Solitude”, “Suns”, or “Miracles”. How about the fact that “Angel” is a common male name? Come on!!!!!

This is pure cultural fascism, where certain names are accepted while others are rejected because they are foreign sounding and not common. There really isn’t much difference in the name “Darling” and “Hope” (the name of the President of the Community of Madrid). You don’t need to look around much in the US to see that the US government could never restrict people’s right to give their children names derived from their own cultural traditions or variations thereof, or simply as expressions of their own creativity — like it or not.

Darling wasn’t even asking for a name change, just this simple request that the name given to her at birth be respected by the Spanish authorities. What message does this send to any foreigner arriving on the shores of Spain? Where is ZP’s Alliance of Civilizations? Or is this as the Spaniards say, “moros en la costa”?

Ironically, I have just recently written a post in Spanish on how the radical Islamists are not the only ones who are dividing the world with their fanatic fundamentalism. This is a great example that proves my point that in the West we are doing the same thing but in a much more subtle way.

In any event, here is the Reuters news feed: Continue reading →

Berga and Cobra’s roomate, Edu (a bit of a leftest poser because he owns a Playstation) is a writer for the Spanish TV show El Intermedio on La Sexta. This show does something that no TV station would ever allow in the US. During each episode it runs a 20 second clip beginning with President Bush’s May 1, 2003 speech proclaiming victory and the end of combat operations in Iraq. It then lists the number of civilian deaths on that particular day in Iraq.

Although I find Spanish news to be incredibly politically biased and unfairly anti-American, US journalism and television are simply too self-censuring. The press is either afraid to tell the truth or believes that the American people are too reality adverse. In any event, irrespective of what the US media should or should not publish, this video highlights the grave harm Bush, his policies, and the war in Iraq have done to the image of the US in the world. Fortunately for him, the great majority of Americans are not living abroad and don’t have to witness how our nation has fallen into ill repute in practically every corner of the globe. For the few of us who are out there, we have to degrade ourselves by pretending to be Canadians just to get laid.