Thanks for all of the information. I'm glad Podemos is more of a standard left-wing party now rather than Syriza++.
The funny thing is, back in the day Podemos was pretty damn similar to Syriza. They did have two huge advantages working on their favour, however:
1) Syriza fell prey to an extreme, basically unsalvageable situation and the desires of many EU member states who didn't want Greece's new government to succeed. Rajoy himself threw Spain's weight against Greece so an eventual collapse of Syriza could abort Podemos by proxy before the elections. It didn't quite work, but he tried his best.
2) Podemos had plenty of time and a more stable environment to weed out the battier elements and mature their initial positions. Some fringe people remain, but the party itself is a lot healthier for it, if highly personalistic. Only God knows about their potential performance as a ruling party, though. Madrid and Barcelona's majors Carmena and Colau have been doing ok so far, but none of them are Podemos proper and they are limited to their roles.
By the way, it's just my imagination or the situation seems like the catalonian mess?
I mean, a president no one wants (in the other parties) of the most voted party and no solution in the horizon, it's like the groundhog day on the spanish polytics.
That's actually a
terrific simile!
S. If that worked and still works, Spain will be fine.
I wish you luck Funky Papa on the rocky road ahead.
Back here in the United States we are watching a similar "dumpster fire" (I love that phrase) within a political party.
Don't worry, we'll be fine. As Bismarck said, "I am firmly convinced that Spain is the strongest country of the world. Century after century trying to destroy herself and still no success".
Is your media a steaming pile of shit, where the renewed attention by the population will go wasted, or could perhaps there be a silver lining?
Edit; Also do you elect politicians based on looks?
It's absolute shit. State owned TVE is basically a propaganda station and private ones are either controlled by corporate interests with their own political allegiances or just going after the viewers with the cheapest ploys, no matter how detrimental they are to the political discourse (la Sexta). The way they propped Ciudadanos as PP's replacement was *insane*, but not as much as how terribly off they were when the polls closed.
Also, I don't think looks play a significant part, although I believe the PSOE tried that card (with much scorn from Sanchez's critics). I was being farcical.
In Spain they would need to enter into a formal coalition to elect the Prime Minister, which in turn means giving the minority party cabinet posts and other goodies. In the United States the President is elected separately and controls the executive branch completely. Republicans and Democrats are never formally required to enter any sort of alliance. Negotiations are done on a case by case basis. And even then sometimes the radical wing of the Republican party can sabotage basic spending bills and cause a temporary government shutdown.
Actually, it could be easier than the bolded. Ciudadanos is already asking the PSOE not to vote against the PP. Sitting this one out could allow conservatives to pick a president without PSOE and C's actively supporting the PP
per se, although the PSOE has already said that they won't support Rajoy.
If PSOE and Ciudadanos absented their votes at the Congress, the PP could pick a new president without enough opposition to prevent their naming while allowing both parties to save face by claiming that they didn't want another PP president, but they refrained from voting against them because the country needs a proper government.
This, however, means that the PP will have to sacrify Rajoy and find a new candidate (Soraya Sáenz de Santa María sounds like the most plausible candidate for the task). Explaining to part of the electorate that the candidate of the most voted political party is not going to be the president after all could be troublesome, as seen in Madrid.
There's also the fact that a huge part of the PSOE's voting base hates the PP's guts, so even an absent vote could be seen as high treason. Spanish politics are highly polarised and saying "we did this for the good of the country" won't fly that easily, so the PSOE will need the deploy contingency measures to avoid further voter flight towards C's and Podemos. Then, it should also be mentioned that Sánchez brought the PSOE to their lowest result in history and is openly despised by much of the old guard, so his head could also roll along Rajoy's.
This could be fixed in a few days or a couple of months. Either way, it's pretty much a certainty that none of the candidates of the two largest political parties will be named president. Rajoy is toxic and Sánchez doesn't have the numbers. Going by previous events, chances are that Sánchez himself will be popped like a bad zit as soon as one of his rivals (probably Susana Díaz, maybe Carme Chacón) gathers enough support within the PSOE.
