What is wrong with politics in Spain?

[El Profesor]

Actually it is heading that way . . . . slowly

[Perikles]

This corruptioncase in Marbella is truely unbelievable. Roca has been sentenced to 11 years prison and a fine of €240,000,000. Here is an article describing the fortune he has created.

[El Profesor]

I was wondering whether to put this in the Spain hits rock bottom thread . . . along the lines of - What can we find below the rock bottom?

Let's think . . . um I know  . . . let's sell the country.

Then I thought perhaps I should put it in one of the desahucios threads, the thread about Spanish eviction policy or  . .  even the nutcase thread . . . but here's the gist - .
So,  the plan is -  (you think I can't make this up?) . . .   – we evict hundreds of thousands of victims of the construction bubble scam, yeah! You know, all the people who were given 120% mortgages when the market was artificially inflated by the banks . . . . . remember? When we just charged them double because they didn't have much money anyway so it didn't matter. . . . well no problem, we can take their houses away now and still make them pay the mortgage back . . win win and double win. Brilliant! So we create a homeless underclass of thickos - tough - where's the rub? Scam the scum, way to go José.

- THEN we sell off the glut of empty properties to wealthy Arabs and Russians and Asians by giving them concessions like . . . . Hmmmm, let's think. Let's offer them free residency in the European Union if they buy up a few of the homes we've just emptied. They'll go for that. And we can just keep evicting Spanish people if we run out . . Brilliant!

We could set a  . . . . say 500,000€ for the free residency so that they pay a good price for the houses . . . but they probably aren't as stupid as our lot, so we can let them have lots and lots of houses, as long as they spend over 500,000€ . . . neat marketing eh? sell them all off dirt cheap.  Take what we can get . . . .  well, we can't get any more out of the people that already live here, can we? So it makes perfect sense.


I wish I had made it up.

Here's a LINK

[El Profesor]

Nobody's going to want the shit they built anyway . . . it's just a way of buying legal entry into the EU.

[Myrtle Hogan-Lance]

Completely agree with you.  I for one will not be very happy to see this place overrun with Russians and Arabs.  It will be interesting when the powers that be decide to scam them further like with the foreign asset declaration and tax. 

[Janet]

maybe it's the Russos and Arabs we need because they will know how to deal with the scamming scum. They won't stand in neat queues like the Brits, saying "oh dear, yes all right then, of course, whatever you say, sorry, please, thank you ... "

[Perikles]

Another little gem from Iñaki Gabilondo today, on Rajoy making a statement about unemployment which was simply wrong.

You are invited to choose your own adjective.

here

[Janet]

I choose "lying" ...

"Wrong"? Nah! 

[Myrtle Hogan-Lance]

This headline goes a long way to answering the original question:  Scandal-hit Spain plummets 10 places in global corruption index

[Michael]

This headline goes a long way to answering the original question:  Scandal-hit Spain plummets 10 places in global corruption index

alongside Gambia, Mali, Guinea-Bissau and Libya