Spanish elections and politics

[jaichind]

Looks real

https://politica.elpais.com/politica/2017/11/12/actualidad/1510492625_447115.html

[TheSaint250]

Looks real

https://politica.elpais.com/politica/2017/11/12/actualidad/1510492625_447115.html

Now, it just remains to be seen whether or not elections are called soon.

[jaichind]

I think the next bifurcation point would be the Catalan elections Dec and see if the pro-Independence forces and capture a majority.  If so the crisis would get worse and PP/C would gain at the expense of of PSOE. 

I have an old rule of politics

If politics of an ecosystem becomes of politics of identity like on ROC (the Chinese vs Taiwanese identity) then political discourse always shift to the Right.   

[TheSaint250]

I think the next bifurcation point would be the Catalan elections Dec and see if the pro-Independence forces and capture a majority.  If so the crisis would get worse and PP/C would gain at the expense of of PSOE. 

I have an old rule of politics

If politics of an ecosystem becomes of politics of identity like on ROC (the Chinese vs Taiwanese identity) then political discourse always shift to the Right.   

Huh, interesting.

This will be a pivotal next few months.

[Former President tack50]

For all what's worth, while the Metroscopia poll is 100% real and from a decent polling company, Metroscopia has consistently overpolled Cs. I do believe that Cs has increased quite a lot and has overtaken Podemos, but they are probably still at 20% or lower, with PSOE ahead of them by a couple points.

Also, notice the increase in "others". It's at 13.8% while on the general election of 2016 it was at  10.1%. This makes me think that maybe that poll that gave VOX a seat was not an outlier after all or that PACMA might be able to get a seat.

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

That poll is most alarming for Podemos: Metroscopia typically overpoll Podemos and C's and under poll the old parties.

The left had better hope the Catalonia issue dies down and Spain gets to talk about actually important issues. (What is poverty and corruption? The only thing that matters is muh fleg!)

[TheSaint250]

That poll is most alarming for Podemos: Metroscopia typically overpoll Podemos and C's and under poll the old parties.

The left had better hope the Catalonia issue dies down and Spain gets to talk about actually important issues. (What is poverty and corruption? The only thing that matters is muh fleg!)

I mean, I would think about the unity of my nation as a "real issue" if I were Spanish.

[Former President tack50]

The time to register as a party to be able to take part in the Catalan election has ended. The following parties will present candidates. The ones with a chance to get seats appear in a colour other than black.

All of Catalonia

PARTIT DELS SOCIALISTES DE CATALUNYA (PSC-PSOE)
PARTIT POPULAR / PARTIDO POPULAR (PP)
ESQUERRA REPUBLICANA-CATALUNYA SÍ (ERC-CatSÍ)
CIUTADANS-PARTIDO DE LA CIUDADANIA (C’s)
CANDIDATURA D’UNITAT POPULAR (CUP)
CATALUNYA EN COMÚ-PODEM (CatComú-Podem)
JUNTS PER CATALUNYA (JUNTSxCAT)
RECORTES CERO-GRUPO VERDE (RECORTES CERO-GRUPO VERDE)
PARTIT ANIMALISTA CONTRA EL MALTRACTAMENT ANIMAL (PACMA)
PER UN MON MES JUST (PUM+J)
DIÀLEG REPUBLICÀ (DIÀLEG)

Barcelona only

LA FAMILIA PAZ Y LIBERTAD (La Familia)
DEMOCRACIA NACIONAL (DN)
PARTIT FAMILIA i VIDA (PFiV)
CONVERGENTS (CNV)
UNIDOS y SOCIALISTAS+por la Democracia

Tarragona only
CIUDADANOS LIBRES UNIDOS (CLIUS)

Party leaders and candidates

PSC-PSOE: Miquel Iceta
PP: Xavier García Albiol
ERC: Oriol Junqueras is the number 1 in the list but he is in jail. The de facto leader is Marta Rovira
Cs: Ines Arrimadas
CUP: Carles Riera. CUP has a strict one term policy for their leaders so their former leaders, Anna Gabriel and Antonio Baños are nowhere in the lists.
En Comú Podem: Xavier Domenech
Junts x Catalunya: Carles Puigdemont. He is in Belgium and I have no idea who the actual leader is. This is PDECat but under another name basically. Though the list includes a lot of independents (including the 2 Jordis that are in jail) and very few who are actually from PDECat.

https://www.boe.es/boe/dias/2017/11/19/pdfs/BOE-A-2017-13305.pdf


Of the minor lists, I'd say the only interesting ones are PACMA (who has a very small chance of getting seats, the threshold seems to be 3%), Convergents (founded by a corrupt regional minister, trying to be like the former Unió, as in nationalist but not secessionist) and maaaybe Recortes Cero (far left, even more than Podemos, but hardline unionist) and Democracia Nacional (the only far right party that is contesting the election). Also, apparently Dialeg República was an ERC list they registered in case the party was illegalized but they weren't able to drop out.

[Zinneke]

hmmm...something tells me at least one of the ones running only in Barcelona are marketing companies.

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

What is PACMA's stance on the union?

[Former President tack50]

What is PACMA's stance on the union?

Surprisingly, they don't have one! They seem to just ignore the issue and pretend it doesn't exist. None of their manifestos even had a single reference to the whole independence process.

[Former President tack50]

Slightly less than 1 month before the Catalan election, the polling average seems to be this:



Secesionists win 45.5-42.9-9.1 and they also win in seat count 67-57-11. They seem to have lost the psychologic barrier of 68 seats (a majority) but honestly that's still a toss up.

I personally hope they lose their majority, that way someone can at least hit the brakes and slow down things.

Also, it seems that the lists of candidates I posted before were temporary, and some of them apparently won't be able to run. In fact other than the ones that will get seats only PACMA, PUM+J, Recortes Cero and Dialeg Republica (idk why ERC didn't drop this list in the end) were allowed to run.

[Zinneke]

Is there really a chance of the revival of the tripartit of 2003 (CeC replacing ICV obviously)? That was one of the better regional governments in recent years, and it could reconcile Catalan society while pushing for more autonomy. But given what happened in Barcelona it seems like PSC, CeC and ERC can't even get along at the local level over the Catalan national issue.

Also, Puigdemont has just gone off on one against the EU

http://www.lavanguardia.com/politica/20171126/433202110437/carles-puigdemont-catalunya-ue-mariano-rajoy.html

[Former President tack50]

Yeah, a tripartit 2.0 seems like an unlikely possibility given how much ERC and PSC hate each other. If Catalonia's independence wasn't on the table it would easily happen but I think independence is too big of an obstacle.

If secessionsists lose their majority it's one of the more realistic possibilities though. Maybe there's some variant of that like say, an ERC-Podemos minority government supported by JxCat, CUP or PSC depending on the votes

Of course, if secessionists keep their majority that option won't be considered.

[Zinneke]

Given that Sanchez indicated that constitutional reform was now a guarentee in exchange for him to have supported article 155, if I were in ERC's position, I would still negotiate with PSOE in order to take a constitutional compromise at the national level. In exchange, ERC would get PSOE to collapse the Rajoy government and campaign on an explicit federalist platform as a reconciliatory exercise. Its not independence but its the best they can hope for, short term.

I doubt there are many federalists left in the PSOE higher-ups, apart from Sanchez (if he even is a federalist), and even less non-DUI ERC members too. I guess the issue is also that both parties (ERC, PSC) have direct competitors advocating a hardline approach to the Catalan national issue (CUP, C's), so compromise and more elections is a risky business. No True Scotsman-style nationalism is hard to stop these days.

[Former President tack50]

Tonight at midnight will officially begin the electoral campaign for the Catalan regional election. And just in time for that, Cs gets its first polling lead ever!

CIS

ERC: 32 (20,8%)
JxCatalunya: 25-26 (16,9%)
CUP: 9 (6,7%)

Cs: 31-32 (22,5%)
PSC: 21 (16%)
PP: 7 (5,8%)

Catalunya En Comú-Podem: 9 (8,6%)

Secessionists: 44,4%
Unionists: 47,1%
Mixed: 8,6%

PP becomes even more irrelevant in Catalonia and gets its worst result since 1991. It would also be a bad election for Podemos as they would get their worst result since 2003 (as ICV-EUiA)

Also, no government seems viable with those numbers IMO. A tripartit 2.0; a pure unionist and a pure secessionist government all lack a majority. I guess either Catalonia goes to a 2nd election or Podemos actually picks a side (most likely secessionists via abstaining).

http://cadenaser.com/ser/2017/12/04/politica/1512382472_552688.html

Though it's not the only recient poll. Here's another one.

Sociométrica/El Español

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

If PP were to somehow drop out of the Catalan parliament entirely (lmao) could you get a C's-PSOE-Podemos alliance, or are C's too right for Podemos?

[Former President tack50]

If PP were to somehow drop out of the Catalan parliament entirely (lmao) could you get a C's-PSOE-Podemos alliance, or are C's too right for Podemos?

Well, PP falling short and getting 0 seats is almost unimaginable. To get seats you need at least 3% in one province. Of course in practice the 3% threshold only applies to Barcelona, everywhere else it's higher. And PP seems to be stronger than average in Barcelona (as expected for a unionist party), so they might need to drop even lower, to like 2.7% or so, in order to lose all their seats.

For reference, Cs entered the Catalan parliament in 2006 with exactly 3% of the vote (3.5% in Barcelona) and the Andalusian Socialist Party (an Andalusian nationalist party which bizarrely contested the 1980 Catalan election) managed to get a seat with 2.7% of the vote (3% in Barcelona)

I don't think it's possible at all for PP to lose all their seats. Even in a worst case scenario they'd drop all the way to 4 or so (losing all their non-Barcelona seats in the process), but not completely drop out. Same with CUP and Podemos.

Still, if it somehow happened a Cs-PSC-Podemos deal would be too right wing for Podemos. Remember we already saw the same scenario happen at the national level right after the 2015 election and Podemos voted against the PSOE-Cs deal (and with PSOE on top in fact!). Granted, Catalonia's circumstances make it different but even then if Arrimadas is the candidate I don't see it. Maybe they could support a minority PSC government if PSC somehow became the largest unionist force (or Cs allowed them to be regional president even if they are far from being the largest party, kind of like Cantabria 2003) but I'm not sure if that might happen.

[Zinneke]

But the unionist alliance (C-PSC-PP) is possible? Surely hard for PSC too.
Look like there is no clear way out.

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

I was thinking that CUP are able to get away propping up a conservative party like CiU, or whatever they're called now.

[TheSaint250]

Yay for Cs!

[Former President tack50]

Here are some posters from the campaign:



No permission for being free, nor apologizing for actually being free



Democracy always wins



Puigdemont, our president



We have a lot in common (kind of a pun with the party name: "Catalunya en comú"



Now yes, we will vote (reference to "we will vote", which secessionists used during the illegal 1st of October referendum)



Solutions! Now Iceta!



Spain is the solution.

Seems like PSC and JxCat are running a presidential style campaign. That seems to be working in both cases, particularly JxCat, who seems to be rising a lot. Seems like they've been having the best campaign so far. Interestingly their posters seem to have copied Podemos

[Former President tack50]

Even more shocking polls! Not sure how accurate they'll be (Spanish pollsters have failed miserably reciently) but whatever. From oldest (yesterday) to newest (today):

Invymark for La Sexta



Feedback for elnacional.cat

ERC: 24% (35-36)
JxCat: 17.1% (25)
CUP: 6.4% (8 )

Cs: 22.8% (31-32)
PSC: 13.5% (19-20)
PP: 6.2% (7)

CeC: 9.3% (11)

Secessionists: 47.5% (68-69)
Unionists: 42.5% (55-56)
Neutral/others: 10% (11)

Internal PP poll

ERC: 36
JxCat: 22
CUP: 8

Cs: 30
PSC: 23
PP: 11

CeC: 5

Gesop for El Periódico de Catalunya





Secessionists: 45.8%
Unionists: 43.8%
Others: 10.4%

Of these 4 polls the Invymark-La Sexta and Gesop-El Periódico ones are probably the most reliable. The elnacional.cat one might be good but it may have a secessionsist bias. The PP internal is almost certainly junk. Lol at CeC at 5 seats

[parochial boy]

Apologies if already asked - but PSC seem to be coming out of all of this quite well. Any reason why?

[Former President tack50]

^
There could be several. I guess that's it's a combination of:

-PSC is the only pure unionist left wing force. Podemos seems to have moved closer to the secessionists after all these events so some Podemos voters may be going back to PSC

-PSC did an alliance with Unió, a conservative nationalist but not secessionist party. PSC seems to also have adopted some soft nationalism. So some soft nationalists that don't want independence might be willing to vote PSC