The beginning of the intervention of Pedro Sánchez has been from the most genuine Pedro Sánchez. With that half-smile of his, he ironically told the deputies: “I ask your honor for some benevolence and I apologize in advance if I am a bit long in my speech, but we are talking about many issues that need specificity on my part” . The benches, especially those on the right, have laughed. The comment was funny because during these days the spokesmen were angry at the ruse of mixing these four issues in the same debate, and what issues: the NATO Summit last Thursday, the European Council last Friday, the plan against the crisis economy and the new stage of relations with Morocco. in full ukrainian war and with inflation at 9.8%, the record in 37 years, it was no small feat.
Then, he listed the challenges that the Prime Minister and his ministers have faced since January 2020, which seems that the wheel had not even been invented then, but that was just over two years ago. The landscape shakes. A pandemic which continues to cause deaths fires devastating, the volcano eruption on the island of La Palma, the storm philomenaa war on the eastern border of Europe, and as if that were not enough, “until a storm of sub-Saharan sand”. The deputies of the PP and Vox have let out a clamor, as if making fun of how heroic the socialist president is, and Sánchez, of course, has been annoyed. He has stopped and released right after: “I am describing, ladies and gentlemen When I get into the valuations, I don’t know what you guys are going to do.”
I was describing, no doubt. All this has happened and all this has been reiterated by the President of the Government on several occasions to contextualize. For him, contextualization in a debate like the one this Wednesday in Congress was very important, to the point that he has replied to the PP spokeswoman, Cuca Gamarra, and her criticism of everything with five words: “We are at war in Europe”.
Because in the same way that the arrival of a new type of coronavirus that is tremendously contagious and more lethal than the previous ones forced the Executive to adopt urgent measures, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is causing the same thing. “We have experience in managing crises,” emphasized the leader of the PSOE. Of course yes, there can be no doubt about that. What the opposition, the left and the right, the liberal and the most extreme, doubts is that this management is good.
Two rhetorical devices
The President of the Government has shown during the debate a series of rhetorical devices that allow several things. 1. Limit the territory of criticism. 2. Draw a clear line between “us” and “them.” For this, it is essential to make a staunch defense of its own management, and from time to time, launch opposition counterattacks. If done right, the battle of rhetoric is won.
Sánchez does the first very well. He defends with all the management of the Government. In the second he is not so skillful. The socialist leader is not a speaker touched with the gift of breeching, that which Mariano Rajoy used masterfully even when he was wrong (the “the worse the better for everyone and the worse for everyone the better (…)” that he told Pablo Iglesias is an example) or that Alfredo Perez Rubalcaba used with the sharp fang. But she is getting better.
To Santiago Abascal, who began his speech with an unexpected reference to the supposed eradication of the philosophy subject, he blurted out, again with that only half smile of his: “You who care so much about philosophy and who have read so much philosophy …”. “What do you know”, a Vox deputy has reproached him from her seat, offended. This is a sign that the maneuver of the sarcasm It has turned out well for him because with sarcasm, in debates like this, the intervener wants to pout.
The Popular Party has been disapproved of that statement by the future leader, Alberto Núñez Feijóo, that the Government was “lining money” with the price of fuel. Bland, staring, he has said: “Those who have made a fortune are those who received bonuses and illegal commissions.” This blow, unexpected as his tone was being, has made the socialist caucus applaud, which happens sporadically on days of long debates in Congress. With Sánchez, constant fervor is difficult.
Regarding the first, defending the Government’s management at all costs, Sánchez has no rival. He is the president, who else was going to do it, but he has coined his own way of maintaining the adherence of his bench. The formulas follow a pattern more or less like this. If he is criticized for the lack of negotiation, he replies: “You can criticize, but what cannot be discussed is that the government listens and dialogues with the political groups and with the sectors.” If he is criticized for not carrying out structural reforms, he replies: “With all the defects and mistakes that we can make, to say that this government does not carry out reforms is completely unjustified.” Sometimes, instead of an adjective, he uses the expression “it doesn’t match reality”. And after that, he deploys all the measures that, in his opinion, dismantle criticism and enhance his management.
“European patriotism” and third rhetorical device
That Sánchez likes Europe is known. His environment says it in private, he champions it in public. The truth is that in Europe he is achieving his greatest successes. The pandemic triggered a profound response from the Union institutions in the form of 140,000 million euros, which is what Spain will receive over the next seven years. The applause of his ministers still resounds when he returned to Moncloa after those marathon meetings in Brussels. The war in Ukraine, for its part, has motivated a series of decisions and actions so coordinated and united that they are praiseworthy. In this context, Sánchez, last Friday, managed to the “Iberian exception” to contain the price of gas and lower the price of electricity.
In Europe, words of the president, is the solution. “European patriotism”, he has claimed before explaining its meaning: it is to act with “robust unity” in the face of “Putin’s war” and is to act in solidarity, so that if the eastern flank is threatened and all the EU states undertake budgetary increases in Defense, Spain does the same. Here has been one of the president’s few future commitments, along with the door open to changing the Response Plan to the war: bring the budget of the Ministry of Margarita Robles to 2% of GDP.
And here has been the president’s third rhetorical resource: asking for unity. On the speaking plane, it is effective. In reality, it has a trick. Sánchez, after describing the context in which he has governed and governs, of pandemic and war, has solemnized: “What else has to happen for us to respond together?” Another thing is what to build the unit on. The Executive emphasizes that it proposes State measures that the PP, especially the PP, rejects for the mere fact of coming from the Executive. The PP, especially the PP, emphasizes that union is one thing and swallowing it is another. And so everything: a loop.
the empty seat
“These are complex times.” “No one is protected.” “The Gravity of the Moment”. “Unprecedented scenario”. “These are exceptional times.” “Exceptional response”. “Uncertainty”. “We have to safeguard our way of life.” they are all expressions of Pedro Sanchez.
They are also: “We are going to go out of our way to placate the effects of the war as much as possible.” “No one will be abandoned.” “The Welfare State cannot be disarmed”. “Social justice”. “Exceptional response”. “We live in complex times, but this government is the same one that faced the pandemic.”
The President of the Government has cemented in a language full of expressions such as a epic, a word that, according to the RAE, means, in its first meaning, “extensive poem that sings in an elevated style the deeds of a hero or great deed, and in which the supernatural or wonderful usually intervenes”; and in its third meaning, “a set of glorious events worthy of being sung epically”. The one that best fits the debate this Wednesday in Congress is the latter.
Epic that, despite the “exceptional” context in which our way of life is in danger because Europe is at war, Sánchez has sung with a civil servant rhythm and a manager’s outfit, which is a striking contrast, because as soon as the deputies were moved by “the painful effects” of the war as they looked at their mobile phones because the president, at that moment, was talking about percentages related to the CPI or a 2007 United Nations resolution.
To dismantle the feat, there was Santiago Abascal and his fight against “climate fanaticism” and an empty seat, the one who left Paul Married one month ago. Next to her, Cuca Gamarra, compliant as always, implacable with the president in waves. His role has been difficult. Play the role of the leader of the PP without being the leader of the PP and knowing what will be in the PP in a few days can not be easy.
However, it has acted with some ease, especially in the reply, and has been more incisive in criticizing Spain’s alignment with Morocco’s autonomy plan for Western Sahara. Because yes, that has been discussed in Congress this Wednesday, although the epic has not happened here.