The Formentor peak
In politics, it happens that sometimes even the worst elements say something true, without doing the math. This is what happened with the Vox spokesperson in the Balearic Islands, whose name we will omit because Vox politicians themselves renounce any of their own ideas and always defer to their supreme leader, Santiago Abascal. However, during the general policy debate, this spokesperson managed to tell a truth: "Prohens is Prime Minister thanks to Vox's votes." Sadly, this is the case. This is the first time (and should be the last) that the Balearic Islands have a president conditioned by the demands of a fascist party, who can boast that, if she's in office, it's because they allow her to be. There will be those who suddenly say that Armengol was conditioned by the far left, but this is a fallacy that we must get used to dismantling: there is no political actor in Balearic politics who comes close to anything resembling the far left. Fortunately, it must be added. Therefore, the equivalences between the far right of Vox and a supposed far left represented by MÉS, Podemos, or Sumar are false and would be laughable if they did not contribute to the confusion that, precisely, favors the far right.
Another unintentional truth was blurted out by the spokesperson for the Popular Party, Sebastià Sagreras, when he praised Prohens's speech, as is his custom. To this end, he claimed that she had given "a speech like herself." Say no more. It was a mediocre, disingenuous speech, in which once again Prohens failed to convey a single idea of her own and simply followed the instructions and arguments of a PP increasingly obsessed with its competition with Vox, which in turn is the only partner with whom it can consider governing Spain. If all the men and women of the PP were as diligent in following orders as Prohens and the PP of the Balearic Islands, Feijóo's leadership would surely not be in such a bad state as it is now.
Following this pattern, the citizens of the Balearic Islands had to push back, feeling how the country's highest authority stooped to defending an indecency such as dental tests on immigrants, which constitute a true attack on human dignity. In fact, the president's speech generally consisted of an intense and sordid accusation that immigrants are the cause of the islands' problems, starting with overpopulation. Not a word about the main causes, by far, of demographic change and the housing crisis in the Balearic Islands: urban and land speculation and mass tourism, two closely linked phenomena that cause accelerated social and environmental degradation, which could have serious consequences in the near future. Since these are the activities to which the PP is linked, the easy way out is to stir up hatred against those who arrive in small boats, thus fueling social division and tension in the streets.
Nor can we expect much more from someone who tries to adorn his speech with glossy quotes, but ends up saying that The Formentor Pine, the immense poem by Miquel Costa i Llobera, was written by Father Alcover. Perhaps instead of a pine tree, he wanted to talk about the puu, a material that you will find described in the puu Catalan-Valencià-Balear Dictionary, whose magnificent dictionary was indeed written by Antoni Maria Alcover, along with Francesc de Borja Moll. After more than half a term of office spent attacking the Catalan language, the desire to cling to the Decree of Minimums and a poorly cited literary classic is revealing of who governs the Balearic Islands, and how they do so.
