Un Nuevo Presidente and Other things.

The news of the hour, of course, is the landslide win that the Popular Party candidate, Mariano Rajoy, achieved last night in Spain's national elections. According to many people that I spoke with, it was something expected that the conservatives would win. It´s just that the masses are tired of the current socialist party which they blame as having contributed largely to Spain's growing debt crisis, although I have spoken with others who say the current administration is not entirely at fault. I have spoken with certain individuals who´ve told me that the previous administration indebted the government by joining the Iraq war and by giving too much power to the banks which then created the housing bubble which burst and in turn crippled the economy (Hmmmm......this sounds eerily familiar). So, yesterday Spaniards went out and expressed their frustration by bringing an end to the People's Socialist Workers Party's winning streak which has ruled the government since 2004 with current president, Mr. José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero. Interestingly, he was the but of many jokes last September when Johnny English Returns landed in cinemas all across Spain. The media said Mr. Zapatero looked like Mr. Bean. And if you look closely, they kind of do resemble each other in the eyes.........

Anyways, certain colleagues of mine have reservations about Mr. Rajoy, specifically regarding education. You see, he is part of the PP conservative party, the same party which the current governor of Madrid is a part of and she has cut the public education budget like last night´s ham. My school in particular lost eight teaching positions from last year and as a result certain classes are no longer offered. There have been several protests and strikes so far and yes, some of my colleagues have gone on strike since I have been here. Seriously, I´m just going to have to dedicate an entire blog to the subject of education in Spain alone.

Anyhow, I hope this change in political direction is a good thing for Spain. As I can see, she needs to re-boot the economy and create more jobs, but as Mr. Zapatero and Mr. Rajoy say, that will be hard to come by without sacrifice. Wow, I think I just had déjà vu.

Hasta luego.

P.S. I stumbled upon a great BBC article about the Spanish government and what makes its debt situation different from other european countries........quite interesting if you are a politics junkie.