the Aznar moment

With the freemasonry of government swinging behind Chief Constable Coverup and with the man himself charmingly hiding from his critics behind the dead of July 7, I wonder if we’re reaching our Aznar moment.

It’s more or less axiomatic that the government will accrue powers to itself in times of crisis, so it follows that crisis is something for which government has a political affinity. Sometimes a power grab can be gradual, representing in Britain not much more than a somewhat accelerated tempo to a general authoritarian drift. But sometimes it seems to involve a direct grab for impunity. We saw this with the Spanish bombings. Despite foreknowledge that al-Qaeda were planning an attack, the Aznar government immediately blamed ETA for the train bombings, partly it seems to avoid the electorate making connections with Iraq and partly because the Partido Popular were making a hard line against Basque separatism a plank of it’s election campaign.

As it went, that gamble failed. The story immediately unraveled and Aznar got spanked by the voters. I’m still convinced that it was his gamesmanship that lost him the election far more than Spain’s war in Iraq.

I wonder if we’ve reached the Aznar moment here. As each and every plank of the hapless Ian Blair’s defence seems to unravel – as he’s reduced to burying himself under the victims of July’s terrorist attacks – so the government’s support for him seems to increase. It’s not that Blair’s an innocent victim of circumstances. It’s more that the government is asserting a right to impunity. If the public can be forced to accept that he should continue in office despite his presiding over the death of an innocent man and the ensuing coverup then it also has to accept that the government no longer has to be accountable to the public for the behaviour of its members and appointees. With the election just past, now is the right time to try for such an overt power grab.

What to do? Right now, just keep piling on I guess.

Comments

[Jeremy]

I'd like to think so but I am not so sure. Ultimately Zapatero and his party actively attacked Aznar at the government level and the defence fell apart. The pathetic cover-up by the disgusting Angel Acebes was blatant to the point of comedic... although the CCTV footage may be the analogy here.

It was very disappointing to see the political actors provide so much support before the inquiry results. But I didn't really expect anything else.