A look at a fallen individual I had admired long ago, after the jump …..
But first: Top Comments appears nightly, as a round-up of the best comments on Daily Kos. Surely ... you come across comments daily that are perceptive, apropos and .. well, perhaps even humorous. But they are more meaningful if they're well-known ... which is where you come in (especially in diaries/stories receiving little attention).------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Send your nominations to TopComments at gmail dot com by 9:30 PM Eastern Time nightly, or by our KosMail message board. Please indicate (a) why you liked the comment, and (b) your Dkos user name (to properly credit you) as well as a link to the comment itself.
The title of tonight’s essay … is the title of the next-to-last chapter of Robert Louis Stevenson’s Treasure Island… referring to Long John Silver. I think it applies to someone I once had a good deal of respect for … not a pirate, but a king.
Years ago, I noted that — upon the 1975 death of your-friend-and-mine, the late Generalissimo Francisco Franco (and where is Chevy Chase when you need him?) — he had designated his successor to be the grandson of King Alfonso XIII— whose House of Bourbon ended when the Spanish Republic was declared in 1931.
Juan Carlos had appeared with Franco in public, appearing to support his policies. And in gratitude for the support of royalists during the Spanish Civil War and thereafter: Franco agreed to appointing as his successor an absolute monarch.
Yet when Juan Carlos took the throne he indicated that he desired only the status of a constitutional monarch: appointing a prime minister, meeting with leaders of various left-wing parties, drafting a new constitution that earned a strong majority in a nationwide referendum and pressed for legalization of the Communist Party — as he listened to Spaniards that the nation needed to modernize after Franco.
Five years later in 1981, though, Fascists hoped for a change-of-heart: when a military coup held the members of the Cortes (Spain's Parliamentary lower house) hostage, seeking a restoration of a dictatorship. Its collapse was finalized when Juan Carlos — wearing his military uniform — addressed the Spanish people on television and telling the armed forces, in effect, "to return to the barracks". Following this, even Spain's left acknowledged the achievement of the King, when he could have accepted an absolute monarchy by simply saying, "Si". Not everyone declines (or relinquishes) that much power voluntarily.
When a 2005 bill legalizing same-sex marriage came up in the Cortes ..... he gave his assent to it. And he made world headlines at a 2007 Ibero-American Summit in Chile when the late Venezuelan strongman Hugo Chavez was berating the then-Spanish prime minister over his predecessor…. when the King interjected, ¿Por qué no te callas? - ("Why don't you shut up?") … which spawned parody videos.
Yet there were things underfoot that were not easily visible from across-the-pond.
His family had fled in exile to Italy (in fact, he was born in Rome in 1938) so that money issues were frequent ... that manifested itself when he took the throne, with lavish purchases and dodgy deal-making. He had a breach with his own father (whom Franco had passed-over in favor of his son) which many point to as leading to a sense of rebellion. And a reporter for the newspaper El Mundo cited the son of Juan Carlos as saying his father “collected lovers as if they were state gifts”. Yet most in Spain (and the press) ignored his private life .... until April 2012.
First, his son-in-law was embroiled in a financial scandal. Then he went on an elephant-hunting trip to Botswana — where he suffered a broken hip— at a time when Spanish unemployment had hit 24%. It was also then that people learned of his affair with his lover (Corinna Larsen from Denmark) and with the tab being paid for by a Saudi magnate …. well, his star began to fall. He then had health issues and after newfound interest in his personal life foibles by the national press: in 2014 he abdicated in favor of his son Felipe, who promised the nation a “renovated monarchy for a new era”.
Yet beginning in 2018 a series of new scandals arose, including:
→ An effort to launder money: his (now former) lover suddenly being told she has been gifted a property worth €3m by the king of Morocco, before being asked to pass it over to the former Spanish monarch.
→ A revelation (dating back to 2010) that he flew into Switzerland in 2010 to knock on the door of his wealth manager and hand him a briefcase containing $1.9m in cash he said was a gift from the ruler of Bahrain.
→ A Swiss prosecutor’s inquiry as to a $100m gift to Juan Carlos from the king of Saudi Arabia in 2008, and whether it was in connection with the awarding of a €6.7bn contract for a Spanish consortium to build a high-speed railway from Medina to Mecca three years later. The prosecutor has found evidence of two tax-haven foundations under his control, connected to Swiss bank accounts.
→ And now prosecutors at Spain's Supreme Court announced the start of the first ever investigation into Juan Carlos in his own country, to establish whether the former king could be accused of any crimes related to the Saudi money. The former king remains immune from prosecution in Spain for any action committed before his 2014 abdication (and there are statute-of-limitations after) although he is not immune from Swiss prosecution, should he be charged there.
Just recently — when it was revealed that his son Felipe was a beneficiary of the aforementioned two foundations linked to Juan Carlos — the new king renounced his inheritance and also cancelled the salary of $225k his father was receiving as “King Emeritus”. There are increasing calls for Felipe to evict him from the Zarzuela Palace, as well. The future of the House of Bourbon … may be at stake.
I am of the opinion that we do need heroes…. yet by doing so, we run-the-risk of things like this happening. It is, I suppose …. an occupational hazard, as Gordon Lightfoot reminded us in his most famous tune: ♫♫ “But heroes …. often fail”. ♫♫
Let’s close with this 1986 Robbie Robertson song …. dedicated to his late band mate Richard Manuel, yet the title could aptly apply to the (now) pariah King.
Now, on to Top Comments:
From dragonwerx:
In the diary by DRo about the death from Covid-19 of Herman Cain— this comment by sandbear75 …. as well as an excellent (and more sobering) comment made by jayden.
From ridemybike (and submitted by jayden):
In the same diary listed above on Herman Cain— this comment by Huskersperfectly sums up the depraved state of GOP ideology.
Highlighted by giddything:
Once again in the same diary listed above on Herman Cain— this comment by ruscle ... we should take wagers on which Republican(s) it will be this time and how long it will take them to delete it from their Twitter feed.
And from Ed Tracey, your faithful correspondent this evening ........
In the front-page story about how staffers for GOP members of Congress are scorned if they practice social distancing and wear masks — stealthtffti begins a thread about the current plans of your-friend-and-mine, Louie Gohmert— which spawns a litany of alternative facts treatments to come.
TOP PHOTOSJuly 29th, 2020 Next - enjoy jotter's wonderful *PictureQuilt™* below. Just click on the picture and it will magically take you to the comment that features that photo.
(NOTE: Any missing images in the Quilt were removed because (a) they were from an unapproved source that somehow snuck through in the comments, or (b) it was an image from the DailyKos Image Library which didn't have permissions set to allow others to use it.) |
And lastly: yesterday's Top Mojo - mega-mojo to the intrepid mik ...... who rescued this feature from oblivion:
1) Person, Catnip, Man, Tuna, TV. … by chicago minx +17320) Bless his hearts by zenvegan +8720) Rep. Cedric Richmond by Denise Oliver Velez +8722) I just fell in love again. by RedDan +8626) Congrats to Krissah Thompson by Denise Oliver Velez +80