Whether you like it or not, when I see Juan Carlos I or Jordi Pujol, I see my youth go by and that of that gray Spain that faced a colossal challenge: to transform Francoism –unlike Hitler or Mussolini, Franco had won the war– into a democratic system that would allow traveling the world without a suitcase loaded with complexes. And, by the way, stop living with clubs.
We all know the end of the story: the two characters have been its most effective detractors. And they are purging their mistakes. Parallel lives? There is something. And converging: that night of February 23, 1981, when he certified the end of military power, with its age-old ability to intimidate the people.
Do they have the right to lead a normal life? Naturally. The problem is that they are the punching balls of political and social sectors that, if they had faced the transition, would have been shipwrecked, in view of their alarming deficit in the sense of State. There is a lot of posturing between so much indignation...
Contrary to the international unanimity regarding the success of the transition, the same ones who are becoming exquisite now to discredit the 1978 regime –some with very poor arguments: they equate a constitutional monarchy to a family farmhouse or an anti-democratic anachronism, as we can see in Sweden, Belgium, Great Britain or Japan– use Juan Carlos I and Pujol –of advanced ages– for their electoral strategies, cainites, by the way.
I do not see the utility of subjecting Juan Carlos I to a humiliating public confession or a Maoist re-education session, nor does the placid life of Jordi Pujol in Barcelona require them. Did he not abdicate on his day? Are we journalists, less and less independent, the model judges of the new Spain? So ideal is our present to waste energy on two retirees who improved Spain?
It burdens me, I admit, that hypocrisy of those who are capable of stirring up one and exonerating the other. In addition, let's be clear, they enjoy a popular affection –in private, yes– that may be inexplicable but it is genuine. Today, as in 1978: look ahead.
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