enthalpy

Thursday, March 17, 2005


Generalissimo Francisco Franco is still dead, yet he's still got a statue or two around Madrid. At least he did up until yesterday.
Before dawn, to jeers and cheers from fascist and anti-fascist supporters, a crane lifted the statue of the general mounted on a horse from its plinth.

There had been no notice that the 1959 statue would be removed.
Some other things they don't notice in Spain:
Since his death and Spain's return to democracy, some other Franco statues and memorials have been removed from public places.

But in 2002, the conservative government - which was replaced by the Socialists last year - voted against proposals to remove street names, statues and other symbols of the Franco era.
Notice that the "return to democracy" was overshadowed and "replaced by the Socialists" in less than a generation? Maybe they should just leave the statues up for another 4 years and wait for the next revolutionary to free them from the oppressive tyranny that subjugates them this week. It's much easier to put a new name at the bottom of a statue than it is to make a whole new one.



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