Independents’ day: Catalans on trial

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Hello and welcome to the Intelligence on Economist Radio. I'm your host Jason Palmer. Every weekday we provide a fresh perspective on the events shaping your world. On Sunday, under heavy Minnesota snow, Senator Amy Klobuchar announced her bid for president. She claims to have plenty of grit, but it's not clear whether her centrist tendencies are are an advantage in an increasingly crowded democratic field. And Sir Don McCullen is drawn to conflict in London's gang scene and in most every war zone from the 20th century. In a retrospective of his work, he reveals extremes of human experience and suffering. First up, though, in a new publicity drive, the Spanish government has hired some big names to celebrate the country's diversity and democracy. European it includes leading figures from business, the arts and science. Among them, the actor Richard Gere. This is the real Spain. But the launch comes in the same week as a high profile trial in which sensitive issues of unity and democracy will be laid bare. 12 Catalan politicians will appear today in Spain's Supreme Court on charges of rebellion and sedition. Some of them could be imprisoned for as much as 25 years. And the issue has angered many people outside Catalonia who believe the government should not negotiate with the separatists. On Sunday, tens of thousands of people protested in Madrid against moves by the socialist Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez to open talks with the Catalan leadership.

In the autumn of 2017, the separatist majority in the Catalan parliament passed laws calling an unconstitutional referendum on independence.

Michael Reed is our senior editor for Spain and Latin America and is based in Madrid.

They went ahead and held the referendum despite the opposition of the Spanish government and attempts by the police to disrupt it. They say around 40% voted for independence. That's unverifiable. And then a few weeks later, they unilaterally declared independence. This was unconstitutional and illegal and was recognized by nobody. And it prompted the prosecutors and the judiciary in Spain to bring charges of rebellion, sedition and misuse of public funds against various Catalan leaders.

And coming to the trial that's starting. Who's on trial and what are the charges?

Well, 12 people are on trial in the Supreme Court in Madrid. A few others are on trial in Barcelona. Some of them, most of them, are former members of the Catalan government, and most of them are accused of rebellion. That's a very, very serious charge which attracts a sentence of up to 20. It's controversial because it's a charge designed for old fashioned military coups in which you put tanks on the street. And the supporters of the defendants point out that their actions were mainly peaceful, and it's questionable whether the charge of rebellion will fit.

Why is this such a sensitive point for Spaniards?

Well, Catalonia has never been an independent country. It's long been an integral part of Spain, but it has separate language, it has a separate culture in part. And Catalonia is divided down the middle about this question between those who have come to favor independence in the past few years, partly a result of the economic crisis in Spain, which is now receding, and those who feel that they are Catalans, but they're also Spaniards and an integral part of Spain. And in the rest of Spain, it's highly controversial. And many Spaniar are angry at what they see as an attempt to break up what is a reasonably successful democratic country.

Right. Which brings us to this trial and the current state of politics. How do you think this trial will affect the political situation now?

Well, there's no doubt that it will keep the issue on the front pages for weeks, probably months, because these are leaders, some of whom have already been in jail for 15 months without trial. And they are seen by the half of Catalonia that supports them as political prisoners in the rest of Spain. And by the other half of Catalonia, they are seen as people who broke the constitution and broke the law. Now, there is a further complication that the current Spanish government, which took office in June, relies on the Catalan separatist parliamentarians in Madrid for its very narrow majority. And the government is trying to get its budget through. And there's been a lot of to and froing as to whether the Catalan separatists will support the budget. Their position at the moment is that they won't. If that remains the position and there'll be a vote later this week, then the chances of an early general election in Spain will rise.

What about, though, the remaining feelings then of separatism? I mean, this trial doesn't end. The question do you foresee future tensions from Catalonia? Is this issue just kind of on hold rather than ended?

I mean, I think the arrest and the imprisonment and the trial have served to freeze public opinion in Catalonia, which might have moved and might have moved away from the separatists had it not been for this. But the impact of the drive for independence in Catalonia in the rest of Spain has been to move public opinion to the right because many Spaniards fear what they see as this attempt to break up their country. So the chances of a meeting of minds over Catalonia look very remote. And the danger is that you still have 2 million Catalans who want to leave the country. And the danger is that that will fester for a long time.

Sunday I flew up to Minneapolis and went to an island in the Mississippi river and and I attended the launch of the presidential campaign of a Minnesotan senator, Amy Klobuchar.

Adam Roberts is the Economist's Midwest correspondent.

It was something more like a winter camp than a political rally.

We don't let a little snow stop us. We don't let a little cold stop us.

There was lots of snow falling. There were crackling fires. People were handing out cups of hot chocolate and hot cider. Some of the supporters came on cross country skis or wearing snowshoes. It was a really colorful scene. And of course there were politicians talking up the chances and the qualities of the Minnesotan senator.

Now Mrs. Klobuchar is entering what's going to turn out to be an enormously crowded field for your money as a presidential candidate. What sets her apart?

You're right. She's entering an incredibly busy field that will only get busier. She says that she stands apart because she's a Midwesterner. She comes from relatively humble roots. She's someone who can claim to be your average American. She's a very hard working person, a very successful senator when it comes to passing legislation. And she's been remarkably popular in her elections since 2006 in Minnesota. She likes to talk about her grit.

I don't have a political machine. I don't come from money. But what I do have is this. I have grit.

When she was speaking about her toughness and her grit, there was something of a question there because she is, on the one hand, a really driven politician who wants to get things done. On the other hand, there is a question about whether she's just too nice. Is she too much of a calm, timid Midwesterner who isn't really tough enough to take on the bruising battle of a national campaign? And so you'll notice she's repeatedly trying to prove herself to point to evidence such as standing in the snow for an hour or. Or talking about her grit, or referring to the time that she quizzed Brett Kavanaugh over the Supreme Court hearing that she has the chops. And one of the questions that she's going to be repeatedly asked in the coming months is whether she really is ready for the primetime.

And what did she reveal about her platform during this announcement?

She also talked about the very high prices of medical care and especially drugs in America. She has a story that she tells of a young man who died because he couldn't afford to buy insul despite having a pretty decent job as a restaurant manager. She talks about the need to do much more to regulate the Internet and to make the power of Internet companies like Google and Facebook more constrained. She talks about climate change, which a lot of Americans feel is a great concern and is currently being ignored by the administration in Washington. So she's addressing issues that Democrats will like without quite being as far to the left as some of the other candidates.

So that all sounds quite straightforward. What do you think her biggest challenges will be then on a platform like that?

As she admitted in her speech on Sunday and also when I spoke to her afterwards, she's not the candidate with big money. You have the money for the campaign?

Thank you.

We will raise the money that's necessary. I have always done that in every campaign. I don't pretend that I'm the one with all the money right now, but once people see me out in the snow, I don't know how they can't help but give me money.

She doesn't come from a rich family. She doesn't have big donors behind her, and she isn't from a big machine politically system. She doesn't have a name that is well recognized yet. And one of the difficulties she has as a centrist is that she has to somehow excite voters who might be more taken up by the promises of candidates who are farther to the left. So those who talk about abolishing America's Border Patrol or who want to have universal health care immediately, or who talk about the Green New Deal and a massive infrastructure spending project to help deal with climate change and boost the economy, she's not quite as bold as those candidates. And so she will struggle to get as much attention as they get.

You said earlier that there's concern she's too nice, but at the same time, reports have been coming out that she's a very tough boss. What do you make of those?

Yeah, this is a tricky one. There is a suspicion that perhaps because she's a woman, she's being criticized more than a man would be. I think one of her bigger concerns is that she's seen as too soft to be able to stand up to Donald Trump. And actually having a reputation as a tough boss, well, maybe that helps her a little bit.

So do you think being a centrist will be an advantage or a disadvantage for her? Has the appetite for radical left policies sort of softened the appetite for a cheery Midwestern peacemaker?

Yeah, well, it will depend where you look. I think the great advantage that Amy Klobuchar has is that she will appeal to people in states like Iowa. And so since that's very early in the primary race or the caucuses race for the Democrats, she could do well with the sort of voters in Iowa who want a centrist, who want a candidate who can deal with Republicans and get things done. The difficulty she has is in appealing to voters in other states, maybe in South Carolina, maybe California, where there are lots of younger voters and people who are really disgusted with Donald Trump and they want to veer away from anything to do with cooperating with the Republicans, and they want to pick a radical, strong, tough candidate who can crush him. And I think her challenge will be to take any advantage she has in the early part of the primary race and to develop that later into the campaign.

And a question that I suspect I might be asking you again, as the field changes, of everyone who's declared so far, who do you think is the opponent Mr. Trump would least like to face in the election?

That's an incredibly difficult question to ask. But I think someone like Amy Klobuchar is a potential threat to him because she talks about the need for ordinary working folk to be heard. And she comes from a bit of the country where Donald Trump did surprisingly well in 2016. And, for example, on Sunday, one of the things that Amy Klobuchar said was that she would bother to campaign in Wisconsin. So Remember, back in 2016, the Democratic candidate, Hillary Clinton, neglected to come and campaign in places like Wisconsin. And that was one of the main reasons why the Democrats lost. The Democrats won't make that mistake again. And a candidate who comes from the Midwest, whether it's Amy Klobuchar, whether it's someone like Sherrod Brown from Ohio or perhaps even Joe Biden, any of those candidates will have a much stronger showing in this part of the country. And so Donald Trump will be stuck, I think, if he doesn't have a new strategy of going beyond the blue collar vote in the Midwest and look for an alternative bank of supporters.

Adam, thanks a lot.

Thank you.

Sometimes people really do seem to have greatness thrust upon them.

You know, I fell in love with photography and also I have to say that photography chose me. I didn't choose it.

Sir Don McCullen's photography has documented wars and famines and sometimes his native England for nearly seven decades. It began with a photograph of a gang in north London.

Taking that picture of the gang that day totally reversed my whole life and future.

The photograph shows a group of young men posing in their sort of modish suits in the shell of a bombed out building.

Andy Miller, our books and arts editor, spoke to Sir Don ahead of an exhibition of his work at Tate Britain Gallery in London.

This is a guy who's seen most of the conflicts of many of the conflicts of the second half of the 20th century, all of which he recalled in detail. That was by turns horrifying and exhilarating.

Andy, you've had a chance to look at the photographs in this exhibition. Tell me about them.

Well, they're all black and white and they all have an atmosphere of glowering threat and sort of violence or doom. So, for example, one of the photographs of his that I like best, one of his most celebrated pictures is a close up portrait of a homeless Irishman in the East End of London. And you can see every crease in this man's face and you feel as if you can see every experience and injustice that he's ever suffered. And of course, there are many photos in the exhibition of the war zones and famines for which actually and Don McCullen is best known.

We started off with this picture in North London, but he's clearly been around the world more than once. How did that come about?

Well, he sold his photograph to the observer and having initially taught himself or learnt, began to learn the craft of photography whilst on national service. He then Went to Berlin kind of, you know, under his own steam.

And it's only looking back over the years, though, I can see the fermentation of. Of the whole romantic. The Cold War was romantic, even though it was cold and bloody awful.

From the first war he went to, which was in Cyprus, he realized that the people he suffered most were civilians.

You know, the greatest fear I ever saw on the faces of anywhere were the civilians who were totally unprepared and always the last to be told what the next part of the act was going to be. So I then started to drift away from the glory of battle, as the soldiers would describe it.

That's kind of what drew him to all of these different kinds of conflict. He seems drawn relentlessly to conflict.

I think that he connects his own experience as a child growing up in an extremely poor and underprivileged family with the experiences of some of the people he's met.

You see, my whole life's been. Basically, has been built upon violence.

Although I think he also, you know, said. He said to me that he developed a taste for him, there is a.

Junkie adrenaline rush in covering war, particularly when you've had a day when you might have been killed. And you got through it because you felt more elated and more blessed.

And that must surely, though, after years and many injuries, really take a psychological toll, too.

He was a person if you. As if you pushed a button. And these stories just sort of tumbled out of him. They were there very, very close to the surface. And he said that he. There was one particular engagement during the Tet Offensive where he'd seen a company of American Marines wiped out.

It was a thing that never leaves me. I think about it, everybody.

He started out as a news photographer, but this exhibition is at a renowned art gallery in London. Do you think he'll be remembered more as photographer or as artist?

He was very resistant to the label art, in part because he felt it didn't fit with his own background, his sense of himself as this kid from the mean streets who'd never really had much by way of education, but also because he felt, obviously, that it was immoral somehow to make art out of suffering.

You feel guilty about that because you think maybe you're composing your pictures in an iconic way and you're questioning yourself, what am I doing here? Am I trying to be a creative person here? Isn't that disgusting?

At the same time, he said, you know, that he needed to apply these artistic techniques. He applied them precisely to bring home the experiences he was documenting.

You have to somehow connive to bring them in and hold them so that they will get the full message of what you're presenting. Really?

Andy, thanks for coming in.

Thanks for having me, Jason.

That's all for this episode of the Intelligence. You can subscribe to the economist@exterator.com radio offer 12 issues for $12 or 12 pounds. See you back here tomorrow.