The policy of annihilation. That's what I call the policy that Ms. Ayuso practices, **really led by Miguel Ángel Rodríguez, her Chief of Staff,** who is de facto the president of the Community of Madrid. And it is the policy of annihilation. Because we have settled in Madrid, in the Assembly and in Madrid politics, on a level where we are not debating ideas or policies. It doesn't matter what the Popular Party Government does, **it doesn't matter what Ayuso's Government does: the important thing is to see who insults the most.**
And in that vein, the Popular Party has placed profiles like the famous Alfonso Serrano, Mr. Díaz Pache, or other profiles who, Thursday after Thursday in the Assembly, dedicate themselves to insulting the opposition, to insulting, to insulting. Not even those who don't think like them anymore, because even VOX receives insults from the Popular Parliamentary Group: to insult everyone who doesn't dance to their tune. They are on an absolutist pedestal that is truly frightening.
And if you add to that the censorship they apply to the initiatives we present in the Assembly, then two plus two equals four. **And I believe that the Popular Party of Madrid is entrenched in this situation especially because it is the most backward, the most stale part of the Popular Party of Spain.** We already saw it with Esperanza Aguirre, and Ayuso is Esperanza Aguirre's heir. And if you look at the middle managers in the Madrid administration, you will see that many were, or already were, in Esperanza Aguirre's time.
They don't know how to be in opposition. Many come from Francoism, that's the reality. I'm not bringing up Franco to justify anything: many come from having been in charge for 40 years in Spain and think that power belongs to them. And those of us who think that power belongs to the people and, therefore, to democracy, understand that the Popular Party has to govern just like other parties in other territories, because that is the purpose of democracy. But the Popular Party doesn't understand it that way. The Popular Party believes that only they can govern, and we have the most notable example of this in the "tamayazo" in 2003, when the Popular Party bought two socialist deputies to ensure Esperanza Aguirre's government.
Then we learned, with the whole string of corruption cases —Gürtel, Lezo, etc.—, that what they wanted was to keep things under wraps so that all the dirt they had stored wouldn't come out. But this policy of annihilating the adversary doesn't just stay in Madrid since Ayuso carried out her internal coup against Pablo Casado. Pablo Casado was also very insolent, but it was another level, wasn't it?
Since Feijóo took over, thanks to the coup d'état Ayuso staged within the Popular Party, the profiles that have taken center stage in the PP are Ayuso and Miguel Ángel Rodríguez style. That is, insults first: the insult comes first, and then, if I finish insulting you, if I don't finish crushing you, maybe I'll slip in the idea. Profiles like Jaime de los Santos, who, frankly, I'm stunned —forgive the expression— every time I see him spew hatred in the Congress of Deputies; it fills me with secondhand embarrassment. Because Jaime was a politician who had a reputation in Madrid for being a calm councilor, a moderate councilor, when he was there during Cifuentes's era, and he has transformed into a totally arrogant character. And I'm talking politically, not personally, as I don't have the pleasure. But politically he has become an arrogant character, a rude character, and a character who puts insults above ideas.
And, evidently, Marquis Tellado, Feijóo's right-hand man. He is the one who actually directs what little Ayuso is allowed to direct of national policy in the parliamentary group. Tellado: you only have to see him speak, not only in what he says, but in how he says it, in the expressions of hatred he displays every time he speaks of the Socialist Party or the left-wing groups. Esther Muñoz, I won't even mention her. The defector Sayas, who it seems must be much more rude and much more extreme than all of them to secure his seat.
And they say they are forceful, and I tell them no: that forcefulness is not insult, that precisely what we have to be is forceful against insult, especially in these times, when hate speech, insults on social media, constant threats, are commonplace. We have to be forceful legally, but also politically, and that implies not legitimizing those who spread these types of discourse and those who try to destroy their rivals instead of countering their ideas.
I believe that a lot of forcefulness is needed against insults and a lot of politics is needed, but real politics, good politics, political discourse, political debate, ideas. And that, with the political figures that the Popular Party currently has in the front line, led by Ayuso, is very complicated, because, honestly, we don't know what Ayuso is doing in Madrid. Well, we do know, but they strive to ensure that it is not known by putting insults above ideas.
So, more assertiveness against insults, more politics, which after all is more democracy.