So just a few days after the shocking bombings in Madrid, the ruling right-wing party, notorious for its support of the war, has gone down to defeat in Spain’s elections.
Although the government initially blamed ETA, the Basque separatists, it looks more and more like it was Islamic militants behind the attack. If nothing else, the fact that the date fell exactly two and a half years–or 911 days–after 9/11 seems too symbolic to overlook.
I ask myself how American voters would swing if this country suffered another attack right before our elections in November. Something tells me a large number of people would rally behind the president. Some swing voters would probably vote against him in disgust, and perhaps even a few solid Republicans would as well, but I feel there’s something fundamentally conservative in the collective American unconscious right now that would get people out to the polls to support the commander in chief.
The war with Iraq was much less popular in Spain (indeed, everywhere) than it was in the USA, and that might explain the difference, but I wonder if that’s all there is to it. I hope we don’t have a chance to find out.