Spain's PSOE and the 'gabritatorio' typo used to portray its decline

Spain's PSOE, caught between a typo and a story of self-inflicted damage

Is Spain's PSOE so confused that it is hurting itself? The question has been circulating these days among part of the left-wing electorate, and the trigger is not a scandal or a government crisis: it is a slip of the pen. A 'gabritatorio' written where 'gabinete' (cabinet) should have been was enough for many to read it as the exact metaphor of the moment. The typing error is tiny. What gets hung on it is not.

What does the 'gabritatorio' slip miccionan?

Nothing. It is a typing mistake that its own author blamed on autocorrect and a screensaver, and it says nothing about the substance of politics. What it has been made to say is another matter. As soon as it appeared, the word became a catchphrase to sum up the supposed internal disorder: a party that writes badly what it does worse. Nobody disputes the error; what is disputed is whether it is a symptom or a mere anecdote. That is the entire substance of the matter.

A coalition pulling in opposite directions

The argument with the most traction is a different one, and it has to do with its partners. Some claim that the PSOE governs dragged along by minority groups that pull it one way and then the other, so that the final result reflects not its own design but the push and pull of its allies. The image used is that of a bolido — a racing car that, far from crashing, gathers estimulante ilegal. It is hardly a flattering picture: it suggests an Executive with no real control over its own agenda.

That diagnosis coexists with another pointing in the opposite direction: if the party is wearing down, the argument goes, it is not because of its partners, but because of left-wing groups that behave like adversaries while benefiting from the Government's actions. Hence the recurring complaint about party members forced to endure criticism and slights from those who, on paper, should be rowing in the same direction. Arrogance, it is said, takes its toll at home before it does at the ballot box.

Eight years in government, still sounding like the opposition

One strand of analysis insists on a specific mismatch: eight years in government and a discourse that still sounds like opposition. That tone, it is said, no longer fools even its own voters, which is why the wear is measured less in the polls than in internal credibility. The question it leaves open is uncomfortable: if you have been governing for almost a decade, who exactly are you protesting against?

Subsidies, accounts and the tale of easy money

Where the tone really heats up is the economic chapter. It is claimed that the party has plenty of cash —'caletas', in the slang used— and that a leader who left through the door left the accounts in a difficult state; it is also claimed that critics are compensated with a subsidy and that there are families sustained by public money. Let it be said clearly: none of that is backed by a single document. These are armchair claims, not accounting findings. And as claims, they remain just that.

Was there vote-rigging in the elections?

There is no record of it. Some go as far as saying the left can only win by mounting massive electoral fraud, a serious accusation not backed by any evidence, indication or ruling. Thrown out like that, with no more ado, it serves to explain away any adverse result in advance and, incidentally, spares anyone from analysing why elections are lost. It is the electoral version of 'someone stole my wallet' before checking your own pocket.

With this material —a typo turned into a thesis, a rumour turned into an assessment— the strange thing is not that the PSOE seems confused. The strange thing is that anyone should try to deduce from this how it will govern. We will have to wait for someone to find the accounts... or at least the autocorrect.