I'm starting to note that they are legion those who feel called out and left high and dry by Mariano Rajoy's memoirs explaining, perfectly bluntly, that he would have applied article 155 of the Spanish Constitution to Catalonia in all scenarios during those final days of October 2017. Rajoy didn't need a plan B because his thing was plans A: to put an end to the humiliation the 1st October has meant, the institutional bewilderment that had occurred and the steps towards the independence of Catalonia.
There was a fake narrative implemented by the deep state with the complicity and all the strength of politicians, the media, and editorial, opinion column and assorted writers which consisted of giving an air of truth to the claim that if the Catalan Parliament didn't proclaim independence, article 155 would remain in the drawer. Today we know that that narrative, in which as well as the governing PP, Pedro Sánchez's PSOE obviously took part, was merely looking to bring Puigdemont and Junqueras to a halt since Rajoy had gone beyond that.
The world of power is so enormous and overwhelming that at a time of such extreme economic difficulty for the large print newspapers, any narrative can forge its path with an ease unimaginable previously. We see him every day although the avalanche of news to the contrary sows doubts about the truth of things. We've just seen it in the independence process trial with a repeated message from the state insistent calling events that never were so a "coup d'état" and "rebellion" and on accusations of sedition which are teetering in Europe.
The strength of the sole narrative is such that this Tuesday, for example, an award will be given in a ceremony held by the paper ABC, in the presence of the monarchs, for a cartoon published in the newspaper relating to the persecution which happened involving teachers at El Palau school in Sant Andreu de la Barca. In the cartoon, a child appears sitting at his desk, with his hand in the air, his shadow morphing into New York's Statue of Liberty whilst a voice asks: "Hands up if your parents are Civil Guard". The Mingote Prize is being awarded, according to the royal family's website, "for its evocation of the fight for the liberty of all those who make up the distinguished corps".
The heart of the matter isn't that ABC should give an award to the Civil Guard, who are part of that paper's DNA, nor that the award should be presented by Felipe VI. Rather that a cartoon responding to fake news and which is just part of a campaign to discredit the Catalan education system should have been chosen. After baseless accusations, some supported by the public prosecution service, two courts in Martorell ended up shelving the serious complaints against the teachers over the summer. That circumstance by itself invalidates giving a prize to a cartoon on a false narrative. But who cares about that?