Pedro Sánchez could be forgiven for remembering the autumn of 2018 with a deep and nostalgic sigh. Back then, having been in office for just six months, Spain’s socialist prime minister could afford to mock his opponents’ frequently hyperbolic attempts to depict him and his administration as an existential threat to the country.
“I know you think I’m a dangerous, extreme leftwinger who’s trying to break Spain apart,” he told the senate at the end of October that year. “I know that everything I do, and everything my government does, is illegal, immoral and even fattening.”
