Politics is almost always an imperfect mix of numbers and mood.
The same day that Pedro Sánchez celebrated his success in the debate on the state of the nation, which no one dares to deny, and the rearmament of his majority with comfortable votes, Mario Draghi went up to the Quirinal hill to resign.
The mood of the Italian prime minister is intact, as evidenced by the joke he told correspondents in Rome on Tuesday about central bankers, his work before leading the Italian government: "A man needs a heart transplant and they offer him to choose between that of a 25-year-old in perfect health until his death and that of an 86-year-old central banker.
"I want the banker's," he replies without hesitation.
-But why?
“Because that heart has never been used.”
Draghi has the spirit, but the numbers fail him.
And he is on the brink of the abyss, although only Italy can reinvent itself and create a Draghi bis with another majority.
In Italy and Spain, decrees were voted on the same day to alleviate the economic effects of the war.
Draghi resigned because his went ahead but part of his government, the Five Star deputies, did not support him.
Meanwhile, Sánchez saw how his majority expanded and once again touched the 188 seats that his two Budgets gave him and guarantee him to finish the legislature with solid support.
If the previous decree of the Government with measures against the crisis had the vote against the ERC and PP and came out by the minimum -176 to 172-, it had the support of the Republicans and the abstention of the popular ones.
Final result: 186 votes in favor, 51 against (Vox) and 108 abstentions (PP and Ciudadanos).
Comfortable numbers for Sánchez, which make Spain the opposite of Italy or the United Kingdom, where Boris Johnson fell last week.
On the contrary, Sánchez emerges clearly reinforced from a decisive week, something that all the politicians of the majority that support the Government underline, but even opposition leaders admit in private, who still continue to think that the background sea will sweep the president away medium term.
Sánchez also ends the week with an approach to ERC that guarantees even more stability for the most part, after the successful meeting with Pere Aragonès, and even makes him dream of a third General State Budget.
A little over a week ago, in the PSOE and in United We Can there was a general alarm.
The Government did not seem to have the courage - behind the Andalusian elections the idea was being installed that the victory of the right is inexorable - or numbers: the majority suffered from internal tensions due to the increase in defense spending and the crisis due to the fence of Melilla once again cracked the seams of a complex majority in Congress.
Meanwhile, Yolanda Díaz presented her Sumar project with much more public than expected and criticized in EL PAÍS that the Government "lacks soul".
The Socialists, especially cyclothymics, seemed sunk.
Sánchez himself confessed before his Executive that they are facing "the worst moment of the legislature" and that the Andalusian coup has been "very hard".
Internal criticism was even beginning to be heard and there were rumors of changes in the Government and in the PSOE.
The latter have not disappeared, and more movements are still expected from Sánchez before starting the new season in September, when a long electoral campaign for municipal and regional elections will also begin.
Despite the Andalusian crash, much higher than expected, in La Moncloa they had a clear comeback plan.
First, a great decree of measures;
later, NATO summit;
and finally, debate on the state of the nation.
Melilla dislocated everything and opened a new gap on the left that disconcerted La Moncloa, which was slow to react.
However, in Sánchez's environment they insisted: "The key is the debate, that's where the turn will come."
If we take the PSOE and its bench as a thermometer, the turn was 180 degrees.
From sinking to euphoria.
“This is where the comeback begins.
Sánchez has shown why he is there.
Any other would sink with the Andalusian coup and the polls these days.
He has gone out there to show that he does not give up and that he has the best instrument in politics to set the agenda and go on the offensive: the government.
And he's not going to sit still.
He will fight to the end.
There is a party”, sentenced a minister.
That feeling is widespread after the debate: beyond the measures, what Sánchez has transferred this week is a key idea in politics: he is not the Zapatero of 2011, who could not even present himself.
He has been in power for four years, has no intention of taking a step back and is convinced that he can win in 2023.
The two key announcements, the tax on energy and banking and the free bonds for short and medium distance trains that depend on the central Administration, in addition to the increase in scholarships, dislocated everyone.
Also the PP, unable to react, lost in a return to ETA that serves to take space away from Vox, but at the same time places the PP of Núñez Feijóo very close to that of Pablo Casado, something that in theory the leader wanted to flee Galician.
The popular ones, who suffered from the anomaly that their leader could not lead the debate because he is not a deputy, did not go well with this crossing.
Even some deputies of the PP admit it in private, who recognize that the bet to return to ETA did not go as expected: Gamarra forced a minute of silence for Miguel Ángel Blanco to see if the deputies of Bildu and others stayed seated, but he got up the entire Chamber, and the PP has received criticism from many victims, including Consuelo Ordóñez, Gregorio's sister, a benchmark for the popular.
However, other leaders, including Feijóo himself, think that this strategy is long-term and that there is a band of socialist voters who can go over to the popular ones due to Sánchez's agreements with Bildu and ERC.
As proof, they appeal to Felipe González's criticism of the new memory law and the manifestos of some former socialist ministers in this regard.
Some prominent members of the PSOE consider that, precisely because of this obvious strategy of the popular, it has been a mistake to give them arguments by agreeing on the memory law with Bildu instead of leaving it parked as it seemed a year ago, although others insist that it was a priority to get and to the law because many victims are in their last years of life.
Empathy
In the progressive bench they think that the PP has made a huge mistake and conclude that Sánchez swept the debate due to the non-appearance of the rival.
Meanwhile, the members of the PSOE are happy because they believe that there has been a clear turn to the left.
Was there?
It seems obvious that it is.
But some ministers dispute it.
“One week they blame us for a shift to the center because of the NATO summit and the other, a shift to the left because of the bank tax.
What Sánchez is doing is occupying the political centrality, not the center.
He is the great protagonist of the scene.
And that is the most important thing in politics”, summarizes one of them.
Others highlight an underlying issue: Sánchez has found a new tone, which premiered in the debate, more empathetic, more direct and less self-indulgent.
But above all, with the furious reaction of the big energy companies and banks and important sectors of big business, he has something new and very valuable in politics: a rival, a powerful enemy.
Sánchez made it very clear in the debate: between the working middle class and the big companies with windfall profits, he will choose the former.
The president, who won the 2017 primaries with a message against the PSOE establishment, which had thrown him out, now wants to connect with his electorate with a new power to face: the great beneficiaries of this crisis.
Hardly anyone doubts that the first round of this new battle has gone very well for him.
But autumn lies ahead and, above all, a long winter that will mark the final result of this new turn of the screw in Spanish politics.
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