Friday, February 22, 2013

Spanish scandal

The embezzlement scandal surrounding Iñaki Urdangarín, husband of the Infanta Cristina, is increasingly embarrassing for the Spanish royal family, as the New York Times reports, though he says his wife and in-laws had nothing to do with his business dealings.  While I feel for the King and support the Spanish monarchy unconditionally, I can't help feeling that if princesses still married princes instead of commoners, we wouldn't have problems like this.

1 comment:

August said...

Well, in terms of breeding I think the aristocracy provided a target and this was on the whole good for humanity. As long as the target is, generally speaking, up, improvements will be made. The problem is now the target is not up, so women go for people like Iñaki Urdangarín. The effect is even worse the further down you go- the princesses at least look for moneyed men, but the low-class women look for the biggest most tatted up thugs they can find.
They don't appear to be thinking about whether or not the guy can provide for children, much less about improving the line.
I like the old Norwegian thing I found in Kristen Lavransdatter- the nobles were the ones whose families had managed to own property (mortgage free) for four generations. That suggests upward mobility can be had in return for displaying prudent administrative skills. Beats handball, in my opinion.