What a strange morning, today. I couldn’t find any news at all on any TV channel. Except, of course, that a rather confused, if talented, pop star had unexpectedly died. It left me wondering, firstly, whether The Second Coming would receive such coverage. And, secondly, whether we shouldn’t call last night’s development The First Going.

Anyway, I was pondering this morning the implications of living in a society where no one really believes anything anyone else tells them. Well, here’s one significant consequence for those selling property in today’s falling market in Spain. Actually, things can currently work out badly for the buyer as well as the seller. I’m still half-waiting for the tax authorities to write to me to say they believe I paid more for the house in the hills than I did. Even though, if you can follow this, the price declared (in my case the correct one) is much higher that that which the town hall has on its books (the valor catastral). The consequence would be an additional 7% transfer tax on the difference between the actual price I paid and their over-inflated notional market price. I guess there’ll be some theoretical appeal process but I won’t take much comfort from this. As I don’t from the fact it’s now more than a year since the transaction took place. In Spain, a lag of this order hardly counts as serious.

What it all means is that the tax authorities can use a plummeting market to take extra money from both the buyer and the seller, not caring whether this is fair or not and probably knowing that it isn’t. Their operating logic appears to be that, if you can afford to run a car in Spain right now, you can certainly afford more taxes via legitimate/illegitimate speeding and parking fines. Even more so if you can afford to buy a property. And even if you’re forced to sell one. It’s all just a game, after all.

The president, Señor Zapatero has repeated yet again that the Government will not make the sacking process cheaper for employers, despite the pressures being put on him to do so. He defended his stance by saying that such a change was not contemplated in his election manifesto. But, then, this would also be true of the increased taxes on petrol and cigarettes just announced. And the higher income tax he’s trying to get approved by parliament, with the support of minority left wing parties. Plus, as we now know, the ‘permanent’ tax rebate of 400 euros each is going to have a shelf life of about two years. There seems to be a widespread view that Sr Zapatero is not very able, not much of a leader and not to be trusted on whatever he says. His good fortune – in this televisual, ‘progressive’ age – is that his charisma bypass operation was less successful than that of the leader of the Opposition, Señor Rajoy.

I say that President Zapatero is not to be trusted on anything he says but the news today on anti-recession government spending in Europe suggests he's sticking to his word that he’ll only try ‘socialist’ solutions to the crisis. At 2.3% of GDP, Spain’s spend is twice as much as other EU members. So I assume that mountains of government debt are now piling up. To be paid for later, as in the UK.

For those looking for an explanation of Iran’s ludicrous infatuation with the power of the British government, here’s a good start.

Finally . . . Spain has a lot of great looking cake shops (pastelerías). But here’s why giving in to temptation is usually not a good idea. Believe me, Lenox is spot on; they may look like the cakes you can buy in France but they certainly don’t taste like them. As he succinctly puts it – “Here in Spain, cakes are to be seen and admired, but never, ever eaten.” You have been warned.