Spanish King Juan Carlos tells Chavez to “shut up”.

Chavez repeatedly interrupted Spanish PM Jose Luis Zapatero at the Ibero-American summit in Chile last weekend, calling former Spanish prime minister Jose Maria Aznar a “fascist.” Zapatero, a socialist who defeated Aznar at the polls after the Madrid bombings, argued with Chavez openly that Aznar was a democratically-elected leader. The back-and-forth went on until King Juan Carlos of Spain leaned into his microphone and said: “Por que no te callas?”—“Why don’t you shut up?” You can watch the footage here (which, because of only one microphone, doesn’t look nearly as dramatic as it sounds).

The king’s admonition has since pinched a nerve across the Spanish-speaking world. From newspaper headlines to cable television news, to clips on YouTube, to T-shirts and cellphone ring tones. The scene has become a comedy skip on a television show in Mexico, and in El Salvador, the phrase has became a playful greeting. It remains uncertain a week later who put whom in his place. Some say it Chavez was the loser for his boorish lack of etiquette, or the king for unregally insulting a national leader at a forum whose theme was “social cohesion.” The leaders of Peru and El Salvador have since defended the King, while Cuba’s Castro and Brazil’s Lulu have come out for Chavez.

Each side made its own interpretation of the incident. The Spanish framed the incident as a simple case of the king upbraiding Chavez for not relinquishing the floor and for referring disrespectfully to a former PM, and Zapatero said this mere “moment of tension” would never have become known had TV cameras not been rolling.

Chavez ignored the comment at first, but four days later used it as an example of the former colonial power’s condescension. Chavez now demands a letter of apology from the King, and has “joked” with reporters using the word, according to Reuters. Venezuela’s state-run media has played footage showing King Carlos standing in the 1970s with Spain’s fascist ruler, Francisco Franco, and describing the king as the late dictator’s lackey. (Unmentioned in the footage of Carlos and Franco was the fact that the monarchy was endorsed by the Spanish people in a vote in 1978, and the king played a key role in quashing an attempted military coup in 1981, and the King is widely loved because of it.)

For me, the appearance of the incident is obious: Chavez is being his typically disrespectful self and is unfit to even be in the same room as other world leaders. I’m surprised if you can see the incident in his favor. And Chavez may think Aznar is a Fascist, but the Spanish could have told him the real meaning of the term—Zapatero’s grandfather was murdered by the real fascists in Franco’s secret police, and the King’s family was sent into exile by them. And as Venezuela blog Daniel’s Diary points out, and from where the picture to the left is taken, let’s not kid ourselves as to who’s tactics and leadership most rescemble fascistrule.

As for the summit, Argentina’s largest daily newspaper the Clarin said it would be remembered for “the differences, lack of agreements and opposing views made more noise than the accords and shared processes.”

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