Richard,
What do you mean? The countries that you mention, vary in whether they are
right wing, leftist, or in the middle.
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Richard Driscoll
Sent: Wednesday, December 07, 2016 11:56 PM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: [blind-democracy] France’s Next President:
Catholic Nationalist Francois Fillon Threatens “a Blitzkrieg” Against the
Welfare State. Neo-Fascist Marine Le Pen Would Save
AllL
But then again you might try any of the countries of South America, Mexico or
Canada. Hmm. Who knows maybe there are others?
Richard
On 12/7/2016 7:16 PM, Miriam Vieni wrote:
Weissman writes: "If you find US politics bizarre, keep your eye on the
French presidential election."
On Sunday, November 27th, Francois Fillon clinched the Republican
party's presidential nomination, having beaten his closest rival Alain
Juppe in a second-round vote. (photo: EPA)
France’s Next President: Catholic Nationalist Francois Fillon Threatens “a
Blitzkrieg” Against the Welfare State. Neo-Fascist Marine Le Pen Would Save
It.
By Steve Weissman, Reader Supported News
07 December 16
If you find US politics bizarre, keep your eye on the French presidential
election. The first round of voting will be on Sunday, April 23, 2017, nearly
five months away. But the race already threatens to change Europe and its
relations with Donald Trump’s America.
Who will French voters choose? The candidate of the increasingly right-wing
Les Republicans, former prime minister François Fillon, who all-too-glibly
promises to be a French Margaret Thatcher? The neo-fascist Marine Le Pen, who
has turned her father's anti-Jewish Front National into Europe’s leading
anti-Muslim political force? Or someone from the left or center who could
beat them both?
Failing divine intervention, I would not bet on that someone. The incumbent
Socialists, former minister Jean-Luc Mélenchon’s Party of the Left, which has
the backing of the once-powerful Communists, the Lutte Ouvrière, the Nouveau
Parti Anticapitaliste, the Parti Radical de Gauche, and the Greens will all
put up their own candidates. Inevitably, they will devour themselves and each
other.
If one includes President Hollande’s wunderkind protégé and former economics
minister Emmanuel Macron, 38, a millionaire Rothschild investment banker who
is running as an independent centrist, the combined forces of the anti-right
could easily win the first round of the presidential election with as much as
35 to 40% of the total vote. But, splitting the vote as they will, none of
them expect perhaps the economically liberal, socially progressive Macron
have any chance to reach the second round of the election on May 7.
The splintering within the Socialist Party makes juicy front-page news. The
current president, Françoise Hollande, whose nationwide approval rating
dropped to 4%, has announced that he will not run for a second term. His
right-leaning prime minister, Manuel Valls, who openly schemed to push
Hollande out, is now widely seen as a Brutus, while the left wing Arnaud
Montebourg, a former minister, creates little enthusiasm among his peers.
Conflicting egos and ambitions naturally play a role. But the sad truth is
that too many of the party’s leading figures are about as socialist as
Hillary Clinton or Tony Blair, whom Valls sees as a role model.
Whoever wins the party primary in January, how do they explain away
Hollande’s failure to create the jobs he promised? As one of France’s
best-educated economists, he knew he would he would need a massive program of
Keynesian deficit spending to stimulate the economy. But that would have
forced him to break dramatically with the fiscal restraints of the European
Union and the austerity-minded economic orthodoxy of German Chancellor Angela
Merkel.
Among the hard left, the gauchistes, the vice is versa. Mélenchon and most of
the others are committed one way or another to Marxist ideas. But they have
neither the following to make an anti-capitalist revolution nor the
flexibility to lead worker-friendly reform efforts that would create jobs and
make France more competitive in the existing global economy. Revolutionary
hopes, reformist possibilities – a conundrum the left forever faces, not
least in our very American debate over Bernie Sanders.
Enjoying a big boost in the polls from his overwhelming primary victory over
both Sarkozy and the less extremist former prime minister Alain Juppé, the
62-year-old Fillon is now heavily favored to beat Marine Le Pen in the second
round of the election. I’m not so sure.
Fillon lives in a bubble, blatantly favoring business while reflecting the
traditionally ultra-conservative social values of the provincial Catholic
bourgeoisie. Those are his roots. He and his Welsh wife, Penelope, still
divide their time between Paris and a 12th century chateau in the
countryside. He regularly demonstrates his sang-froid as an amateur racing
driver. He burnishes his undeniable establishment credentials in ministerial
offices and as one of the longest serving members of the French parliament.
And, since leaving office if 2012, he has worked as a part-time business
consultant, raking in an average of €17,000 a month.
How much will all this appeal to ordinary French voters who famously hate
business and rarely darken the inside of a church except to be hatched,
matched, or dispatched? How will Mr. Establishment’s improbable call to
“fight the system” play after months of attack from left, far-right, and
center?
“France is more right wing than it has ever been,” Fillon declares from his
bubble. The people are “on the verge of revolt.” He then offers “the people”
the same harsh austerity that much of Europe is now rejecting. His promises
include:
• A two point or more increase in a regressive sales tax (VAT)
• Cuts in unemployment insurance, social benefits, and public spending
• A vast reduction of hard-won worker rights
• Huge tax cuts for the rich
• Loosened regulations, protective tariffs, and subsidies for business
“I’ll do everything for entrepreneurs,” he enthuses, exhibiting a faith in
trickle-down economics worthy of Donald Trump and American Republicans.
Fillon promises to cut 500,000 public sector jobs. As others point out,
nearly 60% of those jobs are in education and most of the rest are in the
armed forces and security services. Which does “Mr. Austerity” plan to cut –
teachers, soldiers, or policemen? I can hardly wait for him to tell the
voters.
He promises to eliminate the 35-hour work week, which is mostly symbolic,
since French industry has already found ways to extend the normal work week
to over 40 hours. He would also eliminate overtime pay, force those in the
public sector to work 39 hours for 37 hours pay, and increase to 65 the age
at which retirees could begin to draw their pensions.
He promises to shut down hospitals and restrict the country’s highly prized
universal health care to severe and chronic diseases. People would have to
pay for private insurance to cover anything else.
Worse yet, he plans to introduce these sweeping changes in his first two
months as president, creating a strategic and immediate “shock” to the French
system, likely provoking a job-killing recession, and bringing a large part
of “the people” onto the streets and barricades.
This is the business side of Fillon’s project. His Islamophobia and Catholic
Nationalism are no less severe.
“There are no problems with religion in France. There is a problem linked to
Islam,” he argues. The “bloody invasion of Islamism in our daily lives could
provoke a third world war.”
Vigorously rejecting any idea of multiculturalism, he believes that France is
and should remain “a Christian country.” He defends the colonization of North
Africa, saying “there was nothing to be ashamed about France just wanting to
share its culture.” He wants schools to teach pride in the way he sees
history. He would force immigrants to respect his Christian cultural
heritage. He promises administrative controls on Islam in France, including a
legal ban on the Salafi movement, preaching in Arabic, and wearing a burkini
full-body swimsuit on French beaches.
Fillon’s views clearly echo Samuel Huntington’s “Clash of Civilizations” and
the eagerness of Donald Trump, his Evangelical supporters, and the Islamic
State to promote such a clash. They reflect the rising tide of racial and
religious nationalism sweeping Europe, from the Britain of Brexit to the
Germany of Angela Merkel and Russia of Vladimir Putin. And they reinforce
anti-Muslim intolerance, competing directly with Marine Le Pen for right-wing
Catholic voters like those in the Manif pour Tous demonstrations opposing
same sex marriage. Le Pen is far more open than Fillon to gay rights, and
welcomes her deputy Florian Philippot and other gays into the top ranks of
the Front National.
Fillon and Le Pen also differ at the margins on foreign policy. Both back
Vladimir Putin and Syria’s Bashar al-Assad, who has protected Syrian’s
Christian minority. But, echoing Gen. de Gaulle, Fillon blames “American
imperialism” for Europe’s problems, while Marine Le Pen and her niece, Marion
Maréchal-Le Pen, are now caught up in a love-fest with Trump and his white
nationalist strategist Steve Bannon.
But the major clash between Fillon and Le Pen will be over his pro-business
economic program, which she has already condemned as “the worst that has ever
existed.” However bizarre it may seem, Fillon will make Le Pen the prime
defender of the French welfare state and could legitimize the neo-fascist
Front National as an acceptable player in European and trans-Atlantic
politics.
________________________________________
A veteran of the Berkeley Free Speech Movement and the New Left monthly
Ramparts, Steve Weissman lived for many years in London, working as a
magazine writer and television producer. He now lives and works in France,
where he is researching a new book, Big Money and the Corporate State: How
Global Banks, Corporations, and Speculators Rule and How to Nonviolently
Break Their Hold.
Reader Supported News is the Publication of Origin for this work. Permission
to republish is freely granted with credit and a link back to Reader
Supported News.
Error! Hyperlink reference not valid. Error! Hyperlink reference not valid.
On Sunday, November 27th, Francois Fillon clinched the Republican
party's presidential nomination, having beaten his closest rival Alain
Juppe in a second-round vote. (photo: EPA)
http://readersupportednews.org/http://readersupportednews.org/
France’s Next President: Catholic Nationalist Francois Fillon Threatens “a
Blitzkrieg” Against the Welfare State. Neo-Fascist Marine Le Pen Would Save
It.
By Steve Weissman, Reader Supported News
07 December 16
f you find US politics bizarre, keep your eye on the French presidential
election. The first round of voting will be on Sunday, April 23, 2017, nearly
five months away. But the race already threatens to change Europe and its
relations with Donald Trump’s America.
Who will French voters choose? The candidate of the increasingly right-wing
Les Republicans, former prime minister François Fillon, who all-too-glibly
promises to be a French Margaret Thatcher? The neo-fascist Marine Le Pen, who
has turned her father's anti-Jewish Front National into Europe’s leading
anti-Muslim political force? Or someone from the left or center who could
beat them both?
Failing divine intervention, I would not bet on that someone. The incumbent
Socialists, former minister Jean-Luc Mélenchon’s Party of the Left, which has
the backing of the once-powerful Communists, the Lutte Ouvrière, the Nouveau
Parti Anticapitaliste, the Parti Radical de Gauche, and the Greens will all
put up their own candidates. Inevitably, they will devour themselves and each
other.
If one includes President Hollande’s wunderkind protégé and former economics
minister Emmanuel Macron, 38, a millionaire Rothschild investment banker who
is running as an independent centrist, the combined forces of the anti-right
could easily win the first round of the presidential election with as much as
35 to 40% of the total vote. But, splitting the vote as they will, none of
them expect perhaps the economically liberal, socially progressive Macron
have any chance to reach the second round of the election on May 7.
The splintering within the Socialist Party makes juicy front-page news. The
current president, Françoise Hollande, whose nationwide approval rating
dropped to 4%, has announced that he will not run for a second term. His
right-leaning prime minister, Manuel Valls, who openly schemed to push
Hollande out, is now widely seen as a Brutus, while the left wing Arnaud
Montebourg, a former minister, creates little enthusiasm among his peers.
Conflicting egos and ambitions naturally play a role. But the sad truth is
that too many of the party’s leading figures are about as socialist as
Hillary Clinton or Tony Blair, whom Valls sees as a role model.
Whoever wins the party primary in January, how do they explain away
Hollande’s failure to create the jobs he promised? As one of France’s
best-educated economists, he knew he would he would need a massive program of
Keynesian deficit spending to stimulate the economy. But that would have
forced him to break dramatically with the fiscal restraints of the European
Union and the austerity-minded economic orthodoxy of German Chancellor Angela
Merkel.
Among the hard left, the gauchistes, the vice is versa. Mélenchon and most of
the others are committed one way or another to Marxist ideas. But they have
neither the following to make an anti-capitalist revolution nor the
flexibility to lead worker-friendly reform efforts that would create jobs and
make France more competitive in the existing global economy. Revolutionary
hopes, reformist possibilities – a conundrum the left forever faces, not
least in our very American debate over Bernie Sanders.
Enjoying a big boost in the polls from his overwhelming primary victory over
both Sarkozy and the less extremist former prime minister Alain Juppé, the
62-year-old Fillon is now heavily favored to beat Marine Le Pen in the second
round of the election. I’m not so sure.
Fillon lives in a bubble, blatantly favoring business while reflecting the
traditionally ultra-conservative social values of the provincial Catholic
bourgeoisie. Those are his roots. He and his Welsh wife, Penelope, still
divide their time between Paris and a 12th century chateau in the
countryside. He regularly demonstrates his sang-froid as an amateur racing
driver. He burnishes his undeniable establishment credentials in ministerial
offices and as one of the longest serving members of the French parliament.
And, since leaving office if 2012, he has worked as a part-time business
consultant, raking in an average of €17,000 a month.
How much will all this appeal to ordinary French voters who famously hate
business and rarely darken the inside of a church except to be hatched,
matched, or dispatched? How will Mr. Establishment’s improbable call to
“fight the system” play after months of attack from left, far-right, and
center?
“France is more right wing than it has ever been,” Fillon declares from his
bubble. The people are “on the verge of revolt.” He then offers “the people”
the same harsh austerity that much of Europe is now rejecting. His promises
include:
• A two point or more increase in a regressive sales tax (VAT)
• Cuts in unemployment insurance, social benefits, and public spending
• A vast reduction of hard-won worker rights
• Huge tax cuts for the rich
• Loosened regulations, protective tariffs, and subsidies for business
“I’ll do everything for entrepreneurs,” he enthuses, exhibiting a faith in
trickle-down economics worthy of Donald Trump and American Republicans.
Fillon promises to cut 500,000 public sector jobs. As others point out,
nearly 60% of those jobs are in education and most of the rest are in the
armed forces and security services. Which does “Mr. Austerity” plan to cut –
teachers, soldiers, or policemen? I can hardly wait for him to tell the
voters.
He promises to eliminate the 35-hour work week, which is mostly symbolic,
since French industry has already found ways to extend the normal work week
to over 40 hours. He would also eliminate overtime pay, force those in the
public sector to work 39 hours for 37 hours pay, and increase to 65 the age
at which retirees could begin to draw their pensions.
He promises to shut down hospitals and restrict the country’s highly prized
universal health care to severe and chronic diseases. People would have to
pay for private insurance to cover anything else.
Worse yet, he plans to introduce these sweeping changes in his first two
months as president, creating a strategic and immediate “shock” to the French
system, likely provoking a job-killing recession, and bringing a large part
of “the people” onto the streets and barricades.
This is the business side of Fillon’s project. His Islamophobia and Catholic
Nationalism are no less severe.
“There are no problems with religion in France. There is a problem linked to
Islam,” he argues. The “bloody invasion of Islamism in our daily lives could
provoke a third world war.”
Vigorously rejecting any idea of multiculturalism, he believes that France is
and should remain “a Christian country.” He defends the colonization of North
Africa, saying “there was nothing to be ashamed about France just wanting to
share its culture.” He wants schools to teach pride in the way he sees
history. He would force immigrants to respect his Christian cultural
heritage. He promises administrative controls on Islam in France, including a
legal ban on the Salafi movement, preaching in Arabic, and wearing a burkini
full-body swimsuit on French beaches.
Fillon’s views clearly echo Samuel Huntington’s “Clash of Civilizations” and
the eagerness of Donald Trump, his Evangelical supporters, and the Islamic
State to promote such a clash. They reflect the rising tide of racial and
religious nationalism sweeping Europe, from the Britain of Brexit to the
Germany of Angela Merkel and Russia of Vladimir Putin. And they reinforce
anti-Muslim intolerance, competing directly with Marine Le Pen for right-wing
Catholic voters like those in the Manif pour Tous demonstrations opposing
same sex marriage. Le Pen is far more open than Fillon to gay rights, and
welcomes her deputy Florian Philippot and other gays into the top ranks of
the Front National.
Fillon and Le Pen also differ at the margins on foreign policy. Both back
Vladimir Putin and Syria’s Bashar al-Assad, who has protected Syrian’s
Christian minority. But, echoing Gen. de Gaulle, Fillon blames “American
imperialism” for Europe’s problems, while Marine Le Pen and her niece, Marion
Maréchal-Le Pen, are now caught up in a love-fest with Trump and his white
nationalist strategist Steve Bannon.
But the major clash between Fillon and Le Pen will be over his pro-business
economic program, which she has already condemned as “the worst that has ever
existed.” However bizarre it may seem, Fillon will make Le Pen the prime
defender of the French welfare state and could legitimize the neo-fascist
Front National as an acceptable player in European and trans-Atlantic
politics.
A veteran of the Berkeley Free Speech Movement and the New Left monthly
Ramparts, Steve Weissman lived for many years in London, working as a
magazine writer and television producer. He now lives and works in France,
where he is researching a new book, Big Money and the Corporate State: How
Global Banks, Corporations, and Speculators Rule and How to Nonviolently
Break Their Hold.
Reader Supported News is the Publication of Origin for this work. Permission
to republish is freely granted with credit and a link back to Reader
Supported News.
http://e-max.it/posizionamento-siti-web/socialize ;
http://e-max.it/posizionamento-siti-web/socialize
