News and information from Europe 🇪🇺
(Current banner: La Mancha, Spain. Feel free to post submissions for banner images.)
(This list may get expanded when necessary.)
We will use some leeway to decide whether to remove a comment.
If need be, there are also bans: 3 days for lighter offenses, 14 days for bigger offenses, and permanent bans for people who don't show any willingness to participate productively. If we think the ban reason is obvious, we may not specifically write to you.
If you want to protest a removal or ban, feel free to write privately to the mods: @[email protected], @[email protected], or @[email protected].
Bought and paid for establishment politicians will lean full authoritarian before they allow leftist party at the table. They don't care about democracy.
French political deadlock: Corporate leaders 'glad' Macron keeping left from power
Yeah that's basically the last nail in his coffin. Let's just hope the right wing doesn't get the votes next time.
Macron can't run for another term so he doesn't really care about his future electoral chances.
My personal little conspiracy theory as a French person:
The Président was fully expecting the far right and right to win so that they could be ridiculed while in power (since the very moment you are in power in France you are unpopular) therefore guaranteeing that the right and far right do not win the next presidential election. However the left unexpectedly won the election throwing off the plan. Due to this he has been forced to push through in nominating a conservative Prime Minister so that the right could be still ridiculed while in power and mobilizing more than ever the left, thus saving French democracy for the next presidential elections.
As an Englishman who has been loosely following the French elections since 2022, I think your theory is sound.
A lot of countries have been usurped by billionaire conservatism. A lot of countries would benefit from revolutions targeting billionaire conservatives.
Why is the President choosing the prime Minister?
Rather, what France's constitutional whatever that set that power structure up?
Here in [Commonwealth nation] we have a Governor General who officially accepts (as the Crown's representative) whichever coalition has majority in parliament as the new government and that government appoints their own prime Minister.
In France the president normally chooses the prime minister backed by a majority in the national assembly, otherwise the majority would do a vote of no-confidence and the president has to find a new prime minister. The current problem is that there's no majority.
The trick here is that nobody had the majority at the parliament. Which is quite unusual in France compared to let's say Belgium where spending over 6 month to build a coalition is the norm.
Macron and moderate right say they don't wanna work with leftist killing the hypothesis of left wing government that moderate right can remove at any time. However, if Barnier allies with Macron party, and get at least the passive support of far right, he has a majority. But basically the kind of majority that far right can remove at any time. Not sure what deal with Le Pen was negotiated
Not a lawyer but an informed citizen, I’d be happy to be corrected if I’m wrong.
That’s a spirit of the law vs letter of the law question which to my understanding has not been answered. I am no lawyer but the wording of our constitution is pretty ambiguous and leaves room to interpretation. I won't try and translate the article in question because as I said, not a lawyer and some blurred lines may be lost in my attempt at writing legalese in a foreign language.
It’s also useful to point out that this situation has never happened before. Yes the left coalition has the highest number of representatives, but there is little political room (as seen when the most radical parts of the coalition proposed not to participate directly in a would-be government) for expanding said coalition.
The constitution of the fifth republic was written in much different times, when De Gaulle wanted to avoid the fourth republic’s issues which was very parliamentary, but quite unstable. He wanted to be able to pick, and got this power when the constitution was written.
But we’ve reached this odd situation (no obvious majority because of the three-block-parliment) which was not really anticipated. So we’ll see how it goes, how long Barnier’s government will stand. As of now, the far right has given it’s blessing not to censor the government, making it a center-right-far right de facto coalition. But as of today, these are just words, so we're not sure what the exact terms of their agreement are. From what I know, the far right is not trying to participate in the current government, they would just abstain from participating in votes of no confidence, which would prevent such votes from having any effect, due to the current structure of parliament.
A party is also trying to impeach Macron which I think has never happened before in the 5th republic.
Here in [Commonwealth nation] we once had a governor general that refused a request by the Prime Minister to dissolve parliament and instead appointed someone ales as PM. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/King%E2%80%93Byng_affair
Maybe some Commonwealth countries have made constitutional changes to avoid this from happening, but it's most certainly not universal thing that the GG has to accept the wishes of a coalition. In fact what is the mechanism for when there is not a coalition, which is common when there's a minority government in Canada? We kinda don't really do the coalition thing, we tend towards minority governments that take a "go ahead and vote no confidence, I dare you!" kinda thing.
Fascinating. TY for a fascinating slice of history.
26,000 people in Paris. That's basically nothing, the NFP militants came out but there's no popular support for the protest beyond that.
For the left to call itself "the winner" was a mistake: not only do they control 1/3 of the parlement only, but by refusing all compromise and branding Macron's party "the enemy" they were guaranteed to never be able to gather more support for their bills. It's so bad that they were seriously discussing passing some bill on pension reform with the help of the far right.
Any compromise with Macron is unfortunately impossible. There is no way a single measure of the NFP would have gotten adopted if they had bent the knee. Macron wouldn't have made any compromise. They're much more efficient in the opposition than they are as lapdogs to the neoliberals.
And, sure, the far right should never be an ally, but if the idiots are going to follow you, why tell them to fuck off? That would be pretty stupid, and this is an example of the sectarism you decry. To you, sectarism is when you disagree with the neolibs, I suppose?
Meanwhile, Macron chose a bigot that shits on migrants and voted against the decriminalization of homosexuality as a prime minister and the RN has vowed not vote out, and that doesn't bother you one bit.
Like, the fuck are you even blabbering about dude? You're so full of shit it's not even funny.
Any compromise with Macron is unfortunately impossible. There is no way a single measure of the NFP would have gotten adopted if they had bent the knee
Of course there are. There's plenty of ideological overlap on public services, LGBT rights, the environment.
And, sure, the far right should never be an ally, but if the idiots are going to follow you, why tell them to fuck off?
Because when the situation was reversed and the far right voted along with Macron's party, the left cried about a supposed "alliance with the fascists".
voted against the decriminalization of homosexuality
This is outright misinformation. He voted against lowering the age of consent for gay sex with minors from 18 to 15 yo. And that was more than 40 years ago too. Homosexuality is legal in France since basically the French revolution back in the 18th century.
You’re so full of shit it’s not even funny.
Says the guy broadcasting fake news.
And, sure, the far right should never be an ally, but if the idiots are going to follow you, why tell them to fuck off?
First off, I'd like to acknowledge that my representation of Barnier does not paint an accurate picture, and that you were right, because I didn't know the full extent of the truth. More on that later.
About Macron being compatible with the French left that won the legislative elections:
Macron is hell-bent on dismantling public service, only pays lip service to environmental causes and works with bigots against the extension of rights for the LGBTQ, despite paying lip service (again) advocating for societal progressive agenda. His government was part of the ridiculous moral panic fighting wokism †, for fuck's sake.
The left being tamed means their agenda is completely nullified as they get absorbed into the center-right, which the French electors majoritarily reject. And it's not like it hasn't been tried before. Hollande's term proved it doesn't work, and its rejection proven by the choice of Hamon to represent the most important milquetoast "left" party proves how unpopular the liberal line is amongst the most moderate fractions of the Lefts, disregarding every ideological concepts about socialist conceptions of society.
People voting for the retirement age to be 60 will never agree with people saying it should be 70. The French electorate fully expects the Left to fight liberalism, and to not be satisfied with "mitigation" measures such as the construction of bike lanes in Paris or the distribution of cheques to buy manga.
About the left crying wolf when the far right supported liberal policy:
It's not so much about about who agrees with who but more about policy. If the left shouts about "moderate" parties doing the far right's bidding, then it makes sense, because we go through the pain of voting for liberals to keep fascists out of office, and we deservedly expect them to prevent the fascist agenda from materializing.
If they cry wolf just to spark outrage, it's opportunistic and I will acknowledge they're wrong. I trust you to show me that's what they've done. Until then, I'll still welcome the votes of the fascists for measures that protect the most vulnerable, even if it doesn't make sense according to their contradictory ideology.
About Barnier being against the decriminilization of homosexuality, you tell me it's not true wholesale (and you're right about that), but you fail to realize how this confirms how bigoted he is ★ He still voted against decriminilization for a portion of all gay people (which you tacitly acknowledge), which makes it only slightly less bad. Oh, and I forgot to mention he also voted against civil unions ‡ much later, which helps cement him as a bigot which the left should refuse to associate with.
Not the slam dunk argument you thought it was.
Macron is hell-bent on dismantling public service
This is a complete myth: France public spending has never been this high (yes, even adjusted for inflation). France has never had so many public employees. France's health care spending has grown (fast) every year. Taxes have not significantly been dropped either.
Macron's government has also passed many left-oriented bills: 1 € meals for poor student, free contraceptive and morning after pills, culture check for youth, increased paternity leave, alleviating the SNCF debt, coverage of listening and dental prosthesis, subsidies for increasing housing insulation or repairing clothes, higher taxation on polluting cars, the shutdown of the airport project in Nantes, surrogate mothers, etc. You are telling me none of this could be worked on further with the left?
People voting for the retirement age to be 60 will never agree with people saying it should be 70.
For one nobody is saying it should be 70, for two the 60 year age is being quietly dropped by the left. Everyone knows we ain't going back to the 1981 age, given the demography.
But the centre and left can recognize there's an obvious demographic and financial issue. And surely can find a compromise where people with long career and hard labor retire early, and those with office jobs and long studies can probably retire a bit later. In other countries like Germany, alliances ranging from far left to centre right can work on compromises and agree on a single program. It's perfectly doable to find middle ground.
but you fail to realize how this confirms how bigoted
I think you fail to realize that in 1982, perspectives on LGBT issues were FAR FAR different than they are today. Huguette Bello, a communist which was proposed as a prime minister by the left, refused to support gay marriage, and that was in 2013 not 1982. But she is not a bigot and Barnier is?
Funny that you would mention that, I was reading liberal propaganda not two minutes ago, and then this came: https://www.lemonde.fr/idees/article/2024/09/10/l-erreur-budgetaire-majeure-de-l-allemagne-emporte-toute-l-europe-avec-elle_6310318_3232.html
Public services do seem to be deteriorating in France, it comes from the mouth of liberals themselves. It's a trend that has all but shifted in the 30ish years I've had the chance to be alive with the West being under the yoke of liberals of all professed kinds.
The Macron regime has brought too little measures, too late. And for one small step it's taken forward, it made two backwards (retirement age being a HUGE one).
What does the 1€ meal bring if public money is going to end up in private hands, driving up inflation? The culture check you mention is a laughable demagogic measure (one would say, "popullist") if I ever saw one. Sure you don't have a job or any economic prospects, but at least you can buy manga, public money that will once again end up in private pockets. That's not what left wing politics are about.
When do we get rid of parisitic media like the foul stuff brought by Bolloré et al? Why did the Macron regime try to restructure Radio France in prevision of a private buyout before the dissolution of parliament? I thought we had a media concentration problem? Also, when do we stop filling the pockets of the already-rich (cf ISF)?
The feminist measures (glad the French have them!) surely don't outweigh the islamophobic panic reinforced by stupid measures about the type of garment you can wear in public? Oh, and when do the French get the long promised right to die in dignity yet?
I'm glad there's a couple things that will materially impact the living conditions of French citizens (dental care is cool!), but it's too little, way too late. I'd say I can accept a few liberal measures in an ocean of actual anticapitalist measures, not the other way around. We don't have time for that shit with the climate crisis. We can't act as if things were business as usual.
It's quite ironic that the libs would criticize the French left's fiscal responsibility. They manage to accomplish the herculean task of delivering very few things in 7 years with an impressive deficit. How cool is that?
Regarding Bello, the truth is a bit more complex: https://www.huffingtonpost.fr/politique/article/huguette-bello-a-matignon-pourquoi-ca-coince-pour-le-profil-presque-parfait-degote-par-le-nfp_236861.html
She did not explicitly vote against gay marriage (abstained) and celebrated the union of two men a few months after the vote. Hardly a vocal opponent against gay marriage, and a far cry from the bigoted votes of Barnier. Sure, that means she wasn't LGBTQ-concious or an ally, but, oh boy, talk about misrepresentation of facts! I'd accept any public apology from the Boutin's and the Maréchal's and the Sarkozy-aligned, in which cast I'd retract my accusations of bigotry... But I think I shouldn't hold my breath. They will be bigoted when enacting societal policy in France, and Macron knows it bloody well.
In a time when avoiding a far right government should be his first concern, I strangely mostly read about him shooting against the left, talking about how dangerous they supposedly are. Looking at it from the outside it sure looks like he branded himself the enemy.
Just like most "conservatives" around the globe, when it comes down to democracy vs corporate profits, he knows which side he's on.
In a time when avoiding a far right government should be his first concern, I strangely mostly read about him shooting against the left
That's because the left has also been shooting mostly against his government as well, while ignoring the far right.
The French left has been consistently fighting the far right, vocally so, even withdrawing candidates in favor of Macron against the far right. What are you even talking about?
And the far right hasn't done the same?
What the guy you reply to said is factually incorrect. While the French left despises Macron and his clique, they did withdraw candidates in the last election in his favor to keep the fascists out of power.
And they've always been vocal about their contempt for the far right.
Not much no. The far right strategy for the past few years has been to be quiet and appear moderate and dignified, so as to shed their image of fascist extremists. (and yes, that seems to work)
