This is why we need the rule of law:
If we lose the courts and the rule of law, this cannot happen.
Trump knows that, of course.
We need to watch very closely what happens in the Wisconsin Supreme Court election this week. The battle for the rule of law is on.
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The optics on this may not play very well inside of France. Sure RN used funds for EU activities in France to forward their national activities. The evidence is damning. Thing is will French voters understand this? Are French politicos sufficiently divorced from the French legal process? Can they say: nowt to do with us. Is RN/Le Pen being got at on a technicality? (I don’t think they are – but my thoughts don’t count). If everything was peachy in France, there would be no RN. They ain’t – hence RN. Leaves the open question: if Le Pen is booted – perhaps this makes way for somebody both more capable and nastier.
This is more than a technicality! This is criminal financial behaviour.
It’s not an abstract decision, it’s very clear.
My experience of living in France is that the electorate is more clued-up than olaces like the UK or the Netherlands. More politics on mainstream media with more debates by participants.
If I may add, this from Transparency International.
https://transparency.eu/transparency-international-eu-view-on-marine-le-pen-guilty-verdict-french-justice-shouldnt-spare-the-european-parliaments-blushes/
The article makes fair points. Offering a counter point to the EP having poor processes: one could approach accounting for how allowances are spent by MEPs in one of two ways:
a) trust politicos to do the right thing – when they don’t (& its blatant) come down very hard (a la Le Pen)
b) require that every Euro is accounted for (= no trust in politicians)
I am inclined to “a” which is about politicos more or less abiding by rules & not being monitored heavily to do so. If they have to be monitored, then we have the wrong set of politicos (& in the case of the Uk back in circa 2011/2012 (I think) – the whole pack of em should have been chucked out of their seats & banned from politicis for life – ditto Le Pen – 5 years? nah, life – sends a message – “want to play games/break trust – you are out – for ever”.
I prefer your option (a) as well
On the face of it, the banning of Le Pen is on a par with the banning of İmamoğlu in Turkey.
I’m emotionally in favour of the first and against the second, but we need independent judges unswayed by emotion. I have greater trust in EU judges than Turkish ones (following Erdogan’s purges of their legal system), but it’s not absolute.
Quis custodiet ipsos custodes? (Who is to judge the judges?) is as key a question as when Juvenal posed it 2000 years ago.
So you are saying the law should not apply to corrupt politicians?
No, I’m saying that sadly there are corrupt judges as well as corrupt politicians.
It’s an argument for having a system where rulings can be appealed to an international body such as the European Court or ICJ. If Le Pen can appeal to the European Court (I’ve no idea whether she can) it should give a decision more likely to be accepted by all parties in France, minimising the danger Mike raises, of her just being replaced by someone angrier and more extreme.
That might be the case if there was some minor technicality here and it was solely politically motivated.
However, in this case there were 40 or so proven cases of fraud with fake purchases so that money could be used for purposes it wasn’t intended. The law breaking was clear and easy to prove.
The question in that case is, why should criminals be allowed to profit from their criminal enterprise just because they are influential right wing politicians?
In setting the sentence, the judges were merely applying the law passed by the French parliament in 2016, as explained in today’s Transparency France Newsletter:
“Transparency salue la décision de la justice de condamner avec fermeté les atteintes à la probité, ayant entraîné une rupture d’égalité devant les citoyens au profit du parti d’extrême droite et de ses candidats durant douze années, dans le cadre d’un système organisé avec cynisme et détermination.
Transparency rappelle que dans un Etat de droit, aucune responsabilité ne saurait être éludé au prétexte que des personnalités politiques entendent exercer les plus hautes fonctions au sommet de l’Etat.
Transparency France rappelle que ce sont les parlementaires qui ont voté la loi Sapin II du 9 décembre 2016 qui prévoit une peine complémentaire d’inéligibilité de plein droit pour les personnes reconnues coupables de délit d’atteinte à la probité, dont le détournement de fonds public. “
I could not agree with you more. Robert Reich has an interesting blog post today titled “Why Trump opponents can’t find a lawyer” and his weekend Coffee Klatch with Heather Lofthouse on Saturday featured this key court election in much detail. Also, I believe that Elon Musk has been “paying” certain influential voters to try and swing this election. At least we don’t have judges appointed by election in the UK. It is some comfort.
King Don is using executive orders to stamp out opposition and dissent.
The risk for the US is unless the courts ( which they are doing up at the moment) enforce the law King Don will be a despot with no opposition.
But that is the Heritage Foundation’s essentially programme, to make the US president all powerful, destroy the checks and balances, which the Republicans are happy to join in doing.
If America loses the rule of law, this is what they will face instead: the concentration camps of the 21st-century surveillance state.
https://pluralistic.net/2025/03/31/madison-square-garden/
As a kid, I never once read a William Gibson novel and hoped that it would be our future, but here we are.
The contrast Is stark between the French dealings with Le Pen (and the Romanian dealings with their Russian-backed candidate, Calin Georgescu) and the inability of America to deal with its Orange Felon. It seems that the US ‘separation of powers’ is worth nothing.
Incidentally, missed by the media here is that Trump has rescinded Romania’s no-visa-required status in response to Georgescu’s treatment. Because of course he would.
Indeed. If you ever noticed, how the far right has a hate hard on for George Soros, and the scream at the mirror conspiratorial suggestion that he’s backing a politician or an initiative, but are, blind to the overt bank rolling of the GOP in 2024 by right wing billionaires. They spent the better part of $1 trillion dollars as a group.
It’s much broader than the few names that we ever hear about.
But I have to criticize you for ignoring another important factor in curbing the cancerous consequences of wealth. You don’t ever mention antitrust. You never mention curves on the kind of financial transactions, especially in stock markets which transfer wealth, but don’t involve any productive activity. Day trading/high frequency trading and the extreme profitability of CDS. I’ve heard more than a few times a few complaints about how the banking interest you no longer invest in small business. The reason is simple that’s not where the money is. It’s peanuts to them. The right question I think is what kind of institutions have to exist that will be motivated to perform investment function, and my general answer is community banking. It would be helpful to also have municipal banking, And larger administrative department, Infinitum systems in order to scale up to whatever country in question
You have been here for a remarkably short period of time.
I’d prefer you moderate your language.
I also suggest you do a little more research.
And I have no clue who you are. Maybe you are just here to test boundaries, and that is boring.
You did a good blog on “The New Economy”. In the context of what institutions could/should/might fund local actions I thought this point by Mr G (who he?) pertinent:
“what kind of institutions have to exist that will be motivated to perform investment function, and my general answer is community banking. It would be helpful to also have municipal banking,”
Uk banks are, for the most part, totally deracinated and have no local knowledge. Might be summat for a future blog. One of the very first questions for community energy (asked at the first meeting) is “where does the money come from?”.
Good point
I saw a brief but chilling clip over the weekend. It may have been in congress and some, if not all, of the US governors were present.
Trump was rambling on and asked if the governor of Maine was present, to which she replied yes.
He then launched into a thinly-veiled, misogynistic threat about everyone having to listen to him, or they’ll be out.
Later his spokesidiot says they can simply defund the federal court system if they don’t comply.
Very chilling words.
Ian Dunt has posted an interesting and compelling take on Substack, contrasting how the media treat far-right corruption differently from that committed by other political hues.
https://open.substack.com/pub/iandunt/p/want-to-know-how-trump-gets-in-just