The neoliberal Single Transferable Party is in a panic in France.
As the Guardian (and others) have noted, Marcon is refusing to appoint a representative of the left-of-centre bloc of parties that won (in the sense of having the most seats) the election he unnecessarily called three or so months ago precisely because he does not want the choice of the people of France to have a chance of governing the country. Instead, it would seem that he wishes for another centrist government, which is what France had before he called the election, and which is very obviously what people no longer want.
Written all over Macron's actions is the obvious contempt that those from the neoliberal Single Transferable Party now have for democracy, the electoral process, and the right of people to vote as they will.
We have seen this in Ireland, where the age-old feud between Fianna Fail and Fine Gael has been settled to keep Sinn Fein out of office.
We are seeing this in the UK, where entryism into Labour has reduced it to being a Tory continuity party.
And now we are seeing it in France.
There is a rightful condemnation of Trump's contempt for democracy. But are we so sure that this contempt is not also happening much closer to home when it is so obvious that people are very deliberately being denied the chance to be represented by those who they would like to govern?
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Macron seems to be following the same path that the Establishment followed in Europe in the 1930s, that facilitated the rise of fascism.
The fascists did not win majority support. They won sufficient support to cause political breakdown and paralysis – until ultimately some underhand constitutional mechanism. or force, was called on to break the deadlock. Rather than let a left-wing government actually govern, the political centre opted, blindly, for the extreme right.
Macron says the left alliance, which has most votes, could not govern because it doesn’t have an overall majority – but it is his own alliance that could give the left that majority by accepting some compromises; instead, he is playing straight into the hands of the extreme right.
Can it really be true that the political centre still hasn’t understood that in times of radical political polarisation, they must work with the left – because facilitating the right leads to fascism, war, holocaust ?
Thank you and well said, Geof.
I will be near Avignon from 5 – 17 September and note the demos planned for 7.
Thank you and well said, Richard.
No one should be surprised by that.
Un peu d’histoire:
Macron, like Streeting, has had rich and powerful sponsors to parachute him from job to job, e.g. working on Jacques Attali’s growth commission, Rothschilds, adviser to Francois Hollande and finance minister.
As finance minister, Macron had the socialist industry minister Arnaud Montebourg ousted, so that Alsthom could be sold to the US General Electric, including having a French executive jailed “pour encourager les autres”.
Soon after Macron flounced out of the finance ministry, “Bercy”, and in preparation for his presidential run, he came to London to meet the Thatcherite French business community and raise money from them* and meet his mate Osborne. That was also the occasion for Macron to lobby on behalf of ATOS Origin for UK social services contracts.
*A repeat of what Sarkozy did in early 2007. I attended the rally with some French friends / former colleagues and marvelled how these people who worked in the City and rarely ventured out of central London wanted Thatcherism imposed on France.
Macron is, or was, lucky. He narrowly got into the second / final round in the 2017 presidential elections.
Readers who understand French may wish to read le Canard Enchaine about how Macron and Zionist allies conspired to have the founder of Telegram arrested as Israel objected to the platform exposing its genocide.
Thank you, Colonel.
Your characteristic insights stir memories of one of the more prominent of those French Thatcherites, namely PY Gerbeau, who was involved in a few ventures in the heady days of early New Labour, including management, for a spell, at the Millennium Dome, that remarkable folly that achieved its purpose at the start of the final year of the second millennium.
He regularly featured in Today interviews and was a an authentic and ardent voice of neoliberal business. I always thought that France was better off with such people in London, but clearly Macron represents the ultimate surrender of that great nation to the same irrationality that has landed us in the mess and chaos which surrounds us.
You are forgetting that in terms of numbers of French electors Lodnon is now, I think, tne fourth largest French city.
Thank you, Karl.
I remember him and the Rory Bremner version.
PYG’s wife is ex BBC, which make explain his MSM coverage.
Thanking Richard and Col. Smithers for international insights unavailable in states, other than at Yves Smith’s…
Thank you.
I forgot to add that Macron feels more at home in the neoliberal and neocon anglosphere and appears to despise his compatriots and their culture. He has American affectations.
I was in Deauville for the long week-end and noted how France’s state owned and oligarch MSM kept linking the leftist opposition to anti-semitism and implying that this is why the left alliance, especially Melenchon’s LFI, should be kept out of office.
It all sounds eminently plausible to me Colonel.
As for Geof – is what we are seeing really ‘centrist’ politicking?
All I see Geof is a form of political entry-ism by people who are not what they seem – people who just pawns for vested interests – ‘placemen’/’placewomen’ looking after themselves or/and those who have anointed them.
Thank you and well said, PSR.
[…] The neoliberal Single Transferable Party is panicking in France Richard Murphy: […]
MSM seems to regard Macron as the acceptable ‘safe pair of hands’. That tells me all I need to know, but thanks to contributors here for fleshing-out my understanding of which way is up.