French Politics

I find people sitting on Nader really obnoxious. He was the only candidate in the US offering a true left candidacy and not pulling the spineless Third Way bull.

He didn't have a prayer and may have gotten the world 8 years of fucking Dubya.

Left-wing minor candidates under FPTP are one of the biggest assets the right has.

People mock Nader because he was a really shitty leftist. He's one of the people who helped popularize Bothsiderism bullshit in the USA.

Only if the major candidates fail to do the smart thing and don't co-opt the minor ones' voters, or, most importantly, get people interested enough to go to the polls, especially against voter suppression.

People mock Nader because he upset the Democrat entrenchment, in the same way they mocked Sanders until he sheepdogged most of his voters Hillary's way. He still got blamed for not getting all of them on board.

Any way, if Nader is a bothsideist, he has no business being put in the same category as Stein and Melenchon, now, does he?

edited 25th Jun '17 7:06:28 AM by TheHandle

Nader's whole deal was running around saying that Gore and Bush were the same, "not a dime's worth of difference" I think is how he put it. Since then, America has blown trillions of dollars, there are millions of people dead in the Middle East, and the environment is dying. American third parties may not steal much of the vote, but they poison the well by screeching about "both sides" even though that's such obvious bullshit if you spend five seconds looking at the evidence (see: Obamacare vs. the Trumpcare abomination). Furthermore, the American Green Party is a fucking joke which will never accomplish anything because they're too busy jerking off to their own reflections. Unlike, say, the Canadian Greens, they hold no useful seats or administrative power of any kind, and they never spend any effort to actually do something. Their whole strategy is "when things get worse, they'll all come to us" which is... naive at best.

Look, third parties aren't viable in the American system right now, and maybe not ever. The Republicans only came into existence because the Whigs collapsed and the voters changed parties. If you want to make a real difference, you have to join one of the two. It works- you think the Republicans just became death cultists and nihilists overnight? The anti-tax nuts and the god-botherers and the mouthbreathing racists have been at this a while. They run their guys in the primaries, and then they vote Republican in the general election, because they value agenda over personality. It changed the Republicans for the worse, but it worked. Nader would rather stand outside and throw stones.

edited 25th Jun '17 7:24:14 AM by JBC31187

For the record, I personally don't put Nader in the same category as those two fuckwits. I think he's awful in a different way.

But anyway, I think we're digressing a bit from French politics.

edited 25th Jun '17 7:22:21 AM by M84

What's stopping them from getting inside the Democratic umbrella?

And I'm honestly skeptical the outcome under Gore or Kerry would have been different. Not unless one assumes there's a causal link between Dubya getting elected and 9/11. I think the US would still have cried Revengeance^note revenge with a vengeance. No, wait, Iraq probably would have been left alone. Then no Syrian Civil War, probably. Oh, I don't know. As they say in France, ah, si le Nez de Cléopâtre...!^note if Cleopatra's nose had had a different shape...!

edited 25th Jun '17 7:28:27 AM by TheHandle

What they consider to be medicine, among other things.

They don't want to work with the Democrats, their desire is to avoid having any actual responsibility and just yell about how they'd totally fix things if they were in charge.

As for Gore, yes an invasion of Afghanistan would probably have still happened, but no Iraq means more money for Afghanistan, it means a more stable middle-east, its more interventionism NATO being discredited come the Arab Spring, it means that Syria would be less of a mess (no ISIS) and Libya might well have been fully stabilised long-term with a more full intervention. Saddam himself would likely have been removed during the Arab Spring, possibly by an international coalition acting with a solid remit and wide support.

The CIA (all from the Clinton administration) warned Bush that "something" was going to happen and were ignored. I don't know if a Gore administration could have prevented 9/11, but he would have taken the threat more seriously.

edited 25th Jun '17 7:40:05 AM by JBC31187

This thread had a topic at one point...

Anyway, yes, Melenchon is the French version of the crazy, pro-Putin left. The fact that there were worse candidates than him in the election is not an endorsement.

edited 26th Jun '17 9:00:17 AM by Ramidel

Oh, he's pro Moscow to? Yuck.

President aside, we have something the US can be envious of!

Also I met with one of my oldest friends yesterday, whose father is a senator - a communist senator. We talked about politics, and while he is more left-wing than I am and admitted to voting for Mélenchon in R1 of the presidential elections, I was surprised at how critical he was of the man and his most buttkissing lackeys. He flat-out said he was happy for the communists to create a group free from JLM's influence in the Assembly, openly said that not saying to vote for Macron in R2 was bullshit, and thought that several members from LFI would rapidly grow tired from his antics - he said that he liked Ruffin or Autain, for example. He also mentioned that he looked more than a bit like a South-American dictator, and that the last few weeks made it obvious that there was not a shred of sincerity in his "calm" attitude during the Presidential campaign.

He also added that he would have picked Hamon if he was ahead in the polls. And that Hamon's biggest mistake, for him, was to try to mend the PS instead of hunting on Mélenchon's ground. I can't completely disagree with that, although I doubt Hamon would have been as successful a campaigner as Mélenchon is.

edited 26th Jun '17 8:58:58 AM by Julep

Ugh, no wonder JLM is a fan of Castro and Chavez, if that Guardian article is to be believed.

News from France !

The Socialist Party is definitely dead and buried six feet under. The last M-Ps they got are going to seat in the National Assembly under the term : "New Left". Rather cynical coming from a party which is indeed THE absolute incarnation of the "Old Mainstream Left"...

Manuel Valls has officially left the Socialist Party, even though he factually left it months ago...

The Chief-Whip of "the Republic on the Move", party of Macron , will be his most faithful serviceman in the person of Christophe Ferrand for whom it is very convenient to leave the government after a scandal has drained his legislative campaign , that he won nonetheless.

The future Speaker of the Assembly will very probably be François de Rugy, an ecologist who left the Socialist Party after he lost its primary elections and have seen it was going to crumble even more than initially expected, to join Emmanuel Macron . He had already been elected this morning as the one and only official candidate of the Republic on the Move so seeing that this party has more than 300 seats out of 577, it is more or less already done ... He is often seen as having some kind of a Chronic Backstabbing Disorder...

Jean-Pierre Rafarin , former Prime Minister under Jacques Chirac's presidency, has definitively renounced to politics and will leave the Senate earlier than expected : an honourable exit for a longtime veteran of the mainstream right-wing and someone who fight against the War in Iraq.

Mélenchon too has been elected unanimously, yes ! Without a single vote against him , which was easy considering he was the only candidate, as the Chief-Whip of the "France Insoumise" parliamentary group in the National Assembly.

Meanwhile, the Council for Ethics has rendered a favourable opinion for the legalisation of the medically assisted procreation for lesbian couples and women alone .

The French alt-right is in "No Pasaran" mode to try and stop it , but Emmanuel Macron has already said before the election he was in favour of that so here again it is almost already done ...

The whole Parliament is probably, still not officially confirmed, going to sit united in early July, that is to say next week, to hear a speech from the President which is theoretically legal but highly Bonapartist in style and very decried by the hard-left and the alt-right but applauded by the mainstream right and left and this is probably a move to short-circuit any opposition ahead of the motion of confidence for the Prime Minister, which is also supposed to happen next week .

edited 27th Jun '17 5:37:56 AM by Nuup-Kangerlua

The French right is disturbingly vocal when it comes to oppose gay rights and reproductive rights. As a French citizen it surprises me quite, given this is France we're talking about.

It's the reactio of Newton's Laws, just in politics rather than physics.

As an American (and especially from Georgia) the idea of being surprising by that is somewhat confusing. But I understand that France is significantly more to the Left than us.

edited 27th Jun '17 10:30:07 AM by Fourthspartan56

I wonder if he passed out ballots with only his name on it. You laugh, but Sepp Blatter the ex-head of FIFA once did exactly that.

edited 27th Jun '17 10:24:03 AM by M84

I am growing tired of LRM's choices at that point. They had the opportunity to have a woman lead the National Assembly for the first time since ever - so, since the 18th century - but instead, LRM decided to pick de Rugy, a fucking professionnal opportunist.

Seriously, the guy was first from Europe-Ecologie, then he supported the government's policies like Pompili or Placé, then he took part in the PS primaries which he lost (but used to get more famous), then despite having promised to support whoever won he dumped Hamon and went towards Macron instead and was a LRM candidate for the legislative elections.

The guy would make Littlefinger proud. But no, only he has the "fame" to lead the Assembly - not that obviously, it's harder for women to become famous when you don't give them prominent positions.

And last week, Castaner was saying that it was very much possible to have a woman elected. Today he could only say that "the disappointment is personal", ie "not what I wanted but I a the government's spokesperson so I can't say anything about it".

It's the second time Macron promised a prominent position for a woman, or at least, used the possibility to appear open-minded and, I suppose, get more voters - he did the same with the Prime Minister before he got elected. At some point, I expect the voters will realize it if he keeps weaseling out of half-promises - this time, he did so by saying that "all elected positions within the Assembly will be renewed at half-mandate (2 1/2 half years from now) and it will not be possible for anyone to keep their position".

So, today, I place a bet. Either it will be totally buried between now and december 2019 OR the next president of the Assembly, provided he is not in jail at that point, will be Richard Ferrand. I honestly wish I am wrong and we finally get a woman, but I am not holding my breath for one sec.

On a sidenote, I wonder if Macron shouldn't decide that the Medically-Assisted Procreation for lesbian couples and single women should be voted using ordinances. You know, just to see if Mélenchon would still be fuming at the mouth when some things are decided without any debate, or if he only does this if it is something he disagrees with - because Mélenchon supports PMA.

edited 27th Jun '17 12:38:43 PM by Julep

Wait, you guys never had a female President of the National Assembly?

At least we had one here in this rectangle.

"all elected positions within the Assembly will be renewed at half-mandate (2 1/2 half years from now) and it will not be possible for anyone to keep their position".

As in they can't apply for re-election or just have to be re-elected to keep it?

Sounds like a strict term limit to me, with no loopholes.

No we are talking about positions within the assembly, like presiding the finances commission or presiding the Assembly itself. The same MP will remain, they'll just pick new delegates.

Apparently Macron gave Lord Dampnut an invitation to Bastille Day.

...Please tell me Bastille Day features fake guillotines.