French politics: houlala!

[The guy from the Vale]

48 minutes ago, Bo Peep said:

Fascism is extreme control by the government/elite of basically all aspects of society. It's nothing of what you describe. If you want to see modern fascism then look at Thailand with its current dictatorship. Where did you even get "corporate-friendly populism" from? It sounds more like you're just taking modern conservative parties and labelling them "fascist" for giggles, which is why I'm challenging people to explain how Le Pen's policies are actually fascist, as in the real meaning of the word.

Party history is also nonsense. In America, it was the Republicans who fought against the Democrats to end slavery. Obviously, you'd have to be pretty stupid to try claim this is somehow relevant to modern politics. We're talking about Le Pen. Today.

As far as I'm aware, your reference to stripping people of citizenship based on "ideology" appears to refer to convicted terrorists holding dual-nationality. I'm not sure how that's a bad thing. If you can dump a mass-murderer on the doorstep he was born on and rid yourself of having to deal with the problem then why not? Terrorists do not deserve sympathy, nor do they deserve to participate in the Western world they want to destroy.

You're describing not fascism, but totalitarianism, of which fascism is one flavor. However, fascism is far more open to private ownership than socialism ( and particularly totalitarian communism) is, and indeed usually promises large-scale corporate welfare (including forced labor) and increased infrastructure spending, which is attractive to business owners (particularly if the only politically viable alternative is full nationalisation under a communist regime). I recomment reading up on Hjalmar Schacht and Alfred Hugenberg if you think fascism was perceived as opposed to big business back in the day. I'd also recommend reading up on who the richest German families in 1900 were - and which the richest families in the 1950es were. Hint: the Nazis were not all that bad for most of them, with the exception of those whose wealth used to be mainly concentrated in possessions in Silesia and Pomerania...

For a checklist of what fascism is, I usually refer to the late, great Umberto Eco's analysis. Let's just say Le Pen isn't looking too great on many of those positions.

As for party history, it's extremely important, and for two reasons. First of all, your history lesson on racial politics in the USA during the 19th century ignores the history of racial politics in the USA during the 20th century in its entirety, in particular the Civil Rights Act and the Southern Strategy, which basically reversed the position of the two parties. However, that switch was based on actual legislation passed by the Democrats, not some window-dressing. You can maybe change such a position over the course of decades, but to do so in just six years seems to me to be quite the warning sign. If the FN continues to expel actual fascists amongst themselves, they may earn my grudging respect for that. But I will not base that change on just once incident when most underlying positions haven't changed to a matching degree.

In case of MLP, she was a party member when her despicable father was party leader. Did she resign in protest over his flirt with fascism? She might have made a political career in any party, but she chose to stay. I think that choice reflects on her principles vis-à-vis fascism. And not in a good way.

As for your example: Yes, I do. Wh do I think it's wrong to strip such a person of their citizenship? Because (s)he may have been born in your country, and only ever lived there? Because it sets up inequality of the law for citizens depending on who their parents were? Because our failure to educate and integrate young people whose parents immigrated isn't their parents' home country's fault? And lastly, because stripping people off their civil rights because they are imagined to be opposed to your own principles makes one precisely totalitarian? 

[Altherion]

42 minutes ago, theguyfromtheVale said:

In case of MLP, she was a party member when her despicable father was party leader. Did she resign in protest over his flirt with fascism? She might have made a political career in any party, but she chose to stay. I think that choice reflects on her principles vis-à-vis fascism. And not in a good way.

To be fair though, it is a whole lot easier to become the leader of a political party by taking over from one's father than it is to create a party with a national profile from scratch or to maneuver into the leadership position of a party where one is an outsider. She might have made a political career elsewhere, but it is exceedingly unlikely that she would be a second round presidential candidate in that case.

[The guy from the Vale]

1 minute ago, Altherion said:

To be fair though, it is a whole lot easier to become the leader of a political party by taking over from one's father than it is to create a party with a national profile from scratch or to maneuver into the leadership position of a party where one is an outsider. She might have made a political career elsewhere, but it is exceedingly unlikely that she would be a second round presidential candidate in that case.

Oh, sure. But you then have to live with being okay, and having been okay, with the politics of said party before yout leadership; you can't claim to have been opposed to it on principle. If you were opposed to it, your opportunism was, quite obviously, greater than your disgust at those positions.

[all swedes are racist]

4 minutes ago, Altherion said:

To be fair though, it is a whole lot easier to become the leader of a political party by taking over from one's father than it is to create a party with a national profile from scratch or to maneuver into the leadership position of a party where one is an outsider. She might have made a political career elsewhere, but it is exceedingly unlikely that she would be a second round presidential candidate in that case.

of course, this was all a calculated career move, gonna change FN from the insisde

[Altherion]

16 minutes ago, theguyfromtheVale said:

Oh, sure. But you then have to live with being okay, and having been okay, with the politics of said party before yout leadership; you can't claim to have been opposed to it on principle. If you were opposed to it, your opportunism was, quite obviously, greater than your disgust at those positions.

You can't claim to be opposed to everything the party stood for, but you can certainly do it for a subset of those positions. In fact, the platforms of modern political parties are so comprehensive that politicians who agree with every aspect of a given platform rare. And since she did make significant changes after coming to power, she always has this excuse:

19 minutes ago, r'hllor's reformed lobster said:

of course, this was all a calculated career move, gonna change FN from the insisde

 

[all swedes are racist]

and people that actually believe that 'excuse' are morons

[The guy from the Vale]

6 minutes ago, r'hllor's reformed lobster said:

and people that actually believe that 'excuse' are morons

I wouldn't go quite that far. But I have to admit, I'm not going to give Le Pen the benefit of doubt after merely six years. We're not talking something that happened centuries ago but rather very recent developments. And while I'm unlikely to ever support her politics for a myriad of reasons, I'd at least give her some grudging respect if she turns out to really have turned a page on positions that, for me, are really unforivable. Some political positions are just too toxic to make you return from contact squeaky clean, and what Le Pen père said and did in his lifetime certainly qualifies for such a political position. His daughter might be different, but she has a lot of proving to do, and her turn from her father's positions was far less clean-cut than might have been hoped for, even if it's commendable that that happened - but so far, it's all been hot air, smoke, and potentially mirrors.

[Mindwalker]

Also, former FN members claim that Le Pen's abandoning blatantly racist, particularly anti-semitic positions is just for show. They can still hold and discuss these positions among themselves, but have clear instructions to never do it in public.

[Jo498]

This might have been the most likely outcome. For me the biggest surprise is how well Fillon still did after the scandals. Of course, assuming that Macron will become president in the second round, this result mainly postpones the status quo. Macron is a slick neoliberal who will do very little to improve the situation leading to the current polarization.

What really makes me cringe is that a slick former investment banker (the paradigmatic class responsible for quite a bit of the mess we are in!) is hailed as the best option and " centrist-leftist" in the German mainstream media whereas someone holding roughly social democratic positons like Mélenchon is called "Ultra-Linker" (extreme leftist, one would assume someone like Lenin from such a term). I despise Le Pen and her ilk but the establishment has still not woken up. I fear that it will really take something far worse and closer to home than Trump and Brexit for the EU elites (and most of the citizens from the still reasonably well off salaried class) to face the situation.

[Loge]

Well, apparently Melenchon has been spewing anti-German propaganda, has promised to renegotiate France's EU membership, and wants to leave NATO. That's not at all like the German Social Democrats, more like Linke.

[Rippounet]

8 hours ago, Altherion said:

Practically every poll has Macron winning with around 60% of the vote and that's a large hill to climb. Of course, given the surprisingly perfect performance of the polls so far, it could be that the universe is setting up the pollsters for a pride-before-the-fall scenario...

60-40 seems a likely outcome after the first round's results.

8 hours ago, theguyfromtheVale said:

You can maybe change such a position over the course of decades, but to do so in just six years seems to me to be quite the warning sign. If the FN continues to expel actual fascists amongst themselves, they may earn my grudging respect for that. But I will not base that change on just once incident when most underlying positions haven't changed to a matching degree.

5 hours ago, theguyfromtheVale said:

I wouldn't go quite that far. But I have to admit, I'm not going to give Le Pen the benefit of doubt after merely six years.

Yeah, I think you've nailed it. There really is no reason to give Le Pen the benefit of doubt, and many many reasons to think her transformation of the party is just a political façade. But even if you don't see her and her party as neo-fascists, they're still openly xenophobic and islamophobic at a time when immigration and religious freedom are both historically low in France.

One thing that has to be said though is that there is a significant proportion of FN voters who don't condone her ideas but see voting for her as a way to make "the little guy" 's voice heard by the big parties and the elite who tend to preserve a statu quo with little regard for the population. Funnily enough, if you add the numbers, up to 80% of French voters could have similar feelings at some degree or the other.

And all that being said... Please don't feed the troll(s).

2 hours ago, Jo498 said:

I despise Le Pen and her ilk but the establishment has still not woken up. I fear that it will really take something far worse and closer to home than Trump and Brexit for the EU elites (and most of the citizens from the still reasonably well off salaried class) to face the situation.

I concur. The elites obviously still believe that they can manipulate the voters. Well, this time they were proved right, but they ought to realize it was a really close call. And five years from now Macron could end up in Hollande's position.

1 hour ago, Loge said:

Well, apparently Melenchon has been spewing anti-German propaganda, has promised to renegotiate France's EU membership, and wants to leave NATO. That's not at all like the German Social Democrats, more like Linke.

I don't believe criticizing Merkel and Schäuble's economic policies is spewing anti-German propaganda... I hope you're aware Schäuble's policies are good for Germany but terrible for the EU as a political institution. Many people outside Germany are starting to realize that German leaders can be blamed for some of their woes.
And it's not exactly new either. When Hollande was elected five years ago he had promised to renegotiate some of the European economic policies. Germany crushed all hope of that within weeks. There's a reason why Le Pen and Mélenchon are saying what they're saying today.
So of course, it makes sense for the French to renegotiate the EU treaties (just like it would make sense for the poor Greeks). I personally don't adhere to the slow privatization of... Well, pretty much everything. I like my socialized healthcare, my free education, and my quality transportation, thank you very much. I feel deeply European and I despise nationalism but seriously, on these issues, I say f*** the EU. I didn't vote for a neo-liberal super-state, so I understand much of the anti-European sentiment.
Lastly, NATO... Well, yeah that's shitty, Mélenchon's not perfect. That being said, France wasn't a full-blown member of NATO until 2009 so it's not as crazy a position as you'd think. France has had a history of being wary of NATO, courtesy to De Gaulle.

 

[Fez]

9 hours ago, Altherion said:

So here are the numbers from what I think is the official site (somebody please correct me if I'm wrong) with 97% of the votes counted:

• Macron: 23.86%
• Le Pen: 21.43%
• Fillon: 19.94%
• Mélenchon: 19.62%
• Hamon: 6.35%

Plus a bunch of others below 5%. If you compare this to the latest polls (Wiki summary), it is basically dead-on for all of them: not only is the order right, but the polls are within 1% of the result for each of the 4 leading candidates. This is actually a pretty unlikely outcome and if this election was in a less democratic country, it would be fairly significant evidence of manipulation, but here I think the pollsters just got lucky.

Interestingly enough Le Pen will be the second person with that name in the last 15 years to compete in the second round. Her father, Jean-Marie Le Pen, was absolutely crushed by Chirac (losing 82.2% to 17.8% or by a margin of nearly 65%). There is little doubt that Marine Le Pen will do much better than that, but there is also little doubt that she will lose. Practically every poll has Macron winning with around 60% of the vote and that's a large hill to climb. Of course, given the surprisingly perfect performance of the polls so far, it could be that the universe is setting up the pollsters for a pride-before-the-fall scenario...

Considering the sample-weighting thing that all French pollsters do; its not surprising they'd be so close. The problem with weighting is that if pollsters guess wrong they'll be off pretty dramatically. But if they are right, then combined with their very large sample sizes (most of the French polls look to be at least 2,000 people, with some over 8,000; in the U.S. polls are rarely larger than 1,000) it'd be a shock for them to not nail the election.

[Arkash]

5 hours ago, Mindwalker said:

Also, former FN members claim that Le Pen's abandoning blatantly racist, particularly anti-semitic positions is just for show. They can still hold and discuss these positions among themselves, but have clear instructions to never do it in public.

That's it.

Despite the dédiabolisation MLP has gone through to make her party appear respectable, far from her father's views, the FN core is still made of a lot of dangerous and archaic individuals. 

[Jo498]

2 hours ago, Loge said:

Well, apparently Melenchon has been spewing anti-German propaganda, has promised to renegotiate France's EU membership, and wants to leave NATO. That's not at all like the German Social Democrats, more like Linke.

One would expect a slightly more nuanced view from serious media than a simplistic tag like "ultra-left", especially if the point of contention is Schäuble's (someone who should have been banned from public office forever because of a never cleared up corruption case) policy that is disastrous for France and other "souther" EU countries.

You are right insofar as the German Social Democrats mostly abandoned or seriously weakened what used to be core social democratic positions from the 1880s until the 1980s, so today's the "Linke" is closer to these social democratic positions whereas the "mainstream social/social democratic parties" are basically centrist and don't care anymore for the working/lower middle class (except in "Sonntagsreden" lip service).

[Loge]

49 minutes ago, Jo498 said:

One would expect a slightly more nuanced view from serious media than a simplistic tag like "ultra-left", especially if the point of contention is Schäuble's (someone who should have been banned from public office forever because of a never cleared up corruption case) policy that is disastrous for France and other "souther" EU countries.

You are right insofar as the German Social Democrats mostly abandoned or seriously weakened what used to be core social democratic positions from the 1880s until the 1980s, so today's the "Linke" is closer to these social democratic positions whereas the "mainstream social/social democratic parties" are basically centrist and don't care anymore for the working/lower middle class (except in "Sonntagsreden" lip service).

I think it goes a bit beyond criticising Schäuble:

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/apr/18/jean-luc-melenchon-germany-putin-french-presidential-race

 

ETA: This isn't the right thread for discussing German politics, but the SPD has been pro-Western and pro market economy since 1959 (Godesberg platform).

[Rippounet]

43 minutes ago, Loge said:

I think it goes a bit beyond criticising Schäuble:

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/apr/18/jean-luc-melenchon-germany-putin-french-presidential-race

That's an op-ed piece written by an obviously biased individual, not actual journalism. She repeats all the usual accusations leveled at Mélenchon (Chavez, Putin... etc) and even adds a few new ones. 
Mélenchon wasn't exactly subtle in his criticism of German leaders, but this author's case that his attacks on Germany go beyond the realm of economic policies is extraordinarily weak. On the other hand, he did completely assume the fact that he was being extremely harsh toward the economic ideology that Germany was imposing on Europe. That's the whole point of the book he wrote!
Of course, it's very unpleasant for everybody (Germans first and foremost) when someone starts attacking "Germany" as a country instead of "German leaders" and it allows people to say it's about more than the economy. But that's bullshit. I can tell you that when French people discuss Europe they don't take the pain to distinguish between German leaders and Germany. So yes, we say that it's "Germany" that squeezed Greece like a lemon and denied Tsipras his democratic legitimacy, it's "Germany" that prevents other countries from modifying European rules and treaties and it's "Germany" that's benefiting from the shitty neo-liberal Europe that we have. I'm aware that it's unpleasant and unfair, but it's also, arguably, fact. And I'm afraid this kind of discourse isn't going to go away any time soon, not with Le Pen being in the second round of our presidential election.
On a personal note, the more I learn about Schäuble, the more I want very bad things to happen to him.

[Fez]

Looks like it was a landslide for Macron among French voters living abroad in the U.S.

 

[The guy from the Vale]

3 hours ago, Rippounet said:

That's an op-ed piece written by an obviously biased individual, not actual journalism. She repeats all the usual accusations leveled at Mélenchon (Chavez, Putin... etc) and even adds a few new ones. 
Mélenchon wasn't exactly subtle in his criticism of German leaders, but this author's case that his attacks on Germany go beyond the realm of economic policies is extraordinarily weak. On the other hand, he did completely assume the fact that he was being extremely harsh toward the economic ideology that Germany was imposing on Europe. That's the whole point of the book he wrote!
Of course, it's very unpleasant for everybody (Germans first and foremost) when someone starts attacking "Germany" as a country instead of "German leaders" and it allows people to say it's about more than the economy. But that's bullshit. I can tell you that when French people discuss Europe they don't take the pain to distinguish between German leaders and Germany. So yes, we say that it's "Germany" that squeezed Greece like a lemon and denied Tsipras his democratic legitimacy, it's "Germany" that prevents other countries from modifying European rules and treaties and it's "Germany" that's benefiting from the shitty neo-liberal Europe that we have. I'm aware that it's unpleasant and unfair, but it's also, arguably, fact. And I'm afraid this kind of discourse isn't going to go away any time soon, not with Le Pen being in the second round of our presidential election.
On a personal note, the more I learn about Schäuble, the more I want very bad things to happen to him.

Very bad things happened to him. before. He's not in that wheelchair because of an accident, disease or a genetic disorder, after all. But yeah, whenever Merkel's seemingly squishy stance makes me consider German conservatives not that bad, all things considered, I remember that there's always Schäuble waiting in Merkel's wings.

[A Horse Named Stranger]

On 23.4.2017 at 8:07 PM, Rippounet said:

Well, no surprise, too bad.

On the plus side, Macron actually got first place, and should easily defeat Le Pen in the second round.

I think we had enough unpleasent political surprises in the past 12 months. As long as Macron manages to win the run off, I am fine. From a mere European perspective, a surprise ala Le Pen vs Melanchon wouldn't have been that cool. Looking back, I guess stability has some merit of its own.

[Stannis Eats No Peaches]

Le Pen is stepping down from leading the FN. I presume this is an attempt to make her seem more appealing to left-wing voters, but won't it also harm her image in the eyes of the supporters of the FN?