France General Discussion III: Tout doit disparaître

[parochial boy]

What a boring thread name. People had plenty of better suggestions.

Would you prefer: The Destruction of the Party of Antonio V?

I decided to arbitrarily settle this myself but keep suggesting, by all means

Y'en a Ma(rre)cron

Best I could do, sorry

[parochial boy]

Centre-Left president Emmanuel Macron's Centre-Left Prime Minister Édouard Philippe is announcing a bunch of policies at the moment, including cutting spending by 3% of GDP and cutting the national tax burden by 1% of GDP.

The good news is that any reforms to the ISF have been put off until 2019 at least.

[parochial boy]

Nouvelle Gauche (PS)
For: 3
Against: 5
Abstain: 23

F**king useless. Hamon was right to leave.

Can you flesh out Hamon's motivations, and what state the PS is in, ideologically? I must say that vote is at odds with how I expected the current PS to act (mainly informed by electing Hamon as their leader).

Hamon is from the PS' left, unlike most of the MPs that were reelected last month. He opposed all of Hollande's right-wing legislation and resigned the government when it became clear he was going to go full supply-side. His campaign was centered around UBI, shortening the workweek, tackling workplace stress, taxing the rich, and radical measures against climate change. It's clear now that the PS will never provide an effective platform for these ideas.

Thanks, I wasn't too far off, just didn't realise the political collapse had hurt the parliamentary PS left more than the right. What do you think of the prospects for his new party? I wonder (no doubt wishful thinking) if it might counter-intuitively allow for/force more cooperation on the Left since they're so disunited that they'll never get in the second round unless voters rally around one.

I don't have very high hopes for his movement (or the non-FI French left in general) right now, but I try to keep up some hope. Hopefully he ends up as an ally and potentially a voice of sanity within a broader left alliance, but it's a long way to there.

I wouldn't worry, the left in France has been in this sort of situation multiple times in the past (1969, 1993...), fundamentally there are just too many left wing people in the country.

That and people are unlikely to appreciate Macron making them poorer

[parochial boy]

RIP Johnny Hallyday

[parochial boy]

I'm not a fan at all either, but he has been around since basically forever, especially at this time of year - so it's a bit weird for him to suddenly not be.

The media reaction has been ridiculous though.

[parochial boy]

Will Generation.s and Les Patriotes have any chance of making somewhat of an impact?

At this point, I wouldn't even like to predict where things fall on the left - Melenchon is far too flawed for many leftists, the PS are broken, and Hamon doesn't really seem like the guy who will lead anything anywhere.

You can bet your house that Philippot won't go anywhere. If he gets anywhere near to where Mégret did it will be a miracle

[parochial boy]

So the ongoing mega strike/shutdown in Mayotte is probably worth a metion, as it has lasted all week and brought the island to a standstill (schools closed, barricades set up along the main roads...) and is threatening to disrupt the special legislative election on Sunday.

There has been simmering tension in Mayotte for a while now (as seen in the fact the 95% Muslim islands gave Le Pen 28% of the vote in the first round of the presidential election last year) that is chiefly to do with crime/insecurity and the huge levels of illegal immigration from the Comoros.

About half of the island's population are Comorian immigrants, the vast majority of whom are in an irregular situation. Mayotte is already by far the poorest department in France, and the huge population growth/immigration has been blamed for the high crime rates on the islands, struggling infrastructure and the growing number of people living in informal settlements

A machete attack on a high school last month was the final straw which led to the current mass strike - which has been handled, lets say badly, by Annick Girardin, the minister of overseas territories.

[parochial boy]

The strikes are because Macron wants to reform the SNCF to introduce "competition" and to take away many of the perks associated with cheminot (ie railway worker) status - which have been blamed for, among other things, the SNCFs funding problems (and "lazy overpaid public sector worker" tropes); as well s to introduce more "competition" to the

Of course, rather than considering why the SNCF has funding problems, this has been used to launch into an attack on one of the few remaing decent working class jobs. Which is a sad indictment of Macron and the priorities of the modern economy really.

[parochial boy]

LREM now want to force municipalities to start selling off their Social Housing stock, aping a policy that has been absolutely disastrous wherever it has been implemented.

Absolute scum...

[parochial boy]

Sorry

[parochial boy]

Bit late but, Les Guignols de l'Info is finished for ever. Seeing as that was the show that introduced me to politics, it seems worth marking.

[parochial boy]

I think he'd wanted to kill them for a while. They were well passed the glory days though, I was kind of surprised anyone still watched them

[parochial boy]

May I be the first to say, lol?

[parochial boy]

For comparison, Hollande was at almost at exactly the same level at this stage in his presidency - and that was despite a much worse economic situation

[parochial boy]

Unemployment in 2013 was 10-11%. Now it's 9-10%. My impression of the French economy - though I'm not there very often - is that the job situation has hardly changed in 6 years, while wages have just kept up with prices until the last year, as eurozone inflation has risen toward 2%. The student towns are doing fine and I don't see many other parts to judge. These are not objectively awesome conditions.

In France, the student towns are, with probably the exception of Poitiersle, the same thing as the big cities - which has always been part of the problem.

Anyway, that is almost the point as to why Macron is not popular despite better top line economic conditions. Until the last few months, the direction of travel had been declining unemployment etc, etc... But the fact that this trend of improvement, which was already heavily reliant on increasing numbers of CDD's, has stalled, plus the strikes and controversy surrounding his economic reforms (although admittedly, the circles I move in are likely to be far more angry about the content of them than the average French person) can easily explain why his popularity is eroding so quickly.

Or it's just part of the French national psyche to hate whoever is president, which makes obvious sense to anyone who has ever met a French person.

Who could potentially beat Macron anyway? Have there been any rumours on potential candidates? It's probably too early for that though (4 more years and this isn't America where everyone starts plotting to run for president and recruiting staff while they're a toddler ffs). Then again, some candidates announced their bids for the 2017 election very early.

In this poll Mélenchon is at 30%, Hamon at 20%, Le Pen at 17%, Wauquiez at 13%.

Yes, as in 2017, Macron is very much the beneficiary of how impressively pathetic both the left and right are.

[parochial boy]

She has the flaw of being the most parisian person in the world

Having quit politics probably doesn't help either

[parochial boy]

So Hulot has resigned out of disappointment with Macron's (lack of) engagement on environmental issues; and the flawless one's approval rating has continued to drop down to 34%

Very good, carry on

[parochial boy]

Could Hulot face him, I wonder?

He claimed he was leaving politics for good.

Anyway, Méluche has been the most obvious opposition figure over the last year or two; but christ knows I wouldn't want to predict what will be the case in 4 years. Let's at least see how LREM hold up in the Europeans and the Municipals.

[parochial boy]

The problem, again, is that the anger of common people is fully justified when there's no solidarity in the effort. In other words: the rich must pay more taxes than the poor, by an amount proportional to the wealth they possess.

they don't?  Rich people in France don't pay the vast majority of income taxes?  Did they learn this from the Greeks?  Sure, regressive taxes like sin and gas taxes should be axed or at least greatly reduced, which is what the protesters are protesting about, no?

He "reformed" the wealth tax, which in practice meant a massive tax cut for the richest - that, the fact that Macron is considered as being the "president of the rich" is one of the underlying factors driving the protests.

But otherwise, yeah, the petrol tax in particular hurts lower income people who tend to live outside the major cities - and are more car reliant.

For me at least, ideologically speaking, climate change is a massive problem; but it is a problem that is mainly caused by the rich - so passing the cost of it on to the poor at the same time as giving tax cuts to rich people is outrageous.

[parochial boy]

The problem, again, is that the anger of common people is fully justified when there's no solidarity in the effort. In other words: the rich must pay more taxes than the poor, by an amount proportional to the wealth they possess.

they don't?  Rich people in France don't pay the vast majority of income taxes?  Did they learn this from the Greeks?  Sure, regressive taxes like sin and gas taxes should be axed or at least greatly reduced, which is what the protesters are protesting about, no?

He "reformed" the wealth tax, which in practice meant a massive tax cut for the richest - that, the fact that Macron is considered as being the "president of the rich" is one of the underlying factors driving the protests.

But otherwise, yeah, the petrol tax in particular hurts lower income people who tend to live outside the major cities - and are more car reliant.

For me at least, ideologically speaking, climate change is a massive problem; but it is a problem that is mainly caused by the rich - so passing the cost of it on to the poor at the same time as giving tax cuts to rich people is outrageous.

is wiki lying to me when it says people that make more than €72k pay 41% of it to the govt in income taxes?  That ain't even rich!

Well it's a marginal rate, so not really...

And the reforms were to the wealth tax, as in it used to tax things like shares or other financial products; whereas now it is really only a tax on real estate. So, as most people are more likely to have their wealth tied up in their homes, it was essentially punishing the middle at the expense of the rich, who are more likely to own shares and whatever.

[parochial boy]

Ifop poll, presidential election 2022

Macron: 27.5%
Le Pen: 27.5%
Mélenchon: 13%
Wauquiez: 10%
Hamon: 8.5%
Dupont-Aignan: 7%

Did they poll the Macron-Le Pen run-off?

61-39 to Macron

Le Pen is still persona non grata to a solid majority of the French - if Macron is going to lose in 2022 he t won't be to her

[parochial boy]

  Got all excited about a national referendum to be held in France, only to find out it might be about, wait for it, drum roll please... reducing the size of the National Assembly.

Yeah tbh I think that's stupid. Honestly I think it's demogoguery to tell the nation that reducing the number of MPs will actually change something. It won't, if anything it will make politicians even more out of touch as their constituencies will be even larger; and it's not the type of thing that's going to save billions of euros either, so I don't see the point.

The idea of proportional representation on the other hand seems very interesting, if the number of MPs was reduced in order to put in place PR that could be something worth thinking about.

Agreed. I think it's a funny tactic though - the gilets jaunes were demanding the introduction of the RIC, so hold a referendum about a tedious subject, then when turnout is predictably pathetic, Macron can turn around and use it as "proof" that there is no demand to have widespread referendums

[parochial boy]

So Decathlon release a "sports Hijab" and all the usual suspects from across the political spectrum line up to denounce this humoungous affront to French values/laïcité/women's rights and all - but, for all that I do think there are areas where there might be a debate to be had about wearing a niqab to school or whatever, I fail to see how this isn't just straight out racism?

[parochial boy]

Ifop poll, 2022 presidential election

Macron: 30%
Le Pen: 27%
Mélenchon: 12%
Wauquiez: 8%
Hamon: 6%
Dupont-Aignan: 6%

Second round: Macron 56%, Le Pen 44%

Yes I think that's the likely scenario*right now*

Why don’t they poll the Green candidate, considering they are ahead of generation.s in the polls?

They did, Yannick Jadot at 2%, suffering from a lack of name recognition and EELV always overperform at the Europeans.

Of course, polling at this stage is entirely irrelevant - remember at this point in 2014 we all thought Juppé was going to be the next president.

[parochial boy]

Good old Macron is pushing forward with the privatisation of ADP group, the company that runs the Paris area airports.

This is a company that generates about 160m Euros a year to the French treasury, and is currently expanding rapidly and becoming increasingly profitable. So why privatise it? Selling off a successful state owned company is either being driven by pure ideology, in the face of actual reality; and works out as a delightful gift from the French taxpayers to the rich.