How far will the rise of nationalistic populism go ?

[L00b]

See problem is that I'm no more enlightened now as the idea that May is authoritarian is kind of funny to me. She did, for example, drastically reduce the amount of time a person can be held without charge as Home Secretary. There's never been a hint of her being against democracy.

Not a hint, no

 

She's been forced to u-turn with her every attempt since July 2016, to the extent she could compete with Vestas and GE for supplying industrial wind turbines.

 

I suppose that, forging ahead with Brexit as she is, some bias colouring your appraisal of her governance style is only to be expected.

Now with the FN, would the election which put them in change of the French government be the last genuine democratic election in France?

Oh, hang on, that's one for my crystal ball. There, bit' o' polishing, now let's see: of course not. There would be plenty more elections, all just as democratically held as e.g. in Germany in March 1933, November 1933, March 1936, April 1938... Edited March 22, 2017 by L00b

[Penistone999]

I can`t even be arsed to answer this.

 

You just have

[unbeliever]

Not a hint, no

 

She's been forced to u-turn with her every attempt since July 2016, to the extent she could compete with Vestas and GE for supplying industrial wind turbines.

 

I suppose that, forging ahead with Brexit as she is, some bias colouring your appraisal of her governance style is only to be expected.

Oh, hang on, that's one for my crystal ball. There, bit' o' polishing, now let's see: of course not. There would be plenty more elections, all just as democratically held as e.g. in Germany in March 1933, November 1933, March 1936, April 1938...

 

Until the supreme court changed the law, it was pretty clear that article 50 was a matter for the royal prerogative. It's not like May failed to respect the court's ruling.

Those German elections would not have passed UN monitoring. This is why I was more specific.

[gomgeg]

You just have

? He gets confused.

[L00b]

Until the supreme court changed the law, it was pretty clear that article 50 was a matter for the royal prerogative.[/Quote]That's just the thing, you see: neither the High Court, nor the Supreme Court changed it. It's May who had it wrong with the Royal Prerogative all along.

 

Have you actually read the judgements at all, before (wrongly) paraphrasing them?

It's not like May failed to respect the court's ruling.

It's not like she had a choice: for all her efforts, this is still a democracy thankfully, and she is still answerable to Parliament (when it's made to do its job, kicking & screaming) and the Law of the land (when she doesn't implicitly condones the editorial bellends that run the jingoistic rags shamelessly targeting the judiciary).

 

I still can't quite make my mind up about whether your posts about this are couched in misplaced naivety, or outright bad faith.

Edited March 22, 2017 by L00b

[Harrystottle]

Thanks for that L00b. It's just that I thought that sort of practice in French politics was fairly well known about, and it seemed strange that it was found necessary to start clutching at peal necklaces in horror just before a Presidential election.

 

Dunno what to make of Macron but there is an undeniable hint of the Tony Blairs about him, which isn't a happy thought.

[L00b]

Thanks for that L00b.

Always a pleasure

It's just that I thought that sort of practice in French politics was fairly well known about, and it seemed strange that it was found necessary to start clutching at peal necklaces in horror just before a Presidential election.

For sure, it's regular-as-clockwork practice, more so even than in the US elections.

 

If anything, with a sense of perverse irony, candidates who let themselves get tainted by scandals in the French electoral race demonstrate their lack of suitability for the job through the carelessness of getting caught and their inability to make it go away, far more than through the substance of the scandal itself. Look at Mitterrand and his illegitimate kids for another (glaring) example.

Dunno what to make of Macron but there is an undeniable hint of the Tony Blairs about him, which isn't a happy thought.

It's a happier thought than Marine, or FN-lite Fillon, tbh. And I was never any fan of Blair...but then, for all his faults and with the benefit of 20/20 hindsight: look at what he did for the UK before Afghan and Iraq 2.0

 

France could do worse than Macron. A lot worse. But that's not a narrative which EU harm-wishing populist/Leavers want to hear over here.

 

I'd still have Juppé over any one of them. He's a statesman, and a proven safe pair of hands, the best (EDIT: of the current lot) to have in a storm. None of the others are (-yet, in the case of Macron...I'll give his youth the benefit of the doubt ).

Edited March 23, 2017 by L00b

[tinfoilhat]

Mr Farron will say he wants to reclaim the British flag from nationalists using it as a "symbol of division".

 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-39318822

 

I must have missed this. Good on you tim.

[L00b]

<...> You clearly have to be a nationalist to be in the FN. You have to be anti-immigration obviously. Do you have to be authoritarian to the point where you reject democracy?

Guess who Marine Le Pen got an audience with today?

 

That posterboy of tolerance governing in the bastion of democracy that is the Russian Federation, Vladimir Putin

 

Vlad has been quoted by Russian press agencies as saying that "Russia will not interfere in the election"...

 

...

[unbeliever]

Guess who Marine Le Pen got an audience with today?

 

That posterboy of tolerance governing in the bastion of democracy that is the Russian Federation, Vladimir Putin

 

Vlad has been quoted by Russian press agencies as saying that "Russia will not interfere in the election"...

 

...

 

I'm not sure that's evidence of anything at all.

Are there any candidates in this election who have not met Putin?