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It Couldn't Happen Here. Could It?

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EV_Ares Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Feb-15-09 09:18 AM
Original message
It Couldn't Happen Here. Could It?
PARIS--Most Americans don't care what happens in France. But the oldest country in "Old Europe" remains the Western world's intellectual capital and one of its primary originators of political trends. (Google "May+1968+Sorbonne.")

The French are reacting to a situation almost identical to ours--economic collapse, government impotence, corporate corruption--by turning hard left. National strikes and massive demonstrations are occurring every few weeks. How far left? This far: the late president François Mitterand's Socialist Party, the rough equivalent of America's Greens, is considered too conservative to solve the economic crisis.

A new poll by the Parisian daily Libération finds 53 percent of French voters (68 percent of 18-to-24-year-olds) favoring "radical social change." Fifty-seven percent want France to insulate itself from the global economic system. Does this mean revolution? It's certainly possible. Or maybe counter-revolution: Jean-Marie Le Pen's nativist (some would say neofascist) National Front is also picking up points.

One thing is certain: French politics are even more volatile than the financial markets these days. In yet another indication of How Far Left?, the Communist-aligned CGT labor union is on the defensive for not being militant enough. "We're not going to put out the blazing fires ," the CGT's secretary general said, trying to seize the initiative by calling for another strike on February 18th. "We're going to fan them."

Two new entities, a Left Party (PG) umbrella organization trying to unify opposition to the conservative government of President Nicolas Sarkozy (who'd be to the left of Obama in the U.S.) and the New Anticapitalist Party (NPA), have seized the popular imagination. The NPA claims to have registered more than 9000 "militants" willing to use violent force to overthrow the government if given the word.

"Only combat pays," read a banner at the NPA's first convention.

entire article: http://www.commondreams.org/print/38194
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valerief Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Feb-15-09 09:19 AM
Response to Original message
1. Viva la France! nt
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ShortnFiery Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Feb-15-09 10:02 AM
Response to Reply #1
6. With respect, it's "Vive la France" ... but we are in agreement.
:-) :hi:
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valerief Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Feb-16-09 12:41 PM
Response to Reply #6
14. Thanks for the editing! I guess I was thinking of Viva Las Vegas! nt
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fasttense Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Feb-15-09 09:30 AM
Response to Original message
2. Remember the guillotine. n/t
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Horse with no Name Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Feb-15-09 10:21 AM
Response to Reply #2
10. Remembers debtors prisons, unecessary drug wars, and the death penalty
Luckily most countries have evolved--oh wait...except for us.
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mmonk Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Feb-15-09 09:30 AM
Response to Original message
3. No. The establishment in this country is rightwing and controls
the military as well as an overreaching domestic spy operation now extending to the local level.
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rurallib Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Feb-15-09 09:58 AM
Response to Reply #3
4. don't forget controlling the media - a major cog in the arsenal.
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mmonk Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Feb-15-09 10:01 AM
Response to Reply #4
5. Yep, quite major.
A population that is perpetually asleep is easy to control.
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ShortnFiery Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Feb-15-09 10:03 AM
Response to Reply #4
7. As long as we have The Net, the TRUTH is getting aired. We need to de-consolidate the M$M. eom
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valerief Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Feb-16-09 12:57 PM
Response to Reply #4
19. And religion, the first estate. nt
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Sal Minella Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Feb-15-09 10:17 AM
Response to Reply #3
8. Much as I don't want to believe this, I can suggest no better explanation for Dick Cheney's
having a "transition office" near CIA headquarters in Washington.

It's not like Langley, VA (or McLean, or wherever it is) is a subway stop on the way to Wyoming.
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Horse with no Name Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Feb-15-09 10:20 AM
Response to Original message
9. I think EVERY country should turn inward at this point
and FORGET globalism. It ONLY works for corporatists--it doesn't work for the people.
It is much easier to fix a country than to fix a world.
Whatever it takes--each country knows it's own needs.
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terisan Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Feb-15-09 11:06 AM
Response to Reply #9
11. True.
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Tierra_y_Libertad Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Feb-15-09 11:30 AM
Response to Original message
12. Here are some excerpts from a speech by Olivier Besancenot - Head of the NPA
Unfortunately, the USA is more likely to turn right, rather than left. But, who knows?

http://links.org.au/node/697

It’s in these times of economic crisis that we will have to show just how useful we really are.

We must, in the year ahead, continue to show that we are the most effective opponents of the Sarkozy government and the policies of the French Confederation of Business Enterprises.

We have been trying to show, step by step, that there is a credible alternative: an alternative in the form of a new party worthy of the name — a left that doesn’t apologise for being left, for being anti-capitalist, for wanting to transform society.

In short, a left that is as faithful to the interests of its own sectors — the exploited and oppressed — as the right is faithful to the interests of their side, the exploiters and privileged.

I know that we are asked to do as activists things that would be a big job for a multinational corporation, when we currently only have the resources of a small business! So what, it’s just what we’ll have to do.

And that means in their workplaces and working class suburbs, people will be able to depend on us. It means that those who fight against racism, fascism, sexism and homophobia know that they can count on us.

Immigrants and undocumented workers must know that they can count on a left that from now on will support them all the way to victory: permanent residency for all undocumented immigrants, closure of the detention centres, full citizenship rights and the freedom to move and live where they like.

The PS tries to tell the majority of people that the only way to escape Sarkozy is to wait … for a hypothetical and uncertain escape thanks to the next presidential election in 2012.

To depend on the uncertain prospect of the umpteenth change of government, in which the only thing that can really be guaranteed is that absolutely nothing in our daily lives will change at all.

Well, we’re part of the left that says, “We’re not going to wait until 2012 to resist, to fight and to try to stop the policies of the Sarkozy government”.

Because it’s a social crisis, for millions of people.

To those that ask, “With your New Anti-capitalist Party, what do you want to achieve?”, I suggest you respond to them in the manner a minister in the government of Bolivian President Evo Morales responded when I met him in Paris with two other comrades.

He said to us, “Deep down, what we want is not to live better, because to live better always means at the expense of others. What we want is to not simply survive, because that’s already a given.

“What we want, is to simply live well.”

We want the same thing! To live well! And living well means the right to existence takes a priority over profits. Living well means having time for yourself — for those close to you — those around you, for creating, for having access to knowledge, for travel.

Living well also means living in harmony with our environment, putting an end to all their crocodile tears and taking the steps that are necessary.

Because if we really want to be ecological, then we must start with the evidence of what has been proven not to work: the existing model of economic development in which capitalism, each time touches any part of the ecological fabric, treats it solely as a piece of merchandise and destroys it.

We arrive systematically each time at the same conclusion: we simply have to have a new model of economic and social development. We call it “Socialism of the 21st century”.

There are those that call it “eco-socialism”, “libertarian self-management” or “communism with a human face”.

Who cares what we call it! It’s a process of a deep-going transformation that we want to take on. But I’ve said enough already… Stop talking about it and let’s do it, together!
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Tierra_y_Libertad Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Feb-15-09 11:30 AM
Response to Original message
13.  delete dupe
Edited on Sun Feb-15-09 11:32 AM by Tierra_y_Libertad
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Romulox Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Feb-16-09 12:44 PM
Response to Original message
15. It will never happen in the US. For one thing, we have only two political parties
both of which are more or less dedicated to preserving the status quo.

Notice that the alleged "collapse" of Wall Street was not taken as an opportunity to re-assess its role in the American economy; the only thought was to "prop it back up" before any such dialogue could commence.
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Lydia Leftcoast Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Feb-16-09 12:51 PM
Response to Reply #15
16. But it hasn't always been the SAME two parties
In the 1850s, it was the Democrats and the Whigs, until the Whigs collapsed due to their failure to come up with a firm position against slavery.
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Romulox Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Feb-16-09 12:54 PM
Response to Reply #16
18. True, but the Rich have controlled the US government since the begining.
regardless of which name they rallied under.
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BlooInBloo Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Feb-16-09 12:52 PM
Response to Original message
17. They hate foreigners (especially brown ones) almost as much as Americans do.
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