French Presidential elections

[Sue]

Did Macron really say "one euro paid into the pension system should be worth one euro at pension age" as the Guardian claims?

Haven't read the Guardian article but suspect this is referring to one of Macron's policies of standardising the state pension.

At the moment there are umpteen different 'types' of pension schemes falling within the state pension umbrella -- think it's split by work sector -- and so what you get out is dependent on the scheme related to your job type as well as what you pay in.

He's saying that if people pay in the same amount, they should all get the same amount out, regardless of their particular state pension type.

Which sounds fair enough except it's bound to end up with everyone getting the crappest version.

(This is a separate thing from more private type pensions provided by employers.)

 

[hot air baboon]

fwiw this writer senses a Le Pen moment could be approaching in France


http://www.counterpunch.org/2017/03/20/french-elections-every-way-you-look-at-it-you-lose/

I travel around France. Sometimes I walk, sometimes I hitch, sometimes I do ride-share. It takes a little longer but I meet people I never would otherwise, people whose names I never learn, people who gab, who share at least a bit of their truth. They know the state of things all too well, they’re not tied to any party. They’re educated or they’re farmers and carpenters, they’re not haters, at least not in the way we have them in the States.

 

[Old Spark]

Fillon paid for facilitating meeting with Putin ? Allegedly.

Fillon 'got $50k to fix meeting between Putin and Lebanese billionaire'

 

[gentlegreen]

Arse.

I may have to delay retiring to France for a year or two - hopefully Le Pen won't be there for a second term.

 

[stavros]

Fillon paid for facilitating meeting with Putin ? Allegedly.

Fillon 'got $50k to fix meeting between Putin and Lebanese billionaire'

The man is "un con extraodinaire". How many times can you fuck up in one election cycle?

 

[stavros]

Every pundit I've seen or read, on both sides of la Manche, has assumed le Pen will make the second round. It would be nice this time, after the 2015 GE, Brexit and Trump, that their predictions were wrong again.

 

[stavros]

I just saw a piece which said that France's Catholics predominantly vote to the right, but not as far as the FN, and that probably a majority would vote for Fillon despite everything. Stats to vary massively on how many Catholics there are in France, between 45% and 65%, but I suppose it depends on the question asked and how they've defined Catholic.

 

[J Ed]

I just saw a piece which said that France's Catholics predominantly vote to the right, but not as far as the FN, and that probably a majority would vote for Fillon despite everything. Stats to vary massively on how many Catholics there are in France, between 45% and 65%, but I suppose it depends on the question asked and how they've defined Catholic.

I follow a few Fillon supporters on twitter, one thing that's fascinating is just how similar they are to Front National supporters, in some cases they are more extreme.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

Every pundit I've seen or read, on both sides of la Manche, has assumed le Pen will make the second round. It would be nice this time, after the 2015 GE, Brexit and Trump, that their predictions were wrong again.

Just two to three weeks before the Dutch elections, opinion polls had Wilders' party at the high 20s percentage of the vote. They consistently polled much higher than the eventual 20 percent that they got in the actual election.

A crumb of hope perhaps. The FN needs to slip down to around 20 percent or lower to fail to get into the second round, from their consistent 25 percent polling so far. I think it's unlikely but not impossible. Either way, she loses second round.

 

[redsquirrel]

Cunts they may be but it's hard to disagree with their summing up on Macron

As president, he would reduce public spending and the size of the state and respect Brussels’ deficit targets. Taxes on business would be lowered. A combination of better education and training and tougher sanctions on the jobless would be deployed to lower unemployment, running at about 25% among the young.

 

[mather]

Cunts they may be but it's hard to disagree with their summing up on Macron

Yet that won't stop liberals from trying to emotionally blackmail people into supporting him to as the 'lesser evil' candidate.

 

[treelover]

The trip is the idea of 27-year-old Violaine Pierre, the founder of a startup travel company based in New York, and has its origins in a night of deep personal angst. Two years ago Pierre was helping with a vote count for regional elections in Sainte-Tulle, the village where she grew up, not far from Aix-en-Provence. For many years Sainte-Tulle had been a stronghold of the French Communist party, but that night Marion Maréchal-Le Pen, fighting for control of the region, won 53% of the village vote. “It made me feel the time had come to act. We need to act now, not wait for the cataclysm.”

Along with her friend, Mathieu Teachout, Pierre approached Macron when the candidate visited New York. He loved the idea of “En Marche! Le Tour” and authorised the campaign to buy the van. So, since February, Teachout, Pierre and Pardo have been spreading the Macron gospel, from Gaillac in the south to Verdun near the Belgian border.

How are these evangelists for Macron going to sell US/UK style welfare reforms?, which will hit the very people they want to win over.

 

[J Ed]

How are these evangelists for Macron going to sell US/UK style welfare reforms?, which will hit the very people they want to win over.

The French are backwards and need to change, look how many of them will vote for/voted Le Pen, they deserve this and more.

 

[Idris2002]

I see Melenchon is tweeting De Gaulle quotes now.

 

[J Ed]

I see Melenchon is tweeting De Gaulle quotes now.

Hopefully it's that funny one about cheese

 

[Idris2002]

Spoiler: macron vs melenchon

 

[treelover]

At the end of a long day in Saint-Quentin, Pierre is taking a breather after a Q&A session with local En Marche! volunteers. She has always been a Socialist voter, but was, like many others, hugely disappointed by the Hollande presidency.

“I don’t see Emmanuel Macron as some kind of saviour,” she says. “But he has managed to mobilise 200,000 people nationwide, involving many people in politics for the first time. Yes, he’s a liberal, but it’s not inevitable that globalisation has to mean greater inequality. We have to make it easier to change jobs and to train. We have to get proper internet access across the whole country. And France cannot succeed by isolating itself.”

Proto Blairite?

 

[redsquirrel]

Spoiler: macron vs melenchon

Who did that? They don't seem to understand what liberal means.

 

[The Boy]

Who did that? They don't seem to understand what liberal means.

Americans, innit.

 

[ska invita]

Yet that won't stop liberals from trying to emotionally blackmail people into supporting him to as the 'lesser evil' candidate.

what kind of blackmail is that? How would the blackmail go?

 

[redsquirrel]

Well going from the Clinton/Trump or Referendum threads and wider debates
- calling people who criticise Macron racists
- calling people who say that they don't intend to vote for either candidate racists and/or FN proxies

 

[Pickman's model]

Proto Blairite?

Proto doesn't mean what you think it means

 

[ska invita]

Well going from the Clinton/Trump or Referendum threads and wider debates
- calling people who criticise Macron racists
- calling people who say that they don't intend to vote for either candidate racists and/or FN proxies

Thats not emotional blackmail - thats an attack on a persons character.
I'm uncomfortable with the idea that discouraging a neo-fascist vote gets dismissed as "emotional blackmail" without qualification.

 

[stavros]

Hamon's way behind even Mélenchon in the polls, I read earlier.

 

[Raheem]

Hamon's way behind even Mélenchon in the polls, I read earlier.

Not really way behind, but Hamon's previous lead over him has been reversed since the first tv debate. Swapping votes on the left is not much to celebrate though, IMO. Wake me when the votes are coming from Macron and Le Pen.

 

[stavros]

Well yes, neither have a hope of making the cut. I thought it telling how low the PS candidate ranked though.

 

[redsquirrel]

Thats not emotional blackmail - thats an attack on a persons character.

WTF, how in gods name is not attacking someone by (falsely) calling them a racist because they criticise/say they won't vote for a liberal political/party not emotional blackmail. I'm sorry but that's utter fucking illogical rubbish. It's emotional blackmail precisely because it's an attack on that person's character.

Green voters were called racists/Trump supporters by proxies by the pro-Clinton democrats. On this thread I've linked to a case where the Green party was charged with potentially letting the BNP in because it dared to stand against Labour in a seat. You had U75 posters called racists because they criticised the scumbag filth that Clinton is.

I'm uncomfortable with the idea that discouraging a neo-fascist vote gets dismissed as "emotional blackmail" without qualification.

Well good thing nobody did that then isn't it.

 

[tim]

Arse.

I may have to delay retiring to France for a year or two - hopefully Le Pen won't be there for a second term.

Second term? Hitler, Franco and Mussolini didn't go in for that namby-pampy liberal stuff.

 

[tim]

Every pundit I've seen or read, on both sides of la Manche, has assumed le Pen will make the second round. It would be nice this time, after the 2015 GE, Brexit and Trump, that their predictions were wrong again.

No chance of that happening her evil old dad made it to round 2 in 2002, without the type of make over she's had against a much more credible field of opponents

 

[ska invita]

Well good thing nobody did that then isn't it.

well the post I asked for qualification, which you chose to answer, was vague. That's why I wanted a qualification... It was suggestive and left a lot open. It would've been interesting to know what Mather meant by it. I read the tone very differently to what you replied