Macron

[cromwell]

Hymns of praise for French President Macron are being sung by the more liberal areas of our media. But in the latest round of elections to the French assembly the turn out was 42%.

42%!! Only four out of ten bothered to vote!

Of which Macron's En March party together with his allies the MoDem party got 49%. So less than half, of less than half. Put another way only one in five French electors voted for Macron, yet he has a landslide in the assembly.

This is popularity that is a mile wide but only an inch deep.

Is this what French politics is going to be like now? "Pop up" parties that come from nowhere and can vanish just as quickly?

[Suff]

France is going through it's "New Labour" phase. So called "the third way". Left, Right and "different". Many are so disaffected they won't vote, others are so desperate to vote for "something different" they'll even vote for a new version of wallpaper with a different patter on it.

We voted in New Labour 3 times and are still paying the price. It would appear that France would like to do the same. Only the US had the gonads to vote for someone truly different and the press, the media and every pressure group in the world has never let them forget it and never tires of telling them it was a bad idea.

So what is left? The tired old choices or the third way? Because, apparently, Le Pen and FN are impossible to vote for, let alone allow into government. Cest la vie. Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose. It is a French saying and they seem to want to live it.

[TheOstrich]

What's he going to do about the unions, Suff? Take them on - or capitulate?

[Suff]

He'll take them on, get crushed with the strikes, borrow money to appease them and be voted out at the next election.

Just another cycle in the current French cycle of democracy..