Music to read by:
You look so tired and unhappy
Bring down the government
They don't, they don't speak for us
I'll take a quiet life
A handshake of carbon monoxide
No alarms and no surprises
No alarms and no surprises
No alarms and no surprises
Silent, silent
This is my final fit, my final bellyache with
No alarms and no surprises.
Bring down the government
They don't, they don't speak for us
I'll take a quiet life
A handshake of carbon monoxide
No alarms and no surprises
No alarms and no surprises
No alarms and no surprises
Silent, silent
This is my final fit, my final bellyache with
No alarms and no surprises.
"By an irony of history, the electors have chosen a second
Socialist president at the moment when the acceleration of the
deconstruction of the welfare state is the only option. While the agenda of the new term has not really been the subject of
discussion, it involves a profound reform of the French social model."
11:03PM BST 06 May 2012
François Hollande has won the most important election in French living memory. He now has to confront a crisis in the public finances that he has promised to tackle with a combination of a heavier tax burden and lower public spending.
He has set a target of returning to a balanced budget by the end of his
five-year term in office.
For a Socialist candidate that is without precedent. But François Hollande remains very vague on how he will achieve that goal.
The crisis is now at the very heart of a state exhausted by an annual budget deficit of 100 billion euros and a debt level of 90% of gross domestic product.
France has the one of the highest levels of overall tax in Europe and any rational being has to conclude that the only option is drastically to reduce the level of public spending.
Yet during the campaign there were debates between the 10 candidates who were in contention in the first round, and then the three-hour debate between the two candidates who qualified for the second, run-off round, but they did not make it possible to get to the heart of the real issues.
There was talk of “restoring the frontiers”, promises of social protection,
economic protectionism, creation of new public sector jobs, higher
purchasing power—more money in people’s pockets.
Globalisation, which requires the recovery of a lost competitiveness to reverse decline, did not figure in the debates.
Nor did Europe, which is demanding, on pain of fines, strict budgetary discipline.
Nor did the reduction in public spending in general, let alone cuts in spending on social programmes.
Instead of encouraging economic success, which would promote growth, there were attacks on company bosses and bankers.
By an irony of history, the electors have chosen a second Socialist president at the moment when the acceleration of the deconstruction of the welfare state is the only option.
While the agenda of the new term has not really been the subject of discussion, it involves a profound reform of the French social model.
Since the emergence of an absolute monarchy in the 16th century, France has been dominated by the idea of an omnipotent state. In France social crises take place when the state can no longer function because people does not know how operate in its absence.
The Left is taking on a momentous burden as it dismantles a social model designed to be irreplaceable.
Globalisation, which requires the recovery of a lost competitiveness to reverse decline, did not figure in the debates.
Nor did Europe, which is demanding, on pain of fines, strict budgetary discipline.
Nor did the reduction in public spending in general, let alone cuts in spending on social programmes.
Instead of encouraging economic success, which would promote growth, there were attacks on company bosses and bankers.
By an irony of history, the electors have chosen a second Socialist president at the moment when the acceleration of the deconstruction of the welfare state is the only option.
While the agenda of the new term has not really been the subject of discussion, it involves a profound reform of the French social model.
Since the emergence of an absolute monarchy in the 16th century, France has been dominated by the idea of an omnipotent state. In France social crises take place when the state can no longer function because people does not know how operate in its absence.
The Left is taking on a momentous burden as it dismantles a social model designed to be irreplaceable.
The now-infamous “Cloward-Piven Strategy” outlined by Richard Cloward and Frances Fox Piven in 1966 proposed a clear roadmap to socialism: get so many people addicted to government entitlements that the economic system collapses, and in the resulting chaos the populace will demand and vote for a new economic system in which everyone is supported by the state.
Sounds logical (if nefarious), and President Obama seems hell-bent on bringing it to fruition in the United States. The problem for Obama’s inner socialist is that he’s also required for appearance’s sake to attempt a rescue of the American economy using Keynesian principles.
This self-cancelling combo-strategy is the underlying cause of our economic stagnation, as outlined in “The Obama-Piven Strategy,” an earlier post I made last year that made some waves. What I noted back then remains true:
I propose that President Obama is simultaneously trying to rescue the economy using the Keynesian/Democratic model while at the same time also trying to destroy the economy through the Cloward-Piven Strategy. His two mutually contradictory plans cancel each other out, rendering all his efforts self-negating, and this explains why the American economy has stalled.
I dub this the Obama-Piven Strategy. And it’s the reason why we remain mired in a deep recession. We are neither recovering, as the Keynesian model predicts, nor is capitalism collapsing, as the revolutionaries hope; the Obama-Piven strategy ensures that we remain in suspended animation between the two extremes.But something interesting happened on Sunday in Europe: Voters in both France and Greece, two countries ruinously addicted to government entitlements, rejected the “austerity” model of debt-reduction and instead doubled down on unsustainable spending sprees. France elected Socialist Francois Hollande as president, and in his acceptance speech he promised to increase government benefits and amp up “stimulus” spending programs — the exact things that got France into a metaphorical debtors’ prison in the first place. But exactly as Cloward and Piven has surmised, once you get 50+% of the population hooked on “free” government money, there’s no turning back — they will vote for socialists every time. The election of Hollande is the culmination of Cloward-Piven; the strategy worked, but in the wrong country.
(In a similar blunder, it should be noted, Karl Marx predicted that the first socialist revolution would happen in an industrialized country like Germany or Great Britain; instead the exact opposite happened, as two backward pre-industrial nations, Russia and China, were the first to embrace communism.)
Also on Sunday, Greece held local elections and voters rewarded various “anti-austerity” parties and candidates: “Greek voters punish ruling coalition, reward far left,” reads the headline. “Voters angry over austerity delivered a blow to Greece’s ruling parties on Sunday, with neither the conservative New Democracy nor the Pasok socialists winning enough votes to form a government while far-left Syriza took second place.” Even a “neo-Nazi” anti-immigrant party won seats for the first time because they too rejected the “austerity” measures and want to maintain the entitlement state (albeit solely for Greek citizens, in their case).
The message is clear: Once enough voters are on the dole, regardless of your party’s ideology or what label it has, you will win elections if you promise to to keep the free money flowing. This was Cloward-Piven’s point, and they turned out to be frighteningly correct.
What this means for Europe is anyone’s guess. Because both France and Greece are embedded in the EU, they do not have complete sovereignty over their own economies, so it still remains to be seen if the rest of the EU will allow them to spiral further into debt and reneg on previous agreements to tighten the pursestrings. But it seems that if they were left to their own devices, both France and Greece are willing to ignore reality and plunge headfirst into a completely unsustainable socialist model.
Sunday might not be as epochal as Russia’s October Revolution, but it should be remembered as the day of the first Cloward-Piven Revolution. It just happened in the “wrong” countries.
Will the revolution spread to America? Have Obama’s policies over the last four years addicted so many people to food stamps and Social Security disability payments and unemployment benefits and so many other entitlement programs that we as a nation will go the route of France and vote for the guy who promises to keep the drugs flowing, regardless of the consequences? Will the inherent resilience of the American economy keep the illusory prosperity afloat long enough to usher Obama into office for the final assault on capitalism?
Hayek help us.
Sophie:
In France, there are a lot of people on the Right involved in politics that are kind of happy that this has happened. They know that within 6 months, Hollande is going to have to break many of his campaign promises BECAUSE THERE IS NO MONEY AND THE EU WILL NOT RENEGOTIATE THE DEALS IT MADE WITH SARKOZY. Hollande, the Socialist, will have to make the cuts and the Left will come out in fierce protest against him.
Just remember, it was NOT Sarkozy and his party that gave rise to the Invisible Committee and their bestseller, The Coming Insurrection. It was the Socialists that provided the impetus for the Far Left. It is why Melancon was doing so well for a while. The Far Left, including the unions, are fed up waiting for the Socialists to deliver the utopia that they have been promising for like…ever.
So, according to the Right's logic, let a Socialist ruin France or make the deep cuts that will have to be made in order to please the bond traders. Either way, Hollande is screwed. Unfortunately for France, what will be left are two extreme parties: The Communists and Le Pen's National Front. It will be a fight between the French (natives, the Right, anti-immigration proponents, the Middle Class, Catholics, etc.) and the Neo-French (immigrants, Muslims, communists, socialists, hard-line union workers).
Update #1:
A Prog wrote: "Same thing will happen here too if the American people allow these Tea Party Extremists to have their way. We need common sense policies instead of the Tea Party policies that takes from the middle class and gives to the rich."
I don’t think so. The Middle Class went for McCain by 20 points. The Middle Class went out in record numbers to spank Obama and the Party of Julia in 2010.
The Middle Class in France, if you want to say that they have one, went for Sarkozy. The Neo-French, immigrants, mainly, Muslims, Socialists, Communists, union workers, etc., voted for Hollande.
Furthermore, this election, as was the one in Greece where some new Conservative leaders were elected — and the horrible Golden Dawn Party (Neo-Nazis) won 20% of Parliament (their very first seats ever) -- is as much an expression of outrage at Merkozy and Brussels at is about internal affairs of each particular nation.
As was the case in the Great Depression, whichever party was in power in 2008 when world financial boat struck the iceberg, the subsequent national elections have seen that party replaced. It has happened in the United States, Britain, Spain, Ireland, France, Germany (Merkel’s Party has been losing local and regional elections), etc. It is like musical chairs. If the music stopped and you were in power, you got kicked out in the next national election.
Furthermore, in the EU, there is little democracy, which has infuriated a people, who — believe it or not (and many in Brussels simply don’t) — actually like being French or German or Italian or Danish, etc., and do not want to be a citizen of the United States of Europe where 27 unelected apparatchiks control their fate…through bailouts, austerity budgets, taxes, etc.
Update#2:
"By an irony of history, the electors have chosen a second Socialist president at the moment when the acceleration of the deconstruction of the welfare state is the only option. While the agenda of the new term has not really been the subject of discussion, it involves a profound reform of the French social model."
Exactly. France has to borrow around $275 billion before the end of the year. If Hollande’s government goes on a spending spree, you will see interest rates charged by banks and bond purchasers skyrocket. They simply will not stand for more spending without fundamental reform. Also, the EU will slap fines and penalties on France if it violates the EU Constitution by running over a 3% deficit-to-GDP. Yes, the EU ignored the PIIGS, but it won't France. In 6 months, Hollande will be speaking on economic policy like Obama did on the war on terror when he adopted most of Bush’s war on terror policies.
Update #3:
Despite fears that he will pursue a “dangerous” economic policy featuring a return to Keynesian tax-and-spend practices, Hollande and his campaign team have told the Germans that this has been ruled out. Michel Sapin, the former finance minister, who wrote Hollande’s economic programme, told senior German diplomats, according to a confidential note obtained by the Guardian, the following:
“We can’t do Keynesianism twice in 10 years.”
“Hollande is aware that right at the start of his term in office, he will have to spell out hard truths to the French,” says the eight-page memo from the German embassy in Paris to Angela Merkel’s office in Berlin. Hollande has vowed to launch his reform programme as soon as he takes office on 15 May, prioritising a rise in taxes for the wealthiest and curbing the state deficit…
“It is absolutely essential to generate growth but this CAN ONLY BE ACCOMPLISHED BY SUPPLY-SIDE MEASURES AND IS NO LONGER POSSIBLE THROUGH STATE SPENDING PROGRAMMES,” the Hollande team told the German diplomats.
Related Reading:
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Give Me Liberty or Give Me Dearth...You Can Keep The "Equality"
What comes after Europe?
Voting For Yesterday In France
Europe, 2012
Uber Alles After All
Bambino, My Cash Money
Europe's Demographic Deficit Grows Wider By The Day
The callous cruelty of the EU is destroying Greece, a once-proud country
Après Sarkozy, Le Déluge. Viva M Hollande - L'homme, Qui Va Détruire La France!
Hitler's Ghost Haunts Europe
Norway: A Tolerant, Inclusive, Diverse, Multicultural Society For Everyone...Except Jews
Occupy Wall Street & Anti-Semitism
Why Anti-Semitism Is Moving Toward The Mainstream
Update on Norway: The Poison of Multiculturalism
The True Perpetrators of the Antisemitic Attacks in Toulouse and Throughout the World
Give Me Liberty Or Give Me Death...You Can Keep The "Equality"
The Taxman Cometh Differently On Either Side Of The Pond....Although Probably Not For Long Divide
Slouching and Slothing Our Way to Ameritopia
France Commits Suicide
No Surprises by Radiohead
A heart that's full up like a landfill
A job that slowly kills you
Bruises that won't heal
You look so tired and unhappy
Bring down the government
They don't, they don't speak for us
I'll take a quiet life
A handshake of carbon monoxide
No alarms and no surprises
No alarms and no surprises
No alarms and no surprises
Silent, silent
This is my final fit, my final bellyache with
No alarms and no surprises
No alarms and no surprises
No alarms and no surprises please
Such a pretty house, such a pretty garden
No alarms and no surprises (let me out of here)
No alarms and no surprises (let me out of here)
No alarms and no surprises please (let me out of here)
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