by Ramin Mazaheri
Communist ideas have won concessions from industry, but they have been unable to stop high finance from exploiting workers.
That is the big battle today. Only revolutionary and heavily socialist countries like Iran, Cuba and China – as well as dictatorships like South Korea in the past – have been able to stop domination by international finance.
France, however, has fearfully rushed into the arms of the candidate who wants your wages to pay for bad loans: former Rothschild banker Emmanuel Macron.
It’s almost insulting to take orders from a 39-year old who didn’t come to power at the end of the gun or at the front of a massive revolution, because how can such a young person not be the puppet of older, richer interests?
There’s no way Macron is as smart, experienced and mature as he believes himself to be, or as they want us to believe. It’s “not polite” by French campaign standards, but I note that his record as Economy Minister produced only economic stagnation and record-high unemployment.
I talk to people in France about how they will vote all the time, even though it’s also “not polite” by French standards. Hogwash. Emmanuel only has two appeals: first, he is young and new blood in a country run by an aged, corrupt aristocracy, and second, he is not Marine Le Pen.
Of course Emmanuel won: Le Pen lost in 2nd round head-to-head polling at all times and against everyone. I mean in every…single…poll since polling began in January.
We were hoping against hope, and because hope was a terrible, incompetent, neo-fascist candidate – hope lost.
Huge change from 2012 – there is no joy in Mudville. I can assure you that France’s spirit of resistance was alive and well in 2012. Ahhhh, austerity was so young back then – it’s so firmly-rooted now.
Francois Hollande was elected on a promise to fight high finance, fight Germany, end austerity and renegotiate EU treaties. The French people were 100% correct to be so optimistic – who can live in cynicism?
But who could have expected that Hollande would make such an undemocratic U-turn? His U-turn threatened to destroy the European Union, which has only been given a stay of execution with Macron’s victory. Even though Hollande couldn’t even run for re-election, nobody with any sense of justice thinks that is fair reparations.
I must pause here for a word on civil war: France talks about the possibility of a civil war an inordinate amount. And I perceived this years before this election involving Le Pen.
In the US that’s relegated to beyond the suburbs…half the country, sure. Of course, the English say the same thing. The Spanish may split over Catalonia. Scotland may break off. Ireland remains divided. Italy barely has a government. Belgium didn’t have one for a year (such Parliamentary gridlock is France’s future).
Only the Germans are happy with their leadership. And why not: everyone in the West “admires them”. Not me – higher poverty rate than France, for starters.
My point is: Western society, and not just France, is fractured in a terrible, horrible way. The lack of unity – even if only perceived – is staggering for a region of the world enjoying such enormous relative prosperity. There is, clearly, a problem in their culture.
Cuba doesn’t have this problem. Nor China. Iran – once you get out of rich North Tehran – will almost certainly have a higher voter participation rate in their elections this month than France, and France’s is still among the highest in the West.
The fear of civil war is a major Western phenomenon, and it was a major reason why people voted for Macron/against Le Pen
What do you expect? You’re all divided into parts of unequal sizes
That’s what identity politics is: Is a Black’s ideas worth more than a Gay? Seems like a Transgender rules the roost in 2017, especially if he/she has to go to the bathroom.
Can the White Nationalists fly their flag at the statehouse or not? We better ask the opinion of the left-handed homemakers north of the Mason-Dixon but west of the Mississippi who prefer jam to Nutella on partially-cloudy days – I’m sure their lobby group is being formed.
Or you could just have what works: Class politics.
Us versus the 1 billionth percent, the 8 people who own half the world’s wealth.
Anyone who supported Le Pen was browbeaten with insults against their character, intelligence and morality. Identity politics are not only about inclusion – I am in this group – it is about exclusion: You have to be like this or you are not in this group.
And who doesn’t want to be in the group the entire media (no exaggeration) said was the “good” one?
Because France does not accept multi-culturalism, promoting assimilationism instead, identity politics in France has a different face. The “in group” here is simply “France”. That’s why Macron saved this big PR gun for the final week of campaigning: “The National Front is the anti-France party”.
It resonated, even though the National Front is the most hyper-patriotic party.
Anyway, I ardently supported Marine Le Pen for two weeks – between the two rounds of voting – does that make me anti-France? Or does it make me a fascist and a racist? I’d swear at you but this is a family publication.
Fascism is a real dirty word over here. It’s not that way in the US because American fascists won WWII and thus were never discredited, like over here. People here had relatives die fighting German, Austrian & Italian fascists.
The past is indeed history, and history is indeed past
France also succumbed to the idea that the fascists their grandfathers fought are the real problem, as if France fought a civil war instead of the Germans in World War II.
More than identity politics, Macron won because France was convinced that the father of Marine Le Pen is more important than her ideas to rectify the very different problems of 2017. But high-speed trading didn’t exist in 1941. There was no European Union. In 1941 there was actually a Left in the West, LOL.
“You don’t see it, Ramin,” they told me “the threat of the National Front.”
What I see is you guys taking a backseat to Germany.
But, I’m exaggerating: I see France colluding with the Germans. Again, just like in World War II.
That is EXACTLY what has happened! Check the data: Which banks are leveraged in Greece? German AND French are the top two. Who funds the European Central Bank? The main percentage comes from Germany, with France in a very close 2nd place – we are talking dozens of billions of much-needed euros.
Acting as if Germany pays everything, does everything, plans everything – this is an Anglo-Saxon view not based on reality. I assume it is related to the historical Northern European view of their genetic supremacy over everyone else, including Southern and Eastern Europe.
But, that’s just more identity politics. It ignores the class view, as usual. The reality is that French capitalism is hugely a part of the neo-imperialist project of the European Union to cannibalize other Europeans – it’s not all Germany.
Le Pen would get that – Macron would think I am speaking Greek. Oh well.
Crying ‘terrorism’ is not just for kicks and giggles
But let’s not insult everybody in France as being class ignoramuses – this is not America: the French got two such bad candidates by another primary tactic of high-finance: the security state.
The first round vote was on April 23, and I already wrote a column about how terrorism was in the headlines an inordinately suspicious amount in the week prior to that vote.
And in the 14 days since April 23rd France’s security state made sure terrorism-related raids and announcements were in the headlines almost every day. Should we be surprised anymore? I made a list:
April 24-26: Fourteen arrests made in France and Belgium on terrorism.
April 25: Five more arrests in alleged Marseilles planned terrorism attack.
April 25: National homage to the cop killed on the Champs-Elysees.
April 27: Raid on an alleged terrorist’s home in Réunion. Two cops shot.
April 28: Citing the war on terrorism, police will ban traffic information apps from warning of radar traps and other police stops.
May 2: Five arrests in anti-terrorism.
May 3: Judgment in a high-profile “apology of terrorism” case.
May 3: In the lone presidential debate Macron said that terrorism will be the “focus of his 5 years”. 30 minutes of terrorism discussion, which preceded the debate on the European Union.
May 4: National day of homage to all cops killed in France.
This is an incomplete list. I can assure you that the French anti-terrorism units do not work this often in normal times – we’d all be in jail if they did.
The canard of terrorism was employed by Hollande to undemocratically ram through right-wing economic measures designed to benefit the bondholder class. It was also used to put Macron in office and, as I listed, Macron plans to keep it there.
Ultimately, there is still no plan in effect to win concessions from high finance. Le Pen would not have provided a solution, but she would have at least been a monkey wrench; she would at least have provided a temporary respite; she would at least have provided the chance to discuss solutions.
Finance is international, but Europe requires a unique solution because the creation and support for the European Union means they have a uniquely European problem.
I have no ideas, and neither do the faux-left supporters of Macron. They just keep telling me: “We’ll take to the streets to fight austerity”. Hey, jerk, check the scoreboard – we did that all the time under Hollande: we lost.
Macron will continue the neoliberal policies which didn’t work while he was minster, and they will not work now.
Ultimately, the election of Macon just kicks the can down the road. Prior to the election this was repeatedly written by mainstream journalists to describe the necessary economic “reforms” France resisted implementing. Absurd, these “deforms”.
What is postponed are the revolutionary, pro-communist changes which put finally the people ahead of the financial class, which is the new aristocracy.
Postscript – the Macron Era, Day 1 of 1,826.25
The above was written on election night. I was planning to finish it in between my 10 scheduled live interviews for Press TV, but at this point in the column the Le Pen camp refused my entry to their headquarters, denying me a place to do some of those interviews and also to finish this column.
I wasn’t the only one – Le Monde, Mediapart and reportedly many other media were the victims of the Le Pen campaign’s allegedly accidental and regrettable choice to choose a small, swanky locale for their HQ.
Maybe such treatment was a harbinger of things to come and we dodged a bullet by avoiding the National Front and their anti-press neo-fascism?
Problem is, Macron banned Russian media a couple weeks earlier.
Problem is, prior to that Hollande took Press TV and all Iranian media off France’s state-run satellite Eutelsat, in a clear case of censorship.
Anyway, the day after the election Hollande joined Macron for the WWII Victory Day memorial and then immediately flew to Berlin to meet Merkel. Isn’t that fitting? And there were thousands already protesting Macron, with plenty of police brutality. I wanted to cover it but my cameraman begged off, citing fatigue. Honestly, I felt the same way.
Glass half-full: Macron is from the younger, less-racist generation. Maybe he’ll be able to take a firm stance on France’s xenophobic nonsense?
Problem is, his team threatened to close the nation’s Islamophobia watchdog, saying they are “in danger.” Pretty Le Pen-like, if you ask me, which is what I always said.
I really cannot even stomach reading the mainstream media’s take on France’s election, but people seem to be talking like Trump was avoided in France. People only say that because the economic angle – the class angle – is systematically repressed in favor of the economic angle.
Macron is going to wage an (economic) extremist war on the French public, and who can be excited about that? Nobody is excited about Macron here except unmarried, middle-aged women, who have finally found someone who won’t ignore them. I don’t want to rain on their honeymoon, though, so “Sweet dreams, ladies.”
Just do the math: 25% abstained and 12% submitted blank ballots (LOL, a record), meaning only 67% of the total electorate issued an acceptable vote. That drops Macron’s alleged final score of 66% down to 42% of the total electorate. Now subtract the 43% of Macron’s voters who say the voted to block Le Pen. That means only 24% of the total electorate voted for Macron’s personality or his policies.
Only 24% of France truly voted for Macron. So forget what the financial/foreign press says: there is no joy in Mudville, French democracy has struck out.
But the beat goes on. And for the next five years I’m covering the exact same news beat – Hollande (Jr.) and austerity.
Ramin Mazaheri is the chief correspondent in Paris for Press TV and has lived in France since 2009. He has been a daily newspaper reporter in the US, and has reported from Iran, Cuba, Egypt, Tunisia, South Korea and elsewhere. His work has appeared in various journals, magazines and websites, as well as on radio and television.
“Macron will continue the neoliberal policies which didn’t work while he was minster, and they will not work now.”
Depends on what’s implied by “not work”. If the ruling plutocracy cared the slightest about the well-being of anybody but its own breed, the neoliberal rot and outright vandalism at home and abroad would never have prevailed; let alone doing so for 40 long years. If Ramin Mazaheri applied the logic of class politics, then he would have concluded that neoliberalism indeed does work.
@ Nussiminen
Agreed. Neo liberalism, or as it should be known, fundamentalist liberalism, has been disgustingly successful, measured by its own objectives.
I think Macron’s win in France has pretty much ended the Western revolt against US/ dollar banking hegemony, with one final act to play. The Basque country, Libya, Iraq, Ukraine, Syria, Greece, Turkey, Brazil, S. Africa, etc etc have all been either brought to heel or brought down.
Austria, the US, Britain, all voted against globalism: the first was rejected and re-rigged in favor of globalism. The second saw its president save his life by flipping. Only Britain stands out as having a vote against globalism being upheld by its government.
The final act, I fear, will be the destruction of the will of the people in the UK after their election on June 8th. The wholeheartedly fundamentalist liberal Conservative Party (=republican) have spent a year playing a charade at delivering Brexit and have captured the faith of Brexiteers and anti-globalists. June the 8th promises a massive victory for them. They have said this will give them both the majority and mandate they need to deliver Brexit on their terms. I fear majority will rather be used to stop Brexit dead, or control the derailment, on their terms. And that, coupled with sweeping media and internet controls, will be the end of the anti-globalism dialogue.
All seems quiet until they are through this. By year end, you wait and see what this crowd have in store for the Russia-China alliance.
On what planet do you have to live to believe the slaughter of millions and theft of their assets by people without conscience could be brought to a halt by a few little votes? Every bankrupt must borrow, then steal. Which works until you meet your match. This will end in war, not because anyone wants it to, but because it has to. The politicians in place across the US vassal states are very well aligned with and ready for this.
It works very well for those it is meant to benefit. Not for nothing did Milton Friedman declare that, ‘Capitalism is good for the Jews’. He meant the Jewish elite, of course, and their wealth and power just grows like topsy, as much of the West sinks into the mire.
Once more, I fear, the abject surrender of France to the agents of Fascism (as defined by Mussolini) will lead to military hubris and a catastrophic world war. “Fascism is the monetary power of Capital allied to the coercive power of the State” — Benito Mussolini, inventor of Fascism.
The current regime and Fascism are polar opposites. The word gets bandied about too much.
Considering the fact that Mussolini was an MI6 stooge and Macron is a Rothschild tool the polar opposites you believe to perceive might just an optical illusion.
” The name of [Macron’s] new party – En Marche !, was chosen in order to have the same initials as its candidate. Otherwise, it would have been called En Avant ! In Hebrew – Kadima ! When it was pointed out to general Ariel Sharon that the name of his new party evoked the name of Mussolini’s party – Avanti ! ”
Thierry Meyssan
http://www.voltairenet.org/article196311.html
I fear that the trajectory of Europe, if it can remain intact in the near term, is to descend into pro and anti-sharia members as immigration progresses.
The replacement rates of Europe are appalling low. Surprisingly Poland and Spain, both Catholic nations, have replacement rates below 1.3. Denmark is not far behind. Biologists will tell you that this represents a terminal condition, from which native populations cannot recover.
A replacement rate of 2.1 is considered necessary to sustain a population and below 1.8 is considered extreme danger. All EU members have rates below 2.
There is a mathematical and scientific certainty in this information. But I do not believe that this has happened as a choice of the citizens of the EU. This is due to the oppressive burden of financialization and debt – the problem is systemic.
What this means is that even the immigrants who move there, will see their future generations wiped out too. Europe has become a human destruction zone, and it does not matter who goes to live there.
Epistrophy:
Replacement rates, ageing population, etc. is all nonsense. Mechanization and automation would be able to compensate the loss of population. With a different economic model people could have a 30 hour work week without financial loss, but that’s not what the financial “industry” would want. (The term financial industry is a mockery of the word “industry”. Finance doesn’t contribute anything that can be labeled value adding work.)
I fear that the trajectory of Europe, if it can remain intact in the near term, is to descend into pro and anti-sharia members as immigration progresses.
Absolutely correct. It’s all a distraction, so that the people – who got screwed by the system – don’t unite. In case that they unite there’s still the military option that can be put in place – state of emergency. Thanks to the overriding power of the Treaty of Lisbon “foreign” police units can be called to assist in cases of emergency. I’m pretty sure Polish military or police units would willingly like to shoot at German protesters and German military / police would be pleased to shoot at Greek rioters, … The Treaty of Lisbon includes some language that brings EU citizens the death penalty through the back door: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3MLtJNCB7Ac.
When he in short order, decides to:
• crank up the austerity machine
• unleash the greedy corporations
• strip away what remains of worker’s rights
• push a hawkish anti-Russia foreign policy
• and aggressively push for the EU to be a big transgender melting pot,
I just hope those who were deluded enough to vote for him keep their frustrations to thenselves.
I also anticipate a very strong pro-Israel agenda from this Rothschild-manufactured creature.
Well as the French would say; bon appétit!
Yes, as one famous Frenchman (De Maistre) once said:
”Every country has the government it deserves.”
Would this apply to Libya, Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, Palestine, Yemen, Mali, Somalia and (the list goes on)? Did those people have any say in their rule?
Yet supposed ‘Leftists’ like Yannis Varoufakis and Paul Mason of the execrable ‘Guardian’ strongly support him. Are they unaware of his class-hating, socially destructive and belligerently militaristic (he wants to reintroduce the draft)policies, or are their true colours being exposed?
Yesterday I read an article very similar (except longer) that I thought was by the same author. It wasn’t, but many concepts overlap: http://www.antiglobalization.org/2017/05/05/the-systematic-effort-of-the-transnational-elite-to-crush-the-brexit-revolution-from-brexit-and-trump-to-le-pen-analysis/
I think both authors approach the same perspectives, namely, that the voices calling out are class related and not racially charged (despite media claims). The linked author states that Trump and Brexit were both pushed through by those who have been damaged by globalization, and here I hear more (concise) evidence of the same.
Saker once said (in a podcast interview?) that he felt a major change over the last ten years was that people were talking about Zionist influences now in a way that people were not discussing things then.
Maybe these two articles are evidence that people are talking about class struggles now, the 1%, the dirty side of high finance. In the 80’s and 90’s we dared to think we had a chance to join the elite levels of society through hard work and merit. Now, its painfully clear that the only way in is to talk with sycophantic voice for globalists. There is no merit door (and probably never really was).
What would you do if the US marines invaded your beaches, overthrew your government and installed a military dictator? As for me, I’d let them have it at the next election!
All I can really do to stop the four freedoms of globalism (per link): open flow of goods, services, money, and labor, is to stop helping it happen. If I stop using credit, learn to grow my own food, minimize my use of fossil resources, and pay only local providers for the things I cannot produce, these globalists will flail and fail and eventually burn themselves to meaninglessness.
20 years ago there was almost no chance that I could enter agriculture without significant financing. Now, as Beechnut or ADM pay 30%+ off the top of each sale directly to pensions and management and shareholders, I’ve got a competitive advantage. What’s more, as the boomers retire, they will be taking an ever increasing share. Yesterday we saw lettuce that was US$4.35 per head. When my wife was in high school she could buy it for $0.39. 1115% in 25 years does not equal 5% inflation.
Friends in southern Louisiana speak of major financial problems. Huge layoffs in the oil industry make me realize that almost no one has a secondary income stream. They have nearly all their needs covered via currency exclusively, and their only form of currency generation is by working for some multinational corporation. And then when the deal breaks, they’re stunned.
I believe we each have the power to off set globalism with our own personal choices. Putting our stock in Brexit Trump and Le Pen is about as hopeless a dream I can see, but local gardening, local manufacturing, the enactment of Ghandi’s vision, “every home has a sewing machine” is really the only honourable team left to join.
So we are trying some roof top gardening this year. We’re in a climate that’s new to us both, and we’re trying some peppers tomatoes and spring lettuce. I’ve seen organic bell peppers for $3/ each. Can I generate a consistent supply in three years time? Maybe. If for the next two years, I merely give away any excess inventory, or trade for other products, my cost of production will still be about $0, and I will have developed my own understanding of the requirements for consistency in this environment. I will have learned about local demand and local supply. For all I know there is a greenhouse less than a mile away with 1000x production of the exact same variety. If that is the case, I can easily switch next year and pick something that isn’t quite and saturated. And because we have spent no money, it can’t really fail.
France chose safely. French people can now predict that the world in four years will be similar to the world today. Everyone knows radical change is inevitable, but if we can milk this system for another 4 years, at least my kids will be through college.
What’s more, in 4 years, Monsanto will need to pay 40% off the top of each sale to their pensioners. And my ability to undercut their fees will be that much better.
What are organic apples worth near you? Here they are US$6.50/kg.
If 40% of Americans cannot make an emergency $500 payment, is it obvious that planting one apple tree could reverse that?
TSP:
Excellent comment. I would like to add some further advice:
– learn trade skills and how to can food
– buy tools
– buy land for agriculture or live stock; if you can’t afford to do so, get something to barter (silver and gold)
– prepare for a break down of the electricity grid and water supply. (I was shocked to learn about the state of US roads, water pipes, power supply lines, railroad bridges, etc. Instead of reinvesting revenues, they were mainly used to pay the investors. This can only go well for a certain amount of time.) Photovoltaic cells might be a start.
We, the “customers” / consumers, are able to change the system from the bottom.
I for one welcome France’s presidential election results.
I consider France a Rothschild asset since the time of the French Revolution. I find it therefore fitting that France should be represented at the highest level by a Freemason, Bilderberger, Rothschild banker and very likely crypto-Jew.
Depressing, yes, but nonetheless true. And only the truth can set us free.
Does the author really not know that “Communism” always the cat’s paw of international finance? That Communism was always funanced and supported by billionaire international bankers like Rothschilds and Warburgs? I thought in the 21st Century all educated people understood that Communism and the “workers’ paradise” were nothing more than the fait accompli of finance capital wherein the financiers seized full control of the state and took ownership of everything? Are there really still people in 1st world countries that don’t know that?
Fascinating how “the Left” has now become completely aligned with the bankers. Much of the left is celebrating a win for a Rothschild.
And in this world of propaganda and BS, its become standard for a campaign against an opponent of the bankers from the right to be smeared with cries of “fascism” and “racism”. And of course “the left” eats this up and thinks that supporting a Rothschild banker to run things is a mighty victory for the cause of man.
It is of course key to understand that the bankers controll all of the “mass media”, and that any opponent of the bankers will be smeared by whatever mud can be thrown their way. For opponents to the bankers from the right, this is the now familiar smears of that they are the next Hitler and will if elected bring on race riots and lynchings. If the left should ever try to actually organize any real opposition to the bankers, we’ll hear the old smears about how they are “socialists” who, horror or horrors, want to drag down our wonderful rich into the mud with the rest of us.
But meanwhile, its fascinating to watch how deluded much of “the left” has become as they protest in the US when Goldman Sachs loses and election and celebrate the win of a Rothschild in Paris. Fascinating, and quite sad and illustrative of the power of modern propaganda.
do people realise the strength of the media and thus the propaganda which ensues?in my village in france i was speaking to a neighbour before the election who told me she spoke to a friend in toulouse who was going to support macron.why? she asked her friend.because i am afraid for my jewish grandchildren if le pen is elected!
For me personally, the most important conclusion Mr. Mazaheri makes is the following:
“I have no ideas, and neither do the faux-left supporters of Macron. They just keep telling me: “We’ll take to the streets to fight austerity”. Hey, jerk, check the scoreboard – we did that all the time under Hollande: we lost.”
And
“Ultimately, the election of Macon just kicks the can down the road.”
And this is basically the conclusion of the entire election.
‘Identity politics’ is just the latest variant of ‘divide and rule’. Dividing society into self-obsessed tribes of gays, blacks, whites, browns, Millennials, Baby Boomers, left-handed leprechauns etc, and having the vicious Rightwing media foment hatred between these groups, takes their minds of the economic and class reality of ever increasing inequality, poverty and elite hyper-wealth. It is an Evil process, but highly successful. Here in Australia the type of hate and fear-mongering required to stoke the internecine fires is seen as very helpful to the more Right of our reactionary, neo-liberal and groveling to the USA and Israel parties. And the hate is led by the Murdoch fakestream media cancer, which produces little but lies, fear and hate.