Free Republic

PARIS (AP) — French President Emmanuel Macron’s alliance got the most seats in the final round of the parliamentary election on Sunday, but it lost its parliamentary majority, projections show. The projections, which are based on partial results, show that Macron’s candidates would win between 200 and 250 seats — much less than the 289 required to have a straight majority at the National Assembly, France’s most powerful house of parliament.

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The centrist party of French President Emmanuel Macron looks on course to win a landslide victory following the first round of parliamentary elections. As polls closed, projections showed La Republique en Marche (Republic on the Move) set to win more than 400 seats in the 577-seat National Assembly.

The opposition in Venezuela has won a majority of seats in the National Assembly, overturning nearly two decades of dominance by the Socialists of President Nicolas Maduro. Five hours after polling ended, the National Electoral Council announced the opposition had won 99 seats. The Socialists have gained 46 seats, with another 22 yet to be declared. President Maduro has admitted defeat, saying his party recognized 'these adverse results'. The opposition alliance, made up of centre and conservative parties, is confident of ultimately taking 112 seats after 17 years of socialist rule. According to senior figures in the movement, that would...

The Once and Future King: The Rise of Crown Government in America, by F.H. Buckley, Encounter Books, 2014, 319 pages, $27.99.Try making sense out of what Americans tell pollsters. According to the Pew Research Center, fewer than one in five of us trusts the federal government. Gallup says that nearly three quarters of us consider it "the biggest threat to the country in the future." Yet by equally overwhelming margins, Gallup shows Americans agreeing that "the United States has a unique character because of its history and Constitution that sets it apart from other nations as the greatest in the...

The Founders of our Republic did a truly amazing job in the creation of the Constitution. They anticipated the pitfalls of an overly strong central government and those of a nation without a resilient central government. James Madison, writing as “Publius” in Federalist #10: “The federal Constitution forms a happy combination in this respect; the great and aggregate interests being referred to the national, the local and particular to the State legislatures.” He obviously did not anticipate the never ending debasement of the Tenth Amendment, but was fully aware of the danger of “factions” (political parties, etc.) and their ability...

Investigating Senate Republicans along with Obama - their cover is blownThe Republican U.S. Senators have it in their power to use legitimate parliamentarian means of preventing the Soros-Obama-Pelosi-Reid healthcare takeover bill. That is the astute and well reasoned revelation of Erick Erickson, of the political blog, RedState.com. His article is linked here and called: "Fight."Tonight's "Awakening" guest, J.B. Williams, of the newly formed electoral action operation, "FreedomForce.US" underscores this with his 12/13 op-ed piece, "Open Call to Congressional Republicans."Mr. Erickson posits: The Senate, unlike the House of Representatives, has parliamentary rules and procedures that give the minority the ability to...

A persuasive argument could be made for moving California toward a parliamentary democracy rather than the federal system that the state adopted from the national government 150-plus years ago. The federal system, rooted in the post-Revolutionary War fear of concentrated power, institutionalizes the concept of "checks and balances." We Californians have enhanced the diffusion inherent in the federal system by making more of the executive branch offices separately elected, installing a system of direct democracy that bypasses elected government altogether, maintaining a long state constitution that decrees how government is to be conducted, requiring supermajority votes on many issues, and...

RAMALLAH, West Bank - The Islamic militant Hamas won a landslide victory in Palestinian parliamentary elections, winning 76 seats in the 132-member legislature, election officials said Thursday. The rival Fatah Party, which controlled Palestinian politics for four decades, won 43 seats. Hamas supporters raised their flag over the Palestinian parliament and rushed into the building amid clashes with Fatah loyalists a day after winning parliamentary elections. The two camps threw stones at each other, breaking windows in the building, as Fatah supporters briefly tried to lower the green Hamas banners. The crowd of about 3,000 Hamas backers cheered and whistled...

RAMALLAH, West Bank - Hamas made a stronger-than-expected showing in the Palestinians' first parliamentary election in a decade Wednesday, and the ruling Fatah Party may have to include the Islamic militants in a coalition government, according to exit polls. The impressive results for Hamas, competing in its first election ever, reflected popular discontent with Fatah, the secular party that has led the Palestinian Authority since its creation 12 years ago and has been accused of widespread corruption and mismanagement. The election was the Palestinians' first truly competitive vote, and officials hoped it would help cement democracy in the post- Yasser...

Tuesday, August 30, 2005 A Constitution for Iraq: Does It Matter? Tel Aviv Notes No. 145 August 30, 2005 A Constitution for Iraq: Does It Matter? Ofra Bengio Moshe Dayan Center for Middle Eastern and African Studies The birth-pangs of Iraq's new constitution are symptomatic of the deep crisis afflicting the country, and even if an agreed document is eventually produced, it may not only fail to resolve the country's underlying problems but could actually make them worse. After all, in its eighty-five years of existence, Iraq has had no fewer than six constitutions. The first was imposed in 1925...

BISHKEK, Aug 3 (Reuters) - France has deployed fighter jets in Tajikistan as part of international efforts to boost security during a September parliamentary election in next-door Afghanistan, a French military official said on Wednesday. "Six Mirage fighters have been deployed in (the Tajik capital) Dushanbe," Major Frederic Lemoine, deputy French military attache to Central Asian neighbour Kyrgyzstan, told reporters at U.S.-led air base Ganci near the capital Bishkek. Shortly after he spoke, two large-body C-135 FR refuelling planes landed at Ganci. "These refuelling jets are due to support the Mirage fighters in Tajikistan," he said, adding that the operation...

Is Lebanon condemned to a balkanized future? After the excitement of the country’s “red and white revolution,” which led to the ouster of its Syrian occupiers (tormentors), things are not looking very rosy – that is, if you measure success by voter turnout in the most recent rounds of parliamentary elections. Hopefully, there is a brighter future for Cedar Land. What a wondrous sight it was when, on March 14, one million Lebanese swamped Beirut to show their support for a country free of Syrian and Hezbollah terrorist control. This show of peaceful strength by far surpassed the pro-Syrian demonstrations...

Who said the following? “Iran is the only country in the world that has now had six elections since the first election of President Khatami (in 1997). (It is) the only one with elections, including the United States, including Israel, including you name it, where the liberals, or the progressives, have won two-thirds to 70 percent of the vote in six elections: Two for president; two for the Parliament, the Majlis; two for the mayoralties. In every single election, the guys I identify with got two-thirds to 70 percent of the vote. There is no other country in the world...

Thailand Premier Thaksin Shinwatra has vowed to "go it alone" in forming the next government if he wins the 6 February general election. Thaksin dashed the Chart Thai party's hopes of joining a coalition with his Thai Rak Thai party, saying his former ally can no longer be trusted. Thailand has never before had a single party government. Text of report in English by Thai newspaper Bangkok Post web site on 5 February - Thai Rak Thai leader Thaksin Shinawatra has vowed to "go it alone" in forming the next government, abandoning his most loyal ally, the Chart Thai...

Terrorist Arafat Clings to Power (Same Old, Same Old) By Andrew L. Jaffee, September 7, 2003 Home   Search   Forum   Terms Yasser Arafat today named Palestinian Authority (PA) parliamentary speaker Ahmed Qurei as new prime minister. Qurei will replace Mahmoud Abbas, who resigned yesterday. The BBC describes Qurei as: ...a leading member of the mainstream Fatah faction who helped to negotiate the Oslo peace accord with Israel 10 years ago. ... Palestinian officials describe him as an Arafat loyalist who's unlikely to challenge the veteran leader. "Arafat loyalist" means he's tainted by terror, and will continue the PA's rampant mismanagement and corruption. Same...