The whole article is well worth a read -- I posted an excerpt to be on the safe side of copyright rules (of which I'm mostly ignorant) -- but the whole article is available for free at the link.
Posted on 03/30/2006 11:13:15 AM PST by USFRIENDINVICTORIA
{Snip} Over the past few years, as other western democracies have shuffled quietly along, France has by turns stunned, exasperated and bemused. This week's massive one-day protest, drawing 1m-3m people on to the streets, was no exception (see article). {Snip} But the underlying difficulty will remain: the apparent incapacity of the French to adapt to a changing world. {Snip}
Yet the striking feature of the latest protest movement is that this time the rebellious forces are on the side of conservatism. Unlike the rioting youths in the banlieues, the objective of the students and public-sector trade unions is to prevent change, and to keep France the way it is. Indeed, according to one astonishing poll, three-quarters of young French people today would like to become civil servants, and mostly because that would mean “a job for life”. Buried inside this chilling lack of ambition are one delusion and one crippling myth. {Snip}
A common feature unites France's underclass rioters and the rebellious students, as well as the election of the far-right Jean-Marie Le Pen into the run-off of the 2002 presidential election. This is the failure of the French political class over the past 20 years to tell it straight: to explain to the electorate what is at stake, why France needs to adapt, and why change need not bring only discomfort. This failure has bred a political culture of reform by stealth, in which change is carried out with one hand and blamed on outside forces—usually globalisation, the European Union or America—while soothing words about protecting the French way are issued on the other. {Snip}
But the president is not to blame alone. Nobody on the French left dares to challenge the prevailing paleo-socialist wisdom, .... {Snip}
(Excerpt) Read more at economist.com ...
The whole article is well worth a read -- I posted an excerpt to be on the safe side of copyright rules (of which I'm mostly ignorant) -- but the whole article is available for free at the link.
The frustrating thing for the French has to be that they've resisted economic globalism, but at the same time some idiotic French politicians allowed a huge wave of Moslem immigrants and their families into their country in the 70s and 80s.
So they resist the economic benefits of globalization but they still have one of the main downsides of the phenomenon- an angry immigrant underclass. And their underclass even wants to destroy their country and doesn't like to work.
"An uncertain France is an uncertain partner for its allies, both in Europe and beyond."
They speak as if this is some sort of new phenomenon with France, lol.
I don't see how a system with up to 40% unemployment in some areas while taxing the working class at 50% to pay for all the free apartments and burned cars can continue.
the benefit of globalism accrue to a small portion of the economic elites - those who work in industries that are immune to it, or profit directly from it.
what's happening in France - the US is just a couple of decades behind it. we are lucky here, that we have a good internal service economy that employs people (albeit at lower wages) to sustain us - as industrial and now technology jobs move to lower wage countries.
but wait until this guest worker program kicks in - and our US service jobs become fair game for foreign workers. buckle up. and carry a fire extinguisher in your car.
I'm shocked that "The Economist" bashes socialism. Normally it is the bastion of Euro-socialism pretending to be a serious financial policy mag.
Very interesting chart. Thank you for both the article link and the chart.
And In Other News:
French Snipers Rousted From Statue Of Liberty
Give Us Your Poor, Your Tired, Your Huddled Masses - And We'll Carve 'Em Up ... Real Nice
New York, New York – The FBI, acting on tips from Staten Island police, have uncovered a squadron of French guerrilas living in the Statue of Liberty murdering American tourists for over a hundred years. The Gallic fighters, now in their fourth generation inside the monument, are the descendents of a militant anti-American sect of the French which included the Statue's designer, Frederic Bartholdi.
According to Det. Frank Mattingly, the statue's victims are usually tourists whose exact whereabouts aren't known while on vacation. Thusly, leads in the disappearance cases have been few and far between. As it turns out, the victims have been ritualistically bludgeoned inside the symbol of America's goodwill.
At any given time in the last 112 years, there have been between 8 to 20 crack French troops dwelling inside of the monument. They refer to themselves as "torch-bearers." Over the years, several of the militaristic Torchbearer sect have retired from their mission but never revealed the group's secret. The squad occasionally recruited French soldiers in secrecy, and some of the Torchbearers were born to mothers and fathers in the group and were born in the statue itself.
Bartholdi and a group of his anti-American cronies devised the entire idea of the statue as a Trojan horse, whereby the guerrilas inside could indiscriminately murder American citizens with little chance of being caught. FBI have just recently discovered a labyrinthian series of trap doors and secret passageways inside the statue.
The statue was unveiled on October 28, 1886 and presented as a herald of the United States as the "country of the 20th century." A similar monument is still being constructed for the Japanese to be unveiled by French "sculptors" within the next year. Japanese authorities have been notified of the potential peril by the State Department.
The Torchbearers didn't stop simply at murdering visitors inside the monument itself. French frogmen, armed to the teeth, patrol the waters around Staten Island, murdering at least 150 fisherman and boaters in the last 40 years alone. It has also been learned that many souvenir Statue of Liberty cigarette lighters contain small amounts of nitroglycerine, igniting unsuspecting smokers who've been getting a light from "Lady Liberty."
During the early to mid 1980's, tourists found a reprieve from the blood spree of the Torchbearers due to the extensive restoration of the statue for its centennial celebration in 1986. It is not yet known where the sect went during that time, but it has been speculated that they were involved in an ill-fated attempt to open a string of chicken-and-waffle restaurants in the Virgina area.
FBI authorities are not resting now even after the Statue of Liberty has been liberated of its French inhabitants. Agents across the country are scouring national parks and monuments in search of similarly diabolical militias in such unlikely places as Old Faithful, the nostrils on Mount Rushmore, the California missions and also Plymouth Rock. FBI Spokesman Darren Block alleges that the rock itself just may house a legion of fanatical Pilgrims bent on "ridding the country of electricity-using heathens".
"French frogmen,...."
Really?!
By New Zealand standards it is one of the most conservative/sane magazines commonly available. (National Review is only available through special request) When you enter Chapters in Canada, almost all other magazines are more leftist than it.
Yes it is a socialist rag. Even your defense of it admits it is.
You Kiwis need to get out more. :)
Nope. I admitted that sometimes articles have a socialist bent to solutions for issues in Africa. But like heck if it is socialist. Its take on the French situation for example. When it bashes the US it normally bashes it for putting up protectionist barriers. It is a strong proponent of globilization.
Is that what the socialist think? That globalization is a good thing? I think not.
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