Scandals in Communist Frenchystan
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French presidential candidate wants a 100% tax on the rich
Jean-Luc Melenchon wants a 100% tax on income above 400,000 euros. He's gaining support in opinion polls ahead of the first round of France's presidential election.
Whoa.
Melenchon has shaken up the polls over the past week by tapping into the frustration felt by many voters over lukewarm economic growth and high levels of unemployment.
And do they see a 100% tax as helping that sort of thing?
The possibility of Melenchon advancing to the second round, scheduled for May 7, has spooked investors.
The difference in yields on French and German government bonds is now the largest it's been since February, suggesting that investors see French debt as a substantially riskier proposition than German bonds.
Their worries will increase markedly if Le Pen, who has called for France to abandon the euro, were also to advance to the second round of voting.Yikes.
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@boomzilla Yep.
:-( 
That guy looked at Venezuela 10 years ago, ignored all the bad side of it and thought they were onto something. Then he quickly forgot that France doesn't have huge oil deposits. And he also forgot to look at Venezuela since then.
In any sane election (as much as any election is ever sane...), he would be dismissed as about as crazy as the other one who want to colonize Mars and the moon (which makes him the perfect...
lunatic).Oh, and the best thing about his proposed tax: the current president did propose a much weaker version of that tax (75% tax on income above 1M EUR), which was ruled unconstitutional and thus never went through. But Melenchon's solution to that is that he wants to rewrite the constitution anyway. So not only he has stupid ideas, but he also wants to break the safeguards in the system that actually prevent those ideas from becoming reality.
As for the second round, I don't think Le Pen has any chance to win it. This has been hugely overplayed by foreign media, probably because it fits well the world narrative. But she has always built her party (and her father before her) as being "alone against the other" which means she never courted any alliance, never looked at compromises to attract other voters, and therefore always had trouble attracting more than her core base. That has always been profitable to her as a minority party (she could play the card of being ostracized by the other, even though it's mostly her own doing) but prevents her from becoming a majority party (which requires being able to weaken some of your ideas to gather a larger following).
Still, a second round between her and Melenchon is unfortunately not out of the possible...
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@boomzilla said in Scandals in Communist Frenchystan:
And do they see a 100% tax as helping that sort of thing?
I'm all for progressive taxation, but I think anyone with an ounce of sense would agree that's the wrong side of the Laffer curve...
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@bugmenot So the results were exactly what everyone expected. Oh well.
Hopefully the second round will go the same way.
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@anonymous234 For once the polls were right... Maybe after a few failures they updated their polling strategies well enough? (in the 80's/90's, French pollsters regularly under-polled the National Front and it was a recurrent post-election debate... they manage to get more accurate numbers since about 10 years or so...)
In any case, the second round is done and dusted. For one thing, the polls show (and have always shown) such a margin that even if they were wrong (which, given they were right for the first round, seems unlikely), they would have to be absolutely, totally wrong (it's about 65/35, so a 30 points lead!). Also, despite all the efforts from her leader, the National Front still is seen (rightly, in my opinion) as a racist and anti-semitic party with fascist tendencies (see her latest quip about a WW2 round-up of jews by French police not being the fault of France...). That makes her totally unpalatable for many voters, no matter how much they dislike her opponent. And finally, as I said in an earlier post, the whole FN's strategy since 30 years has been to show themselves as a party-not-like-the-others and that doesn't compromise with mainstream parties. As a result, she has herself cut (or prevented building) all bridges that could bring her more voters.
So, yes she will attract some of the right's (Fillon) voters (about 1/3 apparently), and Macron will struggle to attract all of the left's voters (no more than 2/3 apparently), but that will still leave him very comfortably ahead of her.
She probably doesn't mind that much. Whenever they got to power (in various local elections), the FN proved that they are no better than the others, that they don't have a consistent political line and that essentially they are just good to complain but not to do. So staying in the role of the poor outsider against whom everyone is leagued is a role that she knows very well, and will happily keep playing for the next 5 years... Whether people will keep following her is another question, but at this point I don't see any major change in that regard.
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LOL, this seems like a pretty good line from Le Pen during their debate:
"I'll tell you what's going to happen, Mr Macron. Either way France will be led by a woman, it'll be either me or Mrs Merkel."
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@boomzilla The whole thing was a mess. The funniest bits were the journalists trying to keep some order. At one point one of them shouted "enough, both of you!" in the same tone you would use with squabbling children, that made me LOL!
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@Jaloopa said in Scandals in Communist Frenchystan:
@RaceProUK said in Scandals in Communist Frenchystan:
You can have surgery to correct that
Short, shrivelled, and always to the left!
STOP BREAKING THE LAW, ASSHOLE!
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@boomzilla If I were french, and Merkel were an option, I'd vote for her. :-/
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@cvi ...because things went so well for France the last time they were under the head of the German government?
(I have no stake in this either way; I simply find the historical irony amusing.)
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@masonwheeler I believe in second chances?
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@lolwhat The accounts don't seem to exist. Looks like fake news.
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@boomzilla I'm not seeing anything on BBC News at the moment, so I'm inclined to agree it's
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@RaceProUK The most "authoritative" thing I found was a WSJ article (paywalled):
@lolwhat's post was the first I'd heard of it, not that I follow French news.
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@boomzilla said in Scandals in Communist Frenchystan:
@RaceProUK The most "authoritative" thing I found was a WSJ article (paywalled):
@lolwhat's post was the first I'd heard of it, not that I follow French news.
"Officials said they have no record of any such entity." Hmm. On one hand, that sounds exculpatory. On the other hand, seems to me like that's exactly what a corrupt banker would say to protect his corrupt clients, especially with no legal transparency requirements he can be held to. So it's kind of hard to draw any conclusions either way from this.
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@boomzilla I've found a few articles in French news sites and they all agree that it's fake and don't give it much coverage. Given how huge news that would be if it was judged to be true, I would be surprised if that wasn't plastered all over the front pages if they gave it at least some credibility (yes, I know, they all want Macron to win, true, but still, it assumes a degree of cohesion between papers that just doesn't exist...).
Macron has apparently just decided to sue for defamation. That doesn't prove anything one way or the other, although if the documents were really so directly damning for him, as it would seem if they were true, I'm not sure he would want more light to be shed on them. But then again, Fillon decided to sue the Canard Enchainé (the newspaper that revealed the fake job of his wife, which killed his campaign), even though I can't really see how he could win (my best guess is that he doesn't care about winning but would just like to try and find who leaked the information in the first place...).
One interesting element is that a similar rumor that he had an offshore account (without supporting documents) surfaced at different times during the campaign. So you can read into that either that this was true from the start (and that for some reason the documents could not be released until now? but then you would have expected more precise details than just "an offshore account", to give it a bit more credibility), or that someone decided that fake documents would give a nice second life to that rumor.
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@remi said in Scandals in Communist Frenchystan:
for some reason the documents could not be released until now?
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@lolwhat If you want to go into conspiracy plans, I believe that the best moment to release this info (assuming it's true, of course) would have been before the first round. The 4 top candidates were so neck-and-neck that making Macron loose a couple of points would have dropped him in 3rd or 4th place. This might then have lead to a second round opponent (for Le Pen) of either Fillon (traditional right) or Mélenchon (hard left): the second one is the only one against whom she had a small chance of actually winning the second round (polls said no, but with a much smaller margin than against the other).
By revealing that info now, so close to the actual ballot that no-one will have time to investigate it (remember that all campaigning is forbidden from tonight midnight!), and Le Pen wouldn't have time to pound him with that (
much?), all she could hope would be to gain a couple of points. Given that he is about 20 points ahead, that wouldn't change anything in the end. So if someone sat on that waiting for the right moment, well, it's much too late!
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@boomzilla The BBC have picked it up now too:
French election: Emmanuel Macron condemns 'massive' hack attack
The French presidential candidate says files have been leaked to damage him ahead of Sunday's vote.
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Well what if the hacking claims are a last minute lie by Mācrōn, to make people think Le Pen is a russian spy?
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@boomzilla said in Scandals in Communist Frenchystan:
LOL, this seems like a pretty good line from Le Pen during their debate:
"I'll tell you what's going to happen, Mr Macron. Either way France will be led by a woman, it'll be either me or Mrs Merkel."
But it wasn't accurate. In either case France will be led by Mrs Merkel.
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@kt_ said in Scandals in Communist Frenchystan:
I'm either case France will be led by Mrs Merkel.
For just a few months (maybe) (probably not) (one can dream).
GroKo seems inevitable this fall, but who knows!
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@aliceif said in Scandals in Communist Frenchystan:
@kt_ said in Scandals in Communist Frenchystan:
I'm either case France will be led by Mrs Merkel.
For just a few months (maybe) (probably not) (one can dream).
GroKo seems inevitable this fall, but who knows!What's a GroKo?
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@kt_ said in Scandals in Communist Frenchystan:
@aliceif said in Scandals in Communist Frenchystan:
@kt_ said in Scandals in Communist Frenchystan:
I'm either case France will be led by Mrs Merkel.
For just a few months (maybe) (probably not) (one can dream).
GroKo seems inevitable this fall, but who knows!What's a GroKo?
Große Koalition. Translates to "Great Coalition" which is an alliance of the two biggest parties (CDU and SPD).
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Voters reject far right Marine Le Pen and choose a youthful former investment banker as new leader.
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@RaceProUK Well, that was unexpected.
And by unexpected I mean COMPLETELY EXPECTED!
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@RaceProUK Phew.
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Reddit comments as expected
they've just ensured another Nice, bataclan, and charlie hebdo
YES another arab country in europe! We dont have to travel to the middle east now
The beginning of the end for France.
They just doomed their future. Unbelievable.
Macron, a hardcore globalist and an Eurocrate who hates his country and people.
There will be more blood in the Macron voters hands with every terrorist attack.
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@lolwhat I love how nobody really god what they wanted.
Also RIP Omar and Stringer.
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@anonymous234 Reasoned debate and moderate views.
Are two things that don't exist on Reddit.
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@remi Wikileaks has been 100% accurate until now. Why would they suddenly be wrong?
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@Rhywden 2022 mate. Another few terrorist attacks ...
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https://twitter.com/AlexMaless/status/861312652320149504
She doesn't look too bothered.
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WHY IS https://twitter.com/MLP_officiel NOT MY LITTLE PONY'S OFFICIEL TWITTER FEED
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@ben_lubar The ponies didn't make it to the runoff.
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@lucas1 said in Scandals in Communist Frenchystan:
@remi Wikileaks has been 100% accurate until now. Why would they suddenly be wrong?
I think you're mixing two things. There was the accusation of having an offshore account, which seems firmly in the "fake news" territory (I've read a couple of articles highlighting clear image manipulations, and apparently even one PDF still had several layers revealing how it was put together!). That was what I was commenting about Macron's reaction.
Then there is the leak of documents from his campaign, which indeed is likely genuine -- at least, not even Macron is saying they're false! These ones, I did comment on the timing of their release, clearly intended to damage his campaign (the documents were apparently stolen a few days ago and released minutes before the official blanket ban on campaigning on Friday evening!). But until now, I haven't seen any clear indication that these documents would contain anything reprehensible. A lot of insider information, and I'm sure there are probably a few not-so-clean email exchanges or the like, but nothing scandal-worthy yet. That might come later, mind you.
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@lucas1 said in Scandals in Communist Frenchystan:
She doesn't look too bothered.
Not really surprising given that 1) she always knew she would loose (and her last debate performance was a clear indicator of that, she knew an overly aggressive stance would never bring huge number of supporters); 2) she has built her career, and her father before her, on being outside the system and therefore she is most at her ease when not in power.
Although it seems her final score was considered by insiders as the minimum she could get, meaning many people in her party will not see that as a success (compared to what they would have expected), so she might face some internal power-struggle... I guess the real test for her, in that regard, will be the legislative elections next month. If she doesn't get good results (I don't know how many MPs would be "good results", but given how the system works it would be somewhat under 50 MPs out of 600 total), she might be in trouble...
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@remi said in Scandals in Communist Frenchystan:
These ones, I did comment on the timing of their release, clearly intended to damage his campaign (the documents were apparently stolen a few days ago and released minutes before the official blanket ban on campaigning on Friday evening!).
Which indicates that whoever stole them was not based in France, as they got the political timing wrong. (The FN simply didn't have long enough to capitalise on the leaks.) Pretty much anyone based in France would have known from experience that key scandals would have to surface earlier to have a real impact. As it is, whoever did it has instead managed to simply seriously irritate the person who is going to be President, and who will have plenty of time and resources to hunt down the people responsible.
Timing matters. Fluff it and your ploy can massively backfire.
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@dkf that is also how I read it, but of course we're all just speculating. One of the FN's official did manage to sneak in a tweet before the deadline, but nothing more. So clearly too late... And in any case, leaking a huge mass of raw documents was never going to work, they'd have needed to at least highlight one scandalous thing (maybe that was what the offshore account thing was about, to try and prime people about that? If so, that failed by being such an obvious fake...).
If anything, the rest of the campaign before and the way Fillon sunk lower and lower should have shown that a scandal in France is like a good French stew, it needs to simmer on for a long time, carefully adding a new ingredient now and then!
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@dkf said in Scandals in Communist Frenchystan:
whoever stole them was not based in France
Evidence suggests Russia behind hack of French president-elect
Russian security firms' metadata found in files, according to WikiLeaks and others.
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@Luhmann The BBC have more details on the leaks too:
The US alt-right, WikiLeaks and bots helped to amplify the leaked emails from the Emmanuel Macron campaign.
They don't come to a definite conclusion, but it is interesting that the vast majority of people trying to spread the leak are English speakers: the French seem to have very little to do with it.
Also, this is the first time I've seen Discord screenclips in a news article.
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With Macron, the leaders of Europe's 4 biggest economies have a combined 0 biological children
The latest Speed Read,/speed-reads,,speed-reads, breaking news, comment, reviews and features from the experts at The Week
So now, apparently the leaders of France, the UK, Germany and Italy have no biological children.
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@Yamikuronue said in Scandals in Communist Frenchystan:
@boomzilla said in Scandals in Communist Frenchystan:
the UK
But the Queen has kids though...
But she's not the UK's leader.
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@Khudzlin Knew I should have gone with the
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@Khudzlin said in Scandals in Communist Frenchystan:
@Yamikuronue said in Scandals in Communist Frenchystan:
@boomzilla said in Scandals in Communist Frenchystan:
the UK
But the Queen has kids though...
But she's not the UK's leader.
Our leadership is... complicated.
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@Yamikuronue Note that this also applies to Germany (not that the Queen is German, that
is about 100 years off...) and Italy, as Frank-Walter Steinmeier and Sergio Mattarella apparently have children.So... @boomzilla is spreading fake news?
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@remi said in Scandals in Communist Frenchystan:
Frank-Walter Steinmeier and Sergio Mattarella apparently have children.
Not together.
At least I guess. Or hope. Whatever. I don't want to know.
#raveparty
