Posted on 05/25/2014 11:36:22 AM PDT by docbnj
France's far-right National Front was projected to win European Parliament elections in France on Sunday with 25 percent of the vote, with exit polls putting Francois Hollande's Socialists in a lowly third place behind the center-right UMP.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
To the news media, anything nationalist = “far right.” Especially in Europe. The FN is a nationalist party but they are nowhere close to what we would consider in America as “far right” or even moderately conservative. It’s always good to see Socialists get a knee in the metaphorical goolies, but the FN is no Tea Party by a long shot.
Also remember that these are for the EU Parliament. For whatever reason these elections seem to skew a lot further toward the nationalist parties than the respective countries’ actual governmental elections...witness the fact, for example, that the BNP could get a couple seats in the EU Parliament a few years ago but couldn’t translate that into any significant wins in the UK at any level.
}:-)4
Pretty broad statement.
Farage (UKIP Leader) knows NF are Fascists. Too bad Wilders in Netherlands didn’t come to the same conclusion.
Farage said no to the NF because he thinks they are Anti-Semites
“Its code for “Nazi” which they cant say outright because it would be laughed at.”
Well in this case I can’t help if that label might be an accurate description of the french “National Front” which is indeed socialist in policy just like a real NAZI party.
The BNP lost votes, the small Christian Party lost some votes. I suspect they all went to UKIP.
Do you know any FN people?
Have you gone to France and talked to them about their "policies"?
I can introduce you to Black members of the FN.
The focus is on French nationality, French culture, and French industry.
This includes some of the former colonies - now Overseas Departments like Martinique, Guadeloupe and French Guyane. And Senegal to a degree, although the mass influx of Senegalese the FN would definitely oppose. But even Dumas was part Senegalese.
The FN has a rational way of regarding their history: leave it as is, but don't do any more of that. For example, the concept of an Algerian Justice minister for France is like putting an Imam in charge of a Catholic cathedral. To put it mildly, they opposed that.
And as for "national socialism", if they advocate government favoritism for their private industries, how is that different from Lockheed, Boeing, and the hundreds of billions of dollars lavished on Citigroup, AGI, and all the other Wall Street criminals?
You're labeling of them is exactly what I'm talking about. You sling smear labels based on shallow analogies.
The FN is what we don’t want to happen to conservatism. The UKIP is. The FN is better than the marxists running the show now and I’m glad they won but it’s simply lowering the dosage of a poison.
That's a "rational" spectrum in the US because the most pressing political debate is between large vs. small government. In Europe, statism is more or less a given, so the relevant political spectrum is framed in terms of issues like pro vs. anti-EU, pro vs. anti immigration, etc. From their perspective, you could equally well construct a political spectrum with multiculturalism/internationalism at one (Left) end of the spectrum and cultural conservatism/nationalism (Right) at the other.
In the United States, the political Left and Right are defined as being on the statist vs. libertarian spectrum, but that simply isn't true in the rest of the world nor has it been true historically. When the statist Bolsheviks overthrew the statist Monarchists in Russia, only a fool would call the Monarchists "left wing" or "socialists" because they weren't US-style libertarians.
Similarly, the political spectrum in France and most of the rest of Europe isn't framed in terms of large vs. small government. It's framed in terms of whether they want EU identity or national identity. It's framed in terms of people who want an ethno-state and culture vs. those who want to flood the country with Third World immigrants. Condemning nationalist movements in Europe on the grounds that they aren't economic libertarians means implicit support for the alternative: multiculturalism and internationalism, because that's the only alternative.
“NAZI is not on the right at all, they were competitors for the same supporters as the commies”
I simply referred to how a circular ideological concept works. It’s a circle. There is not Right, nor a Left. It’s just a concept.
“This does not come from reason, but from the simple fact that the Communists labeled anybody who opposed them as “far right”. Thus Nazis and Jeffersonians are both “far right”.”
If you take the circular concept and put 2 random points on a circle then travel along its path in a direction to the right. Eventually you will hit both. It’s a circle.
That is not an “irrational” concept at all.
I agree with your “rational spectrum” just as much as the circular one interests me.
“Left” and “Right” are defined as the political forces of revolution vs. those of tradition and reaction. So what’s Left and what’s Right is time and place specific, and it’s absurd to assume that the political and cultural issues that define Left and Right in America today are somehow universal, applicable to all places and times. The defining issues of tradition vs. radicalism in Europe today aren’t small vs. big government.
Nazis and Communists are both Statists. Neither believes in small government.
Case in point: neither Czar Nicholas nor the Bolsheviks who overthrew him were small government libertarians. That doesn't stop most rational people from characterizing the Bolsheviks as Left-wing and the Czarists as right-wing in that context. Similarly, neither LePen's supporters nor the EUcrats who run France are US-style libertarians. That doesn't change the fact that the nationalist anti-EU, anti-third world immigration faction represents the French Right, while the EU-crats and multiculturalists represent the Left.
This chart stops at Socialism. Which is not 100% Government control. That is more likely, Communism, or just - Statism.
The order should also maybe be: Progressives - Liberals - Conservatives
And that's the key point. All European governments engage in state support or control of industry; the question is the degree.
The babble about "national socialism" being akin to Communism and therefore different from some pure vision of free market / private property regime in Europe exists only in the minds of people who don't live there. Even England has state subsidies for the few remaining English industries, and that's about the only place where something resembling the American model exists (which of course is not surprising...).
The FN is the expression of French chauvinism if you want to sling smear labels.
But if opposing the takeover of Europe by Muslim masses means being a smug Gallic chauvinist, by all means take the hit. Far better then your children ending up kneeling to Saracen overlords with scimitars.
Their ancestors handled the Soldiers of the Caliphate far more effectively at Tours. Time to do it again.
““Left” and “Right” are defined as the political forces of revolution vs. those of tradition and reaction. So what’s Left and what’s Right is time and place specific, and it’s absurd to assume that the political and cultural issues that define Left and Right in America today are somehow universal, applicable to all places and times. The defining issues of tradition vs. radicalism in Europe today aren’t small vs. big government.”
I believe that this is already taken into context by anyone who is experienced.
LePen's supporters are the only viable entity who oppose subsuming the country to EU bureaucrats and a wholescale transformation into an Arab and African slum. To oppose them because they aren't Hayek-style free marketeers is absurd. American anti-Communists didn't have problems with the "statism" of anti-Communists like Chiang Kai Chek in Taiwan or Francisco Franco in Spain because they recognized that these were the only viable alternatives to Bolshevism and Maoism. Why is it so difficult to accept French or German Nationalism as the only viable alternatives to the EU and the Third World Colony model for Europe?
You said it better then me.
One comment...it may be too late.
Was in Paris for a couple of weeks last winter, and it’s far, far more Arab and African then just 20 years ago.
I don’t have the time to search it out but I believe that the number of births to non-Europeans in Ile de France (greater Paris) is now 55%; in a few decades Paris will be majority non-European.
Only violence will change that. They aren’t going to leave voluntarily.
I was there for the big riots back in 2005; the car burnings were simply amplified over the usual pummeling that the Banlieu gangs subject the French to. No one had told them they had to leave, they were just mad that they couldn’t get more freebies. So they thought they’d take the game to a new level.
The FN will be a force to reckon with for the invaders. But when push comes to shove, it remains to be seen if the rest of France can stomach the shoving.
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