Bulletins and News Discussion from June 17th to June 23rd, 2024 - Macron's Gambit - COTW: France
Bulletins and News Discussion from June 17th to June 23rd, 2024 - Macron's Gambit - COTW: France
Macron has recently called a snap parliamentary election in the aftermath of the far-right getting a large proportion of the votes in the EU elections. Why exactly he called an election at a point of profound weakness is a little beyond me. Explanations that I've seen range from "He thinks the element of surprise will benefit his party and not others," to "WW3 is about to start and he doesn't want to be leader for it," (which, like, isn't true - Macron is the President of France, not Prime Minister, he won't be unseated by this election and he has said he will not stand down regardless of result), to "He doesn't want to swim in the shit-filled Seine."
While we still have a couple weeks to go, the polling I've seen generally puts the far-right in first place with the left-wing coalition slightly behind, with Macron's party all the way back in third place. Anybody who knows anything about French politics knows that while France does actually have something of a left opposition in aggregate (in contrast to the two wings of the Capitalist Party in the UK and the US, for example), French left coalitions are profoundly unstable and this one will inevitably split - perhaps even before the voting begins - meaning they aren't nearly as useful as they otherwise could be.
Living in a France governed by far right parties would be awful, but maybe they might at least be against the carnage in Ukraine, and sue for peace with Russia? Well, possibly not, if the example of Meloni in Italy is anything to go by. It seems that the differences between the "centrist" parties and the fascist ones truly are not that great, beholden to the exact same set of capitalists regardless of which party wins, and will likely bend the knee to NATO, though they may grumble a lot. Would a left coalition be better on Russia/NATO? They have already helpfully told us that they won't (only opposing sending French troops to Ukraine but otherwise being full steam ahead), and additionally are genocidal Zionists. Western leftists have long been hampered by a dramatically faulty misunderstanding of how geopolitics works, with many seemingly believing "imperialism is when countries interact with other countries" and "democracy is when you can vote between two parties even if widely popular policies aren't at all represented by either of them, and if those popular policies are enacted but it's by a one-party state then that's authoritarian evil" and other such strange ideas, making them terminally useless on foreign issues and pretty unremarkable on domestic issues too. France is no exception.
And just to top it all off, this is coming in a period of further imperial decline for the tattered remains of the French empire, with West Africa rebelling and Kanaky (New Caledonia) deeply unhappy with recent French decisions.
The COTW (Country of the Week) label is designed to spur discussion and debate about a specific country every week in order to help the community gain greater understanding of the domestic situation of often-understudied nations. If you've wanted to talk about the country or share your experiences, but have never found a relevant place to do so, now is your chance! However, don't worry - this is still a general news megathread where you can post about ongoing events from any country.
The Country of the Week is France! Feel free to chime in with books, essays, longform articles, even stories and anecdotes or rants. More detail here.
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Israel-Palestine Conflict
Sources on the fighting in Palestine against Israel. In general, CW for footage of battles, explosions, dead people, and so on:
UNRWA daily-ish reports on Israel's destruction and siege of Gaza and the West Bank.
English-language Palestinian Marxist-Leninist twitter account. Alt here.
English-language twitter account that collates news (and has automated posting when the person running it goes to sleep).
Arab-language twitter account with videos and images of fighting.
English-language (with some Arab retweets) Twitter account based in Lebanon. - Telegram is @IbnRiad.
English-language Palestinian Twitter account which reports on news from the Resistance Axis. - Telegram is @EyesOnSouth.
English-language Twitter account in the same group as the previous two. - Telegram here.
English-language PalestineResist telegram channel.
More telegram channels here for those interested.
Various sources that are covering the Ukraine conflict are also covering the one in Palestine, like Rybar.
Russia-Ukraine Conflict
Examples of Ukrainian Nazis and fascists
Examples of racism/euro-centrism during the Russia-Ukraine conflict
Sources:
Defense Politics Asia's youtube channel and their map. Their youtube channel has substantially diminished in quality but the map is still useful.
Moon of Alabama, which tends to have interesting analysis. Avoid the comment section.
Understanding War and the Saker: reactionary sources that have occasional insights on the war.
Alexander Mercouris, who does daily videos on the conflict. While he is a reactionary and surrounds himself with likeminded people, his daily update videos are relatively brainworm-free and good if you don't want to follow Russian telegram channels to get news. He also co-hosts The Duran, which is more explicitly conservative, racist, sexist, transphobic, anti-communist, etc when guests are invited on, but is just about tolerable when it's just the two of them if you want a little more analysis.
On the ground: Patrick Lancaster, an independent and very good journalist reporting in the warzone on the separatists' side.
Unedited videos of Russian/Ukrainian press conferences and speeches.
Pro-Russian Telegram Channels:
Again, CW for anti-LGBT and racist, sexist, etc speech, as well as combat footage.
https://t.me/aleksandr_skif ~ DPR's former Defense Minister and Colonel in the DPR's forces. Russian language.
https://t.me/Slavyangrad ~ A few different pro-Russian people gather frequent content for this channel (~100 posts per day), some socialist, but all socially reactionary. If you can only tolerate using one Russian telegram channel, I would recommend this one.
https://t.me/s/levigodman ~ Does daily update posts.
https://t.me/patricklancasternewstoday ~ Patrick Lancaster's telegram channel.
https://t.me/gonzowarr ~ A big Russian commentator.
https://t.me/rybar ~ One of, if not the, biggest Russian telegram channels focussing on the war out there. Actually quite balanced, maybe even pessimistic about Russia. Produces interesting and useful maps.
https://t.me/epoddubny ~ Russian language.
https://t.me/boris_rozhin ~ Russian language.
https://t.me/mod_russia_en ~ Russian Ministry of Defense. Does daily, if rather bland updates on the number of Ukrainians killed, etc. The figures appear to be approximately accurate; if you want, reduce all numbers by 25% as a 'propaganda tax', if you don't believe them. Does not cover everything, for obvious reasons, and virtually never details Russian losses.
https://t.me/UkraineHumanRightsAbuses ~ Pro-Russian, documents abuses that Ukraine commits.
Pro-Ukraine Telegram Channels:
Almost every Western media outlet.
https://discord.gg/projectowl ~ Pro-Ukrainian OSINT Discord.
https://t.me/ice_inii ~ Alleged Ukrainian account with a rather cynical take on the entire thing.
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Joe Biden has succeeded in creating more wealth for the rich than any of his predecessors has ever managed, and this is why he, not Trump, will have the full backing of the bourgeois class.
This assumption is like the base assumption in economics classes, that the average person or member of the bourgeoisie is a completely rational actor.
Joe Biden has succeeded in creating more wealth for the rich than any of his predecessors has ever managed, and this is why he, not Trump, will have the full backing of the bourgeois class.
So this is basically like, petit bourgeois (Trump) vs. mega bourgeois (Biden) right? Do you think Trump might actually go to jail for that reason? Because the mega bougies are more powerful? (or are they?)
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Which, if you'll note, Trump is very publicly trying to do. Multiple meetings with billionaires, some coming out in support.
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Why would anyone give Biden credit for the supposed autonomous Fed economic policy? The consequences of that policy are obvious here yes, but I don't think anyone is thinking the Fed/Powell would ever take words from either of these idiots.
Also you severely underestimate Trump's tax cuts, it was the first time Billionaires started paying less than the working class. Now the Dems are campaigning against these cuts and Trump is doubling down. Top 0.01%(Buffet/Musk) don't care but the average petite bourgeoisie definitely cares more about the short term money in their pockets than any "rational" long term analysis about anything, Biden is promising a tax hike.
The Bush era cuts already cost trillions in lost tax revenue and extending Trump's already going to cost another ~5 trillion
This is The Economist literally running a pro Trump tax cut propaganda piece recently.
The increase in those interest payments will be significant for sure, but so are these continuous tax cuts in the long run. I severely doubt Wall Street or the petite bourgeoisie prefers Biden significantly more than Trump, or even at all, they're pretty much the same with pros and cons for them.
Look at what the capitalists are saying themselves.
After trial, investors weigh Trump 2.0 factor as election looms
STOCKS The S&P 500 rose 68% through Trump’s first term, which was marked by tax cuts and infrastructure spending as well as a trade war with China and the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. The benchmark index is up 38% so far under Biden.
An analysis by LPL Financial on Friday showed the S&P 500, which is up about 9% year-to-date, has risen alongside Trump’s election odds this year, as measured by betting site Predictit. At the same time, Biden's election odds have remained negatively correlated to the S&P 500 since February, the study showed. Some investors believe a second Trump term could be supportive for equities, especially if Trump is able to avert tax hikes promised by Biden. Much would depend on the makeup of Congress.
"In a Trump administration with a divided Congress or with a Republican clean sweep, we can say, a corporate tax hike is off the table," said Sonu Varghese, global macro strategist at Carson Group.
A second Trump White House would also seek to reduce the power of U.S. financial regulators, according to a Reuters report. That could be another positive for stocks, especially small cap companies, which may find it more expensive to comply with regulatory requirements, wrote Stephen Auth, chief investment officer, equities at Federated Hermes.
Also they think interest rates could be even higher under Trump.
Trump’s tax proposals “would be a big drain on revenues, and I think the bond market wouldn’t react well to that," said John Velis, FX and macro strategist for the Americas at BNY Mellon. Inflation and fiscal expansion could lead the Fed to raise interest rates, another path to higher yields, analysts at Nomura said.
"Between elevated U.S. interest rates and tariffs, a Trump presidency could very well keep the dollar stronger for longer," said Jonathan Petersen, senior markets economist at Capital Economics.
Most of these wealthy failsons are literal manchildren that can only think about the next quarter profit and their bank accounts. Trump delivered a lot where it mattered to them and he is promising more. My take is they're both at best equal.
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Was listening to Warren Mosler talk about this on Varn Vlog. Interesting stuff. It’s stimulus, but incredibly unequal stimulus as it’s not like the working class is the one holding all the T-bills.
Lol I love how Varn has been ranting about MMTers for a while but each time with a bigger disclaimer that he agrees with their fundamental analysis, up to the point where he has the founder on. I'll have to give it a listen.