French rebel with a cause
VENISSIEUX, near Lyon, France
The young man dressed simply but smartly in a black shirt and jeans clutches a large microphone in one hand, while the other cuts the air, soars, jabs.
The impish grin has gone and he radiates passion and an air of seriousness - for all the world like the one member of a boy band who has the talent to go solo and live on beyond his good looks. (I owe my colleague John Lichfield, The Independent's superb Paris correspondent, for sparking the comparison.) Olivier Besancenot is the Robbie Williams of French Communism.
"Don't let them tell us that we are after utopia.
"It is" - and he spreads out the word to make a point about the economic crisis - "a pol-i-ti-cal choice: when there is a natural disaster, an earthquake or a war, the state declares a state of emergency. For us the social consequence of capitalism is a natural disaster".
The banner above his head means: "No question: We will not pay for their crisis". At the foot of the platform: "Ban layoffs!"
Not that you hear the "c" word from the platform. One name check for Marx (worth reading apparently), none for Trotsky or revolution, permanent or otherwise. Perhaps the one give-away is the logo of the NPA, the New Anti-Capitalist Party - a megaphone outlined on a red flag, stylised and very Soviet Constructivist.
The NPA is indeed new, but it was formed two years ago, when the Revolutionary Communist League decided to disband and reform. The goal was to create a rainbow alliance, deliberately embracing feminism and ecology as essential components of a modern radical movement.
The original party doubled in size to 3,000 people when Besancenot fought the presidential election. The new party claims to have tripled that membership.
I am in this packed town hall, along with about 1,000 others, because I have a bee in my bonnet. I can't quite believe that we will emerge from the economic crisis with politics as usual intact, although so far I must admit there is no sign of anything but business pretty much as usual.
But these Euro elections are the first chance for people in most EU countries to pass a verdict on their governments. So I am particularly interested in whether the hard left or right pick up votes, and I am here in France to look at the left.
Olivier Besancenot has enough charisma and charm to be able to stress that policies, not personalities, are what matter. But I think my mum would like him. A good-looking, well-groomed young man, casually smart in jeans and a black shirt, who sounds like he cares. But he is not leader, for there is a collective leadership and 10 people share the platform.
One extraordinary opinion poll in March suggested that Besancenot was almost level-pegging with Sarkozy as the most credible politician in France. Asked who is most capable of changing things 38% choose the president and 35% Besancenot. The leader of the main opposition party, the Socialists, got 28%. And the disarray of the traditional French left is a big part of this story. But polls ahead of this election put the NPA at a miserable 7%.
Besancenot tells me: "There is a new political space opening up. We feel there is even a part of the French political class that is taking up ideas which only we were expressing four or five years ago. That allows us to go a bit further. But our discourse only makes sense if there is a mass of the population who thinks politics belongs to them, not professional politicians."
He adds: "The crisis will only be useful to the left if there are victorious social struggles which make our anti-capitalist solutions credible. The crisis can bring out the best or the worst. The best being victorious mobilisation at a European level, which would give back confidence. The worst would be if this doesn't happen and it becomes every man for himself, which would bring out individualistic or even xenophobic ideas."
My feeling is that if there is something of a resurgence of radicalism in France, it is a mood, not a movement. But that stylised megaphone does make a lot of noise (ah yes, we in the media amplify the phenomena). And we will have to wait until 7 June to see who is marching to a post-revolutionary tune.
I’m Mark Mardell, the BBC's North America editor. These are my reflections on American politics, some thoughts on being a Brit living in the USA, and who knows what else? My 
~RS~q~RS~~RS~z~RS~29~RS~)
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Interesting article. This is the first piece of journalism i have seen that suggests "I can't quite believe that we will emerge from the economic crisis with politics as usual intact, although so far I must admit there is no sign of anything but business pretty much as usual."
That is also my view. The underlying political reality of the banking crisis is that the state has used taxpayers money to support the continued power of the banking class in a supposedly free market. But it has been the bankers, and their parliamentary puppets, who have brought "class" back into politics in a big way, not the commies.
And I don't see how society can be told that class is a reality, and that the economic welfare of all depends upon the survival of that class structure, without a resurgence of communism.
So it is business as usual for the present time, but the dialogue at Universities and in union meetings must have already changed irrevocably. Nobody I know talks "business" anymore. Presuming a free market, or even a market free of government supervision, is now a sign of naive foolishness. So naturally the talk then proceeds towards discussions of what is the best form of government supervision and control.
And one might guess that the bankers will ultimately lose that contest for government. Sure, they own government now, but they only own government because the people have accepted the previous ideology of capitalism and the free market. Nobody cared or objected to corporate control of parliament because government itself didn't matter. It was all about the economy, and the free market. Now that is dead and gone, and government itself has become the economy, and the prize.
And communists know how to run a government, arguably at least as well as bankers do.
So I figure we just need to wait for a few years, until the students today become the graduates of tomorrow. Then we are going to see the fruits of a return to class based feudalism, where bankers are simply too important and too precious to go broke, regardless of their managerial folly and incompetence.
The bankers gave away the system, in an effort to retain short term profits. They have demonstrated beyond doubt that they are shortsighted, and devoid of principles. They appear to run on pure greed.
Oh well, perhaps communism is the better way forward. It is surely better than feudalism, and being a slave to the local lord. At least in the communist state, one gets fed, and an education.
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"Oh well, perhaps communism is the better way forward. It is surely better than feudalism, and being a slave to the local lord."
And having one hand cut off is better than having both cut off. Not really keen on either though.
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Mark,
An excellent article. Marx never thought that the British (for him English) would ever give up Capitalism as the slaves and the masters of English society knew, just like the Ronnie Corbett, John Cleese and Ronnie Barker comedy sketch about Class, their place in relation to one another.
I would imagine that the anger of the citizens towards the political classes and the Banking System in general is such that the UK is ripe for a massive change in the way we are governed or misruled depending upon one's place in the hierarchy.
Perhaps, if the French Political Classes are as found wanting as our own national politicians with their hands and snouts deeply entrenched in profiteering from tax-supported but immoral expense claims, the French, too, could be easily persuaded that a revolution in the way they are governed is due.
The change in the UK maybe far sooner than democracythreat imagines at #1. The silver haired generation have seen all their hopes and aspirations since the end of the Second World War diminished and subborned by a lying and deceitful political class within the United Kingdom that would certainly find their palms being felt for callouses and suitabiltiy for firing squads should there be a revolution in the British Isles. The supineness of the English that Marx felt was unswerving has certainly been put to the test with recent events. The time is definitely ripe for change.
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Intersting article and what is even more intersting is the fact that the Franch communist party has seen the need to reform itself. Strangely enough, the ideas put forward by Marx is even more relevent today. Communism is a fantastic idea, full of concern for the ordinary citizen where the wealth of the world is used for the many, as opposed to the current idea where 90% of the wealth is owned by 10% of the population. However, the problem with communism is that it doesn't work for the very basic premise which is: as soon as someone is put in charge that old saying of 'Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely'. At least in this present system we all know, or can find out, who the corrupt are when it comes to power. The problem with politicians, which ever colour their party may be, is that they like the idea of being in power. How many times have we heard those self-same words coming from the mouths of politicians.
A large proportion of the blame for this corruption has to be laid at the feet of us voters. If we vote the politicians in then we really have little cause to complain; our votes put those people in. It is no use us complaining that we have very little choice when we know that all of the political systems on this planet is intrinsically corrupt from the top to the bottom as we all scramble to grab as much of the pie for ourselves. However, I am sure that there are many individuals out there who try to do what is right but are swamped by the mass of corruption that washes around this world. All we can do is throw up ours arms in sheer frustration and resignation.
Back to the blog ;-) I think it is an unusual angle that the NPA are taking by including green issues, femmanism and communistic ideas. It will be interesting to see how they do. Even if they do well I suspect that they, too, will fall into the morass of corruption just like everybody else. C'est la vie.
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The EU election is a chance to have the referrundum we were refused.
A vote for anyone but the three main parties in the UK would halt them in there steps, not voting at all would remove support from any.
We can simply take control of our direction this way.
I hope MEP's expences are uncovered before the election.
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Anyone advocating Communism really needs to talk to someone who was an ordinary person under those regimes.
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I was so disappointed when Segolene Royal lost the election. Now I see there is new hope. France is its own worst enemy. Let the games begin. You have to wonder what kind of alarm bells will go off in the Corporate headquarters of the major Corporations around France and the rest of Euroland if this thing catches on as it well might. Two things nobody has ever accused the French of, being practical and being sensible.
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There is an evident cause for discussing the political system. It is called the global finantial crisis. But is it really an another option in existence? Is it really just a matter of choice between capitalism and communism? I would rather say we are using an obsolete terminology.
If it were the matter of simplification, it would be more plausible to choose between democracy and tyranny, like in the good old times. The political system of tyranny in the classical period was not considered in so negative context like it has been recently, but it could be again. One never knows.
Therefore, I would rather strive for observing the concrete causes of the crisis, leaving the prejudices behind. It has to be something wrong with the communism, for sure, otherwise there would not be so many malcontents, and perhaps former USSR would stand much longer than 70 years. The modern French communists should ask them how it was being to live under that option.
No doubt it is something wrong with the global financial system as well, but that's not why the answer should be looked for in the books of Marx. What was exactly Marx doing in England, was he grasped properly or wrongly, it is gone with the wind of history.
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# 6 Freeman
'Anyone advocating Communism really needs to talk to someone who was an ordinary person under those regimes.'
Communism is a good idea; it's a pity that nobody has tried it yet.
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The French and other western European countries, unlike Eastern Europe, have never really suffered the rule of an extreme ideology, in particular Communism. They have experienced shorter or longer periods of fascism in various forms. Thus the hankering for the ideal solution of the extreme Left in for example, France.
Here in Poland, and its neighbours the extreme Left is derided as a marginal bunch of loonies. People, other than the under 25s, have direct experience of what Communism really means. The over 70's have direct experience also of being on the receiving end of Nazism. A plague on both extreme ideologies and their supporters!
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Marcus Aurelius II, please answer me this: where you actually born that obtuse, or is it something that you worked on and perfected over the years ?
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I like Mark was at the meeting last night and found that Besancenot give a very compeling and articulate speech. There are two things however which I think Mark fails to point out.
1, Communism was never mentioned, the main aims of the party being to redress the balance of power: turning back the privatisation / supression of public services; cutting back on the obscene remuneration packages handed out to those who caused the crisis; permitting the free flow of labour throughout the world in the way that the financial markets are free to move currency throughout the world; and making companies more responsable for the troubles they cause in other countries.
2, They are aiming to form a europe wide coalition with other similarly minded parties, so any interested parties in the UK should bear this in mind. I feel that it is time to fundmentally change the structure of government throughout the world and not just in France. Given the fact that the MPs are merrily spending their way through their expenses allowances, there may be others in the UK with the same thoughts.
Finally Mark, I have to say that I am very impressed that the BBC would make the effort to report on such a left-wing meeting, pherhaps not all the media try to cover up events as Besancenot so elegantly put it.
What ever happened to the video interviews / footage taken last night? Any chance of getting it put on the blog so that we can see what other participants thought.
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#10 - mikewarsaw
True Mike, but a bewildering number of old style commies have successfully reinvented themselves as born again democrats - at least here in Hungary.
Having said that, they do seem to take it seriously, fight open elections and accept defeat gracefully so maybe they are sincere.
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"And communists know how to run a government, arguably at least as well as bankers do."
Cuba, North Korea. Oh no, I must have missed something. Ah yes, it's the old argument "they are not communist, they are a perversion of the pure idea of communism". Or the other argument, they would be super-prosperous if the mean West didn't sabotage them and let them flourish.
I think only self-interest can motivate a human being to give his/her best. Society should find a rule-set to channel the self-interest of everyone such that we profit from it. Maybe we got the crisis because the bankers' self-interest harmed ours. But definitely communism is an utopia as it relies on selflessness and solidarity.
I lived in communism, it's rotten, with a profound disregard its people. May it never appear again on the political map.
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I have found that too many French people "of the Left" have a too cosy notion of communism. This denies the millions of deaths in the gulags, etc of Stalin and clings to a version of armchair Marxism that is leagues away from my own reading of that man's difficult works. Difficult because he spoke not only of economics but of a much wider range of aspects affecting the life of man.
You have it right, Mark, Besancenot is "cuddly" to Mums across France; and appears to speak good sense to many other, younger men and women. The problem is when asked what might replace capitalism. His plans appear to revolve around the sequestration of capitalist funds (as if that were even possible) - but, then what?
An open democracy allows parties such as the NPA. Fortunately, Besancenot (supposedly a Postman still?) and his party remain a minor - but useful - irritant in the French political landscape - as the polls indicate.
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sorinm wrote:
""And communists know how to run a government, arguably at least as well as bankers do."
Cuba, North Korea. Oh no, I must have missed something. Ah yes, it's the old argument "they are not communist, they are a perversion of the pure idea of communism". "
Yes, you missed something. You missed something profound, and it says more about how you see the world than it does about my own comment.
I said, very deliberately, that communists know how to run a GOVERNMENT, at least as well as bankers. A GOVERNMENT. Not an ECONOMY.
The difference between running a government and an economy is profound, and the point I was trying to make is that the two have become melded into the same activity, and that this terrible concurrence of power is the result of the bankers refusing to own their own losses, and refusing to let the market operate.
Now it is my own view that the demos, or the people, should run both the economy and the government, the former through regulated individual property rights in a free market, and the latter through direct democracy.
But that is what I would like in a perfect world, and this article and the commentary is about the world we live in. Regrettably, we are faced with a stark choice between corporate feudalism, where ordinary people work to remain poor, and their taxes support an aristocracy of bankers who can never lose economic or political power, or emboldened communism, where the party deem themselves the expert bankers, and simply do away with the fiction of a free market. But at least the communist state does offer food and education to the poor, whereas corporate feudalism has a free market ideology for the poor (let them starve) and socialism for the rich (tax the poor to pay for corporate deficits).
Freeman put my view about right when he said:
"And having one hand cut off is better than having both cut off. Not really keen on either though."
Indeed. The choice is unappealing, but this is the choice we face, because our sham system of representative democracy has conspicuously become nothing more than representation for an elite group of mega shareholders.
The reason this article is brave journalism is precisely because of the hysteria that grips the casual reader when faced with the word "communism". Folks who do not understand very much at all start accusing anyone who mentions the word of supporting Stalin and Mao, because they cannot follow the arguments being made.
Now if you had followed the arguments being made, Sorinm, you would have noted that I never made any suggestion that soviet or oriental communism was a different animal to theoretical communism. I do not make that argument because I think it is the foolish splitting of hairs. It is precisely the delusional love affair with the theoretical possibilities of human government that make communists such a practical disaster whensoever they take power over a government.
But if it is a choice between the commies and the bankers telling my children what to do, I will take the commies any day.
I will never suffer to live under the feudal law that says one class of human beings is superior to all others, who shall be masters over human slaves, as men master beasts. That is what we have now in the west, and it is simply unacceptable.
At least perhaps you can argue with commies, and promote real direct democracy and regulated property rights.
Our current bankers clearly just want slaves to do their bidding, and wars to spread their glory across the pages of history.
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crackhead;
You like all Europeans suffer from a mental disease called Eurosis of the Fliver. Everyone in Europe has it to one degree or another but it is most widespread and severest in France. It is enedmic, the infection usually spread at early childhood especially in schools. It can also be transmitted over local media by for example ORTF. It is characterized by delusions. One common one among French victims is that France is paradise on earth, the Garden of Eden and that the whole world should emulate it. French people believe that French society is the pinacle of civilization and should stand as a model for the rest of humanity. Funny, the farther you get from France, the more people generally disagree. China is practically at war with France, still very angry over the snubs related to the Olympics.
For some mild sufferers, living outside of Europe might help, different air, different atmosphere. But coming to the United States often makes the symptoms worse as British ex-pats living in America posting here prove time and again. It sets their jealousy juices flowing against their nationalism juices and there is a bad reaction, a synergy of negative energy. Perhaps living in Africa, India, or South America would help. But in the most severe cases there is no hope, no cure, no effective treatment so far. French victims are loathe to even leave France at all.
Speaking of China jeandenice, America invented modern China. Thirty six years ago when Secretary of State Henry Kissinger and President Nixon visited China, it was a primitive dangerously isolated society that knew how to build hudrogen bombs. But it didn't know how to feed itself. Although 90% of its people worked on farms, there were periodic famines. This could not be allowed to continue, far to risky for the rest of the world (including the USSR Web Alice.) China had a 25 year history of Communism and a 5000 year history of mercantilism. It was this deep rooted cultural asset the US sought to encourage and develop. And it did. China now has the world's third largest economy second only to Japan and the US. It is exploiting its vast virtually limitless pool of inexpensive labor that can be developed to perform semiskilled tasks such as manufacturing mass produced goods including textiles and consumer electronics. America has poured a vast fortune of money investing in this development and globalizing the world's economy to provide open markets for these goods and those of other developing nations. Unable to compete with it in that type of product, unable to compete with the US or even Japan in technology, unable to compete with large agrabusiness nations like the US, Canada, Brazil just to name a few, Europe has no market niche where it is a winner, an area it can best exploit to its advantage. Everything it makes or does can be done as well or better at lower cost, usually far lower cost somewhere else. The factors that keep it expensive are among other things its vast lavish social network taxation must support and its very high standard of living based on high labor costs far beyond what comparable workers earn elsewhere. Europe is being driven bankrupt. It doesn't matter what type of economic or social structure or system it chooses to have as the end looms, the destination could hardly be more clear. Sayonara Europe. Sayonara crackhead.
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Mark wrote:
"I can't quite believe that we will emerge from the economic crisis with politics as usual intact"
Toujours la même chose, eh?! Mark, the same people are still running the institutions. (Mervyn King is still the Governor of the BoE etc!) Perhaps you hadn't noticed, but nothing has changed and there has been no actual increase in banking regulation. Where is the Olivier Besancenot in the UK? Why haven't any of the radicals here (in the UK) dared to speak out? All we get is ranting bloggers!!!
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"Gedguy says : "Interesting article and what is even more intersting is the fact that the French communist party has seen the need to reform itself"
Not at all. You are confusing the far Left former Ligue Communiste Révolutionaire, a trotskyst party, member of the 4th International, whose leader is Besancenot, AND the French Communist Party, that did not manage to reform itself. The far Left has actually overstepped the PCF a few years ago. However they don't have any elected mayors and no real program. One very interesting thing that mark Mardell doesn't mention: their name is "Nouveau Parti Anticapitaliste". It is interesting since it shows that they dare not assent themselves to be communist. In fact they know AGAINST WHAT they are, but not what they fight FOR. It says a lot and you may easily understand that this is mostly a party of refusal without positive goals. They refuse actually every responsible political view. It is normal to report about them, but please make no mistake: this party has definitely no chance to have any MP, even at the EP.
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MarcusAurelianusII
You seem to be pretty ignorant of French affairs (not only French affairs). Please note that the ORTF doesn't exist anymore. Actually, it was abolished a long time ago in 1985. This confirms that you hardly watch French television or read French press. And I don't think at all that you are right when you say: "French people believe that French society is the pinacle of civilization and should stand as a model for the rest of humanity" If you could follow French elections, you would see how wrong you are. And even if it was true, this would by no means be exclusively French. Please try to inform yourself.
Now China ? It is absurd to write that "America invented modern China". You obviously overestimate the importance of Nixon's foreign policy, which was only short sighted realism. I view it as an expression of Western narcissism and possibly ignorance of Chinese history. The origins of Chinese modernization are ENDOGENOUS. Zhou En Lai and Deng Xiao Ping were clearly its initiators, but their position is also an heritage of Sun Yat sen. Both wanted to make good the damage done by the Cultural Revolution. It is a process a SELF CENTERED modernization, it is Chinese self modernization.
And Europe ? The EU is the first economic and commercial power in the world. It has 480 millions inhabitants. When you say "Sayonara Europe" it is nothing but wishful thinking. Get real.
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emocracythreat @16 is right, communism is government.
at least that "communism" or whatever it was that we had in the USSR.
(we were told we are "socialism", and "communism" will start soon, just you wait and work a little bit harder).
Frankly I didn't notice much of either, somehow we hoped both socialism and communism ought to look differently :o) can't explain why such high expectations
but whatever we had was government throughout, vertical, horizontal, all-penetrating government.
government - is when you always know it's near, beside you.
:o) there is a feeling there are 3 in bed, two plus "government".
that's the test. if you don't know whether you live in the "government" state or not - ask Russians! LOL.
Interestingly now , in simple quantitative figures, there is far more of it than there were in the USSR.
One simply wonders how they managed to rule before being so a hand-ful ! :o)
May be today it is somewhat easier because our government all became capitalistic individually, after personal gains. They get constantly destracted :o) from their sacred mission :o) by counting and pocketing money. How to return them back into the "government" shape nobody knows.
Ideally they don't join you in bed or meet in the empty kitchen at night as an ever present invisible ghost, but do something useful.
Modern Russian government became less ghostly in its operations but kind of deviated away off entirely, drifted away in the directions known to them only.
I know this doesn't explain much, sorry. :o)
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Putin, BTW, made a huge effort to return government to its purpose.
Like, Ahoy there!
But I am not sure he is happy himself with the results.
I think I prefer it the way it was before, government separately people separately (of the three options we have had so far). The cease-fire period, when at Yeltsin they were busy making big money on the side.
At least were kept busy away from us.
Now they were made to return, but they returned with newly acquired tastes, and somehow I think it works better when they make money at a step-two-step-three-step distance, instead of looking into every tiny thing. They have targets in mind one would think :o) and now have to collect the same from a wide field of small sources.
One definite advantage of the Russian system nevertheless is that in non-money-interesting areas our government does not interfere and does not annoy you. absolutely cold nose and indifferent. Which gives us more freedom than it seems to me is the case in Britain or other Western places. Where your governments look a bit fanatical to Russians, sorry.
It seems a tricky balance how far to keep your government away and from what. Russia is experimenting, from everywhere, all aspects of life and economy levels - to nowhere - to every profit where. What's next don't know we are working :o) on it.
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DupontdeNemours
"And I don't think at all that you are right when you say: "French people believe that French society is the pinacle of civilization and should stand as a model for the rest of humanity""
Oh really. Well don't make the mistake of letting a Frenchman buy you a drink or he will make you pay for it by listening to him chew your ear off for four hours while he tells you why it is exactly that :-)
I'm glad the ORTF is dead. I owed them some money never having paid for my TV license....35 years ago :-) They haven't bothered sending a bill collector to my house to get it.
I followed the French elections, listened to the debates. Sarkozy gave a great interview to Charlie Rose for about an hour I think around January 30, 2007.. Rose IMO is the best interviewer in the world today. You can see the interview on his web site. Great insight into the man. What claptrap Sarkozy is. What a bag of wind. It's hard to tell if Royal would have been even worse but she seemed even more clueless than he was.
If the EU admitted Malaysia, Thailand, Indonesia, and Sri Lanka, it would have even more people and a higher percentage of the world's GDP than it already does.
Had the US not opened up China, agreed to admit it to the UN replacing the Taiwan Republic of China, encouraged investment by relaxing all restrictions on imports of goods into the US and exports of technology, and many other steps that made the transition feasible, China would be today exactly where it was in 1973, maybe even worse off...if it hadn't blown the world up. Without the steps the US took, all of Chou En Lai's and Dung Xiao Ping's plans and hopes would have come to nothing.
What would France do if the EU cancelled the CAP?
I diagnose a clear cut case of Eurosis of the Fliver here, no doubt of it, the signs are all there. All I can offer you is my sympathy :o) There is no cure, not even a treatment. Perhaps a glass of wine to calm your nerves. (Do college students still drink that awful concoction of Creme the Menthe and milk?)
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MarcusAureliusII it's good to see that you are a fully paid up member of the capitalist propaganda machine. Its always good to see that public services are considered a burden, yet the privatisation of these services at knock down rates for the benefit of the MNC's is seen as our saviour.
Do you really believe that it was right, when the Bolivian Government privatised their water supply after demands from the IMF, only for the poor to see price rises of 400%
Do you really believe it is morally correct for Nike(replace with whatever other MNC you wish) to make goods in China paying a pitance in wages to the workers, then selling these throughot the world at obsence prices.
It is time the MNC's realised that it is the workers that make them the profit, not the manager / CEOs, as for the workers, its time they unite and fight the salvery (in all but name) that is imposed by the capitalist system.
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@jeandenice & DupontdeNemours
you've been suckered by MAII. He's the forum-troll, and as with all trolls it's advisable to ignore him instead of feading it.
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The NPA was actually founded and the LCR dissolved in February 2009, not two years ago as stated in the blog.
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jeandenice
I don't see what water in Bolivia has to do with France. Apparently the left feels democracy should go out the window when a democratically elected government makes decisions they don't agree with. I don't know what you are complaining about though, not given the obscene prices the French charge for bottled water. If the French had more effective water treatment plants and conservation practices, the water out of the kitchen tap would be every bit as good as what comes out of a bottle from an underground spring. Prehaps if your government spent more money on improving its municipal water supplies, it could spend less money on medical treatment for the consequences of drinking it.
If West Europeans think their unsustainable society that is utterly out of touch with the economic realities of the rest of the world can continue on the way it has been going, they are deluding themselves. Your President Sarkozy said upon taking office that the French government was bankrupt. And now that you are tied to the Euro, you can no longer unilaterally just print new money and devalue your currency to pay off old debts. Your government may have gotten away with insisting on the Growth and Stability Pact in Maastrict, with its severe penalties, and then being the only ones who violated it along with Germany and year after year yet at that, have gotten away with it through your thoroughly corrupt political system bribing its way out of the billions in fines it should have paid, but it will not escape the consequences of violating the laws of economics with impunity. There is no one to bribe to get around them. You make nothing I could not buy from somewhere else that is just as good or better for less money except cheese and I've had more than a lifetime's fill of that. You spend far more than what you produce is worth. I don't blame you for being jealous that the USA can do the same and get away with it because it can print money if it has to. But that is an economic fact of life and there will be consequences even for America when it does. Live with it because you can't change it. The EU's economy is probably past the tipping point just as global warming due to climate change is. Ice those precious bottles of your best Champaigne you've been cellaring, the time for one last big bash of a party before it's all over is coming.
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BernardVC
Invariably, calling someone a troll on the internet, especially on blog sites that are pre-moderated is a sign that someone with arguments you strongly disagree with is beating the pants off of you. And I do it with one eye shut and one hand tied behind my back even though I'm up against an entire continent and their misguided traitorous allies in America. Even combined, they are no match for me. I have the facts on my side, those are all the allies I need.
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#27 - MarcusAureliusII
Most tap water in Europe is safe to drink. The fetish for bottled water is almost entirely down to the triumph of marketing over common sense.
#28 - ". . I do it with one eye shut and one hand tied behind my back" - pretending, no doubt, to be Nelson.
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threnodious, you forget, I lived in France for nearly two years. I know what it is to get sick on their water. Why do you think they drink so much wine, because they are all drunkards??? Is that why the British and Germans drink so much beer? I've been in nearly half the US states and have drunk tap water in every one I've been in. I never got sick from any of it even once. Perhaps if the French want something really exotic, they could import their bottled water...from China. I think the French could really improve their export market for their bottled water if they took my advice and invented....ready?...."Vintage Water." Ta Dum :o) The ultimate triumph of marketing over common sense. That's right, each high end water company like Perrier could bottle their water under differnt years, the reserve classification each year being the highest priced. Eau de Chateau Margaux, Premier Grand Cru Classe' en 2009. All of them could receive government controlled official appelations, just like wine. Ordinary bottled water could receive a classification of "eau de table." If nothing else, think of how many new government jobs could be invented just administering it. And think of the industry of professional water tasters, water review magazines, newsletters, different ratings by reviewers, just like wine. Who knows, you or I could become the Robert Parkers of the water tasting industry. But since they didn't think of it themselves first, they will probably just ignore the idea. It's only brilliant if they come up with it first. That's the French for ya. All that's left to do then is for me to go back to the Grand Vin de Chateau Margaux.
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Besancenot says he is "anti-capitalist", and this is not obviously the same than "communist". The first tag can attract more voters than the second one, I'm afraid.
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To MarcusAureliusII (30):
Excuses excuses, you were just not man enough to drink their tap water! A real man drinks tap water, likes it even if throwing his cuts out and later on tells everybody how fine the water was.
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:o)
Mineral Water "Remedy Springs"
Composition: Spring water extract; water
Minimal content of spring water: 50%
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We've got very good water in St. Pete, that is, when it's still in the water distribution centres. There it's a darling, checked by live cray-fish. Checked by other things as well, but the moustachee lobsters kind of we trust better. They go belly up if anything in seconds. Water people stare at them constantly, and when they begin looking funny they rush to do checks.
One cray-fish recently scared all, was reported to be restless, un-quiet. We all thought they are fooling around wuith water data but finally they published he had a heart failure. We don't belive it still.
Anyway then the water travels to the apartments by rusty tubes and becomes rusty and we all gradually turn rusty and full of iron.
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Web Alice
"Mineral Water "Remedy Springs"
Composition: Spring water extract; water
Minimal content of spring water: 50%"
Who do you think you are kidding? We all know the other 50% is vodka.
Do St. Petersburg hospitals or veternary hospitals have ICUs (Intensive Care Units) for Lobsters and Crayfish suffering chest pains, apendicitis, acute gastrointestinal disorders or breathing difficulties? After you treat them, bring them back to health, do you prefer to boil them, steam them, or broil them? Butter and lemon? Wine or "mineral spring water?" Maybe a little Beluga or South Ossetia on the side :o)
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Olivier Besancenot scares the socialists because of his "hitting-the-nail-on-the-head" speeches and the astounding results when one compares NPA population to the French P.S. Although he prones high and low "down with capitalism", this postman (his job) comes from an upper middle class family and has a university degree in history. His wife is the actual litterature diector with Flammarion (the book editors). Capitalism ?
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