France's Undemocratic Minority

From an item on the hopefully limited post-election violence in France, posted at No Pasaran:

What’s driven so much of the social thought which handed Sarkozy what amounts to a landslide is a public frustration with just how little risk of change it takes to bring angry crowds onto the streets.

Think 70’s America and Britain, and think of these several hundreds who were out in the streets tonight trashing out their inability to accept election results as the “dead-enders” of that age in the civilized west.

The sign that the times are changing? The new President called for unity to his own partying supporters. “Je demande que vous tender la main” in an effort to diffuse rancor and reach out to the Socialist, saying that to respect Royal is to respect the millions who voted for her. In reality there’s not much of a stomach left right now for scorched-earth politics.

History has proved that accepting a majority's will regardless of ones' own disappointments is the only place pacifism has figured positively into a sustainable and good society. It looks like it's finally sinking in, even under those red flags.

Risk of change? I'm not convinced casting post-election violence in a democratic state in concepts of contemporary psychology is a good idea. While I suspect even France's undemocratic minority is probably smaller than what some sensationalistic reports of previous violence would suggest, nevertheless, it does appear to have one.

... (a) new social outlook which he urged, almost a form of the “3rd way” which swept the US under Clinton and the UK under Blair that they like to call a ‘Social-Democratic’ view. In effect, it's a more responsible leftism promoting ideas instead of revolutions.

French immigration law has left the country with a small subset of the population which, if it has much of a political history at all, is based upon revolution and not democratic process. In a sense, France is almost the inverse of what we are presently seeing in Iraq, where a hopefully emerging democratic trend is struggling to supplant a non-democratic history.

Sometimes I wonder if ultra-civilized societies in the West haven't become so politically correct that they can't identify genuine armed revolution when they see it, however small in scale, and don't have a prayer of standing up to it until it's mass grows so large as to demand a major confrontation to put it down. That conflict would move well beyond the Paris burbs - with disastrous consequences for France no matter what.

If Iraq is the front line of bringing democracy to the Middle East, certain countries in Europe are the other side of that battle - maintaining order and democracy against a creeping non-democratic intent. We need them to succeed and should wish them luck. Unfortunately, I do think they'll need it. The struggle will last longer than the one in Iraq and France and some others don't have the luxury to think about how they might re-deploy.

See No Pasaran   Pajamas Media and Fausta for updates and more.

Comments

[nova]

It was only several hundred who protested the election results in France out of a 70 million voter turnout. 85 per cent of French voters voted. I wish the USA could get a turnout that high.

[seekeronos]

"I wish the USA could get a turnout that high."

Political stupor is cultivated by a mediocrity of the candidates.

If only we had some folks running that would take a stand instead of flip-flopping (Romney), pandering (Hillary), or otherwise bringing something to the table that gave the voters a clear picture.

As much as I detest Dennis Kuchinich (sp?) for his views, I'd give him marks for at least being consistent in his beliefs and his stand. The man is a far left raving looney, but consistently so.

On the Right, I'd rather see someone with a similar stomach and the vision to drive this nation away from all the special interests and other institutions of political correctness.

Fred Thompson looks like he could be that man, if he should choose to run.

[Cindi]

Nova, I went back and found this in my fliles. Don't have the direct link anymore. Having worked in the last presidential I was curious about voter turn out
Sixty-four percent of U.S. citizens age 18 and over voted in the 2004 presidential election, up from 60 percent in 2000, the U.S. Census Bureau reported today. Tables from a November survey also show that of 197 million citizens, 72 percent (142 million) reported they were registered to vote. Among those registered, 89 percent (126 million) said they voted. In the 2000 election, 70 percent of citizens were registered; and among them, 86 percent voted.

seek, did you watch the video of Fred from the lincoln club?

[southdakotaboy]

It just goes to show you that as long as people don't feel affected by things they don't care about voting. As soon as it hits them they turn out. So low voter turn out is a rather good indicator that most people aren't feeling threatened byh anything. Looking at it that way low voter turn out is a good thing.

[Fred Beloit]

I've read that about 50% of the US population pay no taxes. I suppose of this number some are children, others are homeless or in deep poverty. But is it a good thing to have high vote participation from this group? Why would they care if taxes are increased? I don't propose they be denied the vote, but encouraging it among this group is not necessarily a good thing for tax-payers.

[nova]

I suppose you could look at it as "the masses are asses" therefore the fewer who vote the better. But a high turnout like the French voters just did says they want CHANGE. Now I have heard it said that the French say they want change but they really do not. So only time will tell. Sarkozy may be terrible or he may be good but I do think he will try to make some changes to pull France out of the doldrums. Jimmy Carter said we had "malaise" and look where that got him.

[Zifnab]

"Looking at it that way low voter turn out is a good thing."

I'm sorry, but from where I sit, low voter turn-out breeds extremism and corruption. Low turn-out means low accountability, a tendency to feed your hardened base red meat rather than aiming for the middle-ground, and a higher incumbancy rate.

It's a shame that you need a major polorizing issue like Iraq or gay marriage to get people to the polls, but better you have people packing the booths in disgust than staying home in apathy. I've yet to see an election year in which either political party has been full of so many saints that they don't deserve to seriously contested in primaries or general elections.

[seekeronos]

"It's a shame that you need a major polorizing issue like Iraq or gay marriage to get people to the polls..."

Seeing as gay marriage affects an even smaller subset of the estimated 1.3~1.8% of the American population that is eligible to vote, I'd hardly consider that to be a polarizing issue. Going from Cindi's numbers, and extracting about 170M voters... you'd still only have around 2.6M votes likely to pull for LGBT marriage, assuming of course, that all those LGBT voters vote as a single block.

I'm not sure how many Democrats of the hetero stripe will go out of the way to vote just for LGBT issues, but I suspect that if the particular issue doesn't touch them, they may not care one way or the other.

Compare that however, to the dedicated masses of GOP voters (who are likely to identify with social and spiritual traditions that preclude the public endorsement of LGBT marriage, much less plan for the upheavals to the insurance industry, health care industry, the tax system, or many other institutions that would have to re-configure just because "we the people" decided to federally legalize gay marriage.

In fact, LGBT family issues should be decided on the state level: why should folks in the heartland be forced to deal with recognizing a federally imposed definition of LGBT marriage or human-animal marriage, or whatever perversions that will sure follow it?

In the same vein, states with a considerable moonbat population (most of the northeast, and the pacific coast states) can vote to legalize and implement LGBT and all other kinds of unholy unions.

As for the war, now... that affects as as a Union of States. And, I think that barring the leftist MSM brainwashing the lot of us, we just might be surprised come Nov. 2008 after the polls close.

As touching Fred Thompson (answering Cindi) ... I think that Fred has a lot of good ideas, and is not afraid to address the hard questions, especially concerning adjusting the SSA to a position that could better meet the reality of Americans not reproducing at a satisfactory rate to "replenish" the aging Baby Boomers. Touching on immigration, I'm not opposed to it, so long as it is handled in a way that isn't opening the door to chaos for the sake of extra votes (current Dem policy: Free Dinner at the Taxpayer's expense if you vote Dem!!).

He might be (as someone else in another thread suggested) a "globalist", but by comparison to the globalism of the Bushes, he is still much closer to being a nationalist than any of the rat's nest of mediocre candidates currently in the field.

[seekeronos]

I might have been unclear on one thing: to clarify further on "globalism" as a trade policy, I regard it in much the same way that Washington seems to have by his statement that we should, as a nation, "avoid entangling alliances".

For me, this would mean engaging in trade so much as it does not come into direct conflict with our national security interests. Personally, I would favour a mild "protectionism", in the form of light tarriffs to offset our tax burden somewhat, particularly with nations that we do not favour diplomatically.

Free Trade within our immediate economic sphere of influence seems like a good idea, but I'm not a fan of NAFTA/FTAA or the SPP where we would be forced to give up our sovereignty along the lines of the EU nations though.

In short, (if I may make an analogy) I'm willing to trade my some of my butter for some of your flour, but don't tell me how to bake my cakes.