What to think of Fillon’s conviction? The notorious French Thatcherite was a shameless embezzler!
Headline: Former French PM sentenced to jail for embezzlement
Sub-headline: François Fillon found guilty over wife’s fake job as parliamentary aide
François Fillon, the former French prime minister, has been sentenced to jail for embezzlement after paying his wife more than €1m of state funds for work she never did, in a scandal that derailed the centre-right campaign in the 2017 presidential election and enabled Emmanuel Macron’s victory.
Mr Fillon, who had been the leading candidate for the presidency before the scandal broke, was found guilty on Monday by a French court and sentenced to five years in prison, with three years suspended, barred from political office for 10 years and fined €375,000.…
Later in this news report: the impending trials of Balladur and Sorkozy contribute to the political piquancy :
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Another former PM, Édouard Balladur, faces trial over allegations that cash was funneled from arms sales to his 1995 presidential campaign. While former president Nicolas Sarkozy is also facing trial, probably this year, in a campaign finance case for allegedly overspending by more than €20m in his 2012 run for the presidency. Mr Sarkozy also faces a separate trial in October for influence-peddling after allegedly attempting to bribe a judge in a different investigation.
…
https://www.ft.com/content/855679e6-53eb-4d5b-9825-a1b3f4444e18
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Headline: Macron has changed prime minister but is unlikely to change course
Sub-headline: Ditching the premier has seldom worked as a route to political revival in France
In early June, Emmanuel Macron announced that the enormity of the coronavirus crisis was a chance to reinvent himself. On Friday the French president set about the task — by reinventing his prime minister. After three years leading the government, Edouard Philippe will return to the port city of Le Havre, where he was recently re-elected as mayor in a landslide. Modesty and competence had turned Mr Philippe into a more popular figure than the president, who seems unable to correct the impression he is arrogant and out of touch.
…
https://www.ft.com/content/9dc773b6-2295-4259-b821-a78d227faddc
As usual, with The Financial Times’ reports on Macron, and his Neo-Liberal regime, that is awash in the low grade apologetics for his once highfalutin Jupertarian Politics, that has reached a series of ,what to call them? A series of confrontations, with the open rebellion by the gilets jaunes, gilets noirs and the gilets femmes. This rebellion is unreported in this ‘newspaper’, that mimics the Pravda of another time and place! The curious need only seek out the videos, posted nearly everyday on Twitter, for the unwelcome news about that rebellion in near ‘real-time‘.
The Critical Reader should not engage in misplaced schadenfreude, as it offers a limited pleasure in the misfortunes of others. It is the ersatz replacement for strategic political thinking and action.
Old Socialist
My reply to Gerard
Thank you for your comment. ‘The gilet jaune rebellion lives on mainly in the fevered imaginations of far-right revolutionaries around the world.’
The above quote from your reply, I find puzzling, since I am on ‘The Left’, I thought that was readily apparent? But the gilets jaunes seemed to be the point of confluence ,that attracted followers from across the political spectrum, in opposition to Macron’s Neo-Liberal Project.Your final sentence is preposterous on its face. The Financial Times led the way, in its scare mongering against ‘the great unwashed’ rebels’ from below. Its about ‘class’ and ‘caste’ , in a seemingly endless collapsing Late Capitalism. Have I established my ‘Left Credentials’?
The gilets jaunes and Corbyn were the favorite villains, in the Neo-Liberal coterie’s hysterical Political Melodrama, endlessly repeated as if it were Holy Writ!
As to your longer comment above , it is pure bourgeois Liberalism, expressed in the Neo-Liberal patois of Enlightened Capital, and Macron as its exemplar. Macron’s attempt at Austerity, no matter how piecemeal, has pushed that Jupertarian Politics to the political periphery. All that is left is Macron’s burning political ambition to replace Merkel as the titular leader of the EU. Such is my sketch of the political territory.Regards,
StephenKMackSD
