As long as it’s mutual, so 18-30 year old EU citizens can live and work in the UK with little restriction, I’m all for this. I imagine there may be people in the UK who will take issue with that.
What’s crazy is that it was revealed that the leave campaign was all intentionally lies and that it wasn’t what people actually wanted and the government just said “too bad.”
Because they only have to start the fire, the native population does the rest. All Russia does is exploit historical cultural tensions within a country and fan the flames online. I’ve always said in the past that some of the research psychologists and sociologists have done over the last century or so was the equivalent of developing WMDs when it comes to psyops. Once a competent psyops department is equipped with how to manipulate people en masse, they can do crazy damage without firing a shot. The US and other countries have done the same thing to great effect.
Edit: I should point out that this form of psyops is most effective in countries with minimal censorship and liberal freedom of speech laws, i.e. most Western countries. That’s why it isn’t as effective when westerners attempt to do the same to countries like China, Russia, Iran, etc.
It’s too raw and toxic for anyone to go near it. Labour will probably tinker around with the deals, maybe pull back on some of the super hard more insane stuff.
Once they’ve had a go and proved that neither party can make it work the conversation can start properly.
The thing is, that won’t work well either. The UK had a very special position previously in the EU, like not adopting the Euro as currency and many other extra “perks” or whatever you want to call it. If they go back in they will likely not get any of those since otherwise it will look really bad for other countries that recently joined. Then people will be unhappy about joining again because it is not what they remembered. So, no, there is no winning with this one, damage is done.
They won’t be allowed back under the same terms they had before the exit. For example every new member has to become part of the Eurozone and adopt the Euro. I definitely see this becoming a dealbreaker for British conservatives who love to have their master King on their currency
Definitely agree the UK wouldn’t get the same terms it had before but I think currency is probably something they could negotiate to keep.
The UK was before and hypothetically would be again one of the biggest economies in the EU and the politicians know what the symbolism of giving up currency would mean to the British.
I really just couldn’t see them letting that stand in the way.
Having said all that, UK isn’t going to be trying to join the EU for a while yet, if ever.
I see this as the EU moving pieces to influence the UK people to revert brexit in a generation (Bregret? Breback?). It benefits the demographic that was already against brexit and keeps the idea od Europe in their minds.
I doubt is for cheap labor. I work in London and in a team of 20 we have a single British, and the few in the company tend to have an easier path for leadership, so why leave? That has been similar in all my previous jobs.
Pretty sure that if you’re a spy, reporter is probably the worst possible cover, since a reporter is already someone that very clearly snoops, and snooping people get watched closely.
I think a much better spy would be a native born Russian, working in a lower-level job where people don’t pay a whole lot of attention to them.
Do you actually think that intelligence agencies are only in contact with one guy? Why wouldn’t the CIA be interested in a reporter traveling to Russia to do a story about Wagner?
Yeah I agree, it’s impossible to know if he’s a spy or not. He might even not know he had shared intresset with other agencies, someone might have led him closer to Wagner than he initially intended.
But he does raise a lot of questions for the Russian it intelligence.
Well, yeah, of course I cannot be certain. I am not that guy. That’s why I’m just trying to apply some basic sense. A spy to me is a person doing espionage work specifically for their government. The difference with a journalist is a journalist is not working specifically for their government, and will publicly publish their findings where a spy would usually not.
I think we have a different view of spying, this can also be Russians just want a prisoner swap.
All intelligence services have people working for them undercover, you can be hired by or talked into doing x and y by an some intelligence service, you can also be asked to share information with them. They can even help you getting in contact with the right people to make what ever you’re trying to do easier.
You can say that a journalist will publish it findings, but also the journalist can do a lot of other things. I mean I can think of multiple things that the CIA would be interested in that is not necessarily related to the journalistic job. Like recruiting a spy inside Wagner, milking information that is a secret: locations, personnel or arsenal. It can also be a damageing story, Russias official stance is that Wagner is not controlled by the state.
Is he a spy? Does he become a spy if he is spying?
Anyways we don’t know, Russia maybe just wants s prisoner swap, and maybe this journalist was digging in places that he shouldn’t have. We arrest Russian and Chinese spies all the time, some of them are working as journalists.
Certainly, a journalist could be an asset or informant or whatever you’d want to call it, for an intelligence service. He’s putting himself and his professional reputation at risk though. If the intelligence service wanted x piece of information about whatever, there are simply easier ways to get it. Bribe a Russian.
You don’t need to ask the American guy that everyone already knows about and is probably being watched to go look at it for you.
I also haven’t heard of any journalists being arrested for espionage in the west.
I’ve got news for you guys, one of these things is going to radically affect the other.
Maybe the key to getting old people to care about climate change is to frame the mass displacement and migration that will occur as a direct result of it.
That is pretty genius for sure but I think the issue is that these people think that once shit hits the fan they will be able to stop the desperate masses at their border by legalisation or whatever.
Yes exactly. Everyone on earth that doesn’t like the idea of paint being sprayed on it is also pushing for a motorway to be built right through it. No exceptions, no questions, no quarter
socratic method: a method of teaching by question and answer; used by Socrates to elicit truths from his students en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socratic_method
Well, it’s a risky move. Especially since just tonight, Far Right won by a landslide in the EU Parliement elections, so it’s likely the results will play against him.
Many of us (in the french subs) think it might be an attempt on his part to get far right into power through the parliment to show electors that all they spout is bull, and make them to suffer hard losses in the 2027 presidential elections.
Edit: some news drop and he apparently believes he can make big wins in this one. We’ll see if this bet will pay off, but personally, I sincerly doubt it will ¯_(ツ)_/¯
Honestly (that’s just my personal opinion but) with the way he’s been acting in the past few weeks after polls gave Far Right far ahead of his party, Macron’s been looking more and more and more desperate. He tried debates between his PM and the Far Right candidate, made a big speech 2 days before the election to plea against far right (a speech in which were pointed out his many contradictions), his PM intervined out of the blue in a debate between each party’s lead EU MEP (most awkward moment in a political debate I’ve ever seen, denounced by every journalist union).
His popularity has been dwindling (with reason) since 2017 and only won the 2022 elections by virtue of not being far right (and the people refused to give him majority in the parliement in exchange). In the past two years, he’s been enacting austerity measure after austerity measure several of which with zero approval, bypassed parliement to get them into law, and barely avoided having his governement destituted (by parliement) by the skin of his teeth. And you know what’s worst? His austerity measures didn’t even ‘save public finances’ because following each of them, he gave additional tax breaks to companies, which means our budget deficit is in a worse shape than it was in 2017.
Long story short, he’s been playing stupid games for the last few years, and the stupid price is that Far Right is now the first party in France and nobody has a clue on how to get them down bar them completely failing at ruling.
(Of course it isn’t just his fault that Far Right is on the rise, but he IS a pretty big cause)
Far Right is now the first party in France and nobody has a clue on how to get them down bar them completely failing at ruling.
Is this another case of doing like the neoliberals do over in the States, trying everything but measures that would actually help the populace instead of funneling their money into wealthy people’s pockets?
Ehh… a proper political analyst would probably add some nuance to that, but that’s a kind of how it feels (the austerity measures were like pills forced down our throats that only made us sicker). Keep in mind there are other factors in play like:
billionaires buying out more and more newspapers/TV channels and giving far right way more coverage than any other party
beyond wealth gap increase, inflation being on the rise + the disastruous state of the housing market made people poorer and poorer
the soc-dems have messed up their presidency back in 2012 and the traditional right wing having imploded after a big scandal and Macron’s surge
Russia apparently paying huge desinformation campaigns here
No, it really isn’t… being able to essentially declare no confidence in your legislature and immediately begin the election process is, in general, a great thing.
France is just an odder case than most parliamentary systems. In short, this places the heads of government closer to the will of the people and requires more coalition building when there isn’t a clear consensus for policy from the electorate.
Most parliamentary systems also allow snap elections - there is usually a maximum length allowed before the next election but the PM can always call one earlier.
This has happened pretty frequently up here in Canada and Trudeau will time elections after good news if the LPC polling particularly strongly.
I think this is an overall good thing, it means that as long as a party is delivering success about once every four years it can remain in power - while allowing it to do the unpopular but necessary things in the interim. A hated party can’t survive in power, but a party that invests in the long term can thrive… it does have a dark side though. The party in power may engage in frivolous bullshit before the election (like unproductive handouts) to try and sway public opinion. It’s up to the public to see through short term bullshit and judge a party more long-term.
It doesn’t belong to the president, no. Think of it as Macron basically asking the French people if this (the anti-EU coalition that did so well in the election) is what they want as a whole. Because if so, their parliament is not properly representing their views.
It seems weird as an american for anyone in the executive branch to have the power to dissolve the legislative, even if (and I assume there are) requirements for an election in X amount of time, can’t do it too often, etc.
Here in the US Congress isn’t just lawmakers, they do investigations, have committees, etc. and act as a check on executive power. It would be weird if the US president would be able to just dissolve Congress
Interesting viewpoint. As a fellow American, I think that that kind of power would actually give POTUS the amount of power that the public seems to think they have. It’s really the only way the federal government has to hold a Swiss-style referendum on a topic.
even if (and I assume there are) requirements for an election in X amount of time, can’t do it too often, etc.
I think the check there is “Why have you done this twice in 6 months? Parliament/Congress/Legislature, please impeach this clown.”
Here in the US Congress isn’t just lawmakers, they do investigations, have committees, etc. and act as a check on executive power
Most legislatures around the world do the same things? I’m not sure why you think the French government is so different, especially given how much French culture/politics/philosophy influenced the Founding Farmers.
I think you forget that America has created possibly the dumbest election cycle known to man. I imagine it’s not nearly as drawn out in France, especially for a snap election like this.
Also, an impeachment would 100% override the dissolution. That happens in America, too, before you mention it; when an impeachment vote is called pretty much everything else comes to a standstill.
I think it’s reasonable to call it centrist, despite also being right-wing (ie centre-right)
To me, centrism isn’t just about being somewhere in the middle between the left and right of the political environment, but also about having policies that make small adjustments to the current system, as opposed to fundamental, large scale change
having policies that make small adjustments to the current system
Well, that’s not really what happened the past few years. Civil rights and social protections have been degraded wayyy faster than by previous rightwing (not claiming to be centrist) governments. Structural change has happened several times, making big changes in some areas. Macron and their buddies don’t want to play it small, they want to make big changes.
Do you have some examples of the structural changes he’s made? My understanding (disclaimer: I’m not french, so don’t follow their politics as closely) was that one of the biggest frustrations both from the left and right is his refusal to make any real change
The biggest event I can think of from his presidency is the retirement change age, but it stands out more to me because of the backlash than the significance of the change itself
As I see it, the biggest frustration from the left is that he makes right-wing changes.
The right pretends to be frustrated by his policies because they need to disagree if they want to have a reason to exist - and they’ve been leaning towards the far right for years to find a place on the political spectrum because Macron took their place.
A few examples, I hope I’ll be able to explain correctly.
So in France we got something called the “prudhommes” which is a board that specializes in dealing with employee vs company legal matters. Usually, when you get fired and you think they didn’t do it right, you go to the prudhommes and you can sue them for money.
The prudhommes are important for the workers because they can charge bug fines to the companies, and once one worker has won their case, it becomes easier for their colleagues to do so if they were wronged in the same way.
It’s a powerful tool that kind of forces companies to follow the “code du travail” aka workers’ rights.
When he changed (read: degraded) lots of stuff about workers’ rights just after his first election in 2017, Macron introduced an important change: there is now a maximum amount that the prudhommes can force a company to pay. This changes the balance of power because now companies can now how much breaking the law will cost them and decide that it’s the cost of doing business. Worst thing is, this amount can be changed by the government at any time without requiring a vote from the national assembly - this is read by many commenters as the start if the prudhommes’ dismantlement.
In France, we’ve had (I believe since the eighties) a kind of universal basic income. It’s far from a livable income (it’s around 600€/month currently) but it’s still more than nothing. You need to be french (we wouldn’t want to share nice thingd with refugees, right?) and jump through a few hoops to claim it, but it exists. Until Macron, the only condition you had to fulfill was having no other income.
This is used a lot by people who are unable to work but can’t apply for unemployment or sick pay mechanisms. It’s always been the last safety: when everything else fails, at least you get something.
Since Macron, you now have to be actively looking for a job to qualify for it. Which means that if your unemployment office thinks you’re not looking hard enough, you can get excluded from this income and have absolutely nothing (which then leads to homelessness and a whole life of fun). And of course over the past 7 years of Macron, the unemployment offices are under an ever increasing pressure to find people who are not deserving enough.
In terms of image, Macron took lessons from Trump: truth and facts don’t matter and you don’t even have to be coherent. Time and time again, he and his governement have lied, contradicted themselves… They are of course not the first to do it, but they are the first to not give a shit. Before Macron, they tried not to get caught lying, and when they got caught they tried to get out of it “that’s not what I meant”. Sometimes they even apologized. Macron and his government have had a different strategy: we don’t even care.
When Macron visited the french carribean, he said in a public discourse “the chlordecone [a nasty pesticid wildly used by french companies in the carribean until y2k] is not cancerigen”. Right after the discourse, scientists and physicians were like “well yes it is, it’s been known for 30 years”. Macron didn’t even bother answering himself, but his services blantly told the press “he never said it was not cancerigen” even though he said it a few hours earlier in front of all tvs and radios. This is just one example of something that now happens weekly.
These changes might seem small, not structural. But they change fundamental things in the balances of power, the way we treat people and the way we do politics. Especially since there are lots and lots of them in a lot of areas, when you take them together, french legislative and checks/balances landscapes have changed a lot in 7 years, much more so than they had since the nineties (Idk before that).
Macron is from the bourgeoisie, is fighting the class war and has been waging and winning more battles than his predecessors by a lot. He is not interested in the status quo at all.
I hope this makes sense and answers your question ;)
Then you are forever looking out the Overton window, and are beholden to those who move it. In this case, Macron has moved it, so you think it’s the center.
The Overton window describes movement on a political axis by views held palatable to the public but does not reject the concept of objective definitions of “right” or “left.”
For example, the Overton Window would imply that there were right, left, and center Nazi party members. And there are, in the frame of the Fucking Nazis, but that doesn’t make a “left” Nazi an actual socialist.
Saying “Macron isn’t center” can be taken as an objective assessment of his politics. And it’s correct. He is not a centrist. Who don’t actually fucking exist anyways, but whatever.
So, basically, OP is saying you’re playing the fascists’ game when you let them define politics by relativism instead of objectivity. Bowing to the terminology of the Overton eventually leads to arguing about which “centrist Nazi” you find most palatable.
Yup, we opened an office and warehouse in Germany for EU sale instead of shipping into our UK HQ warehouse and out to the EU. The costs of the new German branch are far less than the costs for shipping into our UK HQ and back out to the EU.
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