The French Will Never Leave the Cafes Now

Socialist France moved further to the left of Putin’s Russia. The French just elected President the leftist Francois Hollande who professes to be the protector of the poor, wants more government handouts (stimulus), and rejects the austerity measures that his predecessor Nicolas Sarkozy had cobbled with Angela Merkel, the German Chancellor.  

The promise to restore generous social welfare programs brought many enthusiastic French to the polls. They were angry with Sarkozy’s vulgar demeanor, his anti-immigration and integration rhetoric, and immediate intentions to reduce the national debt which is unmanageable without austerity measures.

Hollande promised to tax the “rich,” a mirror image of our government’s rhetoric, “the rich don’t pay their fair share.” It was instantaneous music to the ears of the French work ethic. They take pride in reduced workweek, tenure on the first day of work, extended vacations paid by the state, and early retirement. “C’est la vie” and it is very self-indulgent.

Handing out more government dependence (stimulus money) means that the French will never have to leave the cafés now. Occupying all chairs, sipping wine, and chain-smoking, they will be looking down their noses at the inferior uncouth American tourists walking by in their dreadful tennis shoes and awful blue jeans, smiling like idiots.

Socialists have given up any pretense of preserving their national identity – Muslim immigrants who refuse to integrate into French society and remain in their self-appointed ghettos, no longer accessible to French citizens, will eventually outnumber them.

Hollande’s campaign was the “change” Europe needed. He said in a victory speech, “In all the capitals…there are people who give thanks to us, who are hoping, who are looking to us, and who want to finish with austerity. You are a movement lifting up everywhere in Europe, and perhaps the world.” He made no mention of the welfare system that takes up 28 percent of France’s GDP.

Hollande will take office May 16 and his first trip will likely be to Berlin to advocate against the government cuts treaty that Sarkozy negotiated with Merkel. He also intends to pull troops out of Afghanistan by the end of the year.

In line with Keynesian economists and far left socialists, Hollande will push for more government spending in order to stimulate economic growth. He wants to tax the rich (anyone making over one million euros) at 75 percent rate and allow retirement at 60 instead of 62, hire more teachers, reduce France’s “dependence” on nuclear energy, legalize euthanasia, and gay marriage. I am trying to figure out how hiring more teachers is going to stimulate or improve the economy. How will he replace the cheap and dependable nuclear energy? Will legalized euthanasia save money?

Jean-Thomas Lesueur gauged the dire economic situation very aptly. “As usual, France went into a bubble and didn’t broach the serious issues. As soon as the election is over, reality will explode in our faces like a grenade and the erosion of public finances will be the big issue for the next president.” (Institut Thomas More, Paris)

If socialists get a majority in the lower house of parliament in June, they will have complete power since they control the Senate. Supporters of Francois Mitterrand, the last socialist president, must be overjoyed.

It is going to be an interesting economic summer since the Greeks will possibly reject the bailout deal. The leader of the Coalition for the Radical Left, Alexi Tsipras, charged with forming a coalition government in Greece, told reporters that the Greek bailout agreement is “null and void.”

Additionally, Tsipras, who does not call himself a Marxist, wants to nationalize banks, restore all salaries and pensions to previous higher levels and bring back union’s collective bargaining rights. He places the financial blame on the International Monetary Fund, the European Union, and the European Central Bank.

There is no hint or admission of personal responsibility for the welfare state of Greece, for people retiring at 50 in over 600 professions, lengthy vacations paid by the government, free rides on the metro in Athens, widespread cheating on taxes, two extra pay checks at the end of year, socialized medicine, and other entitlements for citizens and illegal immigrants.

It appears that the Marxists are on the march again, stronger than ever, crawling out of the darkness into the spotlight, brazenly, all over Europe and America, demanding the spread of wealth, taxing and taking by force someone’s earned income, rioting to get it, and voting en masse for more welfare. What happens when everybody runs out of other people’s money and taxing the rich 100 percent will not cure the basic problem that ails these countries, sloth, entitlement, and social overspending?