(Bloomberg) -- Prime Minister Michel Barnier warned that France has reached its “moment of truth,” as far-right leader Marine Le Pen is set to join a left-wing coalition to topple his government as soon as this week.Most Read from BloombergAs Wars Rage, Cities Face a Dark New Era of Urban DestructionRiyadh Metro Partially Opens in Bid to Ease City’s Traffic JamsSubscribe to the Bloomberg Daybreak podcast on Apple, Spotify or anywhere you listen.Le Pen’s National Rally as well as a leftist
I agree with everything you said, except for this part. Obama was way more left than Clinton, and Biden was way more left than Obama. Pardoning marijuana prisoners, investing in a big way in climate change and unions, and forgiving student loans were about 5 times more than the big project of health care that Obama took on, alongside all the drone strikes and transfers of police equipment. And bailing out the banks. Biden actually raised corporate taxes in a huge way, which basically never happens in American politics.
I would be surprised in one person in ten knows that any of that massive stuff happened. All they know is weird little talking-points that always seem to point in one particular direction… of which, and I’m not trying to be rude because like I said I mostly agree with you, “everything is always sliding to the right so what’s the difference” is a huge one. In certain segments of the left. Other segments have other collections of talking points.
You’re right, I actually had a second take when writing this sentence, for exactly the reasons you state. France and the US aren’t exactly comparable, but to me it seems the Macron “center” and the US democrats are left leaning in social issues, and go with the times, there’s that, but hard right in economy with neoliberalism, trying to run a country like a private business (yes, the education department costs money, it’s public service!) , and crony capitalism. That’s what I was thinking about with the sliding to the right bit. In both countries the main media belong to billionaires pushing hard the far right agenda. It’s exhausting. We mobilised to avoid for the far right to outright win the legislative elections, but I can’t be confident we’ll be so successfull in the next presidential elections. We have a real left here, but they’ll bicker and split when it matters the most. It’s baffling.