Paris, January 17, 2023, by Socrates George Kazolias
This is an abstract from a long and on-going discussion I am having with an American friend on the ‘misconceptions’ of what is happening in Ukraine and on Putin and Russia. I am convinced Russia is on the right side of history here.
Some say it is a totalitarian move, apartheid, a health dictatorship; others claim that it is the only way to get French people to accept to be vaccinated and stop the spread of Covid. The one thing everybody agrees on is that, if you want a life, and a job, after mid-September, you will need to prove you have had both Covid shots at all times.
The Germans are a funny bunch. Germany is certainly Europe’s most successful nation and yet probably among the most stressed of its people. Just a few of my observations as we enter an uncertain 2020. Oh mein Gott!
Stuttgart– I must give credit where credit is due: the Germans listen to each other. I think this is in part because German grammar throws their verbs at the very end of every sentence which forces you to wait for the conclusion to know what they are really trying to say before you can yell back. For those who don’t understand German, it is easy to think they only discuss serious things which, in fact, is not necessarily wrong.
Forty-thousand French citizens could find themselves without a bank account at the end of the year because French banks are unable to meet the US tax information reporting law known as FACTA (1), according to Laurent Mignon, the head of the French Banking Federation, FFB. In all there could be more than 300 thousand people across Europe who will have no place to park their money and collect their salaries in 2020.
Paris Rioting hit mainly the chic districts, targetting the symbols of wealth and the 1%: 5-star-hotels, luxury cars, banks, jewelry stores…
After two weeks of Yellow Vest protests, government insults and deaf ears, President Emmanuel Macron is scrambling for answers but unwilling to compromise. There is a no-confidence vote is in the making, the left and right oppositions are calling for new legislative elections and an already weakened economy is teetering. This leaderless, grassroots movement by mainly angry, lower and middle income white French families, may still peter-out, and then again, as I wrote on November 22, in ‘France’s Deplorables Explained’ (Click here), it may not.
Russian Radio asked me, an American reporter based in Paris, to analyze the Yellow Vest Revolt in France. This is a five minute excerpt from that interview. Just click on the icon below or click here.
Please leave a comment.
“A medieval peasant revolt with social media. An Arab Spring without the Arabs. Don’t underestimate the potential danger of the Yellow Vests.”
They are the ‘deplorables’ of France. They get up early and go to work. If they were American, they would be those that make up Trumps hardcore base but no French worker is stupid enough to believe a billionaire can represent their interests. In the 1960s and early 70s they would have voted Communist. Today they vote for Marine Le Pen’s National Rally and other hard right conservatives. The Yellow Vests are White and ethnic French. They are mad as Hell and won’t take it any more! (1.)
Real unemployment in the US is much higher than the official figures tell us, perhaps over 20%. “Figures […]
German tax payers will not pay other people’s debt. This is in substance what the Chancellor, Angela Merkel, told the Frankfurter Algemeine Sonntagszeitung, June 3, when she said there could be no “union of the debt.” The comment was in response to news out of Italy that the new ‘populist’ coalition wants the European Central Bank to forgive 250 billion euros in Italian debt. The problem is, when you forgive debt, someone has to pay, and in Europe, that someone is Germany; the only EU country whose economy is strong enough to prop up the euro.
“A quarter of Europe’s inhabitants — more than half of them under the age of 30 — will be ‘Africans’ in 2050.” This is the startling conclusion Stephen Smith draws in his new book: La Ruée Vers l’Europe (The Rush for Europe). (1.)
The Professor of African Studies at Duke University has shaken France so deeply that President Emanuel Macron and National Front leader, Marine Le Pen, both referred to him in TV interviews in March.
KazoDaily 