Well yes, but it was also done by such upstanding “gentlemen” as Churchill.
It’s about as relevant to the thread as whether I’m personally inconvenienced by the strike or not. Hasn’t stopped you harping on about it for the best part of half the thread.
The army should be brought in. There’s this thing called “representative democracy”. We elect a government to make hard decisions on our behalf. Don’t like those decisions? Vote them out at the next election. Don’t shut down the damned country (and half your continent) because you aren’t getting your own way. That’s bullshit. Nobody in the West is living in a tyranny where the only recourse is civil disobedience.
That the government should hold ultimate power, not unelected unions? You tell me.
In a democracy, the government’s power to act is limited by, among other things, the right of the people to strike. Your conclusion that this exercise of this right amounts to “subversives destabilizing the country” is pure hyperbole, of the kind employed by people who have no interest in protecting civil rights.
Really? How many people have to go on strike for this annoyance to become a “right”? Should 25% of the population, unhappy with the current situation, be able to make life intolerable for the rest, with the government given no recourse to act in the public and nation’s interest?
“Intolerable”? “Nation’s interest”? More hyperbole.
Almost all exercise of civil and human rights creates a likelihood of inconveniencing someone else. You’re going to have to do better than that to show that it has reached the point that militarization of civil society is called for.
The *people *should hold ultimate power. It’s a [del]democracy[/del]republic, not a leased monarchy.
Try 70%. That’s the current proportion of French people who are behind the strikes (cite). Your 25% figure is actually a bit higher than the government’s approval rating, which was sitting at a record 21% last I heard. That’s record for the entire span of the Fifth Republic, mind you, not just this administration.
So, should fewer than 25% of the population, happy with the current situation, be able to push their self-serving reforms, which are intolerable for the rest, with the victims given no recourse to act in their own interest ? And if they try, roll in the tanks ?
Well fuck that, pardon my French.
Self-serving reforms? Well, I guess yeah, they are self-serving as they benefit France.
I doubt there are many economists (certainly outside of France) that see these reforms as anything but an essential and inevitable change.
As for power residing with the people, unfortunately you’re right.
The job of government is not to represent the consensus view (which in the case of public spending will always be spend, spend, spend, as seen in California), but to run the country as experts.
However, if the public want to dig their heels in about something, then government ultimately has to capitulate, as has been seen now many times in france.
If y’all deny them the right to strike, they’ll strike in protest. The only solution is public executions, but that might be seen as an overreaction…
Why can’t you wait 18 months to vote the bums out of office?
Well, there’s always Ronald Reagan’s solution. Mind, I’m no fan of Reagan in general. But in this case he was right. When the U.S. controllers went on strike, in violation of their work rules, Reagan simply fired all of them, and had the FAA start hiring new ones who would agree not to go on strike.
I was thinking of Reagan when I posted earlier.
It wouldn’t work, anyway. The “they” who will strike in protest of being denied the right to strike are much of the rest of France. Really, the only solution is to tell Frank Castle that the French are intimately involved in human trafficking and drop him in the middle of Paris.
they are on strike, just fly over them and no one will notice 
Well Reagan actually had the law on his side band I vaguely recall reading that the whole deal negatively affected airline safety foe years after.
Last time the ATC guys went on strike in the US they were all fired and then banned from ever working for the Federal government in an capacity or as an air traffic controller in any capacity.
Of course, the delay while new ATC personnel were trained (a multi-year process) was pretty damn disruptive, too, and arguably continued longer than a strike would have. But Reagan taught those damned dirty controllers a lesson, he did!
It’s illegal for ATC to strike in the US. It always has been. That’s only been challenged once, and none of those guys ever worked in aviation ever again.
I’m interested, in general, in the matter of fighting ignorance, as to what service providers find it illegal to strike in the UK. And, specifically, do “various other services” include ATCs?
Sorry, you dont elect anything. You’re a British subject, if you want to elect the French government, you’re free to move to France and ask for French citizenship. Until then, you’re free to shut up.
France’s airspace belongs to France, and that’s the end of that.
The right to strike is a constitutional principle, meaning no treaties, including the EU treaties, can supersede that.
The only thing would be France deciding to change its Constitution to amend that.
Like pouring out fire on gasoline.
Incidentally: the whole “French are too irresponsible to govern themselves”, wow, do you have to wear a Pith helmet when writing that?
What, we’re not allowed to comment on actions in other sovereign states now? This message board is going to get awkward from now on…
They may have the right to strike, but we have the right to be pissed off by it, and discuss it on a message board. We also have the right to debate general principles of politics and democracy.
Well, that’s a glaring flaw in the constitution then.
As a practical matter there is a line at which government must interfere, and in which other states may be compelled to act; the point at which serious harm is being caused.
If a government stood by and let emergency services, power station engineers etc strike routinely, a prosperous nation could be reduced to poverty rapidly, and where would that leave people’s retirement plans?
Sorry but the OP made it very clear that it wasnt over a concern for France’s well being that he was pissed off but because his flight had been delayed (or not. It wasnt very clear if he was complaining about something that actually happened to him, or could have happened to him. Or may. It’s hard to tell with rants).
So it was just the fact that France had sovereign power over its own air space. Tough noogies.
I was going to suggest this strike was a plot on the behalf of the BOFH and PFY to make some money.