But maybe a little bit less miserable this time?
Dammit!, I spent 15 minutes trying to come up with something like that on Friday.
stares angrily at OldOlds
I guess you needed one day more.
My friend, sometimes you’re the pigeon, and sometimes you’re the statue.
stares even more angrily… then starts to laugh
It may be initially confusing to us Americans, but it is standard usage in most parliamentary systems that I’m aware of. When they say “goverment” I think “administration”.
Yes. I think for what you understand by “the government”, we’d say “the state", or depending on context “the Crown”.
So will there be immediate elections?
You know, when I started this thread 10 months ago I had no idea it would still be an active topic.
Looks like the only option, but Macron is stubborn as well as arrogant; and a parliamentary election might well be as inconclusive as the last time. On the other hand, there might be something to be said for allowing Bardella his chance to muck things up, and see if he falls out with Mme Le Pen.
I’d be surprised if Macron chooses to forgo his last couple of years in the Elysée, but who knows?
Parliamentary elections? I am not familiar with the procedure (how do you dissolve parliament? How long does it take? What is the minimum duration of the electoral campaign?) but it would not surprise me.
Presidential elections? I doubt it. Has a French president ever stepped down before the end of his term? Not in the Fifth Republic, as far as I am aware.
The French public is in a sorta analagous state to the US’s. Several incompatible factions of broadly similar size that really don’t like each other.
Under the US system, the factions are forced to hold their noses and join one of two parties. And the election cycle is fixed, so governments can’t fall in the parliamentary sense, but we can sure have the permanent campaign by both sides.
In the French system that same rigidly fractured multi-polar populace results in a succession of weak governments, no one of which can get shit done with 3 or 4 big detractors and 1 or 2 kinda-allies-but-not-really. So the lifespan of any given government is just until enough of the other factions fancy their chances to improve their situation in a fresh round of internal politicking and elections.
My bottom line point being that IMO this thread will remain intermittently topical for the next decade or more.
Ahem… its very founder went off in a huff
It’s just been drawn to my attention that Marine Le Pen is currently ineligible to stand for office (as a result of her little expenses problem), although she has an appeal due to be heard in January
So it occurs to me that if Macron wants to set a cat among her party’s pigeons, he might stand down now and hope they tear each other apart while the election gets done and dusted before then. But maybe his own party would be as open to fracture too.
Yes, should have remembered the General. OK, let’s see what happens next. Will Macron resign or not?
He could try invoking Article 16 of the constitution, but that hasn’t been done since a failed coup attempt during the Algerian War. Is Macron really that desperate and arrogant?
Well the fifth prime minister is the same guy as the fourth prime minister: