Paris Protests: Might the French Actually Overthrow Macron?
Populist unrest is still alive and strong in the West, as hundreds of thousands of protesters and rioters stormed the streets of Paris in an expression of rage against President Emmanuel Macron’s gas taxes and his globalist agenda in general:
“France weathered its worst riots in decades Saturday as “yellow jacket” protesters continue turning parts of Paris upside down over concerns related to high gas taxes and the high cost of living.
French riot police closed popular tourist areas and fired tear gas as they tried to quell the chaos in the streets. At least 110 people were injured while protesters associated with the grassroots-driven demonstrations clashed with authorities and vandalized the Arc de Triomphe.
Much of the anguish stems from citizens’ disdain for French President Emmanuel Macron’s high gas taxes and overall war on fossil fuels. The beleaguered president denounced the violence in a statement crafted during the G-20 summit in Argentina.”
Awww, the US media’s Man Crush isn’t so popular with his own people 🙁 🙁
Recent polls show Macron’s approval rating down in the mid-20s. These protests are said to be the worst since 1968, so this is a significant moment.
Protesters adorned in yellow vests (according to Wikipedia: “The “yellow vest” was chosen as a symbol because all motorists had been required by law—since 2008—to have high-visibility vests in their vehicles when driving. As a result, reflective vests have become widely available, inexpensive, and symbolic”) set cars on fire, vandalized iconic monuments, smashed storefronts and blocked off major streets over the weekend–at least that’s the media’s spin on it because the protests are against a fellow member of the rootless globalist aristocracy. You don’t see this sort of negative portrayal when the protests are coming from the Politically Correct Left. The Dem media doesn’t care about property destruction and strife when their minions do it.
The protests and riots are pretty simple: you’ve got a city, Paris, that ranks second-highest in the world in terms of cost of living.
These are the world's top 10 most expensive cities https://t.co/J6XF4XSLXR pic.twitter.com/0VJHdKGxza
— Bloomberg QuickTake (@QuickTake) March 15, 2018
Then, you’ve got an out-of-touch globalist President who believes Climate Change is the most pressing issue facing his nation (and the world, because Globalists are all about Saving The World), and so has instituted steep taxes on fossil fuels, further angering citizens who were already struggling due to high costs of living.
The consistent story of these globalist leaders is that they simply do not enact policies that benefit the regular citizens of their nations. Regular citizens consistently pay the price for their elites’ virtue signaling. From disastrous open borders immigration policies transforming Western Europe into Eurabia to punishing taxes to combat the nonexistent threat of “Climate Change,” these elites enact their terrible policies to gain the approval of one another, not to benefit their citizens.
I’m sure these protests, like virtually all others, began with legitimate grievances and then was co-opted by violent miscreants using the unrest as cover to loot and burn.
But the larger story is that the Western elite is still painfully out of touch with the masses in their nations, and people are sick of them.
Globalist world leaders in 2015 celebrated their World Saving Paris Climate Agreement to much media fanfare, with little regard for the high taxes it would impose on citizens.
So what if it raised taxes on gasoline? What do the elites care? They’re rich anyway. It won’t have any material impact on their lives like it will the ordinary citizens.
Well, now those citizens have had enough. The gas tax was merely the final straw.
Most damning of all for Macron, many police officers are siding with the protesters:
https://twitter.com/KTHopkins/status/1069308643038896133
There’s a strong nationalist angle to these protests, too. Lots of flag-waving and nationalist displays:
https://twitter.com/Syrian_Lion/status/1068843118437560320
The sheer size of these protests–nearly 300,000 people turned out–and their sustained nature, having gone on for over two weeks now, makes what’s going on in Paris a big deal. Daily Caller’s Joe Simonson, who was in Paris covering the action, called it a “genuine proletarian uprising.”
They’re in the capital in the hundreds of thousands raising high hell. And now we’re seeing many police officers side with the protesters. Is it just me or is there a real shot they stop demanding Macron step down and go depose him themselves? They have the numbers to do it. And with the police on their side, little is really stopping them.
I know–the thought of a populist revolution in a rich western democracy like France is totally unrealistic, right? Stuff like this only happens in the third world, right? Western democracy is eternal!
Until it isn’t. If you study enough history, it becomes clear that the unthinkable often has a way of coming to fruition. Less than a decade ago, similar situations (although in response to different outrages) in Egypt, Libya and elsewhere in the Muslim world led to the deposition of several deeply entrenched dictators, although NATO was mostly responsible for taking out Gadaffi in Libya so perhaps Mubarak in Egypt is the best comparison. Protesters overthrew the government in Tunisia as well.
I’m just saying that these protesters in Paris are a lot closer to overthrowing the government than most of us think.
All the ingredients are there: a disaffected populace that has been trampled on and left behind by out-of-touch globalists for far too long. The people are protesting and rioting in the hundreds of thousands in the capital. They have certain elements of the police on their side. Is it really that much of a stretch to wonder if they’ll use their numbers and police backing and simply storm the presidential palace? All they have to do is realize they can do it.
It’s always a surreal moment when the unthinkable becomes the inevitable. All throughout 2016 we were told that it was totally unthinkable for Donald Trump to become President, or for Britain to leave the EU. Then, when both happened, we witnessed a deluge of thinkpieces and political commentary telling us how we all should have seen both coming.
The point is, don’t allow the media to convince you something like Trump, Brexit or even a revolution is impossible. At best, the 27-year-old know-nothings comprising the media are ignorant of history, at worst they’re attempting to rig a political outcome in favor of the ruling class by discouraging its opponents.
Now, it appears these protests in France are largely grassroots and unorganized. They don’t seem intent on overthrowing Macron and replacing him with a leader of their own. The protesters don’t appear unified and I’ve seen reports that say they’re a mix of left and right, so they would have trouble uniting around a leader.
But my takeaway is that the elements of a popular uprising and revolution are there in France–right now, today.
They may not ultimately overthrow Macron this time around, but I think we’ve all learned that they could if they wanted. If they’ve got police on their side, or at least willing to stand aside, then what else is truly stopping them?
I’ve been saying this for a while now: the globalist political elite in the West had better start honoring its end of the social compact and giving the people what they voted for. If you continually tell the people to go fuck themselves and give them the Spaulding treatment (“You’ll get nothing and like it!“) then eventually they’re going to rise up and overthrow you. This is nothing new. It’s been the way of the world for millennia.
If they keep screwing the people over and rejecting their democratically expressed will, then it’s not a matter of “will they rise up and overthrow us?” but rather, “Which of the globalist leaders will be the first to get overthrown: May, Merkel or Macron?”
Right now, it looks like Macron.
Oh well–at least the American media still loves him.
Also: the American media, predictably, is totally uninterested in the use of tear gas on protesters by French police. I thought GASSING people was unacceptable and something only HITLER does?
Tear gas fired in clashes between Paris police and protesters during a third weekend of "yellow vest" demonstrations
[Tap to expand] https://t.co/yMgF2TxF5d pic.twitter.com/3tEERdWSc5
— BBC News (World) (@BBCWorld) December 1, 2018
