Archive for the ‘Sarkozy’ Category
Gérard Depardieu: Boycott this Tax Traitor!
Boycott Greedy Gérard!
Gérard Depardieu, one of the best-paid French cinema actors, now lives in Belgium in the village of Néchin, near the French border.
This place, it is said, has all the charms and cultural attractions of a South Essex hamlet.
The Bourgmestre (Mayor), Daniel Senesael, openly admits the new resident is there for financial reasons.
That is, to avoid French taxes and benefit from a more favourable regime that the wealthy (and only them) enjoy in Belgium.
27% of the village’s inhabitants are ‘tax exiles’.
Earlier this year, when he was not pissing himself on planes, Depardieu, gave his public backing to Nicolas Sarkozy.
At a public rally with the Presidential candidate at Villepinte he said,
“Since my friend Nicolas Sarkozy came to power, I only hear bad things about this man who does nothing but good,”
Libération reports, that the French left has taken a serious dislike to the man once proud of his working class roots.
“Minister Benoît Hamon has said that Depardieu has decided to avoid paying his due in a time of economic crisis. That is “anti-patriotic”. ”
The PCF has compared him to a miser.
“It’s shameful” says Nathalie Arthaud, of Lutte Ouvrière. “It doesn’t surprise me, when somebody gets millions every year to get tired of paying tax. Meanwhile workers, those on the minimum wage, the unemployed, they have to.” She called for a crack down on tax evasion.
On France-Inter this morning there were strong suggestions that the French state will not take Depardieu’s efforts to avoid giving something back for the money he makes from the country lightly.
They will be watching his every move for ways to get him to pay up.
Meanwhile we support this: Boycott every film Gérard makes!
What of Depardieu’s future?
We imagine him, in his Néchin Mansion.
Dressed in a giant nappy, barely able to contain his girth, he is watching DVDs of his past triumphs.
Gérard is eating his tenth Horse steak and washing it down with a pail of wine from his Château de Tigné.
Next to him is a bucket of chips swimming in mayonnaise.
Sometimes he breaks into lonely sobs.
Ridan (Nadir Kouidri): From Le Blues de Banlieue to the Front de Gauche.
Ridan sings “le Blues de banlieue”.
“les chansons à textes entendues chez ses parents d’origine algérienne, celles de Léo Ferré, Jacques Brel ou Serge Reggiani, lui parlent davantage et prennent naturellement le relais. Face aux inégalités, au racisme ou face à l’hypocrisie de la société, il choisit les mots comme exutoire à sa révolte. Ceux qui parlent de notre quotidien, de nos désillusions, de la police, de racisme, d’injustice, avec une pertinence qui rappelle celle de Renaud à ses débuts. Ridan chante alors ce que Nadir écrit. L’écriture écorchée, réaliste, laisse transparaître le spleen de l’artiste.” More – Here and Wikipedia (French) Here.
In the Presidential elections Ridan backed the Front de gauche (interview here)
He performed at theFdG Bastille Rally on the 18th of March.
Ridan against Fascism here.
Sarkozy Insults Hollande as UMP Prepares to Negotiate with the Front National.
@DavidAzariaFR from Here.
Coming back from a UNITE meeting (we didn’t go to the pub) the French Presidential debate was still on the radio.
The BBC sums up what stuck in my mind,
The president called Mr Hollande a “little slanderer”, (Petit calomniateur TC) while his rival said Mr Sarkozy shirked responsibility.
Mr Sarkozy defended his record and said he had kept France out of recession. But Mr Hollande said France was going through a “serious crisis” and was struggling with slow growth.
The BBC’s Gavin Hewitt says it was a long, bad-tempered debate that left the impression that neither candidate liked each other.
There were plenty of angry exchanges, with both candidates accusing each other of lying.
Mr Hollande accused President Sarkozy of “ruining the French economy”, prompting his rival to say he had been unfairly blamed.
“It’s never your fault,” Mr Hollande responded, to which Mr Sarkozy said: “It’s a lie, it’s a lie!”impression of the debate.
The above, and a rather arid exchange of statistics and economics, was my central impression of the debate.
On Europe 1 this morning I heard an actress say that she was now voting for Hollande because only he could unite the French people.
That certainly was the pre-political impression you got of how people would react to Sarkozy’s agitated, attack-dog, approach. Not to mention his obsession with ‘immigration’ and other far-right themes.
The capacity of the French Right to split the country is now accelerating.
This is the latest on a possible agreement with the Front National.
The outgoing Defence Minister,Gérard Longuet, gave an interview to Minute, an extreme right-wing weekly . It called for a ‘dialogue’ with the Front National. This was widely interpreted as a call for political arrangements.
François Hollande: A Tranquil Force?
Can François Holland Repeat this?
François Hollande has won the French Socialist Primary.
In next year’s French Presidential elections he will stand as the principle opponent of Nicolas Sarkozy.
The Guardian comments,
He was known as l’homme tranquille – the quiet man – an amiable, if shambling figure who liked to talk, but not about himself, and who was witty, well-meaning, normal and just a little dull. The Socialist Party’s eternal backroom boy, doing all the essential, worthy jobs, but keeping resolutely out of the spotlight. Here.
The reference to the ”l’homme tranquille” does not only have this connotation – leading back the film The Quiet Man.
For anyone who has French political culture (perhaps not the Guardian’s Kim Willsher), ‘tranquil’ refers immediately to 1981 when Francois Mitterrand became the first left President of the 5th Republic. “La force tranquille“, his campaign slogan, remains glued to that event.
Holland won the run-off with Martine Aubry. He is considered by some to be on the right of the Parti Socialiste (PS) - though more accurately as part of its social democratic centre. She was sometime portrayed as on the left. Aubry runs Lille in coalition with the centre party, the MoDems, which blunts this image.
This right-left division (though they disagree on many issues, such as the details of the 35 hour week) is misleading. Both are wedded to the PS late 90′s turn from support for state intervention to backing for its ‘regulatory’ role. Both endorsed the 1998 PS’s déclaration de principes which dropped its remaining references to class struggle socialism for an appeal to republican and Enlightenment values.
Both are pretty decent human beings, whatever the very strong political differences a left-wing socialist would have with them.
The surprise 17% score of left-winger Arnaud Montebourg in the first round lost its own impact when Montebourg announced in a ‘personal capacity’ that he would cast his ballot for Holland.
Holland now stands against Sarkozy. If he is ‘normal’, that is capable of rational argument, with ordinary tastes and a calm manner, that will play to his advantage.
France’s President is not a decent human being. Nor is he ‘tranquil’ . Described as “morpion hystérique” Sarkozy is a bundle of nerves, whose ability to present a case rationally, or accept contradiction, is not immediately apparent.
Holland now leaves the way open to a challenge from the left. Those attracted to Montebourg’s call for measures against fiannce capital and for radical social change can look to another Presidential hopeful, Jean-Luc Mélenchon.
With the outside left, the Nouveau Parti Anticapitaliste and Lutte Ouvrière down at a low level of support (at respectively 0,5% and 1,5% in opinion polls) most the left is focused on Melenchon (uop to 9%) and the alliance behind him, the Front de Gauche.
Jean-Luc Mélenchon has announced his willingness to debate Holland.
We hope he is able to.
