The Digger

Excerpt: By Isabel Roy and Johannes Stern  17 January 2019 The protests by “yellow vests” in France have exposed the anti-working class character of the Left Party in Germany. The Left Party leadership and its affiliated media reacted with hostility to the first mass demonstrations which took place in late November in Paris and other French cities. “Language of Violence” was the title of the Left Party daily  Neues Deutschland (ND) on November 26. The paper was not referring to the brutal actions of the French police and security forces, but rather to the mostly peaceful demonstrators who took to the streets to protest against higher fuel taxes and for higher wages and more social justice. “The ‘Yellow vest’ demonstrations which were not approved by the police have” degenerated into violence “and it took hours for the police ‘to restore calm,’” the paper complained. For the Left Party leadership the biggest social protests in France since the general strike of 1968,...

Link:   Which way forward for France’s “yellow vest” protests? Excerpts: • " The danger, however, is that without a clear political perspective and orientation for a broader struggle against Macron, the movement can be frittered away in fruitless protest actions or subordinated to the maneuvers of the ruling elite." Where have (Maxwell's) Marxists gone, BTW? • " It is significant that some “yellow vest” groups like that in Commercy are calling for the building of popular committees to decide upon and coordinate the activities of the movement. What is developing, in a highly embryonic form, is dual power. Against the bankers’ government, protected by its hordes of riot police, the specter of separate and opposed institutions, representing and organizing the workers in struggle, is beginning to emerge." • " Daniel Cohn-Bendit, the middle-class student leader in May 1968, shamelessly slandered it as fascistic, telling Germany’s  taz  newpaper that “...

Puti-nazis come out in force against the continuation of previous  governments' (incl. the French socialist party Hollande, and the   Republican  Sarkozy) " financial and military dictatorship"-engineering,  neoliberal policies, personified by the political-centrist, "call me President," "Jupiterian" government of "Manu" Macron, a Rothschild banker.

Link:  Macron Announces Wage Hikes, Tax Cuts Amid "Economic, Social State Of Emergency" " " When violence is unleashed, freedom ends ," said Macron - while acknowledging that there is a "deep anger" at the French government that is justified - yet which should not devolve into violence." It appears that les gilets jaunes have a different perspective of the role that violence has played in their protests against neoliberalism at 5:40.

Link:  Yellow Vests Rise Against Neo-Liberal ‘King’ Macron  by Diana Johnstone "For centuries, the “left” hoped popular movements would lead to changes for the better. Today, many leftists seem terrified of popular movements for change, convinced “populism” must lead to “fascism.” But it needn’t be so" Excerpt:   “I’m more worried about the end of the month than about the end of the world.” After the second Yellow Vest Saturday, November 25, which saw more demonstrators and more tear gas, the Minister in charge of the budget, Gérard Darmanin, declared that what had demonstrated on the Champs-Elysée was “la peste brune”, the brown plague, meaning fascists. (For those who enjoy excoriating the French as racist, it should be noted that Darmanin is of Algerian working class origins). This remark caused an uproar of indignation that revealed just how great is public sympathy for the movement – over 70% approval by latest polls, even after uncontrolled vandalism. Macr...

Link:  Can the Yellow Vests Speak?  by Éduard Louis France's elites were quick to condemn the gilets jaunes protesters as stupid and backward. But as novelist Édouard Louis writes, they're just standing up for their rights. Excerpt: "The gilets jaunes speak of hunger, of precarity, of life and death. The “politicians” and part of the journalists reply: “the symbols of our Republic have been tarnished.” But what are these people talking about? How dare they? What planet are they from? The media also talk about racism and homophobia among the gilets jaunes. Who are they kidding? I do not want to talk about my books, here. But it is interesting to note that whenever I have published a novel I have been accused of stigmatizing poor and rural France precisely because I mentioned the homophobia and racism that existed in the village where I lived as a child. Journalists who had never done anything for the popular classes were enraged, and suddenly set themselves up to play...

Link:   Macron Heralds The End Of The Union  by Raúl Ilargi Meijer "There are 28 countries in the Union at this point, and one of them is already preparing to leave. There are 28 different cultures too, and almost as many languages. It was always going to be an uphill struggle, a hill far too steep for mere greed to master and conquer. History soaked Europe in far too much diversity through the ages for that. To unify all the thousands of years of beauty and darkness, of creativity and annihilation, of love and hatred, passed on through the generations, a lot more than a naked and bland lust for wealth, power and shiny objects was needed." Excerpts: " Traditional right/left parties have been destroyed all across Europe in recent national elections. And it’s those traditional parties that still largely hold power in Brussels. As much as anyone except Germany and perhaps the European Commission hold any power at all. The shifts that happened in the political spect...