That is a great list. The principle behind this is the defensive democracy.
Seems like a reasonable policy we should adopt in the US…
People find the dream of hitting the jackpot far more appealing than creating a genuinely classless society.
No, there’s nothing noteworthy here, especially for a crime Le Pen didn’t committed herself and which every single party of France is guilty of.
Don’t choke on that kool aid!
Excuse me but what in the hell? To come in here and redefine a corruption investigation as being in that camp is not only an insult to the reader but it an insult to everyone who both cares about civil rights and government corruption at the same time.
Defensive democracy is just marketing spin on exactly the sort of civil rights violating process that gives the establishment huge advantage over any challenger and exactly the sort of crap totalitarian regimes love and leverage to great effect.
The wikipedia page that you linked lists the following examples of "defensive democracy".
>Surveillance by the security corps (especially military and police intelligence) of activists who are considered dangerous, or after entire associations outright;
>Restrictions on the freedom of movement or action over bodies suspected of endangering democracy;
>Deprival of the rights of individuals and parties from running for election
>Outlawing of organizations considered a danger to democracy;
>Cancellation of elections as a last resort ""
Does that sound like the kind of stuff that fair, well run by rule of law, stable democracies with lots of buy in from the populace do to you? Because it sure doesn't to me. It's basically a list of stuff unpopular governments use to stay in power a little longer.
To come in and lay claim to the credibility of of something that everyone can agree is good (prosecuting corruption, equality under the law) and siphon some of that off onto a subject that is highly controversial (selective violations of civil rights, nominally for a good reason) by just falsely claiming the good thing is a subset of the controversial thing is dishonest and morally reprehensible.
...Yes?
Or are you saying politicians can just barge in and say "the rules don't apply to me because I'm popular"? Because that's how you don't get stable democracies. What you get is Trump, or the Red Brigades, or the Brown Shirts running things to the ground. Because the motto of those orgs is "one man, one vote... One last time"
I read that list and it looks like instructions on how to end democracy, not preserve it
So your question seems to evade the point.
It’s like having a gun to defender yourself then the criminal takes it from you.
So are you comfortable with someone like Trump using those same tools?
In short, no, Trump should not be able to take these tools. But in actual democracies they have checks to ensure that this is not possible while in the US no such checks exist.
I asked if you would be comfortable if he did.
Either you believe it is possible to create a perfect political system which never makes a mistake, or you believe mistakes can be made thus those tools should never be available to those in power.
Which one is it?
I’m sure that encompasses all possible outcomes, so clearly it’s not false.
Also, Trump could have been stopped by the processes in place in USA, they just were not properly used. There were several cases open against him, they just failed to do what they were supposed to.
And no, Trump couldn't have been stopped because the US has very limited rules over criminal convictions preventing running for President.
This isn't Europe ya know.
If this system had been in place when Nixon did his crimes, he would've just shrugged and kept going.
You are indeed not Europe now, not even close. Well, except for Hungary and Belarus.
Americans made their bed, now let them lay in it. Ideally those tools would have been used against him, but since they weren't... now is the time to reap the results of that inaction.
I hope you misrepresent due to ignorance and not deliberately.
Nobody is saying that politicians should not be investigated. And nobody is saying that politicians should not be convicted and even put in prison.
What people are rightfully baffled about is the riddance of the passive election right - as in, inability to be elected. If a candidate was convinced and is in prison, then it's up to the voters to decide if they still trust that person and if they consider the conviction rightful and not bias.
Surely, if the conviction was pure as a tear of a newborn baby and there was no dirty persecution of the political competitors, surely voters would take that into account and there would be no need for artificial restrictions. But that requires the absence of political hunt. One needs to impose artificial restrictions only if there is fault play.
The EU is taking the tried and tested ways Putin used to destroy his opposition. First Romania, now France.
P.S. The same critique applies to the American democratic travesty of "current/former criminals are not allowed to vote".
> Usually these people are friendly to capital as well, and the opposition are the "little people"
Don't know if this is actually true, I assume capitalists generally prefer stable market-oriented politicians and not far-right kleptocrats in favor of protectionist trade wars. And plenty of wealthy people value democracy for its own sake, Kamala outraised Trump in the 2024 election for example.
Also I doubt traditional media spend plays as large a role in a nationwide contest with a lot of eyes, if I recall during Trump's 2016 primary candidacy Fox News tried to go against him but was rebuked by their own viewers (who fell in love with him on social media) and forced to bend the knee.
Cults of personalities are more dangerous than other types of brainwashing though, and the right level of protection from the state here should be other checks and balances on the office's powers.
If we don't want to use the state to protect democracy by limiting it, then we either need to limit the concentration of wealth so that no small group of people has the power to spread the lies, or we need new forms of democracy that are resistant to such things.
If people are allowed to choose only from preselected candidates, then that is no democracy at all. "You can choose any color of the Ford you want as long as it is black".
That's the same reason I despise the "minimal amount of votes/percentage threshold to be elected" shenanigans that exist in many countries (including Europeans). That's exactly how Putin started to take over Russia's democratic election system in the beginning of his reign.
System needs controllers. But who is going to control the controllers? And who is going to control the controllers of the controllers? Turtles all the way. And the only reasonable and workable system is when people have the control. Even if they sometimes/often make mistakes. It's still the best system we have.
Course, the problem with democracy is that if you elect a crook, you'll get a crime ring haha but I guess democracy also means giving folks what they ask for.