Archived copy is here: https://archive.is/DqZ6m
The article says this:
“Immediately withdraw from NATO’s integrated command and then, in stages, from the organization itself. Reject the tribute demanded by the United States of 5% of GDP devoted to defense spending,” read France Unbowed’s 222-page program.
However, France under Mélenchon would still provide assistance to European Union countries under EU treaties, the document added
Is Melenchon right? Is it better for the EU to be the organisation of mutual defence guarantees for Europe, rather than NATO?
Um, but the “kind of NATO” is called EU already. The mutual defense wording in the EU treaties is by far stronger than the wording in the NATO contract. I mean, in the end it’s all words on paper anyway, but there’s that.
He is also against the EU though.
I am all for the EU as a meanginful defense union but capabilities need to exist and they don’t yet. Blowing up the one thing while not having a working replacement at the same time means inviting hostile powers to carve up Europe.
No he’s not, what the fuck. You’re thinking of his main political opponent, Marine Le Pen, who wants to exit NATO and the EU.
FI’s platform is explicitly against exiting the Union or the Euro Zone.
LFI’s platform also states that:
This is all anti-EU and no better than the far right.
It is much better than the far right though, and the reason is in the context which you swiftly omitted. They don’t want to exit the Union but to headbutt agressively against the far right anti-immigration packages that are being forced down our throats, as well as the industry deregulation push that would force us to reverse social protection and ecological regulations we, as a people, have voted for.
FI is indeed not ready to apply in France any European law that gives the workers fewer rights, or sabotages our ecosystems (“principe de non-régression écologique et sociale”), or makes us a part of bullying the global South. Please show me where those objectives are in MLP’s platform cause i have a hard time finding them.
It doesn’t sound all that stupid when you take the context into account (which FI knows well as we have a bunch of deputies in Bruxelles).
Firstly, as usual LFI’s vision pretty much stops at the French border. They claim it’s a viable and good idea to create a constitutional principle of non-regression, but they only propose adding it to the French Constitution, not to a European treaty.
Secondly, it doesn’t really matter why they want to end the primacy of European law. If the precedent is set, it will almost certainly end up being used for things they don’t want, in France and in other member states. It’s also likely to result in a diplomatic crisis and possibly to the breakup of the EU.
The far right also has MEPs, it doesn’t make them knowledgeable either.
No, I am not. Mekechon’s opposition comes from a different, leftist, direction but it is opposition all the same. He is a staunch critic of the “neoloiberal European Union” and demands a fundamental renegotiation of the treaties. Are you seriously denying that?
Guess what, the far right in many member states is demanding the same. It is hard to keep track though with the far right, as the are oscilating between demanding leaving the EU, and “reforming”, ie destroying it. To my understanding Le Pen is currently demanding to “reform”, ie destroy the EU from within. As such a fundamental “reform” will fracture the Union or at least lead to a massive weakening of its political structure and its ability to act.
So your point is that any attempt at reforming the (grossly ultra-liberal) European Union would fracture the Union, and also that any criticism of its (grossly corrupt) operations is just playing the same team as the fascists ? How fucking convenient, especially for the fascists who actually spawned and bankrolled the whole Frexit movement.
How are you supposed to make something better when you’re not allowed to formulate any criticism of it ?
No, I am claiming that it doesn’t need any major treaty changes to change the political direction of the EU to a left leaning position. It would need however a left majority among voters, currently there is a clear right majority on EU level and most national capitals are right/conservative as well.
The EU’s operations are not “grossly corrupt”, corrrupt maybe but less so than most member states, certainly less corrupt than Germany or Austria, not sure about France but I would be surprised if things were different there. Most of the corruption is taking place on local level with EU funds. Fighting corruption on both levels is possible without any treaty change, as the creation of EPPO has shown. Great institution that has a mandate to fight corruption on both, European and national level, as long as it has something to do with EU institutions, policies or subsidies.
How do you know?
You can read the court of auditor reports and compare them to national ones, you can observe how when there are business lobby groups fighting for something, it is often some national governments who are already fully in line, copy pasting their positions and fighting for it in Brussels, while in Brussels the Commission is still on the fence and the European Parliament hosts meaningful opposition. Also on multiple occasions, where the national level was already completely in line, including national parliaments, initiatives still failed in the European Parliament, against massive lobbying campaigns because the public made a fuss about it
I also know from people, who are no business lobbyists that you can get heard by the Commission if you represent something of interest, eg open source initiatives. I also know from the business perspective that bribing agencies for getting some registration on EU level is not an option and that things that are not working as they should are rather issues of lack of resources or unclear legislation.
My favourite example however is the former interior minister of Austria, who afterwards continued his career as MEP in Brussels/Strasbourg. It is pretty clear he did not change the way he was doing politics but within a short time, he was uncovered to be bribed. That alone never happened in Austria in his long career before and unlike in Austria, it did have severe consequences, he did not only lose his job, was subject to prosecution but was entirely shunned by the party, as this had become such a big deal (also something that rarely happens in Austria with any corrupt politician). Of course Austrian nationalists were talking about how corrupt Brussels is, when in fact the Austrian modus operandi lead in Brussels to the destruction of a politician’s career.
EDIT: Things have improved further since the creation of the EPPO. A bribing case like the one above relied before purily on action from member state’s institutions. Now, EPPO can get active on its own and launch investigations and inquire assistance when raiding someone for example.
Which Aubry is already doing as head of the Left euro-group. There is not one single mention of treaty changes in FI’s platform. They just state that we may decline to apply some European laws if they lead to worse social or ecological outcomes for French workers. It’s called “principe de non-régression écologique et sociale” and i don’t see any great arguments against it.
Making EU legislation fully optional (after all national politicians could arbitrarily then go on to decide to not “apply” binding EU law of whatever kind they choose further down the line), means destroying the very legal basis the EU is built upon. That is indeed not a reform, that is straight going to “destroy the EU from within” without the detour of pretending to go for “reforming the treaties”. Ironic or not, that is pretty much what the authoritarian far right was also trying to do in Poland and Hungary before being ousted by the people, albeit on other topics.
The only way to implement this is either by having cake and eat it for France (getting special privileges for France) or by changing that very aspect in the treaties for everyone. Both needs a treaty change and unanimous support by every member state which are almost entirely conservative or liberal.
So choose, this demand either means breaking the treaties or reforming the treaties.
This is the kind of fake dichotomy that makes it impossible to enact any real change in the current system. “Oh gosh we’d sure love to have a more just Europe but i guess that’s incompatible with current European legislation so we might as well forget it and do nothing”.
The point is to go head to head with the current state of the Union, then we can create a coalition of similarly-minded countries and introduce deep reforms. And if it means headbutting with the ECJ and tanking a few sanctions then so be it. The point is not to break the whole thing but to create a counter-force that is significant enough to have a say. I don’t understand how you can even compare that to the far right project which is basically Brexit with more Trumpism on top.
There is no European country that has a better shot at that than good old France, and the historical window is closing fast. There’s probably some hubris in there, but there’s also, i believe, some courage. You can’t live your life according to your adversaries rules, and you can’t materialize a popular movement by coloring inside the lines drawn by the 1%, so at some point you have to break some laws to make better ones.
It’s against leaving, everyone’s is. But they’re very much eurosceptics.
That is a very strange position to take because LFI euro-députés engage very hard with the system. There are actual euroskeptics who barely show up, vote once a year and never bring anything to the table. But that’s not LFI, I mean Aubry is leader of the European Left coalition ffs, and they don’t bullshit around. Do you have any elements to the contrary ?
FYI the party’s official line is : “we stay in the Union & Eurozone but we might disobey some treaties if they lead to worse social or ecological outcomes than our local laws”. Happy to debate all day long but i don’t see anything fundamentally wrong with this position.
It makes little difference if you demand exiting the EU or destroying it from within, maybe the latter being worse. Both serves Putin’s agenda.