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The problem is that even when Europeans think they have elected left wingers they turn out to be functionally right wingers (with the honorable exception of Greece, which is why it was necessary to punish them so severely)

It used to be only central Europeans who saw no distinction between left and right. Now it's the whole bloody continent.

(Probably overstating the case, but Italy and France are the latest victims)

It is rightly acknowledged that people of faith have no monopoly of virtue - Queen Elizabeth II

by eurogreen on Fri Dec 28th, 2018 at 11:20:01 AM EST
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Isn't Le Pen against the big banks as well as immigrants?
The old L-R polarity just doesn't stand the test any more.
Even more so the concept of what centre-anything means!
The Overton window has slid right out of the wall.
Get 'em by the semantics and the rest will follow'.
I am far from happy about the power Salvini has garnered piggybacking on the MV5*'s electoral victory, but this budget, though far from perfect, does more to make the very poor slightly better off than any has in decades.
It is distributive, which is why Brussels bashed it so.
The chances it will bring economic growth are still slim to none, but neither did austerity so something new deserves to be tried.

'The history of public debt is full of irony. It rarely follows our ideas of order and justice.' Thomas Piketty
by melo (melometa4(at)gmail.com) on Sat Dec 29th, 2018 at 02:13:11 AM EST
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