Join institutional investors, analysts and strategists from the world's largest banks: Subscribe today for as little as $7/month
Already have an account? log in
Macron Incurs Ire Of French Left With Barnier Appointment
I'd be remiss on Thursday not to briefly mention Emmanuel Macron's decision to appoint Michel Barnier as the French prime minister.
A quick glance at the calendar strongly suggests it's September. The second round of France's parliamentary snap vote was concluded on July 7. The two-month delay in naming a premier counts as extraordinary, to put it mildly. Macron wasn't obligated to stick to any schedule, but eight weeks is a helluva long time. The process -- if you can call it that -- was excep
To be honest, my feeling is that Macron, while far from perfect, is too good for France. We deserve to fall, just like the rest of Europe. We’re pathetic.
What strikes me about the anti-establishment / anti-center vote across Western democracies is that it’s by now out of proportion to the share of the electorate who can plausibly claim they’d be materially better off under a far-right or far-left government. A lot of the grievances (blue collar despair in America, immigration concerns, inequality and so on) have merit, but sometimes it feels like voters are just restless and determined to act on that restlessness.
Macron generally and genuinely puts France above all else, including himself, with his leadership. It is impossible to please everyone, but it would be difficult to argue that he doesn’t have integrity as a leader.
In the US, we have a lot of very competent and principled leaders at the Congressional, state and local government levels -who are currently being ignored by the DNC and the RNC, but who can hopefully rise up to become Presidential candidates in the 2028 election.