Is the West Experiencing a Right-Wing Drift?

Finally some good news

Finally something happened

Is there any indication as to what the motivation was or who (if anyone) was behind it? Fico is such a murky guy there could be any number of reasons

unconfirmed reports are that the perpetrator is a 71-year old activist who opposes the government's attempts to impose political control over the public broadcaster?

I saw it was a 71 year old but not what the reason was.

Occam's razor seems applicable here, even though there could be a range of possibilities, it looks very lone wolf

Slovak PM has 'very difficult hours and shits' ahead of him

https://www.theguardian.com/world/article/2024/jun/09/eu-elections-far-right-gains-germany-austria-netherlands-exit-polls

The far right is on the rise all over the dang place, sheesh

Left wing and green parties were strong in Scandinavia.

right wing party Vlaams Belang not the biggest in local Flanders elections after all, after leading in the polls for years

I think France is what matters, in terms of impact on the EU. The extreme right did incredibly well. Macron calling legislative elections is an incredible roll of the dice. I think there's an argument that, unlike Sunak who has played a bad hand badly, Macron may have played a bad hand reasonably well. His government was likely to collapse anyway with a vote of no confidence almost inevitable, so he's taken the initiative. The result of this election will be messy, with Reassemblement National almost certainly the largest party but probably not an absolute majority, so will have problems forming govt. Bardella is charismatic but has zero experience in govt, I guess Macron is assuming he'll fuck it up and spoil the pitch for Le Pen in the next presidential election.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/article/2024/jun/10/belgium-general-election-2024-pm-prime-minister-alexander-de-croo-set-to-resign

A French farce indeed.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/article/2024/jun/12/les-republicains-party-revolt-leader-eric-ciotti-le-pen-alliance

Yup. Interesting how a lot of the right are imploding, whereas left wing parties have put up a temporary alliance together

These have undoubtedly been the wildest 72 hours in French politics in my lifetime. Pretty incredible stuff.

A 🧵

— Arnaud Bertrand (@RnaudBertrand) June 13, 2024

It's quite a gamble, to see if the "centre"-right/right parties in France won't be able to stomach getting in bed with the far-right. Esp given how the right in the US are simply down with winning and have shown willing to bed down with blatant fascism (and were perhaps/probs willing all along)

And phew that is an incredible thread!

my ignorance is showing here but what i dont understand from that thread is where macrons faction sits?

and relative numbers as far as they can be projected

I think they're polling like 15%. They sit wherever Macron tells them to sit.

Yeah, Macron's party is basically just a monument to his ego, zero work done to shore up support beyond that, nothing on offer that makes it stand out.

15% is the EU elections. The last legislative election, at the start of Macron's mandate, his party was at 25% in the first round, beating the left coalition by a hair, far right at 18%. Their margins improved in the second round: 38%, 31% for the left, the far-right dropped to 17%.
The question is how much has really changed and can they reiterate that. I think they can. Sending deputies to the EU is one thing, electing them in your own government is another. The left has not really progressed. The right was and is still nowhere, though maybe their stance against their own president will help them. Bardella is now arguably more popular than MLP, but he's just a face / story. I don't expect more than a minor drift for the right/far right... it can be a stepping stone for 2027 and that's where the bigger uncertainty lies.

nothing on offer that makes it stand out.

― Daniel_Rf, Thursday, 13 June 2024 bookmarkflaglink

They are neither 'hard left' or 'hard right'. Has always sounded like Guardian politics in action.

appreciate the detail there thx

The bits of polling I've seen suggest Macron's party is done. That maybe Macron is trying to get them to run things for a while which could create a Liz Truss style moment.

Unfortunately Giorgia Meloni is another example of someone who has been sorta stable in Italian politics. As have the BJP in India, for a decade. If it goes that way then by '27 the far right would capture the presidency too.

I thought En Marche/Renaissance like barely existed as a party before the presidency and they then won seats off the back of his success. Politics have always been hollow af, being either racist enough to compete with the fascists or progressive enough to please leftists, it’s like the least surprising thing of all time.

Yes. Macron basically fucked over the center left PS by splitting off, the party is almost a formality, no reason for it to exist beyond the guy's ego.

Funny how its initials are the same as Macron’s 🙄

Dismayed to discover just now that centrism.biz, a satire that became more otm with every passing year, is defunct. Thankfully there is an archive of sorts here https://www.scottvrooman.org/centrism-dot-biz

xp the youth wing is called Les Jeunes avec Macron!

the bjp have at least just gone backwards in india and no longer have a majority on their own so they're now going to have to rely on their coalition partners to pass anything. this should heavily limit how evil they can be since most of their coalition partners are secular regional parties who don't support the hindutva part of the bjp's agenda.

Dismayed to discover just now that centrism.biz, a satire that became more otm with every passing year, is defunct. Thankfully there is an archive of sorts here https://www.scottvrooman.org/centrism-dot-biz

― Maggy Scraggle

read this as "centrism is defunct" which... "yes and", i guess i'd say. the _idea_ of compromise and negotiation is ok, it's current centrists' commitment to continuing to sit at the table with open fascists that's, idk, politically nihilist maybe?