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The Daily Mail endorsement of Le Pen
The Daily Mail endorsement of Le Pen
I'm very frustrated by the Daily Mail's choice to openly endorse Marine Le Pen in the French elections as the only 'responsible vote' for France in the recent Presidential elections. Given the Mail's readership, it sounds to me that extreme politics on immigration are legitimised under the guise of aims like sovereignty from Brussels, tackling youth unemployment and so on and so forth.
So here's the controversial bit of my opinion, I really think that editors of the Daily Mail should sack the author of that story and offer a full and unreserved apology. After all, they already have a tainted history by justifying Hitler's politics back in the 30s. Such endorsements, even though they are very unlikely to have any impact on French politics themselves, could offer a boost to the BNP and other such organisations in the UK itself that can easily point to that article and the similarities between themselves and the Front National to gain legitimacy.
Freedom of speech dictates that this person could post it on his blog. Common sense and responsibility dictates that a (sadly) leading paper shouldn't publish such views.
I'm linking to the article in question for anyone who hasn't read it.
1 year 8 weeks ago
Let's take a look at the substance of Waghorne's support for Le Pen junior. A number of caveats trail Waghorne's claim that it would be "responsible" to vote for Le Pen. First, he highlights the incompetence, vagueness and tactical weaknesses of her economic policy. As he rightly points out, her partly has committed a serious strategic mistake by failing to capitalise on concerns surrounding the financial crisis. Not only does this reflect badly on Jean Marie's offspring, it also indicates a lack of political experience and insight among her advisers. In short, Marine is blinkered and out of her depth, and the people responsible for filling in the gaps in her skillset are incompetent. On this basis alone, voting for her cannot be considered "responsible".
Wagnore also notes that Le Pen's efforts to improve the FN's image have "mitigated, without cancelling out [sic] present reminders of its unacceptable past." This is true. However, the party's "unacceptable past", includes links with the ultranationalist Japanese Issuikai movement; Le Pen senior's virulent anti semitism; the party's late 1980's proposal that AIDS sufferers be interred in de-facto concentration camps; the bizzare suggestion that Jewish people should join the FN in order to obtain protection against "Islamic extremists"; Le Pen senior's exclusion from the European Parliament for physically assaulting a socialist candidate during the 1997 French general election; holocaust denial; and the FN's membership of the Alliance of European National Movements, a pan european group that includes border-line facist organisations such as Jobik.
Presented with such details of the party's "unacceptable past", any strategist worthy of his salary would advise Le Pen junior to close the FN down, resign her position, offer profuse public apologies for the hatred and bitterness stirred up by her father and his supporters and move into a career other than politics. There is no way in which a vote for FN can be a "responsible" use of the franchise, and no way in which Richard Waghorne can be considered a serious or competent journalist.
1 year 8 weeks ago
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Presented with such details of the party's "unacceptable past", any strategist worthy of his salary would advise Le Pen junior to close the FN down, resign her position, offer profuse public apologies for the hatred and bitterness stirred up by her father and his supporters and move into a career other than politics. There is no way in which a vote for FN can be a "responsible" use of the franchise, and no way in which Richard Waghorne can be considered a serious or competent journalist.
Why should liberals get to decide what is a 'responsible' use of the franchise? The whole point of being able to vote is that individuals can vote for what they believe in and there are parties to reflect that. If people are voting for far right partys then the mainstream needs to work out how to solve the issues behind the vote rather than constantly condemning them as racist and illegitimate which is not very constructive.
Second I dont agree that the best thing for Le Pen to disband FN and offer profuse apologies because Le Pen could then simply create a new party on the same platform that would probably be much more popular. Without FN's baggage there is a good chance that a chunk of Sarkozy's supporters would have gone over to the new party and we would have had Le Pen in the second round.
1 year 7 weeks ago
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You undermine the first paragraph of your response in the second paragraph. You criticise my take on one of the most offensive articles that the Daily Mail has published for years (no mean feat) by implying that I am being elitist.
It is quite clear that it is possible to use a vote in an objectively irresponsible manner - in a way that supporters of both the political left and right would agree to be damaging to democracy. A voter could spoil their ballot. If a majority of voters did so, their state would undergo a constitutional crisis. Such crises are expensive to resolve and hold up the progressive and problem solving business of government. It is obvious, therefore, that it is irresponsible to spoil one's ballot. Similarly, voting for a party with no policies, or one run by objectively incompetent individuals would be equally irresponsible, as it is highly likely that their confidence will undermine the operation of the state, costing yet more money and time.
A cursory glimpse at Le Pen junior's fiscal and monetary policy documents reveals that she is much more adept as a lawyer than an economist. Her attitude to the EU and to protectionist fiscal and monetary policies are fantastical, to say the lest. In addition to this, there appears to be no one in the FN willing to challenge her lack of experience, due to her obvious popularity. Add this to a fanciful scheme to withdraw France from NATO and the Euro and it is plain to see that a vote for the FN would not just be irresponsible but irrational. A vote for the FN in France or the BNP in the UK is little better than a vote for the Monster Raving Looney Party or Rodent Supreme.
It is not elitist, nor a uniquely liberal trait, to highlight the harm that could be done to a state by a party devoted to realising patently unreasonable and unfeasible policies.
1 year 7 weeks ago
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You undermine the first paragraph of your response in the second paragraph. You criticise my take on one of the most offensive articles that the Daily Mail has published for years (no mean feat) by implying that I am being elitist.
Actually I was thinking anti-choice and so anti democratic but elitist could be thrown in too if you insist!
It is quite clear that it is possible to use a vote in an objectively irresponsible manner - in a way that supporters of both the political left and right would agree to be damaging to democracy.
The disagreement here is whether voting in a way that is damaging to democracy is an irresponsible use of the vote. For me the point of democracy is that people should be allowed to vote against having a democracy if they wish. The point of democracy is not for it to be self sustaining but to proviode the people with the government and the policies they want. If the people want a totally different form of government why is it irresposible to vote against it?
A voter could spoil their ballot. If a majority of voters did so, their state would undergo a constitutional crisis.
Yes it would cause a constitutional crisis but if so many people believe ALL the possible parties are not worth voting for I would say the country is already in crisis and in need of shaking up.
Similarly, voting for a party with no policies, or one run by objectively incompetent individuals would be equally irresponsible, as it is highly likely that their confidence will undermine the operation of the state, costing yet more money and time.
How do we know that Marine Le Pen is incompetent? Her success in the party and in increasing their share of the vote implies at least some level of competance. Similarly you attack the idea of voting for her on the basis of a lack of experience which seems odd, opposition politicians not irregularly come into power without having been in government before.
A cursory glimpse at Le Pen junior's fiscal and monetary policy documents reveals that she is much more adept as a lawyer than an economist. Her attitude to the EU and to protectionist fiscal and monetary policies are fantastical, to say the lest. In addition to this, there appears to be no one in the FN willing to challenge her lack of experience, due to her obvious popularity.
You attack her for a failing that applies to most small parties. Not expecting to get into government tends to lead to somewhat fantastical shopping lists of policies. By this argument it is irresponsible to vote for small parties like the Greens, or given some of the attacks there were before the last election the Liberal democrats for their fairy tale policies them too.
Add this to a fanciful scheme to withdraw France from NATO and the Euro
Dare I point out that you are making this statement from a country that is not a member of the Euro and France is a country that until 2009 was practically not a member of NATO with it having withdrawn from all military aspects of NATO and expelling allied forces from French soil in the 1960s while still remaining a member.
It is not elitist, nor a uniquely liberal trait, to highlight the harm that could be done to a state by a party devoted to realising patently unreasonable and unfeasible policies.
It is however a pretty liberal trait to assume that we should be able to decide what is responsible and what is not and moralise about who democrats should vote for. Just as we demand democracy in the Middle East and express horror when they vote in Jihadis. They used democracy and voted the wrong way!
1 year 7 weeks ago
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Fortunately he did not manage to persuade enough french voters to vote for le pen to put her in to the second round. To be honest it is pretty much in line with what one would expect from the daily mail. Yes perhaps it is irresponsible to be encouraging voting for a pretty extremist party but I would not be too surprised if at some point the Daily Mail endorse UKIP for a UK election - something which would have considerably more impact than an endorsement for a french election. As a result this would be rather more worrying. Generally I think we have to realise that newspapers are not always the best places to get information as they dont provide balanced coverage. When it comes new newspapers I agree with Romney's 'corporations are people too' as in the case of newspapers they tend to have a certain view and stick to it and with the Daily Mail this opinion happens to be right wing, anti immigration, anti EU etc. Newspapers are all about freedom of speech and while I dont agree with it we have accepted the idea that they should be able to endorse candidates, if the Economist can endorse Sarkozy, and The Guardian Hollande why cant the Daily Mail endorse Le Pen?
It should also be noted that 'rightminds' the area where this was published appears to be the Mail's opinion section, so I am not sure this really means that his opinion really constitutes a daily mail endorsement of Le Pen (is an endorsement not usually an editorial/leader?). And as an area that is meant for opinions it seems reasonable that freedom of speech should mean that it can be published.