A Simple Solution to the French Strikes: the Vote!

Hey, Frenchies, the answer to the government-citizens standoff is simple. It’s called democracy. It's weird how after they're elected politicians think of themselves as MASTERS and the citizenry as SLAVES. Remember when idiot boy Tony Blair thought it would be great fun to lead (or drag) Great Britain into war against Iraq just because he and idiot boy George Bush are both BORN-AGAIN IDIOT BOYS? Neither of the idiot boys cared about what their people thought about going to war for no reason other than engaging in a new 21st century crusade and making a lot of money for the war industries by killing Araabs.

I guess you read about Twinkie Boy Blair getting lots of expensive gifts. God, being a politician is fun! You get to play war games with real people and live like royalty.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/blair-left-office-with-76-prime-ministerial-gifts-2109417.html

One of the givers was Italian Prime Minister, Silvio Berlusconi, you remember him, the billionaire who supported the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq, which caused him become unpopular, especially after an Italian intelligence agent was killed by U.S. forces in 2005. But the warmonger’s crime was soon forgiven and he was reelected by the Italian people, who are more concerned with their pasta than with their government's committing war crimes. It's an old Italian tradition called indulgences.

Which shows a strong American-Italian connection because Americans proudly reelected their infamous (wealthy, and right-wing) war criminal George Bush. And so the killing goes on:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yQdnFXbXeIQ

But who really cares? Killing Afghans is a lot of fun with very little risk. Actually China has proven itself a much greater threat to the U.S. and Italy. China's weapon? Capitalism. How about an Operation Enduring Freedom against China to liberate the Chinese from their tyrannical government? That's a different matter. The Chinese have a real military, not just a bunch of freedom fighters whose arsenal consists of dated AK47s and RPGs, homemade bombs, and of course their weapon of mass destruction the human bomb...

Let's get back to the people who are despised by Americans for preferring drinking wine, making love and eating croissants (pretty much in that order) to making war.

So, Sarko, all you need to remember is that you are president, not king, of France. Besides, you got a hot wife so Décontractéz-vous! Let the people decide in a referendum whether they should have to work to 62. C’est incroyable! expecting people to work until they are 62. All human beings have a god-given right to retired for at least as long as they have worked, no matter the month off each year, weekends, a bunch of saints days, etc.! (Unless you live in Africa, Asia, India, etc. In those places you retire when you die. That's the whole reason for believing in Heaven.)

Oh those poor spoiled French! Only one country—Finland—gets more paid days off 44, 40 for France, 25 for America (who are happy if they have enough time off to to watch sports on TV). And the French work only 35 hours a week—poor babies! But of course the French work to live, not live to work. Still, the big question is who is going to pay for all those retirees living the good life until they are eighty. 30 years straight of paid vacation! What nation can afford that?

But the people should decide. It's their country—their kids' future. That’s what democracy is supposed to be all about. The government can make its case on television. Let the experts have their say. Then let the people vote. If commonsense prevails, then they will choose to work until 62. If self-interest prevails, then so be it. That’s democracy. Sometimes it doesn't work very well, such as when warmongers like Bush and Berlusconi get reelected. But at least the people can't do any worse than their leaders.

Therefore Nicky I say let the people decide. At least the present turmoil will be avoided and the people might stop hating your guts and their government (as is the case in the U.S., where you get only as much democracy as you can afford). Let France give real democracy a try. It’s a simple solution and a democratic one. Sarkozy baby, this is your big chance to show the French people that you are their president, not their king. And maybe you will stop being guillotined in the polls and the press!

P.S. Now of course I'm assuming that the people want to retire at 60 because (1) they're just worn out and can't work another day, so the only humane option is too call it quits at 60 and head down to the Riviera to catch some rays and have a little fun before dropping dead in 30 years. And (2) it only only fair to young people to get out of the way and give them a chance to work.

That is the big complaint of the young demonstrators throwing rocks at the cops, burning cars, and basically destroying a lot of stuff other people built and paid for. It's interesting to see these youngsters so upset, who haven't worked, or paid anything into the system, and who have been receiving lots of freebies from the system (working French taxpayers), such as their education, or welfare benefits if they are just hanging out like a lot of immigrants who expect good jobs but without having to work to work to become well educated.

I read that many of the French rioters are immigrant youth who have nothing better to do and see the French government as the old colonial master and the police as its fist. I read about an unemployed son of North African immigrant who has a high school education but has never held a steady job. He lives on welfare and rent subsidies totaling about $980 a month. No bad at all. And he's thinking about retirement when has been retired for years. After seeing the movie The Class

http://video.yahoo.com/watch/3813173/10434837

I'm wondering, are these the masked youthful rock throwers? Wanting good jobs but lack a work ethic in high school. I see that as wanting the benefits without having to work for them and not appreciating the benefits being offered by French society—paid for by taxpayers who worked hard to become educated and work hard at the jobs they perform. And by the way, the private sector (i.e., the capitalism sector) has to pay not only for the social benefits received by the ungrateful strikers (such as education, health care, retirement, and unemployment benefits) but also pay for the public sector jobs (which are paid for with tax dollars that come from tax dollars).

In other words, you can't have welfare state (in which everyone is living and working off the state) without creating massive debt. The British have just sobered up to this fact. You must have tax dollars coming in from that hated private sector. The French strikers see the solution as a combination of the state's printing or borrowing more money and taxing the wealthy even more. The wealthy should be tax, and certainly not allowed to become obscene billionaires as in plutocratic America.
But if overtaxed the fatcats or their money tends to live the country since they really don't belong to any country except that of the wealthy.

A country that is doing much better than France economically as well as providing extraordinary benefits and services to its people (it ain't America!) is Switzerland. How is it that the Swiss unemployment rate is a 1/3 of France's yet the Swiss are required to work until 64 for women and 65 for men—you know, if a low (60 is low; 59- is parasitic) retirement age means more jobs?

However, I want to give the workers and nonworkers who are demanding retirement no later than 60 the benefit of the doubt, that they simply can't work beyond 60 and want to make their jobs available to the younger generation. However that would mean really retiring and not taking a second job once they retired. To do that would DOUBLE-DIPPING, which is very popular among retired public employees in the U.S. That's practice of receiving more than one income. For example, a worn-out Frenchie retiring at 60 taking another job in order to have two incomes. Wouldn't that defeat the purpose of making more jobs available to young people? And it's kind of disingenuous (perhaps greedy is a better word) you're giving up your job to a younger person and turn around and take another job.

In spite of my obvious cynicism, I believe the French people should decide this question, not by rioting but by voting. That should always be the case today when a government (in a truly democratic society) is making a BIG DECISION that will substantially affect the nation as a whole. With modern communications and voting technologies, there is no reason not to allow the people to decide. This is done in California. But it would be great for France to lead the way to taking democracy to a higher more democratic level.