I am saddened by the latest round of Yellow Vest protests in France. To top it off, Trump is practically gloating over them.
Please consider Paris Luxury Stores Looted, Burned in ‘Yellow Vest’ Riots.
Rioters looted and torched shops and businesses on the famed Champs-Elysees avenue in Paris on Saturday, on the 18th weekend of French “yellow vest” protests, characterised by a sharp increase in violence after weeks of dwindling turnout.
President Emmanuel Macron cut short a skiing trip in the Pyrenees to return to Paris for a crisis meeting, as hooded protesters went on the rampage in Paris, leaving a trail of destruction in the touristic heart of the city.
The police appeared overrun as protesters swarmed the Champs-Elysees, vandalising and later setting fire to Fouquet’s brasserie, a favourite hangout of the rich and famous for the past century — as well as luxury handbag store Longchamp, a bank, another restaurant and several news stands.
The rioters also looted several clothing stores and set fire to barricades in scenes reminiscent of the worst yellow-vest riots in Paris in December. Saturday’s protests were markedly more violent than in recent weeks. Police said close to 240 people were arrested, while prosecutors said more than 100 had been taken into custody.
The bank set alight was on the ground floor of an apartment building, and fire firefighters had to quickly evacuate the residents, including a nine-month-old baby.
French Protesters Riot in Paris, Accuse Macron of “Hot Air”
AP News reports French Protesters Riot in Paris, Accuse Macron of “Hot Air”
French yellow vest protesters set life-threatening fires, smashed up luxury stores in Paris and clashed with police Saturday in the 18th straight weekend of demonstrations against President Emmanuel Macron. Large plumes of smoke rose above the rioting on Paris’ landmark Champs-Elysees avenue, and a mother and her child were just barely saved from a building blaze.
Cobblestones flew in the air and smoke from fires set by protesters mingled with clouds of tear gas sprayed by police, as tensions continued for hours along the Champs-Elysees. By dusk, as the demonstrators had dispersed, the famed avenue was a blackened expanse.
The resurgent violence comes at a watershed moment for a movement, which had been fizzling in recent weeks, and at the end of a two-month-long national debate called by Macron that protesters say failed to answer their demands for economic justice.
One arson fire targeted a bank near the Champs-Elysees on the ground floor of a seven-story residential building. A mother and her child had to be rescued just as the fire threatened to engulf their floor, Paris’ fire service told The Associated Press. Eleven people in the building, including two firefighters, sustained light injuries.
A 43-year-old German factory worker who identified himself only as Peter had traveled to Paris to show solidarity with yellow vest protesters. Standing Saturday outside the burned-out bank, he said he agreed with the destruction, calling banks “the biggest problem in the world.”
Riots for 18 Weeks
What kind of twisted mind agrees with violent protests that threatens innocent persons including babies?
I really thought the worst of these protests were over.
For those new to the story, these riots started 18 weeks ago in response to Macron’s ill-advised gas tax hike to save the planet from CO2.
In recent weeks the crowds diminished from hundreds of thousands to the low tens of thousands. The violence tapered off as well, until today.
This is inexcusable, and so is gloating about it.
I am totally disgusted. Condolences and best wishes to those hurt by these unjustified actions.
Mike “Mish” Shedlock
Well, ‘word’ is that, little boy in short pants Macron, lost to LePen in the first and second round, but due to LePen gaining ~72% of the first round vote tally, there shouldn’t have been a second round. I would think that if the OWO establishment in London weren’t so blinded by their own wishful thinking, they would’ve done the same in the Brexit vote… they most likely assumed they would win it… not like the Scottish Referendum in which the over 70% vote in favor forced them to rig the count as well… they knew what was coming in that one. With France, the OWO establishment is facing the scripted/engineered collapse of their system, simultaneously as the ‘select few’ need prep for the NWO…. same here in the States, which is why our OWO empire is having the puppets in DC attack each other… to collapse the OWO system, same for all our regime change ops worldwide…. to prep for the NWO global police state… at least some of the French are fighting back… better late than never. Here in the States, we’re big on buying guns, but they never use them…. like programmed zombies… allowed to think highly of themselves as long as they don’t use their mind for much else.
“I really thought the worst of these protests were over.”
All democracies end, and they all end in badly, in violence. There are are only two possible ends. One is that the people rise up, looting, and with violence, and take over, leading to anarchy. The other other is that, when the people try to rise up, and loot and and destroy, the military puts them down, and suspends the Consitution “until order is re-established”, leading to a military dictatorship.
Is this the end for France, or just a preliminary bump? If the violence escalates, will the military and police begin shooting the looters to kill, or just stand by passively and observe, or even join in? I don’t know.
This is the future for the US as well. As I said, history teaches that all democracies ultimately collapse. Watch the events in France carefully to gain insight of where the US will be in another twenty years.
Carl, my good man, you dazzle us with your historical acumen. The British for one have had representative government both before and after the English Revolution. The King was not all powerful. America has had representative government now for over three hundred years in one form or another. And of course, the Venetian had a form of representative government in their ascendancy. All things end as the Bible tells us, but I will wager the French will come out of this with their democracy intact. Constitutional Democracy as an idea never goes away. As for the Chinese, some day the “Bullets of Tiananmen Square” will not be enough to stop the Chinese from gaining a representative government.
The US is unusual in that they have lasted 300 years. The primary reason is that the founding fathers were aware of the weaknesses of Democracies, and tried to prevent them. Their fear was that a class of career politicians would arise, and continue to be elected by promising things to people. To prevent this, they came up with 5 protections:
Only since 1937 has the US government effectively had unlimited power to tax, to spend, to print money, and to borrow. In 80 years the US has come a long, long way towards the inevitable end. It might make 100 years, but it will be close.
I’ll look into the the Venetian government, thanks. As for pre-Revolution Britain, it is one thing to say that “the King was not all powerful”, and to say that the elected representatives had unlimited power to tax, spend, print money, and borrow. I don’t see that as example of one that lasted a long time.
I did some reading on the Venetian government, and I plan to do some more, as it looks interesting. At first glance, though, it appears to have some very different characteristics that enabled it to survive for 1000 years, rather than the 1-200 years that Democracies typically survive for. The first difference I noted is that the Doge was elected for life. That means that, once elected, he no longer had to be constantly responsive to public opinion, and was able to make difficult, decisions, that, while unpopular, were good for the country. The primary flaw with a normal Democracy is precisely that decisions are not made based on the long term good for the country, but based on immediate popularity. Thus, it is always popular to spend money, but such spending is not necessarily good for long term stability.
Thinking closer to home, if you asked your children, they would never be in favor of you kicking them out of the house and forcing them to be on their own, yet there can be times when that is for their greater long term good. Decisions that are good in the long term, are not always the ones that are popular in the short run.
The second difference I see is that my initial reading makes me believe that it was an oligarchy, not a democracy. It was essentially ruled by the merchants, from what I can tell, and the common people did not control the vote. Given that successful merchants tend to be people who learn to spend less than they take in, it seems likely that they would have applied that to government as well, and not have spent themselves into bankruptcy, the normal end of a true democracy. That would also partially explain why it lasted so long.
I also noted a comment that they had very strict laws, and ruthless enforcement. That also is not a characteristic of a true democracy.
ll those broken windows and burned out storefronts will do wonders for the French economy.
Everyone will die for lack of a $5000 purse.
If they’re “too big to jail” …. this is what happens. No Justice, No peace.
From a distance, the French seem to have infinite patience…until they don’t.
French angst has been simmering and growing since the Algerian civil war.
The casual dumping of millions of more refugees onto the French people as they are becoming increasingly aware of the lies and failures of socialism may be the next spark.
Miss I think you need yourself a health dose of reality. It so transparently obvious what’s going on in France, and you’re missing it.
The Govt is controlled by the ultra rich, rich gigantic corporations, the elites and is systemically enacting polices to take everything from the working class and place it into the hands of the ultra rich and corporate welfare queens. It’s called neoliberalism and it’s a world wide policy. The govt has insisted on ignoring peaceful opposition, and responded with brutality, violence, and lies to it’s citizens. Anyone who thinks violent revolution is not acceptable in response to such will attempts to lie and steal form the vast population, it not paying attn.
Yup, I believe you’ve pretty much nailed it. The people have reached a boiling point and the resistance is now on.
Hi Mish,
I’m French and have lived in the suburb of Paris since 2014.
French social movements have a reputation to turn violent rather than not since 1789 and even before…
My take of this is some of those people are getting more and more desperate not to be heard and are eventually turning to violence.
Yellow vest were at best 150.000 people at their highest. That’s hardly one French out of 500, that is 0,2% of the population mobilized, pretending to make a “revolution” one day per week, that is, if it was not too cold or too rainy, and going back to work during week days.
Obviously not enough to make any change, but those people had high hopes they would. After several weeks of dwindling participation, the most radical are simply meeting the sad truth and some of them obviously can’t cope with it.
If the global trend is defiance of the people against their governments, the French Yellow Vests are still much too little to make a difference, if you compare it with what was needed in, say, Armenia last year, or with what we see now in Algeria (17 millions people in the street and growing…).
Violence is of course to be condemned, but in a country such as France, with the fading hopes of this little crowd and the deafening silence of the government, was to be somehow expected…just like what happened in Greece not so long ago.
I’m expecting next time to be worse, it won’t be Yellow Vests nor Nuits Debout. Unless the people find an unexpected non-violent leader who can channel the growing anger of half the population of this country, and I don’t see one at the moment.
Yellow Vests protests against the globalist elites – Burns local peoples’ businesses. This protest could have gone in a totally different direction that was meaningful, but they never do.
They did in Mogadishu. And in the US in the 18th century. And never really stopped doing, in Afghanistan. Which is why the Muzzies had “Arab Spring.” While the West will remain stuck in perpetual Fall and Winter, by the looks of it until the Muzzies get numerous enough to arrange for a more properly meaningful Spring over here too.
Had Macron offered an actual dialogue and wanted to really change something for the people, this probably would have calmed down. Kicking the can further only amplifies the problem.
“I am totally disgusted. Condolences and best wishes to those hurt by these unjustified actions.”
I agree. That said, while two wrongs do not make a right, when the so-called rulers are perceived to enrich themselves at the expense of their citizens (which is what is happening across the world) the path to throw them out turns out to be violent. The path capitalism is on presently (especially since 2008 – bailouts, ZIRP/NIRP, QE4EVER) will lead to this ONLY and that too on probably an unimaginable scale. It is restricted to Paris now. Imagine, if it spreads to other cities, you would have not Paris but whole of France burning and it might not be restricted to France alone. Therefore it could well be a taste of things to come. How and what form it would take is beyond me. But it will happen.
IMO, this can only escalate if the cabal of politicians, elite, regulators, bureaucrats, corporate and central bankers continue to maintain status quo (see the actions of the central bankers since Dec 2018-they are unable to even stand a small bite on the assets held by the rich). Therefore it is time for the cabal to own up and choose wisely. Barring this I do not expect this simmering to die down any time soon. There might seem to be moments of cooling down but always with the premise that it can boil over any time. The present capitalist system will be dismantled eventually and IMO, it needs to be dismantled too. My fear is it is going to be replaced by something awful in the guise of doing good for the citizens (but then this is what the central banks have been doing since 2008).
When in the past I read about French Revolution I never imagined that I will witness it too. But then life has its surprises.
If I had to blame two people for all the ills of the world today, I would name Alan Greenspan and Ben Bernanke.
Just shoot the people doing this. It would be justified and would put an end to it.
Don’t make the link between the riots and the yellow vests too quickly. One of the targets of the yellow vests is the press who has been accused of twisting the facts and terrible coverage.
Yea blame Trump. Boy i am glad he pulled us out the Climate Change Accord. Give the man a break. MSM beats on him everyday.
Now we got the AOC Climate Accord to worry about. It never ends.
“To top it off, Trump is practically gloating over them.”
Macron’s ski trip to the Pyrenees was a lot more despicable. After all, it was his policies that started the demonstrations/riots and it is his country. The protests have now taken a violent turn but, in previous ones, the perpetrators of violence were mostly Macron’s police.
I wonder what Paris in the Spring will look like? The warm weather may bring out even more. It could even last into the summer tourist season.
The French government, at least the NATO part of it, inflicted far more damage and death on Libya than les gilets jaunes have inflicted on France. The government is also prosecuting LePen for publishing ‘graphic’ photos of Islamic terrorism.
The EU and globalism in general, also bear some blame for all this. In addition to his bad environmental policies, Macron said, just before the riots, that “patriotism is the exact opposite of nationalism: nationalism is a betrayal of patriotism” – not too bright, politically speaking.
(I’ll add here that I’m an individualist, not a nationalist, much less a globalist).
Yeah, I’m most interested in how long these protests will continue with warmer weather. This is why Macron wanted an EU army, to quell demonstrations like this.
We won’t see this in the US since law enforcement and/or the military would clamp down swiftly and brutally, so it will be tougher to gauge societal angst. China and Russia are similar to us that way, but in Euro-land this could become the norm for a while.
Macron is a French Nationalist that attempts to manipulate his image against that truth. Nothing more than an actor and a shallow one at that.
I don’t agree with this violence but when an alouf elitist cabal runs the show I can at least sympathise a little.