“At what point does a beleaguered population living near or below the poverty line rise up in protest?” From the author’s talk on April 4 at the Independent National Convention in Austin, Texas.
Far from constituting an exception, March 16 marks the 100th time under France’s Fifth Republic that the executive has drawn on special powers to force through an unpopular measure, writes Mathias Bernard.
When it bypassed Parliament and forced through pension system changes, Macron’s government exposed the anti-democratic deterioration in the Fifth Republic’s dual-executive system, writes Muhammed Shabeer.
Despite Colin Powell’s presentation and the U.S. media’s embrace of it, every other nation on the Security Council, with the exception of Britain and Spain, was highly skeptical of the U.S. argument for war, including allies Germany and France.
The mobilization on Tuesday was the latest demonstration against a government initiative that is currently being discussed in the French Senate. While the bill calls for raising the retirement age, protesters want it lowered.
Having used arms control to gain unilateral advantage over Russia, the cost to the U.S. and NATO in getting Moscow back to the negotiating table will be high.
The German and French leaders have told Ukraine they must seek peace with Russia in exchange for a post-war defense pact, according to a report in The Wall Street Journal.
Despite widespread opposition to raising the retirement age, many French lawmakers remain determined to fulfill the president’s election pledge to overhaul the nation’s pension system, Kenny Stancil reports.
Given the duplicitous history of the Minsk Accords, it is unlikely Russia can be diplomatically dissuaded from its military offensive. As such, 2023 appears to be shaping up as a year of continued violent confrontation.