EU Ewwww

Conservative parties dominated the European Union parliament elections last week as voters in 27 nations sent warnings to France, Germany, and even the United States. This could even affect aid to Ukraine. The center held, but the trend is clear. Europe is moving to the right.

Marine Le Pen’s ultranationalist National Rally in France scored twice the support of a centrist coalition led by President Emmanuel Macron’s Renaissance party, prompting him to dissolve the National Assembly and calling for snap legislative elections. These elections will take place right before the summer Olympics begin in Paris.

Macron said, “The rise of nationalists and demagogues is a danger for our nation and for Europe. After this day, I cannot go on as though nothing has happened.” If Le Pen’s party wins parliament, France may be ungovernable. Hmmm, where are we currently seeing that play out? Macron says he trusts French voters. Hopefully, they care more about France than some American voters care about their country.

You don’t care about this nation if you vote for insurrectionists like Matt Gaetz, Jim Gym Jordan, Ted Cruz, Josh Hawley, Lauren Boebert, Nancy Mace, Marjorie Taylor Greene…or Donald Trump. The party that controls our House of Representatives literally supports the people who attacked it in an insurrection attempt.

The Greens lost a quarter of their seats in the EU parliament while the center held theirs. It was farmers and other rural voters who hurt the progressive pro-climate parties. And if the hard-right conservatives had gotten their way, pulling in the European Conservatives and Reformists, another right-wing group dominated by Italy’s prime minister, Giorgia Meloni, they could have potentially lost building a coalition with the groups in the center.

Meloni is considered a radical far-right extremist. The difference between her and Benito Mussolini is that he championed himself as a fascist. I don’t think Meloni is as open about it.

The EU Parliament, like other legislative bodies, is not controlled by only two parties, like here in the United States. To form a functioning government when you don’t have a full majority, parties have to build a coalition with each other, which is more representative, requires more political diplomacy, and is more interesting. It would probably be harder for an entire party to turn into a cult and destroy the nation by itself if it was forced to build coalitions with other parties.

Here in the good ole U.S of A, our government constructed itself in a way that prevents more than two parties in control. Like soft drinks here, you only have two choices (don’t get me started on Shasta. Pffft). The Libertarian Party never gets more than three percent of the vote, but you gotta give them an attaboy for always trying. Remember Ross Perot’s Reform Party? What happened to it? And I almost forgot about the Green Party (sorry, Dr. Fink…that’s an inside thing). Out of the 535 members of the United States Congress, only four are not Republicans or Democrats. But each four vote with one of the two major parties. But I will say that the Freedom Caucus is fracturing from the GOP and may in the future become the MAGA Party. That’ll be fun.

Here, we have an entire party goosestepping toward fascism. That may not be the case in Europe yet, but they’re putting their boots on.

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