It was a blow most saw coming but that can\u2019t have softened the sting for French President Emmanuel Macron. <\/p>\n
Opposition lawmakers from both ends of France\u2019s political spectrum joined forces Wednesday to vote to oust his government, which had been in office for just nine weeks, marking the first such fall in a no-confidence motion since 1962. <\/p>\n
The minority government led by a veteran negotiator, Prime Minister Michel Barnier, whose appointment was already seen as a political compromise of sorts to sate a tricky three-way split in the national assembly, tumbled at the first hurdle. <\/p>\n
As the latest round of political head-scratching begins in France, the main question on everyone\u2019s lips is: \u201cWho will Macron pick as the next prime minister?\u201d <\/p>\n
Barnier \u2013 a champion of the European Union\u2019s Brexit negotiations and serial compromise man \u2013 was seen as a fine balance between Macron\u2019s increasingly right-leaning centrism and the political heft of the far right. <\/p>\n
Macron ignored the left\u2019s previous nomination for prime minister, and no far-right candidate appeared to be in the running. (Jordan Bardella, the top disciple of far-right leader Marine Le Pen dropped out of the running after their National Rally (RN) party failed to win a parliamentary majority.) <\/p>\n
In a polarized French parliament, few figures for the next PM seem palatable, yet fewer still appear likely to be successful. Many in the country are preparing for a surprise. <\/p>\n
Unless the next government leans heavily into a coalition with either the broad left-wing or far-right bloc, it doesn\u2019t seem possible to avoid a repeat of this week\u2019s political dead-end. <\/p>\n
For Macron at least, the arithmetic doesn\u2019t add up. With the parliament pretty evenly split between left, center and far-right, he needs a friend. <\/p>\n
What\u2019s sure is that Macron\u2019s grand plans for domestic policy reform are dead in the water. <\/p>\n
Both the left and far-right are violently opposed to most tax hikes and austerity measures. Barnier\u2019s budget, which sparked his downfall, included \u20ac60 billion ($63 billion) worth of tax rises and spending cuts aimed at bringing the country\u2019s budget deficit down to 5% next year, according to the government\u2019s calculations. <\/p>\n
Yet given the policy divides between Macron\u2019s domestic ambition and both other camps, anything more than bench-warming will be almost impossible for any future PM. <\/p>\n
The opposition camps can smell blood in the water. The left-wing New Popular Front group has already declared it would bring down any government that doesn\u2019t have a leftwinger at the helm. <\/p>\n
The left \u2013 who were the ostensible winners of this summer\u2019s snap election, after voters banded together to deny the far-right a widely-expected victory \u2013 want their first-place ranking respected, with lawmakers coming out in force overnight to put the crosshairs firmly on Macron\u2019s back. <\/p>\n
\u201cThe Macronists lost the European (elections), they lost the legislatives. And now Emmanuel Macron plans to name a Macronist (prime minister) again. There\u2019s a democratic problem,\u201d Manuel Bompard, national coordinator for the far-left France Unbowed party said Wednesday night. <\/p>\n
Le Pen\u2019s political tribe, riding the crest of their record-setting election results in April, still seem to have their eyes set on 2027, the next presidential election. <\/p>\n
However the current political impasse is resolved, it surely provides only a poisoned chalice for the next prime minister. <\/p>\n
Le Pen has booted the blame for the crisis to Macron and offered little in the way of solutions, pointedly not calling for his resignation Wednesday night. <\/p>\n
Needing the backing of one camp to pass his budget earlier this week, Barnier sidled to the right more than the left, appeasing Le Pen\u2019s demands. She then appears to have stabbed him in the back. <\/p>\n
Barnier accused the far-right of political blackmail after he said they demanded even more from him, setting the stage for the no-confidence vote. Conveniently for Le Pen, it was a left-wing motion that doomed Barnier (even if the far-right later proposed a similar motion), with the left copping most of the government\u2019s public ire over the move. <\/p>\n
The far-right party members are keeping their powder dry. Le Pen knows they can demand even more from Barnier\u2019s replacement. <\/p>\n
The political machinations on the right and left appear little more than gamesmanship. <\/p>\n
It\u2019s wishful thinking from the left that Macron will resign. A politician who is never one to back down from a fight, he\u2019s safe in the Elysee until 2027. <\/p>\n
The far-right don\u2019t seem willing to sully their political polling with genuine cooperation with Macron. <\/p>\n
Deadlock and discontent currently rule supreme. Once upon a time it was other European nations wracked by political turbulence, including stalemate in Belgium and fleeting Italian governments, among others. But France can\u2019t boast of stability now. <\/p>\n
The next presidential election in 2027 seems far beyond the political horizon, even next summer \u2013 the next possible chance of another legislative election \u2013 appears impossibly far away. The path ahead for France\u2019s politics is rocky and barren. <\/p>\n
For Macron, who kicked off this whole saga by calling an election to find stability, it\u2019s an ignominious state of affairs. <\/p>\n<\/p>\n
It was a blow most saw coming but that can\u2019t have softened the sting for French President Emmanuel Macron. Opposition lawmakers from both ends of France\u2019s political spectrum joined forces Wednesday to vote to oust his government, which had been in office for just nine weeks, marking the first such fall in a no-confidence motion […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":6054,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6053","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-politics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/investingsstrategist.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6053","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/investingsstrategist.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/investingsstrategist.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/investingsstrategist.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6053"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/investingsstrategist.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6053\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/investingsstrategist.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6054"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/investingsstrategist.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6053"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/investingsstrategist.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6053"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/investingsstrategist.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6053"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}