Shouldn't BOTH sides listen?
French police arrest nearly 600 people in post-election violenceOne of the ideas behind actually 'voting' for a country's leadership is that both sides (or all, depending) will abide by the results of the vote. Apparently, the idea that their candidate didn't win is so distasteful to some on the losing side in France's election that they can't imagine actually going along and cooperating with the other side.PARIS, May 7 (AP) - (Kyodo)— French police have arrested a total of 592 people across the country as bands of rioters protested conservative Nicolas Sarkozy's presidential election victory Sunday, French media reported.
The police said a total of 730 vehicles were torched and 28 police officers were injured in violent incidents from Sunday night to Monday morning. Police fought stone-throwing rioters with tear gas, but it was not clear how many rioters were injured, according to Radio France.
On Sunday night, about 5,000 people gathered at the Place de la Bastille, a favored gathering spot for right-wing supporters during the election.
Other fights with the police broke out in Toulouse, Marseilles and Lyon.
So instead, they riot.
Is it just me, or does it always seem the leftists in any society seem to be doing the rioting and street displays? The right, the more conservative sectors, the ones who actually seem to understand that as fun as it may be to riot and burn things down, that the next morning SOMEONE has to clean up and try to rebuild what the evening's excesses burned out, don't seem so inclined to quick use of the torch.
It's a lot of fun to call "man the barricades", but eventually someone's got to go open the stores and make sure the water and lights stay on.
And the ones quickest to call for riots are usually the furthest from that bit of 'reality'.
J.
Comments (3)
That is, indeed, the Leftist view: 'We want change and we want it NOW or ELSE!'
So romantic to stand up against the 'authorities' and show how brave one is in their ideals. Throw anything into the barricades and set fires and act like anarchists... because that social change is so important! Just like the French Revolution. That worked out so well, didn't it? What did happen to the original revolutionaries? Oh... Guillotined by even more radical people. And then those went to get the hard haircut. That is what ushered in Napoleon.
Then 1917 the February Revolution! Of course they wanted to keep to the intercourse of Nations and continue the war. So the October Revolution! And the rights of man? Oh, the worker over all and the Party over the worker because it knew best... and don't mind the new secret police that acted just like the old secret police. And the ruthlessness of 'Uncle' Joe Stalin that was the last standing and then 'purged' the Army and trusted another tyrant by the name of Hitler. Decades of tyranny, repression...
Remember who brought down that 'Worker's Paradise'? It wasn't the US. It wasn't the radicals. It was the *workers* in Poland. I remember the great quote from the coal miners when they were threatened with the army: 'Let them come dig with their bayonets for we will not work for them.'
Workers brought down the 'Worker's Paradise' from the inside. They hold to Roman Catholicism. Had a Polish Pope.
And the Spanish Civil war... Guernica. 'Homage to Catalonia' by Orwell...
It seems that every time these barricades get manned things go from bad to worse in short order.
Hmmm... a bad trend, that. Tyranny and repression following Revolution because it takes the form of those that made the Revolution. The American points that out because it was a Revolution *for* Rights and listened *to* the common man so that Citizenship could be upheld. Very argumentative bunch, that, but upheld their differences to form a new society to make something better. Nearly fell apart under the Articles... which we forget, also. Then the drive was to make something just a bit better, but not perfect. And that is what we are enjoined to do: make a more perfect Union.
The Left adores perfection and doesn't mind the body count to not reach it. Because they forget that only tyranny and despotism can be perfected... not democracy. And when 'more perfect' doesn't work out you go back to what was not so bad and then see if another way can be found TO 'more perfect'. While founded on Revolution the US is pragmatic in the knowledge that the perfect is unobtainable because WE are imperfect. The rivers of blood and bloody hands of those seeking perfection point to their problems.
It is hard to *work* at democracy and accept differences while not killing each other over them. Tyranny is perfect in that... people have no rights in it. 'Accept my way or else' is tyranny.
And only the blood of its victims comes from it.
Posted by ajacksonian | May 8, 2007 2:16 PM
Posted on May 8, 2007 14:16
Very good comment, A. To the left, if it isn't perfect it needs to be pulled down and rebuilt, no matter the cost in lives or money.
J.
Posted by JLawson | May 9, 2007 9:08 AM
Posted on May 9, 2007 09:08
J - That is the long and short of it.
As a polisci teacher on a course on this said: Whatever structure brings them to power, that is how they will rule.
The Left wants a perfect world.
Humans are imperfect.
Therefore humans must go.
So simple! So simplistic....
Posted by ajacksonian | May 9, 2007 10:41 AM
Posted on May 9, 2007 10:41