Germany and France move to supporting Russia in Syria...

You can only draw so many fake red lines before everyone realizes you are full of sh*t. 

Via Veterans Today:

Germany is surprisingly quitting the anti-Putin Alliance created by the United States: Germany now officially welcomes Moscow’s readiness to engage with Syria and launches an initiative to end the war with the Russians and the French.
Thus, the stream of refugees is to be stopped. Germany put thousands of soldiers on standby.
A spokesman of the Foreign Ministry also said Germany would welcome a greater engagement of Russia in the fight against the IS.
German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier even announced, with Russian Foreign Minister Lavrov and the French colleague Laurent Fabius, a push to start to end the civil war in Syria. Lavrov and Fabius are expected in Berlin on Saturday.
Keep on reading…

The French are threatening to block Iran nuke deal if there are no inspections of military sites...

Sacre Bleu! The French are tougher than Obama.

Via Truth Revolt:

Reuters reports that Iran and the six world powers resumed negotiations on Iran’s nuclear program yesterday, seeking to iron out their remaining differences before the June 30 deadline.

A framework accord had been reached between Iran, the United States, France, Britain,Germany, Russia and China on April 2, but several issues remain to be resolved, among them monitoring and verification measures and access for U.N. nuclear inspectors to Iranian military sites – which Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and Iran’s top military commanders flatly refuse to allow.

As Iranian deputy Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi put it,

Inspection and access to non-nuclear and military sites will not be accepted by Iran. Controlled and managed access does not mean inspection. We are trying to set some rules for managed access to non-nuclear sites.

France said last week it would block any nuclear settlement that does not allow inspectors access to all installations, including military sites.

France suggests Obama usurp our Constitution...

Well, they are a socialist county now...

Via The Hill:

The French foreign minister said Monday that any international deal that comes from a climate conference in Paris this winter should be written so it avoids needing ratification by Congress.
“We know the politics in the U.S.” Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius said, the Associated Press reports. “Whether we like it or not, if it comes to the Congress, they will refuse.”
The United Nations will host a landmark climate conference in Paris in December with the goal of crafting an international treaty to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Countries are expected to submit individual reduction targets — the Obama administration’s goal is at least a 26 percent reduction in emissions over 2005 levels by 2025 — and strategies for achieving those goals.

Sacre bleu! The French are taking a tougher stance on Iran nuke deal than Obama...

Well, this is embarrassing. 

LAUSANNE, Switzerland—France is again adopting the toughest line against Iran in negotiations aimed at curbing Tehran’s nuclear program, potentially placing Paris at odds with the Obama administration as a diplomatic deadline to forge an agreement approaches at month-end.
President Barack Obama called French President François Hollande on Friday to discuss the Iran diplomacy and try to unify their positions. The presidents “reaffirmed their commitment” to a deal “while noting that Iran must take steps to resolve several remaining issues,” the White House said.
French diplomats have been publicly pressing the U.S. and other world powers not to give ground on key elements—particularly the speed of lifting U.N. sanctions and the pledge to constrain Iran’s nuclear research work—ahead of the March 31 target.

Jewish cemetery in eastern France vandalized...

No change...

PARIS (AP) — Hundreds of graves have been vandalized at a Jewish cemetery in eastern France, in what the president called an “odious and barbaric” anti-Semitic act against French values.
The vandalism comes at a time of growing insecurity among French Jews and amid general religious tensions in Europe, after Islamic radicals attacked a kosher market and a satirical newspaper in Paris last month and similar attacks hit Denmark this weekend.
French Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve said in a statement Sunday that a criminal investigation team is at the damaged cemetery in Sarre-Union, near the German border, and authorities will do “everything” to pursue the vandals.
Jewish and Muslim gravesites and places of worship in France see sporadic but frequent vandalism. The incident this weekend was of an unusually large scale, and hit a cemetery that has been vandalized in the past. Local media reported that about 200 grave stones were knocked down, and a monument to Holocaust victims was damaged.

Spineless mainstream media refuse to show Charlie Hebdo Mohammad cartoons...

Charliehebdo.jpg

Cover of Charlie Hebdo, newspaper in France. Speech bubble reads "100 lashes if you don't die of laughter!"

I am calling the mainstream media out as cowards. Giving these animals what they want isn't the way to deter them.

CBS News also not showing the cartoons, CBS News spox says. That’s every major network
— Rosie Gray (@RosieGray) January 7, 2015

ABC News to me just now: "We are describing the cartoons in our reporting but will not show them.” sorry if this is getting repetitive
— Rosie Gray (@RosieGray) January 7, 2015

NYT "we do not normally publish images or other material deliberately intended to offend religious sensibilities” http://t.co/PyU0Q1C1J1
— Rosie Gray (@RosieGray) January 7, 2015

updated w/ NBC News statement - they won't publish cartoons seen as "insensitive" or "offensive" http://t.co/8vny75dvcp
— Rosie Gray (@RosieGray) January 7, 2015

#Break: Internal CNN memo: 'We are not at this time showing the Charlie Hebdo cartoons' http://t.co/WIqq6G4UKc via @Hadas_Gold
— Dylan Byers (@DylanByers) January 7, 2015

It's AP policy to not move "deliberately provocative" images. Okay. http://t.co/O7wzx6QWVb http://t.co/2YMVn7VuvJ pic.twitter.com/3vsgQgHXfN
— Adam Steinbaugh (@adamsteinbaugh) January 7, 2015

per @ErikWemple, Fox has “no plans” to show the cartoons http://t.co/iOByMJIHjU
— Rosie Gray (@RosieGray) January 7, 2015

More from AP: they are removing photos that include pics of the covers from the wire http://t.co/v80jnkIosv
— Rosie Gray (@RosieGray) January 7, 2015

France lets 75% super-tax quietly expire...

It was really bad PR.

PARIS (Reuters) - When President Francois Hollande unveiled a "super-tax" on the rich in 2012, some feared an exodus of business, sporting and artistic talent. One adviser warned it was a Socialist step too far that would turn France into "Cuba without sun".

Two years on, with the tax due to expire at the end of this month, the mass emigration has not happened. But the damage to France's appeal as a home for top earners has been great, and the pickings from the levy paltry.
"The reform clearly damaged France's reputation and competitiveness," said Jorg Stegemann, head of Kennedy Executive, an executive search firm based in France and Germany.
"It clearly has become harder to attract international senior managers to come to France than it was," he added.
Hollande first floated the 75-percent super-tax on earnings over 1 million euros ($1.2 million) a year in his 2012 campaign to oust his conservative rival Nicolas Sarkozy. It fired up left-wing voters and helped him unseat the incumbent.

Yet ever since, it has been a thorn in his side, helping little in France's effort to bring its public deficit within European Union limits and mixing the message just as Hollande sought to promote a more pro-business image. The adviser who made the "Cuba" gag was Emmanuel Macron, the ex-banker who is now his economy minister.

French Foreign Minister: “We have 500 days to avoid climate chaos,”

We are doomed. We are not doomed because of global warming, but because most of the world's leaders are idiots. 

Via CNS News:

The world has “500 days to avoid climate chaos,” French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius said alongside Secretary of State John Kerry at the State Department on Tuesday.

“We have 500 days to avoid climate chaos,” Fabius said. “And I know that President Obama and John Kerry himself are committed on this subject and I’m sure that with them, with a lot of other friends, we shall be able to reach success in this very important matter.”

Fabius was referring to the next big United Nations climate conference, scheduled to open in Paris, France in November 2015, or in 565 days’ time.

Keep on reading…

Right set for big gains in France...

Socialism isn't working out. 

Paris (AFP) - France goes to the polls on Sunday in the first round of local elections set to represent a landmark for women in politics and, possibly, the far-right National Front.

The first nationwide vote since Francois Hollande's 2012 election as president takes place with the ruling Socialists battling record unpopularity and the main opposition UMP party grappling with scandals embroiling former president Nicolas Sarkozy.

Against that backdrop, polls have suggested around one in four voters are considering casting their votes for Marine Le Pen's National Front (FN), setting the scene for what could be a breakthrough election for the anti-immigration, anti-EU party led by the daughter of its founder, Jean-Marie Le Pen.

The vote is also set to be a groundbreaking one for women: whatever the final outcome of the two rounds of voting on consecutive Sundays, it is certain that Paris will end up with its first female mayor, while changes to the electoral rules are set to significantly increase the number of women in local governments across France's rural heartlands.

Heroes: French soccer teams on strike due to high taxes...

They are protesting a 75 per cent income tax rate.

Via the Financial Times:

François Hollande has bent over backwards since becoming France’s president to avoid provoking the Gallic propensity to strike. Now, of all unlikely sources, he faces a weekend of strike action by the country’s football clubs, who have instructed players to hang up their boots in protest against his 75 per cent income tax rate.

Angrily condemning the “unfair and discriminatory” tax for threatening to cripple struggling clubs, Jean-Pierre Louvel, head of the UCPF, the professional football club union, declared on Thursday: “We are talking about the death of French football.” …
The 75 per cent tax, a key Hollande election pledge, which is set to take effect from next year, will be levied on employers who must pay it for two years on all annual salaries above €1m. …
“We are already the most taxed league in Europe and the other leagues are already much stronger than us,” complained Mr Louvel.

French Socialists continue their obsession with high taxes...

This time they want to tax salaries over €1 million at a 75% rate. This idea is making Barack Obama drool...

Businesses rather than employees will foot the bill for a new 75 percent tax on salaries over €1 million, French Finance Minister Pierre Moscovici said in an interview with Les Echos on Thursday, while a plan to cap directors’ pay has been dropped.

 

French businesses will face a 75 percent tax on employees’ salaries above €1 million a year under new legislation set to be introduced by the country’s government in 2014.

However, the government will stop short of introducing a cap on executive pay in the private sector, France’s Finance Minister Pierre Moscovici revealed in an interview with French daily Les Echos published on Thursday.

Change: Some French tax rates top 100%

Barack Obama most envious...

(Reuters) - More than 8,000 French households' tax bills topped 100 percent of their income last year, the business newspaper Les Echos reported on Saturday, citing Finance Ministry data.

The newspaper said that the exceptionally high level of taxation was due to a one-off levy last year on 2011 incomes for households with assets of more than 1.3 million euros ($1.67 million).

President Francois Hollande's Socialist government imposed the tax surcharge last year, shortly after taking office, to offset the impact of a rebate scheme created by its conservative predecessor to cap an individual's overall taxation at 50 percent of income.

The government has been forced to redraft a proposed bill to levy a temporary 75 percent tax on earnings over 1 million euros, which had been one of Hollande's campaign pledges.

The Constitutional Council has judged such a high rate of taxation to be unfair, leaving the government to rehash it to hit companies rather than individuals.

Battre en retraite: French looking for an alternative to 75% tax on millionaires

Hopefully, France has learned a valuable lesson. The rich don't have to live in France...

Via FT:

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France’s Socialist government is considering replacing its stricken 75 per cent top income tax rate on earnings above €1m, with a 65-66 per cent rate on households earning more than €2m.
The proposed new rate is working its way through the National Assembly as part of budget measures aimed at redressing France’s growing public deficit.

But it has come under fire from Christian Eckert, the Socialist head of the assembly’s budget committee, who said it did not fulfil President François Hollande’s emblematic manifesto promise.

The next Frenchman to flee high taxes is...Nicolas Sarkozy?

I can't blame anyone who leaves France. 

Via The Daily Mail:

Nicolas Sarkozy is preparing to move to London to set up a billion pounds plus investment fund, it was claimed today.

If the move goes ahead, the controversial Frenchman will become the latest to escape a potential top tax rate of 75 per cent in his home country. 

He and his former supermodel third wife Carla Bruni-Sarkozy would be likely to settle in an affluent district like South Kensington – so becoming the most high profile Gallic celebrity couple in the city. 

But the former president is under investigation for corruption in France, and if he does cross the Channel there will be outrage.

Socialism Alert: French Minister in charge of ferreting out tax evasion accused of tax evasion...

When the rates are high enough, almost everyone cheats...

Via Time:

Though it may not have the same celebrity appeal as the Gérard Depardieu exile controversy, France now faces another roiling scandal over alleged cross-border tax evasion — this one focusing on Socialist Budget Minister Jérôme Cahuzac.

French justice officials announced on Jan. 8 that they’re launching an inquiry into claims Cahuzac hid money in a secret Swiss account as a tax dodge for nearly 20 years. Cahuzac — whose current job makes him France’s top tax enforcer — energetically denies the allegations, and had previously requested an official investigation he claimed would prove the charges false. That may well be borne out over time. But coming as it does amid swirling headlines of Depardieu’s flight from France to protest rising income taxes, the mere suspicion of a government official having illicitly stashed income away is creating new troubles for beleaguered French President François Hollande in dealing with France’s financial crisis.

Amusing: Former Communist country accepts refugee from country trying out Socialism...

Change...

(Reuters) - French film star Gerard Depardieu arrived in Russia on Saturday to meet President Vladimir Putin, who granted him citizenship after a public spat in France over his efforts to avoid a potential 75 percent income tax.

Putin's spokesman Dmitry Peskov said the two would meet in the Black Sea resort of Sochi, where Putin was spending part of the 10-day New Year and Russian Orthodox Christmas holiday.

He said it was possible Putin would hand Depardieu his Russian passport during the meeting.
"It is a private meeting, we will not be releasing any other details," Peskov said by phone.

Russian media quoted him as saying the meeting would take place on Saturday. Depardieu's spokesman could not immediately be reached for comment.

On Thursday, the Kremlin announced that Putin had signed a decree granting Russian citizenship to Depardieu, who objected to Socialist president Francois Hollande's plan to impose a 75 percent tax rate on millionaires.

Millionaire tax ruled unconstitutional in France...

Barack Obama hardest hit...

Via Bloomberg: 

President Francois Hollande’s 75 percent millionaire-tax is unconstitutional because it fails to guarantee taxpayer equality, France’s top court ruled today.

The tax, one of Hollande’s campaign promises, had become a focal point of discontent among entrepreneurs and other wealth creators, some of whom have quit French shores as a result. The ruling comes as the president seeks to cut France’s public deficit to 3 percent of gross domestic product next year from a projected 4.5 percent this year.

“Politically, this has an impact because it was a symbol for French public opinion, and was considered abroad as the emblem of French tax excess, of French tax hell,” said Dominique Barbet, senior economist at BNP Paribas SA in Paris. “In deficit terms, it’s truly negligible.”

Video: Generation Identitaire - "A Declaration of War" - From the Youth of France

I don't know what to make of this video, but it has over 100,000 views on YouTube since October 6, 2012. It seems some French youth are fed up with multiculturalism and ready for revolution...

Obama would get 78% of the vote in Socialist France...

Yet another reason to vote for Romney/Ryan tomorrow... 

(AFP) — Seventy-eight percent of the French want US President Barack Obama to be reelected in Tuesday’s vote, said a poll that showed that even a majority of extreme-right voters here backed the Democratic candidate.

Only five percent support his Republican challenger Mitt Romney, according to the opinion poll for BFMTV published on Monday. Seventeen percent said they had no preference.

Sixty-one percent of voters from the far-right, anti-immigrant National Front party headed by Marine Le Pen said they favoured Obama, while 14 percent backed Romney.
The poll was conducted by the CSA agency between October 31 and November 2 in which 975 people were surveyed.

France goes all in for Socialism

Socialists now control the presidency and an absolute majority of Parliament in France.  Let's see how that works out for them.

(AFP) — France’s Socialists won control of parliament Sunday, handing President Francois Hollande the convincing majority he needs to push through his tax-and-spend agenda to battle the eurozone debt crisis.

The Socialists’ bloc obtained between 308 and 320 seats — an absolute majority in the 577-seat National Assembly — and so will not need to rely on the Greens or the far left, polling institutes CSA, Ipsos and Sofres said.

The far-right National Front was set to return to parliament for the first time since 1998 after winning at least two seats in the south of the country, although party leader Marine Le Pen lost her own bid for a seat.

Hollande, who defeated right-winger Nicolas Sarkozy in a May presidential election, had urged voters to give him the MPs he needs to steer France through the eurozone crisis, rising unemployment and a faltering economy.

“The task before us is immense,” Hollande’s Prime Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault said as results came in from the run-off vote. “Nothing will be easy.”