The Left Wants America to Look Like France

Politics The Hexagon is reaping the consequences of socialism and mass migration. TakiMag (Pascal LACHENAUD / AFP via Getty Images) I think all writers, especially those writing about politics, have been guilty of getting their facts wrong at times, not on purpose, mind you, but in their eagerness to make their point. This one stuck out like the proverbial you-know-what. The writer, Rich Lowry, I used to know in the old Bill Buckley days. Last week he wrote about the troubles in France, prompting me to write this column. However incredible it may sound, I knew the French general involved in the story I’m about to tell you, the one that would reject an assertion made by Lowry. Lowry writes, “In 1968, President de Gaulle himself briefly fled Paris for fear that student protesters were going to topple the government, before finding his nerve.” When I read this line, it was like hearing someone say that Leonidas and his 300 Spartans had fled before the Persians at Thermopylae. Although not particularly drawn to de Gaulle, I happen to know first-hand why he had left Paris, and it was not because he feared the spoilt and pretentious students who had risen against his government and were burning down the ancient city. De Gaulle had flown to Germany to meet with French General Jacques Massu, the tough-as-nails paratroop leader and veteran of Indochina and Algeria colonial wars. Massu was based in Germany with a French army group. De Gaulle wanted to know if Massu and his troops were ready to come to Paris if needed and to crack the whip. The start of the conversation went as follows. De Gaulle: “Alors Massu, toujours con?” (So, Massu, still an a–hole?) Massu: “Oui, mon General, toujours Gaullist.” (Yes, General, still a Gaullist.”) (The same exchange between the two men has been reported as occurring a decade earlier.) Army people talk like that, semi-tough, semi fun between them. Massu had first sided with the generals who had revolted against de Gaulle when he granted Algeria her independence. They formed the OAS and began a guerrilla war against the mainland. But Massu ultimately remained loyal to de Gaulle, who forgave him. How do I know what went on between Le Grand Charles and the toughie Jacques? That’s an easy one: The latter told me while we were watching tennis at Roland-Garros in the players section. That’s where we first met, back in the early Sixties, when I spotted Massu sitting alone and watching the matches. None of the players had a clue who he was. I introduced myself and he asked about various tennis players. Massu was very well read, like many Frenchmen, and was close to generals Salan, Challe, Jouhaut and Zeller, the OAS leaders who all eventually were locked up but retained the respect of the French people, who considered Algeria part of France. Well, we all know how it ended. France lost Algeria in 1962, but gained millions of its nationals over subsequent decades. Many of them have remained Arab, Muslim, and feeling foreign despite having been born in France. There has been no cultural assimilation whatsoever. (As the U.S. Congresswoman Ilhan Omar allegedly said, she and her compatriots are “Somalis first, Muslims second.” I predict Omar will be with us for the duration.) They have also remained anti-French, anti-Catholic, and anti-establishment. France today is what those nice socialist Democrats would like the U.S. to become one day, with open borders and welfare payments for everyone. One-hundred thousand Somalis in Minneapolis will one day turn into millions. The irony is that de Gaulle had foreseen all that when he headed the new Fifth Republic upon his return to power in the late ’50s. He broke with Israel because he knew the country’s policies would alienate the Arab world, and remained an independent member of NATO. De Gaulle was personally very brave. He had made his reputation when as a colonel he led a bold counterattack during the Guderian blitz in May 1940. When the OAS sprayed his presidential Citroen limo in Petit Clamart, he did not even flinch or bow his head, but miraculously escaped unscathed. Hence the idea that a bunch of publicity-seeking, smelly lefties drove him from Paris in 1968 is quite false. Subscribe Today Get daily emails in your inbox France at present is what our socialist friends would like America to become. For decades, despite apocalyptic warnings by both politicians of the right and writers such as Michel Houellebecq, France has taken the path to disaster. The warnings have been ignored, and those doing the warning have been persecuted as Nazis. What motivated the mob back in 1968 and still does is greed, laziness, entitlement, and envy. The rioters are not the weak and starving, but the indulged and ignorant children of a welfare state and woke culture. They smash windows, grab designer goodies, and the media headline them as revolutionaries. And another thing. The deep-seated hostility toward free markets and enterprise derives from the French passion for philosophers, clowns like Michel Foucault, a pseudo-philosopher, and others who taught “nothingness” as a value system. Those clowns were venerated by leftist media and publications and taught that history was false, all lies in order to exploit the people. The only joy, according to those false prophets, was the criminal act. The French state owns nearly all public services, public transport, energy interests, and utilities. Public debt stands at 120 percent of GDP, the highest since right after the Second World War. Pensioners enjoy a higher income than workers. If you wish to see the same thing over here, vote for those nice socialists next month. It will be a start.