Friday, November 23, 2007

Sarkozy May Break French Rail Strike

If he does, good for him and good for France.

What I can't figure out is exactly why this strike is different. Reports aren't clear about why this strike is going under, except to say that "support is fading" or some similar vague terminology.

Union leaders began to concede defeat yesterday. "We have to face reality. Since yesterday's negotiations, things have changed. The strike is no longer the solution. The strike strategy is no longer winning," a leader of the Sud union representing Paris underground railway workers, Philippe Touzet, said in an interview with Bloomberg News.


Here's hoping that a new day has dawned in France.

It's still kind of dark during dawn, though, and leftie university students wallow in the darkness:

Meanwhile, protests between students opposed to Sarkozy's reforms and students trying to get to class shut down Sorbonne University in Paris.

The University of Paris administration issued a statement Friday saying that protesters resorted "to physical violence against students who wanted to go to class," according to the Associated Press.

"People's security is no longer guaranteed," and therefore the Sorbonne campus was closed until Monday, the AP reported.

Protesters have rallied for several days against a new law giving universities greater freedom to seek private contributions and raise tuition.

Our intellectual and moral betters. I wish Sarkozy success in fixing this mess--and I don't just mean breaking strikes and raising university tuitions.

3 comments:

allenm said...

The diminishing public support for the strike fits with my observation of the eroding support for the left which, like the future, may be here but isn't evenly distributed.

It's kind of neat that some of the physical altercations were between students intent on getting to class and lefty students intent on trying to shut down the school as a means of using the school as a platform to support the strike.

The lefty students don't expect to pay any price for their noble exertions since it's all just good fun for them. Some serious push-back from their peers is probably an unpleasant surprise and if what you're interested in is some fun, who wants serious consequences?

Anonymous said...

Darren - It should be remembered that previous governments tried to slip past reforms past the unions and the voters. Sarkozy this time around was VERY explicit about what he was going to do, and why it needed to be done. The French electorate voted for him anyway.
The strikers cannot claim that Sarkozy is trying to pull a fast one on them. If the voting public there did not want reforms in France, Segolene Royal would be president, but she is not. To me, it is a combination of Sarkozy's honesty, and some growing up on the part of the electorate.

Darren said...

I hope it continues.