Yes, because if history is any guide, that is usually how Socialism turns out in the long term, right?
asks Hot Air's
Erika Johnson with a touch of sarcasm (merci à Valerie, while in France, Janina commented that "
Many
here have thought about a joke, unfortunately with Flanby everything is
possible to satisfy his ridiculous optimism while the Titanic is
sinking.").
Via the Telegraph:
French president François Hollande has asked his cabinet
to describe France in the year 2025, sparking claims that some are
living in “Cloud Cuckoo Land”. …
Ministers were given a month to complete their “summer homework” on
their “vision” for France in 12 years with answers due to be handed in
on Monday. …
In documents leaked by Le Point magazine, Pierre Moscovici, finance
minister, warned that the exercise could be “risky” if allowed to turn
into “public policy fiction”.
But he went on to predict “full employment” by the year 2025,
describing it as a “realistic aim” for a country in which the jobless
rate is currently approaching the 11 per cent mark.
Typically bombastic is Arnaud Montebourg, the industrial recovery
minister and self-styled champion of “Le Made in France”. He sees his
country as a world leader in a wealth of industrial sectors from
nanotechnology to rail.
Oh, boy. The French government is wiping their brows over a
better-than-”expected” emergence from their latest stretch of economic
recession, but Hollande has been struggling beneath plunging approval
ratings after hardly even a year in office; he’s been making some pretty
far-fetched displays of France’s economic outlook,
and I have the gravest doubts that this was really an exercise in
defining his ministers’ goals and ambitions for their departments as it
was some kind of ill-conceived PR stunt designed to help assuage the
country’s deep-seated pessimism with fantasies about their policies’
prospects.
I’m with these guys:
The forecasts received a mixed press, with Le Figaro
scoffing at the “idyllic vision” of some, l’Express calling them
“self-congratulatory” and France TV headlining its article: “Ministers
in Cloud Cuckoo Land.” Right-wing senator Roger Karoutchi, meanwhile,
suggested the tone was reminiscent of Alice in Wonderland.
