Patrick J. Buchanan
The statements, views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of this site. This site does not give financial, investment or medical advice.
A week from today, Europeans may be able to gauge how high the tide of populism and nationalism has risen within their countries and on their continent.
For all the returns will be in from three days of elections in the 28 nations represented in the European Parliament.
Expectation: Nationalists and populists will turn in their strongest performance since the EU was established, and their parliamentary group — Europe of Nations and Freedom — could sweep a fourth of the seats in Strasbourg.
Nigel Farage’s new Brexit Party is predicted to run first in the British elections, winning two to three times the votes of the ruling Tory Party of Prime Minister Theresa May.
In France, Marine Le Pen’s National Rally is running even with the party of President Emmanuel Macron, who pleads for “more Europe.”
Matteo Salvini, interior minister and leader of the League, predicts his party will finish first in Italy and first in Europe.
At Salvini’s invitation, a dozen nationalist parties gathered in Milan this weekend. A week from now, they could be the third-largest bloc in the European Parliament. If so, their gains will come at the expense of the center-left and center-right parties that have dominated European politics since World War II.
Speaking before tens of thousands in front of Duomo Cathedral in Milan, Salvini threw back in the faces of his enemies the taunt that these new parties are rooted in the old ugly politics of the 1930s.
“In this piazza, there are no extremists. There are no racists. There are no fascists. … In Italy and in Europe, the difference is between … those who speak of the future instead of making trials of the past.”
Tomorrow versus yesterday, says Salvini.
While the European establishment draws parallels between the populist parties of the present and what happened in the 1930s, it fails to recognize its own indispensable role in generating the mass defections to the populist right that now imperil its political hegemony.
The populist-nationalist parties are energized and united by both what they detest and what the EU has produced.
And what is that?
They resent the inequities of the new economy, where the wages of the working and middle class, the core of the nation, have fallen far behind the managerial class and the corporate and financial elites.
People who work with their hands, tools and machines have seen their wages arrested and jobs disappear, as salaries have surged for those who move numbers on computers.
The disparities have grown too great, as has the distance between national capitals and national heartlands.
Then there is immigration. Native-born Europeans do not welcome the new ethnic groups that have come uninvited in considerable numbers in recent decades, failed to assimilate and created enclaves that replicate the Third World places whence they came.
If one could identify a cry common to populists, it might be: “We want our country back!”
Whatever may be said of populists and nationalists, they are people of the heart. They love their countries. They cherish the cultures in which they grew up. They want to retain their own unique national identities.
What is wrong with that?
Patriotism is central to nationalist and populist movements. Globalism is alien to them. They believe in De Gaulle’s Europe of nation-states “from the Atlantic to the Urals,” not in the abstract Europe of Jean Monnet, and surely not in the Brussels bureaucracy of today.
The nation, the patria, is the largest entity to which one can give loyalty and love. Who would march into no man’s land for the EU?
Europe’s nationalists are not all the same. The ruling Polish Law and Justice Party disagrees on Putin’s Russia with the ruling Fidesz Party of Prime Minister Viktor Orban in Hungary.
While the EU Parliament does not possess great power, these elections are not without great meaning.
Consider Farage. Should his Brexit Party run first in Britain, how can the Tory Party not carry through on the 2016 vote to withdraw from the EU, without betraying its most loyal constituency on its most critical issue?
Nationalism in Europe is spreading, even deepening rifts between the premier powers in the NATO alliance.
Germany will not be reaching the promised 2 percent of GDP for defense President Donald Trump has demanded. And Berlin is going ahead with a second natural gas pipeline under the Baltic Sea to Germany from Russia, Nord Stream 2.
Turkey is taking possession of a Russian-built S-400 air defense system this summer, despite a U.S. warning that our sale of 100 F-35s will not go through if the Turks go forward with the Russian system.
Have the nationalists of Europe caught the wave of the future?
Or will the future see the revival of the idea of One Europe, a political and economic union that inspired the dreamers of yesteryear?
From here it looks like Matteo, not Macron.
The statements, views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of this site. This site does not give financial, investment or medical advice.
Whilst I agree with most parts of this article, when it comes to ‘hordes of migrants’ invading Europe, it has no one but itself to blame, when you joined the invasion and destabilisation of defenseless african and mid-eastern countries. Until Europeans acknowledge the war-crimes committed by their governments in their name, you’re guilty. Karma is a bitch, isn’t she?
Yes it is.They all sang from the same hymn book ,NATO, who is mostly run by the US ,and no one batted an eye on following the script. How many nations did they destroy for the sake of pillaging the spoils of their criminal wars.
The wars were not supported by most people any more than mass immigration – there were massive demonstrations against the Iraq way, but Blair went ahead regardless because that was what his masters wanted. Both wars and mass migration were initiated by the same elites, who get others to fight their wars and who are not affected by the growing colonisation of our cities. Yes, one encouraged the other, but the same people were responsible for both. Now people are fed up with their rulers and don’t see whay they should pay the price for their folly. Maybe it’s a… Read more »
“hordes of migrants” – the result of US wars for “Greater Israel”.
Nothing to do with colonialism.
True but how much of this can be explained by the formerly impregnable capacity of the elites to dupe the masses through the MSM? Hopefully, that is now a thing of the past and we will see an ever increasing number of people in the West waking up to the truth. I think we can be harsh in our judgement for those who now fail to wake up to the truth.
What is ‘populism’? Is it the voice of the people as opposed to the elites? If so there’s nothing wrong with it in states that proclaim they are ‘democratic’ – the real problem that nationalism and populism are being conflated into meaning something bad – you should not fall into that trap. In its true perspective the unelected and elected elites have run roughshod over OUR planet in corrupt and criminal, illegal and unscrupulous ways for ever and kinda gotten away with it. If, finally, people are waking up to this abuse then surely that is a good thing. This… Read more »
agree, this article just try be “pro usa” .. but for exemple italian salvini win will very negative to todays or before us administrative. , becouse russia and Chinese economic cooperative, witch is needed as hell for italy becouse debt. -they need export same like trade with China and Russia where they loose in agriculture and food,food technologies and other ,, export xx billions !! just check Data : export from EU to Russia before usa military cup in ukraine maidan.. its about xxx billions witch was big loose for eu states. and trump/demos was used this “russian” sanctions against… Read more »
Yes, but we need to go further than that. Locking up puppets however criminal doesn’t get at the root of the problem. The elites are the root. They hide behind the puppets and institutions (national and international) and get back to pull all the strings. It’s the elites that need to be taken out, ultimately.
Even Soros is yet another puppet.
20 years and it will all be forgotten.
That is the ‘Conservative’ (Perennial Ruling Class’) plan and theory.
The die-off and attached fatigue of successive generations is a fairly elementary Ruling Class
Things might look quite differently if, for the past 30+ years, the rich hadn’t been so busy promoting themselves. Now we, the peons, want to eat cake too.