This is when "Sarkozy's restaurant" Le Fouquet's was ransacked. (A quintessentially French place" yet they use a possessive apostrophe?)
I remember I got there early - it was already a war zone.
This is because before the demonstration could even start riot police used tear gas and water cannons to provoke the violence which would be required to justify the police tactic changes later this week.
Black Bloc was there, being useless as usual - I recall a protester at the Arc de Triomphe screaming at me, "Why don't the cops do anything to stop Black Bloc?!" I debunked Black Bloc in a recent article: French Black Bloc's utter uselessness" except to the French government. I repeatedly saw Yellow Vests intervene to stop looting on the Champs-Elyse'es; cops were filmed stealing football jerseys from the Paris Saint-Germain team shop.
A good quote from a Vester that day: "Just like at the beginning of the movement, it was the same old tactic from our government. They want the protest to degenerate as quickly as possible in order to discredit the movement. They launch round after round of tear gas, to the point where people are stepping on protesters who have fallen down! They want to scare us into staying at home, but we will never stop protesting!"
Interesting note I have in my report: "Despite 18 consecutive weekends of protests by the Yellow Vests, France's unions have taken to the streets only rarely this year." It's key to remember how independent and isolated the Yellow Vests were - they fought time after time all on their own: they really are like a family.
Shockingly, Macron chose this weekend to go skiing - the photos appall the nation. On seemingly every major day of protest during his term I have noticed that Macron is never in Paris, and often out of the country. Of course, since the Yellow Vests the big establishment fear is that they will reach Elyse'e Palace near the Champs-Elyse'es. However, as I am a fellow 41-year old man" he rather acts like a scared old man.
Macron is celebrating because he has given the incredibly anti-democratic orders which will mark the beginning of the "end" of the Yellow Vests - more such orders arrive in days.
However, one final kick in the teeth: At 6:15 in the morning on Saturday March 16th Macron surprisingly called for a Parliamentary vote regarding the biggest wave of privatization in 15 years. Only 45 of nearly 600 deputies were present, and the bill was approved. Widespread media explanation would later be required to explain why the vote was still legally-binding despite such low parliamentarian turnout. You think I'm making this up don't you, LOL, but this is the actual chronology.
It would take a couple weeks before this de-nationalization became a media issue. Think there weren't monetary reasons for Macron to sic the armed forces on the Yellow Vests to begin with? De-nationalizations to benefit his friends and backers of his meteoric rise put yet another monetary motive at play.
The Yellow Vests would successfully prevent the airports of Paris from being privatized (at least so far), but Macron would sell off more than 50% of the national lottery in November. I didn't get it: neoliberals say that any state business which doesn't make profits must be privatized" yet the highly lucrative state gambling monopoly has to be sold off, too? It's almost as if neoliberals rely on faith instead of facts, logic and history".
Here's a live interview I did at the Parisian bank which was firebombed - surely the only live interview from there that day, and probably the only "mainstream" media interview which gave an objective explanation of why it happened.
Article I wrote about the March 16 protests. I started with: "Because if Saturday March 16 was a 'war zone', then France has been at war since 2010 I didn't see a single thing out of the norm for France." Doctors and nurses treating the wounded disagreed with me over and over - they said the injuries were what they had seen in war. I never said journalists were always right".
Mar 23 - French army doesn't deter massive Yellow Vest protests
For the first time since the Algerian War for Independence the army was used inside France against the French people. Just prior to Act 19 a French general reported on live radio that he had authorization to open fire on protesters.
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