Will France Scrap Christmas? Government Mulls Abolishing a Holiday to

[jonessa2]

Will France Scrap Christmas? Government Mulls Abolishing a Holiday to Finance Elderly Care (http://ap.tbo.com/ap/breaking/MGAO03CQVJD.html)
<span style='color:black'>By John Leicester Associated Press Writer
Published: Aug 27, 2003
PARIS (AP) - France, a country where leisure time is sacrosanct, is mulling a radical plan for financing health care after a heat wave estimated to have killed thousands: Make people work on a national holiday. The idea, which the government floated Wednesday, immediately split opinion and provoked one main question - which of France's 11 national holidays should go? Labor Day, perhaps, or a religious festival?

At least two ministers said Christmas should not be touched.
Ever wary of angering France's powerful unions, the government insisted it still hadn't made a decision. But even considering the idea shows how seriously the government is taking calls to improve care for the elderly, who made up most of the victims from the record temperatures that baked Europe this month. Hamlaoui Mekachera, secretary of state for war veterans, told The Associated Press that if the plan is adopted, social taxes from the extra workday could help finance elderly care. *But most of all, abolishing a holiday would signal that France is ready to make sacrifices to better care for the vulnerable, he said. *&quot;It's a very important, very strong symbol,&quot; Mekachera said in an interview. &quot;The gesture of solidarity is more important than the financial gesture ... so that we never witness again what we saw.&quot;

Thousands died in the heat, the government has estimated, many of them elderly and living alone. The deaths focused attention on France's struggle to care for an aging population and prompted a storm of criticism that the center-right government reacted too slowly.</span>...

[jonessa2]

If France eliminates Christmas, I feel that this would signify the beginning of the end of Christianity as we currently know it.

We are a judea-Christian Country. So is the UK, and other European countries. Arab countries are muslim...minority faith religions need not apply.

Already we are breeched by those that fear the name of our God in public. Challenges to the Pledge of Allegiance, granite statues, to name a couple.

[XNavyGunner]

Why is this a shocker? We all knew France is a secular humanist socialist nation. Actually I'm suprised this long.

[USMC vet]

Quote[/b] ]&quot;The gesture of solidarity is more important than the financial gesture ...

A Clintonion effort of image over substance if I ever saw one. Intentions are all that count.

What a bunch of loser cheese eating surrender monkeys. Of course Christmas will go. What do you think we are seeing here in this country but a small glimpse of a new world order where, heaven forbid, no one will ever be offended or uncomfortable again. Especially homosexuals, atheists and others whom the Holy Spirit convict in their own hearts. *Not to mention that we have to suck up to Islam because they are really the misunderstood victims in all this. *Those bad Christians are really the problem. There must be a place somewhere we can hide from God. Notice that the EU's constitution is intentionally omitting any reference to diety and the Vatican is fighting back.


Semper Fi

[noPEACEwithoutJUSTICE]

If there is NO Muslim holiday yet, then they WILL scrap Christmas out of a sense of religious equity.


Hey, I've felt this way a long time about Europe--the best thing about them is their foreign exchange students. I've found most of them to be intelligent and not without the capacity for reason, even the French FES's. But maybe they were all trying to get horizontal with American girls....who knows.

IMO, as long as there's the French, we'll always have someone there to stab us in the back.

I've heard it said that the Statue of Liberty was supposed to be like a Trojan Horse for a massive French invasion...But they abandoned the idea because their scientists couldn't find a way to keep French men inside a woman for more than 5 minutes...

[XNavyGunner]

[I've heard it said that the Statue of Liberty was supposed to be like a Trojan Horse for a massive French invasion]

How would the French invade? With their hands in the air or with white flags?

[noPEACEwithoutJUSTICE]

I actually think there's a move by Jacques Chirac to have the national flag changed from the &quot;blue white red&quot; to just &quot;white&quot;.

[contrapuntal]

The issue is whether France is going to forgo one holiday to finance health care for the elderly. Christmas, being relatively popular, was the obvious example for the headline writer to use to hook readers. Christmas is barely mentioned in the article, except insofar as the French are AGAINST working on Christmas.

In your eagerness to criticize the French, you failed to read the article carefully or consider what it said. If you can't stand the French, fine, I'm not sticking up for their politics or their committment to making health care available to the elderly. But it is counterproductive to abuse facts in taking political stands, because people will more readily accuse you of ignorance.

Thanks.

[noPEACEwithoutJUSTICE]

Thank you contrapuntal for the lecture on taking a ridiculous article seriously in the hopes that other ridiculous people will take us more seriously.

[jonessa2]

<span style='font-size:11pt;line-height:100%'>French heatwave kills 11,435 in two weeks (http://news.ft.com/servlet/ContentServer?pagena me=FT.com/StoryFT/FullStory&c=StoryFT&cid=1059479430867&p=1012571727088)
<span style='color:black'>By Jo Johnson in Paris
Published: August 29 2003 18:12 | Last Updated: August 29 2003 18:12
The heatwave that roasted France this summer killed 11,435 people in the first two weeks of August alone, making it, in human terms, one of the worst natural disasters in the country's history.
The provisional figures in the first government estimate, published on Friday, do not take into account the abnormally large number of elderly and frail people who have continued to succumb to the effects of the freak temperatures since the end of the heatwave. The head of the French hospital co-ordination service said it was &quot;undeniable&quot; abnormal numbers were still dying.... (http://news.ft.com/servlet/ContentServer?pagena me=FT.com/StoryFT/FullStory&c=StoryFT&cid=1059479430867&p=1012571727088)
On Tuesday, Mr Raffarin, who has until the start of October to draw up a plan, said France should cancel one of its public holidays to finance better care for the elderly. One scheme would see employers pay an extra day's social security contributions into a special fund, officials aid.... (http://news.ft.com/servlet/ContentServer?pagena me=FT.com/StoryFT/FullStory&c=StoryFT&cid=1059479430867&p=1012571727088)
Polls show 70-80 per cent of people say they are willing to work a public holiday if a day's worth of social security contributions is paid into a fund to care for the elderly. French workers are legally entitled to five weeks' holiday and 11 public holidays. The 35-hour week also allows many to take days off during the week.... (http://news.ft.com/servlet/ContentServer?pagena me=FT.com/StoryFT/FullStory&c=StoryFT&cid=1059479430867&p=1012571727088)

François Hollande, Socialist party leader said the measure &quot;at first looks generous but on closer inspection penalises workers at a time when the government is announcing lower taxes for the better off&quot;. Unions have suggested the government should also hold Christmas on leap years and make children join the workforce.</span></span>

[azwhitewolf]

Quote[/b] ]France, a country where leisure time is sacrosanct, is mulling a radical plan for financing health care after a heat wave estimated to have killed thousands:
So I have a few quick points to ponder.

1. How can an improved health care system have helped &quot;thousands&quot; of people in a heat wave?

2. How is French people working ONE holiday going to stimulate the economy? From what liberals tell us, we have more money to spend if they tax it from us.
Quote[/b] ]Secretary of State for the Elderly Hubert Falco noted that Germany has made people work the Day of Penance and Prayer in November to finance care for the aged since 1995.
And I'm sure everyone is &quot;gung-ho&quot; and motivated to work on a holiday. Or as they put it better than I did:
Quote[/b] ]&quot;It's enforced charity, totally unacceptable,&quot; he said in an interview.
Kind of like... another group of people who like to take from the middle class, and make them as poor as the poor class. U.S. Liberals!
Quote[/b] ]&quot;The idea that we can solve problems by working more is a big first for our country,&quot;
http://www.gopusa.com/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/rotflo.gif I'm sure it is! http://www.gopusa.com/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/rofl.gif

[jonessa2]

I still can't get over 10k+ deaths.

Do ya' think that california would miss 1ok?

Quote[/b] ]2. How is French people working ONE holiday going to stimulate the economy? The money that employers would have paid employees would go back to the state. Your right how can a socialist state improve the welfare of the masses by taking away from those same masses.
Hopefully the improvements would be air conditioners. I doubt that there is an electrical grid to support any modernization tho.'

[wyatt45earp]

I hope that I can keep well informed about this. Does this mean, that if I send christmas presents, they won*t be delivered?

[noPEACEwithoutJUSTICE]

Quote[/b] ]...and make children join the workforce.

Ahhhh... *Those enlightened and civilized French. *

&quot;Let's put thee leettle b*astards to work. *Eef they cannot work, eh, we can eet them, non? *Eet ees only fair, non?&quot;



Wow... http://www.gopusa.com/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/eh.gif *we really should be taking plays out of their book, non? &lt;&lt;sarcasm&gt;&gt;