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[quote=Anonymous]WaPo today features an article about how in Europe, it's not the Boomer Conservatives, but Gen Z and social media that is driving the far-right. This time, the case is Portugal:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2024/03/08/portugal-election-young-voters/

I have many, many thoughts.
First, the obvious is that Europe's far right is largely about immigration. Somewhat similar to Trump and focus on the Border, but even moreso. Other issues - culture wars, jobs, even progressive concerns like housing, are traced back to immigration. While the center-left bungles their chances at finding humane, but firm solutions, the right finds scapegoats and that sells better.

Second, European center-left parties (generally to the left of our Democratic Party, especially on economic issues) have become entrenched with corruption. On the surface it's no worse than our own corruption - just our corruption is legal (campaign finance bribery). The uncomfortable truth for economic progressives is that when the government has more regulatory bureaucracies and control over industries, there is more room for funny business. However, the privatization alternative may cut the bureaucratic red tape, but the same funny business can happen with corporations, and then they charge you more than your taxes would have been in the first place.

Third... culturally, the European youth is more subject to pendulum swings to extremes, because many were not alive during the previous fascist (or communist) regimes. From the left, this makes people like Robert Fico in Slovakia popular with those who don't remember the Eastern Bloc days. From the right, using WaPo's Portugal example, the younger generation was not alive during the Estado Novo.

What's going to happen IMO is a lot of people are going to regret what they vote for, no matter what. Young people getting behind far-right governments because they want control on immigration are going to be sorry when they find out that what will actually happen is more privatizing of industries making things more expensive, more concentration of wealth, and corruption shifted from government to business. Immigration restrictions too far in the other direction will cause service sectors to collapse and cause other unexpected chaos like Brexit is experiencing. And even worse, governments toying with the idea of leaving NATO or siding with Putin will be in for a nasty surprise worldwide. [/quote]

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