Bastille Day

The country is broke after fighting two extended wars.  The citizens are broke after financing runaway government.  Ideas are circulating that question the need for the rulers responsible for this.  And the rulers are living it up.  Does this sound like American in 2010?  Maybe.  But this was the scene in France in 1789 on the eve of the French Revolution.

Today people of La Francophonie celebrate the storming of the Bastille.  Members of the Third Estate, or commoners, overtook the armory in Paris and seized vast amounts of arms and ammunition.  This event precipitated the abolishment of the king and touched off years of violence.  The country would never be the same.

As the late great H.L. Mencken noted, " Political revolutions do not often accomplish anything of genuine value; their one undoubted effect is simply to throw out one gang of thieves and put in another."

So today is Bastille Day, the day people in France celebrate throwing out one gang of thieves and putting in another.  Let's open une bouteille de vin rouge and celebrate.