presidential elections

Opponents of President Nicolas Maduro are calling on demonstrators to flood the streets of Caracas on Saturday as part of a weeklong protest movement that shows little sign of losing steam, after Venezuela’s embattled socialist government stepped up its campaign against the opposition by banning Henrique Capriles, two-time presidential candidate and governor of Miranda state, from holding public office... for 15 years.

Capriles wrote on Twitter Friday...

Via Disobedient Media

The cyber firm Crowdstrike has been one of the main proponents of allegations that Russia interfered in the 2016 American presidential elections using their cyber capabilities. The analysis performed by Crowdstrike was relied on almost exclusively by the Democratic National Committee (DNC) to establish their claims of "Russian hacking."

Global stocks were pressured by a poor start to the second quarter in the US, where carmakers reported disappointing sales data, slamming auto stocks around the globe. The selling has persisted for a second day, with Asian stocks and European shares all partially in the red today after their biggest decline in two weeks. Car sector is biggest mover in Europe, offsetting gains in financial services and media.

Authored by Mike Shedlock via MishTalk.com,

Polls show close to 40% of French voters are still undecided. That’s a record total this late in the game.

In the “what if” category, two candidates proposed counting blank votes (a vote for none of the party candidates).

It’s quite possible, if not probable, that “nobody” would win in such a match-up.

Via email, Eurointelligence provides some interesting commentary.

Via MauldinEconomics.com,

What does it mean to be French? Inherent in this question is a fundamental tension within French nationalism that is unique to France.

Originally, France consisted of diverse regions with their own languages, resources, and way of life. Take a look at the map below.

This diversity grew into a united country. From this, we can understand how one aspect of French nationalism is that it views itself as a universal program.