In the annals of the idiocy of France's ruling elites, how is this for a doozy?

Via ABC News:

Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire said Monday the government could delay some payroll taxes, but expressed resistance to restoring the wealth tax or lowering taxes for retirees, among protesters' demands.  He stressed that the measures should focus on helping the working classes.

"We are ready to make any gesture" that works, he said on RTL radio.  "What is important now is to put an end to the crisis and find peace and unity in the country again."

Did I just read "gesture"?

Gestures.  Seriously, he really said "gestures."  Even accounting for nuances of language, he chose to say that, and it most certainly can mean "gesture" as we know it.  Like, you know, a Gallic shrug.

Given what is going on in France right now, the remark is so stupidly insulting it's likely to inflame more riots, not fewer.  By his remarks, Le Maire comes off as having us think there's no crisis here, and the spot of bother in the streets can be fixed through a few mannerly things, some "gesture" pellets thrown to les déplorables to calm them down.

Listen up, pal: the time for gestures came and went.  When you've got 136,000 yellow-vested shopkeepers, truck drivers, housewives, teachers, and farmers rioting across the entire country, wheeling out model guillotines with the president's name on them, singing Le Marseillaise as if it were 1792, and demanding President Macron's resignation, you can pretty well bet that these people aren't looking for "gestures."  What this guy needs to be thinking about now is keeping heads on pikes out of the picture.

Cripes, that would drag me to the streets to protest, and I'm not even French.

As if gestures would be enough to stop four weeks of sustained, not-stopping, just-growing riots that have already driven the tourists out, have put France at the center of global headlines and not in a good way, and are expected to shave off 0.1% of GDP.

What it demonstrates is the Mr. Magoo-like opacity of France's ruling classes – and their utter unwillingness to change. This guy should be talking about a serious course change, such as dumping every tax hike permanently, scrapping every bureaucratic regulation, apologizing to the voters, and ending the green regime. Does he really think a few 'gestes' will stop this fiasco?  What France needs to be doing right now, what howls for decisive action, is pulling out of the Paris climate accord and following the example of the U.S., which has stepped up oil drilling while simultaneously cutting emissions to green-happy levels, all through the beauty of free markets.  No such sign that sort of thing is going to happen so long as the French ruling elites think that all that's needed are gestures.

The French ruling class clearly doesn't have a clue, and like Louis XVI, this sort remark is of the same character as his writing "nothing" in his diary on the day the Bastille was taken.

Get ready for some surprises, pal.