Guardian: Polls show Sarkozy moving further ahead

[BeyondGeography]

France heads to right as political showman delivers final performance of campaign

Polls show Sarkozy moving further ahead as Royal clings to hope of late switch

Angelique Chrisafis in Montpellier
Saturday May 5, 2007
The Guardian

<...Mr Sarkozy, 52, now seems unstoppable in his 30-year dream to lead France. More than 100 opinion polls have tipped him to win. Despite his critics' cries that he is a US-style neo-conservative, a racist authoritarian, and a volatile power-freak with a complex about his height, who poses on a horse to look like Napoleon charging into battle, Mr Sarkozy is coasting on the highest support of any politician in France for decades.

Yesterday, three new polls showed his lead widening to between six to 10 points against his Socialist challenger, Ségolène Royal. The first woman to get this close to becoming president of France says her inspiration is Joan of Arc - yesterday, her supporters whispered that she would need a miracle to win.>

<...For years, as Mr Sarkozy has plotted his rise through Jacques Chirac's party, he has been convinced that France, despite its social model and powerful state, has shifted firmly to the right. Contrary to Mr Chirac, the "weather-vane", who never proclaimed himself proud to be right, Mr Sarkozy decided long ago that a French election would never again be won on the centre-ground. Unrepentent in his crusade to win over Mr Le Pen's voters, he has pressed every button, tapped into every far-right instinct, hammering home law and order and promising a "ministry of immigration and national identity". Le Pen's vote was decimated and Mr Sarkozy's vote soared in the south of France. The left called him a populist demagogue, but at the rally, the crowd gave thanks.

"He is the man that killed Le Pen," said a waiter from Marseille. "He has restored democracy to the south of France." The crowd in the hangar were the embodiment of Mr Sarkozy's soundbite: "The France that wakes up early." Far from the financial market figures who laud his plans to lower tax and loosen labour laws with a mix of interventionist and free-market plans, many came from the working class whose vote he has wrestled from the left and extreme-right. They were attracted by his vow to "respect those who want to work", rewriting the 35-hour week, and cutting charges on overtime.>

http://www.guardian.co.uk/france/story/0,,2072996,00.html

[burythehatchet]

1. dam

[burrowowl]

3. DAMN! DAMN!

The Le Pen's will vote for him. DAMN!

[bluestateguy]

2. Is he against the Iraq War?

That's really my only concern. The rest is France's problem.

[BeyondGeography]

7. He was...but he apologized to Bush for the manner in which

France opposed the war.

More from The Nation:

<Sarkozy is no Blair-like puppet. He allows as how "the messianic side of Americans can be tiresome."

But the conservative has distanced himself from retiring President Jacques Chirac's policy of distancing the French from the Bush administration. Sarkozy, who served with Chirac and has the outgoing president's endorsement, says he shares the current president's opposition to the war in Iraq. But he also talks about wanting to "rebuild the transatlantic relationship" with the U.S., and protests that "profound, sincere and unfailing" French relations with the U.S. do not amount to submission.>

http://www.thenation.com/blogs/thebeat?bid=1&pid=192501

[Rosa Luxemburg]

4. We need to write to the French newspapers - letter to the editor

Oui, Sarkozy is a right wing fascist %&*$#^$##

[villager]

5. What is "we're about to fuck ourselves royally" in French?

n/t

[BeyondGeography]

9. On est sur le point de se faire foutre royalement

Then again, the French would probably go with "vachement" instead of "royalement."

[Colobo]

6. Sarkozy will win.

It's in the hands of the French people. If they elect him, then they deserve him.

[Selatius]

8. Amen to that. You get what you vote for. n/t

[DBoon]

10. We know, we know

nt

[Gloria]

11. Nobody seems to learn anything.....US, Britain, France...France should

know better, having seen what's gone on elsewhere....

I bet there will be McDonalds springing up on every corner, at long last....

[Cessna Invesco Palin]

15. There are already McDonald's all over France. n/t

[Gloria]

18. Pardon. that was before...I guess I'm thinking about the "English" that

people have been fighting getting into the French language....

[Cessna Invesco Palin]

19. I don't understand what you're getting at.

Perhaps you could elaborate.

[Gloria]

20. Sorry. At one time, the French were adamant about McDonald's

intruding on French culture. DisneyEuro also has arrived. Another front some French were very adamant about was, an may still be, the idea of letting English words and names permeate the French language, rather than creating French versions.

[Rydz777]

12. France has three problems:

(1) "Chomage" - unemployment
(2) "Croissance" - growth
(3) "Pouvoir d'achat" - purchasing power
Sarkozy will not fix any of these.

[burythehatchet]

13. yes but he'll be good at finding scapegoats

[dave_p]

14. I'd rate only one of those

Unemployment

Growth's lagged these past few years, but that's nothing that every European country hasn't experienced in recent decades. And you know what? After a few years of poor annual change, investment and output surge again to make up for the activity that went undone.

Purchasing power? There's plenty of that about except for those unfortunate enough to be out of work. Prices are reasonably stable and living standards generally high. Taxes are higher than in most of Europe, but you wouldn't know it from the quality of life.

Employment is a thornier issue, and one where France seems to have a chronic problem. The right's prescription of deregulation and longer hours doesn't seem much of a solution. Maybe the answer's for more French people to work less.

[AX10]

16. If France wants a racist, xenophobic, Bush ass kissing, neo-con...

then the French are no smarter than the Americans.

[legin]

17. Alas, the bookie prices last time I looked

Sarkozy 1/9

Royal 5/1

5/1 in a two horse race !!! (a big disapointed raspberry)