The French

Is the American one about Keeping With The Joneses? Is that considered an American trait?

Or, I suppose, it's my right to one if he's getting one.

ha I have not seen that.

Véran making it look like it's palace intrigue as to whether we're locking down again, but it may just be decision theater to put pressure on MEDEF and to buy time to figure out how to handle the public unrest they're anticipating.

I guess, but it still falls a bit flat imo. The joke would work better without the American.

xp another full lockdown (minus schools) seems likely due to the British variant.

whether to close schools is one of the sticking points, since Blanquer wants them open. But maybe they're why we can't get below 20k a day?

Blanquer is LREM's candidate for the presidency of the Conseil régional d'Île-de-France, against Pécresse. Ugh.

Worth a read (I seem to recall you being a Monde subscriber too):

https://www.lemonde.fr/planete/article/2021/01/27/vittoria-colizza-avec-le-variant-britannique-le-nombre-de-cas-peut-augmenter-tres-vite-malgre-les-mesures-de-distanciation-sociale_6067715_3244.html

thanks! yes, I subscribe to Le Monde (& Le Parisien for local news)

Young people will save us.

🇫🇷#France, presidential election poll (1st round) :

Among 25-34 years old :#LePen (RN) : 37 %#Macron (LREM) : 18 %#Mélenchon (FI) : 14 %#Bertrand (LR) : 7 %#Jadot (EELV) : 7 %#Hidalgo (PS) : 6 %#DupontAignan (DLF) : 3 %
...

Elabe, 14/04/21 pic.twitter.com/jtYR217Ocf

— World Elects (@ElectsWorld) April 15, 2021

jesus christ.

I saw 29% among voters aged 25-34 according to IFOP & IPSOS, which tend to be more reliable than Elabe. Still a disturbingly high percentage, obv.

According to IFOP / IPSOS (source), those aged 18-24 plan to vote as follows:

29% – LRM (Macron)
20% – RN (Le Pen)
19% – LFI (Mélenchon)

(They don't provide figures for the other parties, which is telling.)

So zoomers are less drawn to Le Pen than millennials.

The biggest takeaway is how utterly disappointing Mélenchon and the PS have been since Macron got elected (in 2017, 18-24ers oscillated between 29% and 31% for LFI). The French left has done precious little to stem the tide, alas – there is no question that 'la lepénisation des esprits' continues apace in France.

One day the centre will work out that you need to offer something to people besides the fact that you’re not the fascists (whose language and policies you keep ripping off).

scampus milne (gyac)
Posted: 25 October 2020 at 17:45:32
They might do a better job of peeling off some of those FN votes if they weren’t so coy about peddling this shit. Ofc all the fascists approvingly qting it will never vote for them when they can vote for the real deal, but as long as they can hide behind the values of the republic then there’s no problem. 🙃

One day the centre will work out that you need to offer something to people besides the fact that you’re not the fascists (whose language and policies you keep ripping off).

This works for the PS (and only by French standards, since they'd be called commies in the UK or the US) but not so much for Mélenchon, who cannot be described as a centrist. His biggest issue is his authoritarian streak and his countless gaffes. He did remarkably well in 2016 and 2017 and then he squandered it all after he didn't make it to the second round.

I’m talking about Macron.

speaking of authoritarian streaks

Ah, nm.

xp

French Politics pic.twitter.com/7eB6kNvkCq

— Axe🗿🇵🇸 (@westernunion2k) December 16, 2021

"Le wokisme, c'est le contraire de la République" https://t.co/yhollPdeKC

— Vincent Bevins (@Vinncent) February 13, 2022

What were you expecting from the right wing candidate?

Admittedly, French politics is more depressing than it's ever been: a couple of fascists battling it out with a proto-fascist and a neo-liberal, plus a ragbag of left candidates polling in the single digits.

ahhh the french

Who cares what Pecresse has to say about "le wokisme", what's a lot more worrying is that she referenced fascist conspiracy theory "le grand remplacement" in the same speech. So I guess we've actually got three fascists vs a neo-liberal now.

https://www.bfmtv.com/politique/elections/presidentielle/presidentielle-pour-hidalgo-pecresse-a-franchi-un-rubicon-de-plus-en-evoquant-le-grand-remplacement_AD-202202130293.html

A poll suggesting Le Pen could win the run-off.

After Macron won, I suggested his victory would pave the way for a Le Pen victory in 2022 because he would not be able to fix the structural crises that are pushing French voters to back authoritarianism. I was bombarded with abuse and called an apologist for fascism. pic.twitter.com/meyazYmLVv

— Ellie Mae O'Hagan (@elliemaeohagan) April 7, 2022

I don't think Let Pen will win the runoff but it's pretty disturbing that nearly half of French voters (and probably the majority of white voters) will be voting fascist. Something will give eventually.

Melenchon seems to be having a similar teflonic bounce - could even overtake her in the first round?

Zemmour doing a pretty bad job of splitting the fash vote

French Millennials vote Marine Le Pen?"Class-party polarization is higher among Millennials than older generations.Professional class kids are more left wing & working class kids are more right wing than their parents"-@policytensor https://t.co/0d5dcE7W9Chttps://t.co/WqCMx2PQLO

— Albert Pinto (@70sBachchan) April 8, 2022

see if you can find when Macron announced he was going to raise the retirement age https://t.co/sJyiezKPJ9 pic.twitter.com/bz3MUpZiPh

— accidental larouchite (@lib_crusher) April 8, 2022

New Ipsos projection:

Macron: 27.6%
Le Pen: 23.0%
Mélenchon: 22.2%
Zemmour: 7.2%
Pécresse: 4.8%
Jadot: 4.7%

Only 0.8pt between Le Pen and Mélenchon. That's the vote share of minnow candidate Poutou. We were so, so close to an evening with a completely different narrative.

— Leonardo Carella 🇺🇦 (@leonardocarella) April 10, 2022

One exit poll has it 28.1 | 23.3 | 20.1

Oh it's the same Ipsos projection but older - so Melenchon's gained a little in the last three hours huh. Throw him in the run off too, what's the worst that can happen...

Macron should win but the problem of a quarter of French ppl voting for the sewer remains. As with a lot of politics in the UK/US/elsewhere it's where this all ends. En Marche won't go beyond Macron and climate's impacts on borders will only increase.

Macron calls to vote against Marine Le Pen. But his whole strategy over the last 2 years was to legitimate all the topics of the extreme right and hoping for a second round against her. The result of his strategy is that she is totally normalized and could now win.

— Daniel Zamora Vargas (@DanielZamoraV) April 10, 2022

OTM

Trying to use the far right to leverage themselves into power is what all French leaders have done for decades though, on the left and on the right. Mitterrand did it to try and split the right vote, Sarkozy sucked up to the far right to get elected etc etc

Muttering to myself “le wokisme”

Still uncomfortable but a little bit better.

One poll was circulating the other day showing Le Pen doing well in the subsample of youngest French people, but that’s absolutely not what today’s exit poll found. She was a distant third among voters under 25, with the left candidate well ahead. She led among middle-age folks. https://t.co/66kLqWPkvZ

— Taniel (@Taniel) April 11, 2022

Is there any good writing on the French election?

Haven't seen any, just the usual liberal-style vomit.

This is pretty good.

https://www.ft.com/content/5bd5e791-9561-42a0-ac8c-f5bdeeb81309?shareType=nongift

I don't know what the big deal about Le Pen is, she couldn't be any more far right than the current UK government.

Turnout at 5pm stands at 63.2%, accoring to the interior ministry - that’s 1.8% lower than during the first round, and 2.1% down on the second round five years ago.

For the time being, this doesn’t look like the surge in abstentions that some had feared.

bodes well?

Macron projected at 58.2%

Only 40% for the fascist, vive 👏🏻le 👏🏻 France 👏🏻

better to have a golem than a fascist

We've got both in charge here.

It’s good if everyone just goes “phew that was close” without considering the reasons why

just read earlier that Blair is proposing to put together a Macron tribute band, a "British version of En Marche" 🤮🤮🤮. The problem or even the silver lining is every UK attempt at establishing a centrist party as a "🤡home for hopeful politics🤡" has been a combination of failure and farce.

LOL @ Macron being considered a centrist.

I think that’s really unfair, Tom, he’s not just a centrist, but so much more!

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FRIRrp9XIAEAC4W?format=jpg&name=large

incoherence at least has the minor advantage of not being purposeful evil