France votes for a new president

France begins voting for president


GO Ségolène Royal!

Hip, Hip Hurray for Ségolène!

I serioulsly hope that she does not win. Sarkozy is the only one who could change things.

As expected: Reuters
Belgian media say Sarkozy, Royal in French run-off

The French system is a two-round election. In the first round, any candidate who can gather 500 signatures from elected officials (around 36,000 total) is eligible. This results in dozens of parties on the ballot. One needs an absolute majority to become President, something extremely unlikely with at least a dozen candidates.

The first round serve several purposes:

* It’s like a primary; multiple candidates from the same party may be running.

* It allows electors to vote for the party that most represents them to make their voice heard, much like voting for the ÖDP or the Free Oktoberfest Beer for Foreign Residents at Partei. That vote isn't necessarily "thrown away" as it would be in the US or even in national elections here and the UK. If that particular party/candidate makes a good showing, it sends a message to whoever wins the presidency that this particular issue is important to enough voters. Additionally, that candidate could get get some ministerial appointment.

* It’s allows for voters to register their discontent. A vote for someone other than the main contenders lets them know that but for the grace...

It's also possible to nullify the entire election in France via null votes. Proponents of the "blank vote" even have their own party, though I'm not sure how you'd vote for one of them.

After all this hullabaloo, a second round is organized two weeks later as a run-off between the top two candidates from the first round.

That's the theory. LePen changed things. In 2002 there were 16 candidates including 10 on the left. When the voters finished voting their personal cause celebres, the vote on the left was so divided that it allowed Le Pen to finish second overall and make it to the second round leaving two candidates from the right to compete for the Presidency. Oops.

So that's how this all works in a nutshell. In next week's lesson I'll explain the American electoral system.

woof-

BBC: France opts for left-right battle

Anyone know how many votes John Kerry got?

@BB, I made french toast for my kids this morning and lunch they had some french fries. In your face BB!

Millions more than you, you chickenhawk shitball. He served in the military with distinction. I served in the military. How about you? Show your DD214 or shut up and go die.

The French are the US' allies. Without the French the US could never have beaten the British in 1776-1783 nor in 1812-1815. The French were also right: the war in iRaq is wrong, there were no WMDs, there was no such thing as any link between AQ and iRaq. The froggies were right, the neocons are, as always, on every single matter, wrong. We wouldn't be in this mess (nor in this one.

You're patriotic? Join the military, chickenhawk. Until then what you say is meaningless. Your actions (and lack thereof) speak volumes.

woof.

post yours and I'll post mine...

foow.

Doesn't look good for Royal:
AP: Royal debates potential French kingmaker

Sarkozy seen winning French election: Belgian media

looks like the belgian media were right, then, malheureusement

France24 is showing sarkozy at 53%

It is over, he has seem to have won...

Tout à fait. She conceded defeat a few minutes after 8pm, he's starting his speech this very minute.

très intéressant here. a nation notoriously resistant to change voting for change. we'll see how the parliamentary elections go next month. no riots yet.

I can't believe that they've actually voted for Ted Rogers, seen here displaying his trade mark 3-2-1 sign.

Merde. My wife was counting votes back home and called earlier.

Well, like I said, it was time to leave the country.

Great post , great day for France , allez les blues (cept in the rugby against us in September).

Great news Nicolas Sarkozy wins and will bring france into the 21st centuary.

He will do for france what Mrs T did for Britain. Reward hard work, reduce the size of the state, and open up the country to competition.

There is pain at first but it has to happen for the long term future.

We now need to do the same at the EU.

he is scary.
qoute: 'le grandeur' of France and 'the concept of work, authority, merit'
hmm, if I exchange France with Germany, it makes sounds like he lived in Germany in the 1940s.

@ planetmoni

What? Were you around in Germany in the 1940s ? What a poor comparison .

because i think using nationalistic sentiments in today's Western world is a cheap way of getting popular. it is popularistic and i don't like it.

We need to wait for the results of the general election in June. If Sarkozy can secure a comfortable majority in parliament, he may actually have the opportunity to push through the economic program France needs. He's going to have a hard time regardless though; the French love their entitlements and reforming pensions and other goodies like 35 hour work weeks is not going to be easy.

French guy at work here is pretty happy with the result. He reckons the French need a good kicking to get their ass into gear, and this bloke will do it..

thuper , you remind me of everything that is wrong with Germany today - a basic inability to love and fear of being cast down upon for loving your country.

nice massaging of the facts there, BD. Wanna tell us exactly how you guys won that war?

Wasnt it that ,Britain declared war on France so they made a peace treaty with US?

If “Thatcher in trousers� is going to be “Bringing France into the 21st Century“, we have a fair idea of what that will mean:

An increasing neo-liberal economy where alone profit maximisation counts.
A re-alignment of French foreign policy in favour of supporting the USA’s and UK’s TWAT.
The continued exclusion of a large section of the population from mainstream society.
The creation of an “underclass� on the sink estates around the large cities, particularly amongst ethnic minorities.
A general attack on working class living standards.

Formidable!

you don't know me parnell and if you did, you wouldn't write that bullocks.

Most of the French I know (and I know a few) are quite happy that finally someone will come in to their country and re-introduce the link between work and pay, discourage lazy scroungers from being just that and get them back to work, restore some respect for the State's authority, and start to clean up the ghettos that have formed in every large French city under the Socialists. Perhaps you were being sarcastic and I didn't get it, but from the French perspective I'm pretty sure they've got the better choice, and hopefully he won't just play the right-winger's favourite 'blame the immigrants' card, but force through the decisions to limit the unions' power and influence and cut social spending, while encouraging the disadvantaged and disenfranchised (under the Socialists) immigrant and poor population to integrate and contribute.

However, from the British perspective I'd say that the French will soon be (even more) revolting when they figure out the 35 hour week is going, and they can't just retire at 50 something with a pension equivalent to their full salary, or stay comfortably on the dole for their entire lives. The BBC will be full of pictures of demonstrations and riots, empty shops, burning cars, stone throwing 'students' and they'll give us that old 'see how much worse it is in Europe' line to make us feel better.

Well let's see here , you're saying that if I "knew" you , I'd have a diametrically opposite view to the one formed by reading your comments on this thread? Nice representation of your views , well done lady...

But the Socialists have created all this. Don't you watch the news about life in France? Haven't you seen the problems on these estates? Honestly they make life in Britian look like paradise, even after (as you say) Thatcher made us focus only on profit and Blair removed the last respect our youth has for authority. The French will never just blindly follow the US, and for this I admire them. The bird was even closer aligned to Blair than Sarko is, and this is another good reason for her to quietly take a back seat and reflect a bit.

Why on earth di you think I am a bif fan od the French "socialists" ?


You have to EARN respect and I think dis-respect for authority is a healthy thing anyway.
Blair's government has certainly been about creating a more authoritarian society rather than letting things slide.
The roots of the problem that DOES exist, particuarly amongst the young in Britain but also amoongst the older population are im my opinion a result of Thatcherism.
The idea that "there is no such thing as society"


She will have plenty of time to reflect when she is getting aquainted with red hot pokers down below in the "toasty zone". Hopefully soon.

I think he was talking about Royal, not Thatcher..

true, nevertheless, i was writing my initial reaction on hearing that qoute (with the riots in mind last year) and didn't realise it has to do with my nationality...

anyway, we will see what future holds for France.

@MonksTown: I got the impression you supported socialist policies, and although the Socialist party hasn't been in power in France for ages the French have always voted for policies that, in Britain, are definitely 'socialist'. Now they've voted for a distinct swing to the right which I believe is the best for France. Socialist policies don't work well unless tempered with the understanding that state benefits and pensions have to be paid for by people doing 'real' work, creating jobs, and making profits and paying taxes on them.

Monks Town said

If “Thatcher in trousers� is going to be “Bringing France into the 21st Century“, we have a fair idea of what that will mean:

An increasing neo-liberal economy where alone profit maximisation counts.

The continued exclusion of a large section of the population from mainstream society.
The creation of an “underclass� on the sink estates around the large cities, particularly amongst ethnic minorities.
A general attack on working class living standards.

It just about describes France as it is today so I dont understand where you are coming from as most of what you describe is caused by the Left.

"Socialist" for me means the control of the means of production, distribution and exchange in the hands of the people who create the wealth of society ie the working class.
On the scale of things, some of the policies that France has supported over the years may certainly be a bit more towards socialism than has been practiced in Britain since 1979, or 1974.
But that doesn't mean they are "socialist" in themselves.

I happen to think that concerns like EdF or SNCF are better in state hands than privatised but that doesn't mean I like the all powerful corporate state.
Even when the so called socialists were in power in France, huge swathes of life were run by the unelected bureaucrat elite of l'ecole nationale (?) graduates rather than the people.

CITOYENS, AUX ARMES!
FORMEZ VOS BATTALIONS!

JohnnyN, and just where have I defended what "the left" has done in government in France?

MT, you are avoiding the point. You claim that a right wing government will cause a whole list of problems/issues. Yet when people point out that these problems exist already and where caused by a left-wing/socialist style government, you simply reply with "I'm no fan of the left/the government in France wasn't really socialist".

You avoid the point that you made a false claim and have been called out on it.

I think MT is going for the 'no government at all, mob rule' type of system. France has that already in the suburbs and it doesn't seem to work either.

Oui et non. For most of Chirac's first term in office Lionel Jospin was Prime Minister, up until the 2002 election.

The trend towards the problems France now has with an alienated "underclass" have been around for sometime and certainly the "socialists" who were in government in the past have to take some of the blame for that. However the "solutions" that Sarkosy's politics have on offer are not likely to solve those fundamental issues, are likely to casue social conflict and are the wet dream of neo-liberals.

I'm in favour of government, but of people governing themselves rather than a self-selected business and bureucratic elite, whether they claim to be conservatives, "socialists", liberals, Green, or pink with yellow spots.

Its all about the freedom of the individual or the control by the state. The 35 hour week is a perfect example. what right has the state to tell you how much or little you work. All this leftie stuff has brought france to its knees.
People like Monks Town just live in the past with some eutopien dream that will never happen.

They do not understand human nature that people want to strive and get on. Whilst a left wing state pays them to do nothing and that is the worst crime of all.

One could argue back and forth where the standard working week should lie in terms of hours and negoiators of contracts and tarifs frequently do.
Such laws as regulation on employment are a PROTECTION of the individuals who make up the majority of society against the employing class who are a minority.

Or do you want children down coal mines to use an extreme example fro the past that was erradicated through legislation?

@ MT
So basically you're sayin that the rights of the larger group of people should dominate and discriminate against the minority. Right , FOREIGNERS ON THE DOLE , YOU LOT ARE OUT OF HERE!

Good stuff , finally saw the light did we?

The rights of one group end where they encroach on the rights of others.

Legal restrictions on the working week weaken the rights of the employing class (the minority) at the benefit of the working class (the majority) and I support that.
Just as I support the the rights of minorities when they are in a weaker position against the majority.

The notion that unemployed so called Ausländer should be expelled from Germany plays right into the purely neo-liberal and in practice racist concept that immigrants are JUST a resource like water or electricity in the production process that the employing class should be able to turn on and off at will.

@ MT

Ok so since it's not about numbers (majority/minority) unlike your earlier post then on what other grounds do you define strength? You do mention "weaker positions".

Nothing is PURELY about numbers, there are grey zones.
I'm sure even Sarkozy is nice to dogs or summat.

The working class a whole is larger and in a weaker position as a whole.
But take say a Turkish businessman. Not a member of the working class but a member of a minority that is in a relatively weak position so worthy of support in some areas:
Against racism and discrimination yes, but to further expolit his workers, no.