Ségo ou Sarko (I)

Or put another way: madame ou monsieur. Or simply: left or right.

The French voters clearly didn't want a re-run of the second stage in the last presidential election in 2002, where the choice was between Chirac and Le Pen. The whole French left had to hold their noses and vote for Chirac to prevent a victory of the fascist candidate Le Pen. This time, a record 84.5% of eligible voters turned out to vote, to guarantee that their favorite would reach the second round.

In the first stage of this year's presidential election, the small leftist parties suffered badly, because many on the left voted for Ségolène Royal to prevent a second stage run-off between Sarkozy and Bayrou or Sarkozy and Le Pen. The once mighty French Communist Party was nearly obliterated with just 1.93% of the vote. France must surely be the only country in the whole world with three, that is THREE (3) Trotskyist parties contesting the vote. Arlette Laguiller of Lutte Ouvrière made a disgraceful exit. The winner on the far left was Besançenot of the Ligue Communiste Révolutionnaire with 4.08% of the vote.

On the far right, the French voters created an even bloodier bloodbath. Le Pen lost no less than one million votes. He failed to come out on top in even one département. Le Front National is history, set back twenty years with only 10% of the vote.

The big question now is what will happen on May 6. Will the winner be Ségo or Sarko? There's only a 5% difference between Sarkozy (31%) and Royal (26%). Ségo will get all the leftist votes and the votes of the migrants and their decedents. No immigrant in his right mind will ever vote for Nicholas Sarkozy, who called them 'scum'. But this guy will of course get most of the votes which went to Le Pen in the first round, although not all, because some disillusioned die-hards will boycott the second round. That leaves both candidates with about an equal number of votes. The outcome will be decided by those who voted for Bayrou. Will the majority tilt to the left or the right?

I believe Ségolène Royal has a good chance of winning, because the French want a change after 12 years of the Chirac presidency. Sarkozy is sometimes describes as an American neocon with a French passport. The French don't want a neocon president. But if Royal wins, it will be a very narrow victory. French society is split in two between left and right, and geographically Sarkoland in the north, east and south and Sègoland in the west and south-west. Even Paris is split. The French better take care to keep out the U.S. Army or it will start building a wall... If Sarkozy wins, the whole of France could erupt in riots. And Ségolène could surf to victory on a campaign of “ tout sauf Sarkozy” (TSS) – anything but Sarkozy. In the end, not the TGV, but the TSS could bring Ségolène Royal to power.

(The Guardian: Forever France; A clear choice) (The Independent: Sarkozy and Royal go through as 84 per cent turnout sets new poll record; Leading article: A result that shows democracy is alive and well)