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Parties

  • Image, Anecdote, and Reality: Why Sarkozy Really Is to Be Feared
    29 April 2007 par (Open-Publishing)
    2 comments

    or, How LePen Made the Second Round in the Disguise of Sarkozy
    By Patricia Alessandrini
    I have yet to see a Sarkozy poster in Paris – or even just a sticker with his name on it – that has not been defaced within a few hours of being posted. The fear and resentment here in regard to Sarkozy, especially in working-class neighborhoods, is palpable. The French left credits the record highs in voter enrollment and turnout for the presidential election of April 22 to anti-Sarko sentiment. (…)

  • Where the French left stands and why it needs to defeat Nicolas Sarkozy
    29 April 2007 par (Open-Publishing)

    After the first round of balloting in the French presidential election, how can we evaluate the political dynamics now at work? Why are we convinced that – whatever our reservations – we must do everything in our power to assure the victory of Ségolène Royal in the second round?
    1. In a time of generalized suspicion of politicians and parties, and in spite of a high percentage of undecided voters just before the polling, the very high level of participation (83.7% of registered voters) (…)

  • French election heralds more battles to come
    25 April 2007 par (Open-Publishing)
    2 comments

    While much of the media sees the presidential elections as a return to “mainstream” politics in France, the true picture is more complicated, explains Alex Callinicos
    siege PCF Etampes
    By Alex Callinicos
    The first round of the French presidential elections last Sunday was haunted by its counterpart five years ago.
    On 21 April 2002 the Nazi leader Jean-Marie Le Pen pushed the Socialist Party prime minister Lionel Jospin into third place and out of the second round.
    But on Sunday Le (…)

  • Heightened political atmosphere in France sees huge numbers at meetings and rallies
    25 April 2007 par (Open-Publishing)

    by Jim Wolfreys, in Paris
    On the face of it, the results of the French presidential election appear to represent a revival of mainstream parties.
    The Socialist Party’s Ségolène Royal, Nicolas Sarkozy, the right wing UMP candidate, and François Bayrou, of the centre right UDF, together won around 75 percent of the vote, compared to under 50 percent in 2002.
    But this resurgence does not represent renewed political affiliation with the mainstream.
    One French poll showed that a third of (…)

  • French Election Results and Analysis: WHY SARKOZY IS DANGEROUS
    23 April 2007 par (Open-Publishing)
    2 comments

    by Doug Ireland
    Here, direct from France 2 TV News (broadcast live in the States via TV 5, the international francophone channel) are the UPDATED exit poll projections from today’s first round of France’s two-stage presidential election:
    NICOLAS SARKOZY — UMP (conservative) 30.4% SEGOLENE ROYAL — Socialist Party 25% FRANCOIS BAYROU — UDF (centrist) 18.8% JEAN-MARIE LE PEN — Front National (neo-fascist) 11.1%
    This means that the Socialist Royal will be in the run-off in two weeks (…)

  • The Euro-vision Contest
    21 April 2007 par (Open-Publishing)
    1 comment

    Presidential candidate Ségolène Royal is officially leading the left in the race for the Elysée. Just don’t expect too much from the candidates
    There was a period earlier this autumn when European Commission President José Manuel Barroso must have wondered just how many other French presidential hopefuls would come knocking on his office door ahead of their official party nominations. The centre-right frontrunner and current Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy’s September 8th visit was (…)

  • Polish witchhunt
    18 April 2007 par (Open-Publishing)
    2 comments

    By Ignacio Ramonet
    The Poles call it the law of lustration, a term meaning ritual purification; the word has strong connotations of repentance and penitence in Poland, where history and Catholicism are so closely intertwined.
    Under the law, which was passed last October and entered into force on 15 March this year, 700,000 Poles are required to confess any collaboration with the communists between 1945 and 1989. All senior civil servants, university professors, lawyers, headmasters and (…)

  • Articles of Impeachment To Be Filed On Cheney
    17 April 2007 par (Open-Publishing)
    2 comments

    Looks like he’s reached his boiling point.
    Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-Ohio), the most liberal of the Democratic presidential candidates in the primary field, declared in a letter sent to his Democratic House colleagues this morning that he plans to file articles of impeachment against Vice President Dick Cheney.
    Kucinich has made ending the war in Iraq the central theme of his campaign. He has even taken aim at the leading Democratic presidential candidates in the field for their votes on (…)

  • Bayrou’s Journey to the Heart of the Chirac-d’Estaing Machine
    13 April 2007 par (Open-Publishing)

    By Sébastien Crépel
    He has occupied every post on the political right. Today, his rebellious tone helps him hold his own when faced with a UMP (Union for a Popular Movement) converted to his same Euro-liberalism.
    Francois Bayrou is the archetypal man of the same ‘system’ that he is denouncing; even more so of the UMP-ex-RPR-UDF majority that governed France for nearly 20 years starting in 1974, for which he was local counselor, deputy, and minister. Originally a protégé of Jean Lecanuet, (…)

  • 2007 Presidential Campaign : Humiliated, the "Beur" Minister Defects ... to the Right
    13 April 2007 par (Open-Publishing)

    By Jean-Paul Piérot
    The lesson under Villepin and Sarkozy was bitter enough. But why on earth did Azouz Begag join the team in the first place? And why must he now bind himself to Bayrou, Villepin’s "centre-right " (right-wing)challenger?
    The team he joined was a nest of vipers. His entry into Villepin’s government in 2005 surprised many, even beyond the circle of his friends. That he, a Beur (1), son of Algerian immigrants who grew up on a rundown suburban estate near Lyon and made a (…)