As expected, the left has lost the presidential election in France. My condolences to Jerome a Paris and the entire European Tribune community.
Nicolas Sarkozy was elected president of France, defeating Socialist Segolene Royal and claiming a “mandate for change.”
Sarkozy, candidate of the governing Union for a Popular Movement, took 53.4 percent against 46.7 percent for Royal, the Interior Ministry said, with 69 percent of the vote counted.
The president-elect, 52, overcame criticism that he was too divisive and too sympathetic to the U.S., convincing voters that he was best-suited to spur economic growth. Sarkozy, interior minister and finance minister for four years under President Jacques Chirac, promised to cut taxes, reduce the number of civil servants, curb immigration and toughen sentencing.
“The people of France have chosen change,” Sarkozy said tonight in a nine-minute address at party headquarters in Paris. “I will restore the value of work, authority, morals, respect, and merit. I’ll restore national pride and national identity.”
In succeeding Chirac, his one-time mentor turned political rival, and preventing Royal, 53, from becoming the first woman president, Sarkozy will be the first French head of state born after World War II. He’ll be inaugurated on May 16 and name a government May 19 or May 20, Francois Fillon, Sarkozy’s chief campaign adviser, said on TF1 television.
So, what does it mean?
it means that the folks that gave us Algeria and French Equatorial Africa and Viet Nam have now shown their true Lilly White color. One more vote determined by a Racial Bias that will be the destruction of the “Old Democracys”.What a Bloody Joke!
I like this headline from Raw Story.
it means he’s a truly world-class hypocrite, the French corporate media are just as biased against the left as here, and 53% of the French people bought a huge load of crap.
For me these two things just DO NOT add up. Running against the government of his own party, that he was part of – and getting away with it.
getting more of the short-end of the stick and taking to the streets.
Worse? I hesitate to say. It doesn’t bode well for the Muslim population of France either. Frying pan, meet fire.
Another win for global corporate interests.
it means that older french people have their heads in the sand. the bottom line is that french white folks have had a negative birth rate for several years now, and without integrating their post colonial populations into the economic mix, they won’t be able to support the various social programs that they have enjoyed for decades. the french like to pretend they aren’t racist, but the failure of the french government to find ways to deal with the various problems caused by unemployment for post colonials disproves that.
cutting taxes, shrinking the government, giving corporations breaks, cracking down on muslims…yeah, because that’s worked so well over here. i guess the french will just have to learn the hard way, as we are.