2017 French Presidential Election

[Zanas]

I think I was the OP from the other thread, but I don't know what happened.

[Zanas]

Well Monday's debate clearly had a positive effect on Mélenchon and a negative one on Hamon. Are they voters directly switching from the latter to the former? It's anyone's guess, but I'd say at least half of the effect is indeed just that, the other half being lukewarm Hamon voters quitting and abstentionists now choosing Méluche.

[Zanas]

Who is Lassalle? He was a member of MoDem, so I can assume he can be described as a centrist. Is it true? Does he fit any label at all? It also seems he uses elements of Occitan regionalism/nationalism.

THe core of his message seems to be the province vs the metropole. He's a bit of a meme small candidate who does funny interviews and ads, but it would be interesting to see what his program is about.

Also, I have a question for the French, is Lassalle's region Occitania or Basque Country, culturally at least?

Well, actually, he's from Béarn, which is part of the "Occitan-speaking" territory, but not part of the present day Occitanie region. It's not Basque country, because language, and historically it has been more aligned with the history of Aquitaine (Gascogne, Guyenne etc.) than "Occitanie", which has always been more to the East.

Today, Lassalle is quite unclassifiable, he always was a bit of a personal maverick, especially in defending ruralité and his terroir, but a couple of years ago he went on a Tour de France on foot to meet the grassroots people of France everywhere, and since then he has been speaking very harshly against centralism, bureaucracy and even financial capitalism. Sometimes, I've heard him speak and asked myself if it was a member of the PCF or the NPA, seriously. I'm not saying he is actually left-wing now, but I think he's genuine in what he says, and he clearly positions himself in defense of the common people and the vulnerable rurals.

[Zanas]

Why are people suddenly falling in love with Melenchon? If he becomes the new French left, I will never be able to support it.

Strong debate performance

Not to mention a majority of people are just now starting to pay attention to the whole circus. Up until now it was just all background noise about Fillon's and Le Pen's judicial troubles, but with the first debate the campaign has actually started and people are now aware of at least 5 candidates instead of just 3 or 4.

Hamon and Mélenchon stand for the same ideology, they agree on everything (except for the EU, basic income).

This is obviously false. The main cleavage is that the former has been a minister during the finishing quinquennat, has a whole lot of former ministers or even outgoing ministers and deputies around him as candidates for the législatives, and is trying very hard to appear as different from the outgoing majority whereas he is just the exact same thing and would do the exact same sh**t. The latter is by any means not perfection, but at least he doesn't have Cazeneuve or El Khomri as candidates behind him.

God I hate the PS.

[Zanas]

Just a quick word : in 2012, Mélenchon had already climbed up to 17%. But it was in only one poll. This time around, he seems to really be closing in on the leading trio. I would still advise to be careful about those figures. I'd reckon you'll have to take a couple of points from his polling numbers to get his actual voting score. A number of people I know and like, who are somewhat clever human beings, want to vote Mélenchon but are still afraid of a Fillon-Le Pen runoff and will end up voting Macron to avoid that, at least with the present situation.

[Zanas]

Here are mine :

Poutou 82%
Mélenchon 81%
Hamon 79%
Arthaud 79%
Cheminade 66%
Macron 60%
Dupont-Aignan 54%
Le Pen 49%
Fillon 43%

which is pretty much exactly how I'd rank them in order of who I agree with, except of course Cheminade who really isn't anywhere near his position on this graph. On the graph, I end up just between Poutou and Hamon, up there on the left, but I've been decided to vote Mélenchon for a while now.

[Zanas]

But I don't understand why LePen would throw her own supporters under the bus by implying that the French played no role in the Holocaust. The typical FN voter would have supported the Vichy government and would have proudly helped the Nazis round up Jews. Why doesn't LePen take pride in her movement's history as being pro Nazi? If you are in Le Pen's universe you probably think there was nothing wrong with the Holocaust

The real thing to be understood here, is that these kind of declarations never hurt the Le Pens, because the public is either unaware or indifferent. The typical FN voter doesn't really know anything about things that happened 70 years ago and doesn't really care either way.

[Zanas]

Nobody drops after the official slate of candidates has been established. Period. So stop speculating about what if X or Y dropped or why doesn't Z or K drop. It's not a thing we do. Learn the rules if you want to participate in this carnival.

[Zanas]

I'd like to meet some of the 14% of Fillon voters who have Melenchon as their second choice

Really bizarre but seems like probably small sample sizes. People who are drawn to egotistical maniacs as a general matter?

These make up the entire sample of voters actually.

[Zanas]

With this recent poll numbers, I have a slight hope for some anti-establishment voters defecting from Le Pen enough to put Melenchon into the runoff...

Mélenchon vs FBM would make for a fascinating map, at least.

It would basically be TCE 2005 2.0, wouldn't it ?

Anyway, seeing the PS at 7% because of "vote utile" is the epitome of schadenfreude.

[Zanas]

I don't think Hamon-Valls in a primary can predict what Mélenchon-Macron would look like in the presidential runoff.

And if you're a racist and you have to choose between Mélenchon and Macron, sadly, I think the choice is pretty obvious.

[Zanas]

Antono: Would you consider voting for Melenchon, if he continues to poll around 3rd, to maybe have a leftist in the seccobd round.

I think any leftist should vote, for the left-wing candidate most likely to make the runoff, before that would mean supporting Harmon, now Melenchon.

I think any leftist, and anyone for that matter, should vote for who the hell they want.

[Zanas]

The Orleanist pretender to the French throne has endorsed Fillon. This changes everything!

are there more than a 100 people in whole of France that would care about it?

Monarchism has its niche, just like Assileneau's ideas, and its vocal enough to be considered larger than 100.

1793 people in France care about this...

[Zanas]

Some leftists tend to like Russia because of the whole "the enemy of your enemy is your friend" fallacy, and they think it's a good obstacle to American and "Western" imperialism. Of course some leftists are just idiots.

[Zanas]

So the first voters have started voting... in Saint-Pierre-et-Miquelon. It's on, fellows, for better or worst.

[Zanas]

Turnout overseas is typically 20 points lower than mainland for presidential elections, except for a few special cases. But that's at the end of the day. Some mainland departments get 14% at noon as well.

On a general basis, don't read pretty much anything into any figures from the overseas zones.