Thread of Griping and Such Things

[Antonio the Sixth]

Election is still in two years, no ? Well, I know Gillard has only a two seat majority, but I've not heard about the possibility of a dissolution so far.

I hope we'll be spared from crazy Abbott.

[Antonio the Sixth]

France is indeed the exception of modern countries... We elected our only socialist President at the time when Thatcher, Reagan and Kohl had just taken or were about to take over !

But yeah, in the long term I think modern countries will start - or are starting - to move toward the left. The rightwards swing has just been too strong since the 1980s.

[Antonio the Sixth]

Anybody who thinks Marine will become President is a retard.

No one is suggesting that, but I'm saying she is a legitimate contender for the second round of voting. A Socialist could win, but the left has a bad habit of shooting themselves in the foot with presidential elections.

You're right, however when the far right makes it to the second round it is mostly due to vote split. After all, Le Pen's 2002 score wasn't that higher than his 1988 and 1995 performances. The main difference is that there were around 10 candidates these times, against 16 (!) in 2002. Sure, the FN has never been as strong as it is nowadays, but it's still "only" around 20%.

Also to note, a lot of Le Pen's support is due to her associating the usual xenophobe anti-immigration rhetoric, to a kind of left-wing populist position (anti-globalization, anti-corporations, etc...). It's certainly playing a "the left has betrayed the working class" game, which works well in France since the 1980. So, in some way, a lot of her voters can be considered "left-wing".

[Antonio the Sixth]

Well, in some way there are always been two lefts, at least here in Europe : a progressive, universalist, intellectual and open-minded left opposed to a populist, anti-modernist and particularist one. In France we have the historic opposition between Jaurès and Guesde. But surely, today's situation is particularely favorable to a narrowing of the gap between the populist left and the populist right : globalization being perceived as the cause of the growth of inequalities, immigrates as the cause of unemployment, islam as a threat to the western culture, etc... So it's not weird to see the far-right appropriating itself these left-wing themes, despite the fact the "solutions" they propose would only dramatically worsen the situation.