I asked what my standard, or anybodyâs standard of French for that matter, has to do with being able to follow or have an opinion on the French election.
You still wonât answer. And you donât even know what standard of French I possess.
I think perhaps you should post retrospectively on the International Elections thread about say, the Dutch election, and ask the various posters there what knowledge of Dutch they have, as clearly any poster who isnât fluent in Dutch has no right to have an opinion, at least according to you. Which means only @Fagan_ODowd can have an opinion about anything relating to Dutch politics.
He has an opportunity to form a centrist coalition with a huge majority, whether he can pull it off is the question. The socialists have been utterly destroyed, and the Republicans also in disarray. It is not inconceivable that En Marche and center right parties could win a huge majority in this environment.
I never claimed to have a huge knowledge of French politics. I never watched her debate. I donât follow it aside from these results.
And clearly neither do you.
Yet you will pretend to have loads of knowledge on the topic and make judgements on someoneâs competency based âon accountsâ of one debate, ignoring the electoral success of that person and party over what is now a pretty sustained period of time. In 2002 her father got to the run off,
and 15 years later she will double his national %. Her party went from a distant third in their 2010 local elections to vote topping in 2015. In the last National Assembly elections her party got the third highest number of 1st round votes and we will see how 2017 goes. Those are the only metrics I really care about here.
In your dreams she is some poor operator who will
now go away, but the reality is quite a bit different. You are delusional about the world you live in, seeing things as you want them to be rather than they actually are.
The so-called move away from âthe establishmentâ in France is overstated. As a centrist in French terms, Macron is undoubtedly an âestablishmentâ politician. Heâs just running under different branding.
There were three establishment candidates, if you want to use that terminology, in this election - Macron, Fillon, and Hamon. They got just over 50% between them in Round 1.
In 2002, Chirac and Jospin polled just 36% between them in Round 1. If you throw in the performance of Francois Bayrou, a centrist who this time backed Macron, the âestablishmentâ vote came to under 43% that time, which is considerably lower than 2017.
I wonder whether she couldnât becompared in some ways to gerry Adams. Dragged a toxic party into the mainstream, giving it a chance of being electable down the line, but not with her as leader as she carries too much baggage. I see sense in some of what she says, and she certainly pushed macron to the right, at least in the pre election mumbo jumbo.
Again, thatâs some load of hot air. I imagine you currently look like the Hindenburg when it attempted to make its final, ill-fated attempt at landing.
It would appear to me that the French National Front is little more than a sort of quasi-family business for the Le Pen family. Their fortunes are inextricably intertwined in the same way UKIP donât appear to be able to survive in a meaningful way without Nigel Farage. Thereâs another Le Pen coming down the tracks after this one and I wouldnât expect a non-Le Pen to be leading it any time soon.
Sinn Fein arose from the armed independence struggle in the North, as every party in this state has arisen from armed struggle. Its politics are pretty mainstream left at this point.
The French National Frontâs politics is based on the mobilisation of hatred against the âotherâ based on religious and racial grounds. It always has been and it continues to be.
Sinn Fein have moved completely away from that - thatâs if you think they ever utilised it, and I would argue they didnât, at least not in a sectarian or racist manner as the FN continue to do, as the Irish independence struggles (both 1916-1921 and 1969-1997) were not based on racial or religious grounds, they were essentially based on anti-colonialism in the same way other armed independence struggles around the world were.
Even the DUP have mainly moved away from the FN-style vilification of the âotherâ. The FN have not. Theyâre the same as they ever were - theyâre a toxic cesspit of racial and religious hatred which anybody with any shred of decency wouldnât touch with a 50 foot pole.
They are left when it suits them. Sinn fein are the definition of populist in most of what they do. See flip flopping on water charges, property tax and most recently abstaining on a vote to say prayers in the dail as glaring examples. They have moved from being EU sceptics to being staunch defenders of it now as well.
She had Macron removed from the Greece bailout talks because he said the Greek deal was a new Treaty of Versailles. Will see how they get on. I suppose once he gets used to the comfy chair and the car he might fall in.
I donât think multiculturalism is the nirvana that some do.
Before anyone screams racism, I couldnât care what colour, race, creed or gender anyone is.
I object to Islam in particularâs treatment of women. I thing full face covering should be banned in public (just like you have to take your motorbike helmet off in a shop), I think children should be forcibly integrated at school level, with all organised religions taught equally for information, or, not taught at all, and, to be honest, I think when in Rome,do as the Romans do, by and large.
I can understand why the French culture should be pre-eminent in France. And before anyone gets hot under the collar, they should spend a few weeks somewhere like Rochdale.
Lot if water under the bridge since then. Merkels stance on the refugees entering Germany has by default strengthened his hand. Plus he is very much pro Europe.
