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Post France: Panorama of the Upcoming Presidential Election
Created by John Eipper on 12/18/21 2:58 AM

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France: Panorama of the Upcoming Presidential Election (Carmen Negrin, -France, 12/18/21 2:58 am)

Just yesterday, our ex Minister, Christine Taubira announced that she might run for President. She might help unite the left; this is at least her intention. In any case, her participation might bring some light and possibly more content to the coming debates.

Although elections are relatively near, nothing is very clear yet. Macron has not yet confirmed his participation and the extreme right is mainly divided between our eternal Le Pen and Zemmour, a well financed, racist, anti-immigration, pro-Pétain, Jewish TV debater, condemned among other things by the highest French Rabbi. On the right, there is mainly Pécresse, who is President of the Parisian region. She won the primaries of her party, LR, but Ciotti who won the first round of these primaries, seems more attracted by Zemmour than by her. She doesn't have much charisma, but has been clear about not flirting with the extreme right.

Then, of course, there is our ecologist, Y. Jadot, who thinks he can lead the ecologists and the left. Nothing is less certain. And not last, nor least, is Mélenchon on the left of the left. He doesn't have a chance, but theoretically he could help a left-wing candidate.

We yet to see the different programmes.

I am not sure we will ever get to that point. In that case and if Macron does enter the contest, he would be the winner, unless there is a huge economic crisis. In summary: too early to tell.

JE comments: Thanks, Carmen! I had no idea that Macron has yet to throw his hat in the ring. Here in the US, we're accustomed to candidates declaring their intentions years in advance--at least it seems that way.

About Zemmour, I had to do a Wikipedia run. He is a proponent of the Great Replacement Theory, which is just as it sounds: the belief that France's native population will be replaced by non-European peoples. He himself is of Algerian Berber background. There's some irony in that.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%89ric_Zemmour