I might just as well warn you, gentle reader, that I writing here past 5 in the morning, only just now back from the Paris front still choking with tear-gas, and that I am very, very angry. Because of that, while it is unlikely that my opinion will change in times to come, my language might be a touch too strong for the easily shocked.
So what happened? How is it even possible that in a country that is sociologically leftist, in a country that even last month had the highest declared satisfaction ever about the current left wing government's action over the past five year, in a country that has one of the longest democratic traditions, we are now faced with a choice between a mafia-supported crook that makes Berlusconi look like a cute teddy bear, and a hardcore fascist that has publicly denied the Holocaust ever took place?
The blame goes two ways.
I don't think that the Socialists did a bad job in government. In fact, while I've been the first one to say over the past five year that they could do more, pretty much everyone agrees that they did a good job. In fact, comparing them to the Balladur and Juppé governments is likely to get smiles out of anyone, even out of right wing people.
However their campaign sucked. People wanted something strong, something to believe in. Not just "We've been good, we'll keep being good." I wanted blood from the start, didn't get it, and was indeed disappointed. The program itself was good, but nowhere did I hear about the key points in it such as the universal lodging system, or continued education. That was step one of the defeat.
Step two is of an entirely different nature. It is made up by a large bunch of fuckheads that think that voting should be a personal pleasure. How many times have I heard people say "oh I don't care, it'll be the same no matter what." While I was not a full supporter of all that the Socialists did, that statement already made the utmost braindeadness of the carrier evident. Anyone that was conscious before 97 can tell you there was a difference.
So many of them just didn't vote, or voted for their own personal pleasure instead of thinking about the people for which the CLU, the CMU, the PACS, the massive regularisations, and many other things do make a difference (eg voted for one of those delightful trotskyist candidates, such as Arlette, that keep saying that employed people should "just get a job").
And now they're complaining that they've got a choice between a crook and a fascist. Oh yeah. Poor souls, it mustn't be easy living when you're that braindead. Pah, fuck them. If you're one of them, fuck you.
Hey frenchies! was it fun laughing at americans when they eleceted Bush? Well, keep laughing while you can as if you keep it that way in three years time the only pride you'll have left is that at least your leaders don't foster fake coup d'états in oil-rich south american countries.
Anyway, what can I say? Now all those losers, all those wankers that were complaining that they weren't seeing any political differences without ever bothering to go read the actual programmes are all crying, and swearing to goodness that they'll go vote against the fascist. Oh cool, so we'll have a crook then.
What I know for sure is that I won't vote for any one of them. Between Le Pen and Pasqua's best friend, ie between a negationist and a guy that is involved in so many stories covering just about everything from simple fraud to murder and drug trafficking, I'm not giving the small legitimacy of my voice to either. Hey, I'm white, I'm French, I'm not homosexual, I might not be rich but I'm not yet poor, so why should I care? I'll just let those fucking morons sort it out for themselves, just in case this time they notice that there's a difference, and that every single vote counts.
And it they still don't, well fuck them. It's their problem by now.
Re:Well said.
darobin on 2002-04-22T15:15:49
Thanks. It is mindboggling, although not surprising once you take into account all of the factors. Add to that that Jospin is an excellent Prime Minister (he would have won the second round as many right-wing people would have voted for him) but a very poor candidate.
I might as yet revise my judgement on not voting, or voting blank. It's a tearing decision because I firmly believe in democracy, and it's hard to know which is worse between refusing to vote, or knowingly help put to power a mafioso.
I heard interesting strategy talks this morning, part of which was having all parties call to vote for Chirac (something which has happened today) in order to get him a percentage so stalinian that it would be obviously illegitimate. If it feels like that might happen in two weeks, then I might as well help.
At the very least I hope that France will wake up for the parliamentary elections in June, and that it will serve as a warning abroad on the dangers of abstention.
Re:Well said.
pudge on 2002-04-22T18:40:39
Me too! Well, except for the part about dismay, since I don't really know enough about any of the candidates to have an opinion about them, and besides, I am a conservative.:) Re:Well said.
pdcawley on 2002-04-23T08:39:17
Um... LePen's an avowed fascist who has dismissed the Holocaust as a 'detail of history'.
I know you're right wing, but I'd be surprised and dismayed if you were right wing enough to not care whether LePen got in.Re:Well said.
pudge on 2002-04-23T12:53:20
I have no problem with you being against him, but unless and until I do some research into him myself, I won't condemn him. I know nothing about him except for that one quote, and that is hardly fair to use as a basis of judgment for a person. I don't even know in what context he said it in, for example. Maybe he was hosting the French version of Saturday Night Live and said it as a joke, for all I know. I am quite sure that is not the case, but the point is that it is unreasonable for me to judge him based on my almost complete ignorance about who he is.
Re:Well said.
pdcawley on 2002-04-23T13:07:11
Fine, you've got an open mind. And yes, it is unreasonable for you to judge him in ignorance.
My point is that I'd be surprised and dismayed if, after you have done something about the ignorance, you came down in favour of him. Not that I'm expecting you to go out and research him, France is, after all, a long way from the US.Re:Well said.
pudge on 2002-04-23T13:15:49
If he seems to have a chance of winning the general election (or actually does win it!), I vow to, time permitting, research him.:-) Re:Well said.
darobin on 2002-04-23T17:31:34
He almost certainly won't win -- though I'd be wary of taking too many bets at this point -- but if he does, don't worry that you'll have plenty of material to research as there is no doubt that it will cause lots of analysis and serious instability in country that can easily have millions of people in the streets.
For the record, the part about dismissing the Holocaust as a detail is not used out of context but in fact part of one of his major speeches. He also made lots of puns about ovens and showers.
Re:Well said.
darobin on 2002-04-23T17:34:25
and besides, I am a conservative.
Again, I guess you haven't researched Chirac much, but even for conservatives there are far better choices (ie far less involved in dozens of financial affairs, mafia deals, drug trafficking during the Algerian war, etc.) such as for instance Bayrou. And at least some of the others don't change their minds every other day, or haven't made racist remarks (the famous one being "the noise and the smell" of immigrants). If I were conservative, I'd have voted to kick him out of politics.
Any sane system for electing a single person to an office should end with a runoff election with just two candidates, where all voters must vote either for A and against B, or against B and for A.
At least France can change its electoral system. As currently constituted, the US's system is no more likely to get fixed than the moon is likely to turn square for a day or two.
Re:Presidents erect
darobin on 2002-04-22T15:08:35
I don't think it's the electoral system, but much rather the current (fifth) constitution. It was created in other times, when it was considered important that France should have a strong figure to represent it abroad and to itself (the President) and an administrative side (the government, chosen by a different election) to take care of internal affairs.
The problem is that France has changed a hell of a lot since then, and so has the world. Do we really need a President when for most things we should really be represented by Europe? Probably not. To make things worse, this system has been strongly weakened by "cohabitation", something that was considered an almost impossible edge-case by the authors of the constitution -- ie that the President and Prime Minister would be of different parties -- but that has happened many times in the past twenty years (in fact, it covers 9 of those 20 years, almost half of it, and the entirety of the past 5 years).
I firmly believe that what is needed now is a strong constitutional change, ie a Sixth Republic. And if we (the Socialists) win the parliamentary elections next June (which is very much possible, even if it'll require solid work on our behalf) thus opening the door to yet another cohabitation with a useless President, I'm pretty certain that it will happen, probably around 2004.
If it does happen, then I can't imagine that Chirac will be left as President. He'll be put out of office, tried, and sent to prison.
Re:Presidents erect
TorgoX on 2002-04-24T20:52:24
I've got a random question: Why does the French national government have a Prime Minister and a President? What do they do?I actually knew this at some point, but was mostly fixated on how it was clearly some fever dream of De Gaule's, and so I remember nothing else about it.
Re:Presidents erect
darobin on 2002-04-25T00:34:41
It was a fever dream... the President is in charge of stability (major reforms must go through him, especially constitutional ones) and of foreign representation (he's the "voice of France"). The Prime Minister is in charge of internal administration (ie almost everything now that we have Europe).
That system made more or less sense when it came to be. It's now over, but the problem is that any attempt by the Left Wing to change the constitution (and move on to the Sixth Republic) with a President that 1) is from the opposing side and 2) will go to jail if he ceases to be President will be stopped by the Chirac Mafia because it would immediately put him out of office.
Yes, I am quite ashamed at being French today. And actually considering moving. I felt literally sick going out this morning and knowing that 1 personne out 8 I would see in the street voted for a fascist (Le Pen + the other extreme right guy got 20% of the vote, 30% of voters abstained... that's about 1/8 of the voters), amongst which most likely half of the people I buy my bread, groceries, etc...
I guess the reason is the usual: the world is complex, it is hard to understand, and for every complex problem there is a compellingly simple answer which is absolutely the wrong one. People want to take the riches this world gives them, but refuse to see that the price is that you have to accept its complexity. So (especially in France) when something good happens (retirement is at 60 here, 55 for a lot of people, 35 hour work week give most people plenty of free time) they take it for granted, and they complain about multi-national companies (which hire them BTW) and the totally fantasized crime wave that supposedly is plaguing France.
So you can blame the media, which I think are quite good here, the politicians, who actually have done quite a nice job at sharing the wealth and what they could not do, like facing the problem we will have soon with the pension system it's because people demonstrate as soon as you hint at pushing back the retirement age or blame who ever you want. In the end it comes down to people being stupid.
Where to go now?
Re:I am ashamed
darobin on 2002-04-22T16:26:57
So am I. I am not, however, considering moving. Jumping boat won't help more than Rilke helped Germany when he went into exile in Brazil and eventually committed suicide with his wife in 1942, thinking that the world was going to become a fascist dystopia.
This is where it's happening, and not all is lost as yet. Already I'm hearing accounts from all over France of people going to their local sections of the Socialist Party and saying "I'm sorry, I voted for Le Pen because I wanted to scare Jospin into listening more to us, but I never thought he wouldn't be there on the second round. I made a tremendous blunder." Of that 1/8th, many voted with their brainless guts and won't revote for Le Pen in the second round. They don't follow his ideas. In other news, Les Verts and le PS have seen today more requests for party cards than ever before.
We have the parliamentary elections ahead, and while nothing is yet won I have hope. I'm ready to bet that non-voters will vote this time, and I have serious hope that they'll vote on the left because even if they didn't like everything in the current government, the incredibly high popularity level that it still has would seem to indicate that people would rather have that than alternative solutions. I also have hope that this will lead the PS to steer more towards the left, something I've been asking from inside for quite a while.
So I think that we should stick together in these tough days, and that the next step is to show ourselves and to show the world that this was just a massive blunder, "une connerie", and that it doesn't represent the people that we live with.
The advantages of an approval vote -- and the perils of plurality voting -- are most apparent in contests like the Louisiana governor's race of 1991. The primary that year was dominated by three candidates: Edwin Edwards, the often-indicted former governor; David Duke, a former grand wizard of the Ku Klux Klan; and incumbent governor Buddy Roemer. Edwards won the primary with 34 percent of the vote compared with 32 percent for Duke and 27 percent for Roemer. But it was Duke's surprisingly strong showing, despite his overtly racist stance, that won national headlines. Time and Newsweek ran long articles about the politics of hate in America. Bumper stickers, anticipating an Edwards-Duke runoff election, urged Louisianans to "Vote for the crook: It's important."
In the end, Edwards walloped Duke by a 61 to 39 percent margin. But the result was hardly a triumph for the runoff system. Say what you will about Louisiana voters, it's unlikely that anyone other than Edwards's core supporters really wanted to put a "crook" in the governor's office. And the election returns from November show beyond a doubt that very few people approved of Duke, outside of the 32 percent who originally voted for him. Roemer, on the other hand, had no strikes against him except that he had recently switched parties. In an approval vote, he might well have finished first, sparing Louisianans the choice between racketeering and racism. By the same token, approval voting might have spared Minnesotans from electing a professional wrestler to the governor's seat two years ago, or New Hampshirites from handing Pat Buchanan a triumph in the 1996 presidential primary.
Re:Crook vs. racist
darobin on 2002-04-23T17:46:45
Where are one's moderation points when they're needed? Thanks a lot for this excellent article, I forwarded it to many people in the French political net.
Re:Crook vs. racist
vsergu on 2002-04-23T18:14:13
I actually found it by googling for "vote-+for-+the-crook-+it's-important". I remembered the bumper sticker, but not enough of the details of the election.
I'm shooting pool tonight with a friend who's from New Orleans. I'll have to ask her if she has any interesting insights.
Of course here in Washington, DC, we've had our own problems with a voting system that doesn't even have a runoff between the top two. That's how Marion Barry managed some years ago to make it back into the mayor's office after getting out of jail. Fortunately we seem to have been spared yet another comeback recently when he decided not to run for the city council after he had another embarrassing run-in with the policeRe:Crook vs. racist
darobin on 2002-04-24T00:47:26
Choosing a good runoff system is also hard. Here we have (mostly) two. For the Presidentials, people vote directly for the President, and only two candidates can stay, no matter how close the third one may come.
For parliamentary elections, you vote for whoever are running for deputation in your area (there are about 500 districts). However, any candidate that scores more than 12.5% of the electors (ie voters + abstentionists) can choose to stay for the runoff. Before the Front National (fascists) became strong that was mostly unheard of. But in the past two elections, there were many cases of triangular runoffs, in which case the traditional parties usually find an agreement to stop the FN with one of them desisting in favour of the other. There were even (rare) cases of quadrangulars, in which case it's a real mess...
This year's election will probably see lots of triangulars. That may help the left wing win, but I can hardly find any joy in knowing that there may be fascists in many runoffs...
Re:Crook vs. racist
vsergu on 2002-04-24T02:44:00
I'm shooting pool tonight with a friend who's from New Orleans. I'll have to ask her if she has any interesting insights.
Well, she did say that the followup bumper sticker, after Edwards was elected, was "Impeach the crook, it's important".
Re:Crook vs. racist
darobin on 2002-04-24T03:03:10
Ah, yes, impeachment. We tried, but it's not so easy. The fact is that while Jospin was running the country as Prime Minister, Chirac was still there as President. At some point he was called to court (as a witness in an affair we all know he was directing whlie mayor of Paris) and refused to go.
The problem bounced back and forth as a hot potatoe as people from various legal instances tried to see what they could do (no party wanted to look like the ones that downed Chirac too close to the elections, as they know it would have been perceived as an electoralist move, though some did try to move in that direction). Mostly the Consitutional Council [a bit like the US Supreme Court, but only for constitutional matters] said they thought that the constitution didn't plan or allow for that, but sent the ball to the regular legal system. Eventually it reached the Cassation Court [the last court you can go to after a series of appeals, and the only one the judgements of which become jurisprudential] which concluded that only the Parliament -- ie those that didn't want to look as if they were planning elections instead of governing -- could take action to force the President into court.
In other words, they f**cked up. Of course, it might have been different if we had a better press that kept insisting on such points instead of eventually letting go, and if people were a bit less relaxed towards corruption (a trait apparently common in the so-called "Latin" countries).
Anyway, if Chirac loses he'll be in trouble, but it's looking increasingly unlikely as all political parties, syndicates, associations, etc. have now called to vote for him (except the two fascist parties of course). Perhaps we'll be a little less stupid this time if we get Parliament. Either way the French constitution probably needs a good rewrite. Hey, we're French after all, rewriting our constitution is something we have to do once in a while
;) Re:Crook vs. racist
pdcawley on 2002-04-24T07:26:54
Hmm... maybe there is something to be said for a monarchy after all.Re:Crook vs. racist
darobin on 2002-04-24T15:35:15
Well, it's not as if there's that much difference between a PM ruling with a useless President and a PM ruling with a useless Queen
;) But don't say that too loud, some people might start reaching for their guillotines...
