So let's celebrate!
HISTORIC VICTORY FOR FRENCH CONSERVATIVES!!!
53% for Sarkozy gives strong mandate to French Conservatives!
It's time to pop the cork on some French champagne, dust off your holiday photos from Paris and sing La Marseillaise. (turn on your speakers, or click here to get the U.S. Navy Band's version)
Polling saw massive turnout all across France and it's territories around the globe. And yet it was one of the nastiest elections with blatant fearmongering and threats of violence the preferred campaign tool of the defeated socialists.
Interestingly, women, including some liberal feminists, also rejected Royal the first female candidate for President of France.
Sarkozy promises to be a President to restore France and save it from the economic, moral and political decline that is clearly the legacy of his predecessors. He also promises to be a better ally to the United States and the issue of our transatlantic partnership became a key factor in the campaign.
The Socialist Segolene Royal, seizing on President Bush's unpopularity in France, accused her rival in Sunday's presidential runoff of "mimicking" the American leader by feigning concern for people who are suffering.
In an interview with the daily Le Parisien published Friday, Royal said Sarkozy has "the same neo-conservative ideology" as Bush.
In France, Running Against BushWell now, how did that work out for the Socialists? Since they attempted to make the election a referendum on President Bush, he also scored a victory in this election!
by John Nichols
The Nation (Yahoo News)
May 4, 2007
...But the conservative has distanced himself from retiring President Jacques Chirac's policy of distancing the French from the Bush administration. Sarkozy, who served with Chirac and has the outgoing president's endorsement, says he shares the current president's opposition to the war in Iraq. But he also talks about wanting to "rebuild the transatlantic relationship" with the U.S., and protests that "profound, sincere and unfailing" French relations with the U.S. do not amount to submission.
Royal is not so sure.
Referring to a trip to Washington on which Sarkozy met with Bush and requested that they be photographed together, she says, "I shall not be the one to shake George Bush's hand like nothing happened [in the sometimes bitter pre-war debate over Iraq], without a word on our tactical and strategic disagreements in fighting religious extremism and terrorism.
Specifically, Royal says, "I am not for a Europe that allies with the U.S. I have never been, and will never. apologize to President Bush for the position of France on the issue of refusing to send troops to Iraq."
Sarkozy denies making any apologies. He says that, under his leadership, France would be an independent player that would not be afraid to tell U.S. presidents when they are wrong.
But that has not stopped Royal's backers from trying to chip away at Sarkozy's popular appeal -- most of which appears to be rooted in the appeal of his tough approach to domestic issues such as crime and immigration -- by referring to him as "an American neo-conservative with a French passport." and producing a 9O-page review of Sarkozy's links with U.S. right wingers that refers to the conservative candidate as a "French unit of Bush & Company."
Linking Sarkozy to Bush is smart politics for Royal and her backers, According to a recent poll for the Paris newspaper Le Monde, the American president has a six percent approval rating in France.
Royal said a victory by the tough-talking Nicolas Sarkozy would lead to more violence in France's troubled suburbs. She will use a critical television debate with her opponent tomorrow to contrast her “France at peace with itself”
The demonisation of Sarkozy
The U.K. Times
May 1, 2007
...Pro-Royal campaigners have called him a “French Berlusconi”, a new Bonaparte and a “French George W. Bush”.His doctrines of radical economic reform and individual responsibility — never before aired by a senior French politician — have been welcomed by many as a revolution, but cast by opponents as divisive, cruel and unFrench.
“His is the kind of madness that has stoked a fair number of apprentice dictators in the past,”
“To vote against Nicolas Sarkozy is to avoid the danger of a France at war with itself, in conflict and in crisis, divided and torn apart,”
Sarkozy asks: “Why so much hate? Maybe it is because I say out loud what everyone thinks to themselves.”
Earlier, Royal shrugged off her low numbers, noting that some voters were still undecided. "I am fighting to the finish to convince the French. We must ... make the French understand the choice before them."
The French have made their choice. It was a resounding rejection of the failures that have seen France crippling herself over the past few decades. But the implication that a Conservative victory would lead to violence is most troubling. We've all seen the violence in France's suburbs these past years which went mostly unchecked by previous governments. Is Royal's message to her supporters a call to use violence when they cannot win at the ballot box?
Conservative Pro-American Tide Continuing to Sweep Western Governments
Sarkozy's election is just the latest trend from the last few years which have seen increasingly pro-American conservatives elected to governments in Australia, Germany, Canada and Japan. All of the above have stressed the importance of a strong relationship with the United States.
And we're constantly told how we've alienated our allies? I feel sorry for John "Francois" Kerry today. The French election result is as much a repudiation of the Democrat's sour brand of international politics as it is a positive affirmation of President Bush.
SARKOZY'S VICTORY MESSAGE TO AMERICA: 'YOU CAN COUNT ON FRANCE AS A FRIEND'...
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