French presidential election, 2022

[Leading Political Consultant Ma Anand Sheela]

Taubira announces her consideration for a possible candidacy.

Infamous for essentially being one of the reasons Jospin didn't make it in 2002.

But also has a weird cult following in the Left for her stint in government during the Hollande years because she manages to enrage the far right due to her passing the gay marriage act and also just generally swiping off any criticisms from the Right in a dignified manner, and resigning when she disagreed with the stripping of nationality of certain criminals.

I imagine this will send the right wing media into a new overdrive. It could even be a way to trick them into going into the vortex that is the gay marriage debate (Pécresse once said she'd demarry gays, but yeah religious extremists will be religious extremists -  they hide among us and smile politely but come Sunday are openly conspiring to fulfill authoritarian fantasies while their pastor screws their wife.)

I also have no idea what Taubira thinks about any economic issues, which seems... less than ideal.

[Leading Political Consultant Ma Anand Sheela]

Mélenchon himself used this opportunity to start the year with some rambling against ‘the European Marian flag’ (he is obsessed with that; note that Léaument has claimed that the EU flag should be removed because it is a symbol of religious origin and, as such, an infringement on laïcité)

WTF

These people are not exactly entirely sane.

You have to be a little insane to want to be President of France, but these days...

[Leading Political Consultant Ma Anand Sheela]

Zemmour also made several days ago comments on disabled children you can, at best, called clumsy, in which he denounced the 'obsession for inclusion' of disabled children and said they should attended specialized institutions, except the 'slightly disabled' ones. Such declarations have been heavily criticized by disabled rights organizations and the whole of the political class and forced Zemmour to partly backtrack.

De Gaulle would be proud. Not.

[Leading Political Consultant Ma Anand Sheela]

Zemmour also made several days ago comments on disabled children you can, at best, called clumsy, in which he denounced the 'obsession for inclusion' of disabled children and said they should attended specialized institutions, except the 'slightly disabled' ones. Such declarations have been heavily criticized by disabled rights organizations and the whole of the political class and forced Zemmour to partly backtrack.

De Gaulle would be proud. Not.

TBH that sounds a lot like a thing De Gaulle would support.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anne_de_Gaulle

[Leading Political Consultant Ma Anand Sheela]

It was about this time that Mélenchon started to surge 5 years ago - but the difference was that there was a big base of support for a basically quite similar candidate like Hamon to tap in to. This time not so much as most of the other lefty voters won't naturally pick him second and little incentive for any of the other left candidates to drop out because the internal left battles are more important than the overall picture.

IIRC it was the debates that triggered it then?

[Leading Political Consultant Ma Anand Sheela]

Don't @ me but I've decided to stop paying attention to this campaign until April because the contours of the result seem depressingly obvious already. Just going to write this down now so I can see if I was right or not:

- Pécresse will end up in single digits or close to it because she's a terrible candidate and French right-wing/reactionary voters are obviously in much more of a Zemmour mood anyway.
- Le Pen will flop because none of the relevant candidates or the media seem at all interested in talking about anything that would get a working-class and/or under-50 voter to pay attention and that's who she needs to turn out for her. Also see Pécresse.
- The left, who care
- Therefore Macron/Zemmour run-off, Macron wins by a landslide but probably on a pathetic turnout.

[Leading Political Consultant Ma Anand Sheela]

Don't @ me but I've decided to stop paying attention to this campaign until April because the contours of the result seem depressingly obvious already. Just going to write this down now so I can see if I was right or not:

- Pécresse will end up in single digits or close to it because she's a terrible candidate and French right-wing/reactionary voters are obviously in much more of a Zemmour mood anyway.
- Le Pen will flop because none of the relevant candidates or the media seem at all interested in talking about anything that would get a working-class and/or under-50 voter to pay attention and that's who she needs to turn out for her. Also see Pécresse.
- The left, who care
- Therefore Macron/Zemmour run-off, Macron wins by a landslide but probably on a pathetic turnout.

Still some time to go, but  I see it's looking like I may end up being wrong about a lot of this.

[Leading Political Consultant Ma Anand Sheela]

Mélenchon is polling badly because, well, there aren't that many left wing voters in France any more; and that non-left wing voters (and a lot of left wing voters too), also not exactly without reason, have some pretty major issues with him. With that in mind, his second round polling has improved quite a bit in recent weeks, from about 33-67 to more like 40-60, because he is (as was predicted) running an overall strong campaign because he is actually a pretty good campaigner.

Death, taxes, and Jean-Luc Mélenchon having a mid-campaign surge.

[Leading Political Consultant Ma Anand Sheela]

Let's keep in mind that in still (IMHO) unlikely event that Lepen were to win the run-off, its very questionable whether she would get the usual win for her party in the legislative elections. In fact we could have a situation where she could be president and her party might still have very little representation in the assembly meaning there would have to be "co-habitation" with a PM and government entirely made up of people from other parties...

People mooted this possibility in 2017 too because LREM was made up of complete nobodies, and they ended up sweeping aside all comers without breaking a sweat. To restate the basics: if Le Pen wins the run-off, she will have won the support of 50%+ of French voters. It's of course possible that a lot of these people could develop buyer's remorse by the time the legislatives come along, but if she wins then by definition the reasons why this could happen are less relevant than ever. We can of course imagine a scenario where her opponents mobilise in response, except that's in fact the exact opposite of what's happened in every French legislative election ever. The only reason to expect it to happen is (understandable) wishful thinking.

[Leading Political Consultant Ma Anand Sheela]

Let's keep in mind that in still (IMHO) unlikely event that Lepen were to win the run-off, its very questionable whether she would get the usual win for her party in the legislative elections. In fact we could have a situation where she could be president and her party might still have very little representation in the assembly meaning there would have to be "co-habitation" with a PM and government entirely made up of people from other parties...

People mooted this possibility in 2017 too because LREM was made up of complete nobodies, and they ended up sweeping aside all comers without breaking a sweat. To restate the basics: if Le Pen wins the run-off, she will have won the support of 50%+ of French second round voters.

ftfy

Its still entirely possible people stay home for Le Pen vs Macron (because Meluche told them it was the same thing) but play an impact in the legislatives. Also, the legislatives have second rounds and the choices may not be as "toxic" to voters in the second round. We have seen than RN often get blocked in legislatives and regional elections because entire candidacies are pulled out. No such dynamics exist in Presidential election.

All of which matters less than ever if we really are past the point of no return and Le Pen has won an election. Anything can happen but we shouldn't assume that her not having at least a substantial minority in the Assembly is the most likely scenario.

[Leading Political Consultant Ma Anand Sheela]

I think JLM is a pretty vile human being even by the shockingly low standards of what's passed for the French left for much of the last century, but I have no sympathy for any Roussel supporters now finding themselves blamed for him missing the runoff. You inexplicably voted for a meme candidate, own it!

[Leading Political Consultant Ma Anand Sheela]

The polling missing Mélenchon is a good sign that a lot of his voters absolutely hated that they felt they had to do that and were looking for reasons not to until the last minute. Same with the extra last minute trickles from Pécresse to Macron and Zemmour to Le Pen

[Leading Political Consultant Ma Anand Sheela]

Is there anway LR and the Socialists survive as is after getting 6% of the voteshare combined?

They still have support at the regional, departmental and municipal level: this could either be a delayed reaction and local machines will gradually be eroded away or a decoupling of the national and local scenes.

You could see a lot of those machines become purely localist/parochialist, or throw their lot in with whatever Philippe will presumably turn LREM into on a transactional basis.

[Leading Political Consultant Ma Anand Sheela]

Can Someone explain to me, Zemmmour doing very strongly in Paris XVI, Nevily Sur Seine etc (upwards of 16%!!!!)? The closest resemblance to these electorates seems like Wentworth or North Sydney. These electorates, no matter how anti-labor they are, would never vote for a far-right candidate. Similarly Kensington and Chelsea had very low UKIP vote shares.

Many wealthy French people strongly agree with what he has to say.

[Leading Political Consultant Ma Anand Sheela]

On the topic of the first arrondissement and prisoners' votes, BFM TV calculated them:

Mélenchon 45.78%
Le Pen 20.28%
Macron 18.63%
Zemmour 3.82%
Pécresse 2.61%
Lassalle 2.03%
Poutou 1.69%
Jadot 1.62%
Roussel 1.06%
Hidalgo 1.06%
Arthaud 0.87%
NDA 0.56%

Unsure about turnout or how many votes were cast, the article cites 13,672 detainees who chose to vote by mail before the election. You could calculate them by adding up the actual 1st arrdt. precincts and figuring the difference with the official results for the arrdt. reported by the Ministry.

https://www.bfmtv.com/politique/elections/presidentielle/resultats-presidentielle-pour-leur-1er-vote-par-correspondance-les-detenus-plebiscitent-melenchon_AN-202204110613.html

Nice of the Ministry to make it easy to work out the exact number of people currently in jail for tax evasion.

[Leading Political Consultant Ma Anand Sheela]

An interesting observation someone made elsewhere yesterday was that there's something of Mitterrand to Melenchon and it works very well, doesn't it? A charismatic figure thriving as the old parties of the Left flail about and collapse; an ego the size of Saturn and a cultish fanbase to match; a clear ability to know which buttons work to consolidate Left voters who don't even like them much... and a definite sense that amidst all that red there's a whiff, a distinct whiff, of something brown as well. It is particularly apt because, as a young man, Melenchon was quite the Mitterrand fanboy.

A likely fraudulent manifesto...

[Leading Political Consultant Ma Anand Sheela]

I suspect that one explanation of the strength of Zemmour's performance in affluent parts of Paris, which goes above and beyond what we would have expected, is that French Jews voted en masse for him. Will they vote for Le Pen against Macron? No, of course not, they are self-respecting people but they would vote for a disgusting fascist bigot who is one of their own - events have radicalized them...

Zemmour's performance in affluent parts of Paris (and other affluent parts of France) is exactly what you would expect just from the crudest possible stereotypes of affluent French people.

[Leading Political Consultant Ma Anand Sheela]

Wonder who voted in Syria and Afghanistan

Mercenaries.

Mercenaries for Zemmour... yeah, I can see it.

[Leading Political Consultant Ma Anand Sheela]

For my own personal amusement; The 1st Round results from Scotland - Edinburgh/Glasgow/Aberdeen


Macron 36.9% -         36.3/35.7/41.7
Melenchon 31.8% -    32.2/33.6/26.7
Jadot 12.8% -           13.2/14.3/8.0
Hidalgo 4.2% -            5.2/3.8/2.1
Zemmour 3.9% -         3.5/3.1/7.1
Le Pen 3.1% -             2.5/3.7/4.0
Pecresse 2.9% -          2.9/2.4/4.0
Dupont-Aignan 1.2% - 1.2/0.5/2.8
Poutou 1.1% -             1.0/1.2/0.9
Lasalle 0.9% -             1.0/0.8/0.9
Roussel 0.7% -            0.5/0.8/1.2
Arthaud 0.3%              0.4/0.1/0.6

I have some experience with the sort of French guys who end up in Aberdeen but still bother to cast votes from abroad. Can't say I'm too surprised Zemmour did better there than in Glasgow and Edinburgh.

[Leading Political Consultant Ma Anand Sheela]

Is it the 2022 debate or it's a rerun of the 2017 one?

It sounds like MLP has at least managed to avoid sounding like a drunk lady yelling at you on the night bus home this time.

[Leading Political Consultant Ma Anand Sheela]

Interesting polling data from Ifop about vote choice by media (print, radio, TV) consumption habits:

Nightly news:
snip

More proof that 24h news channels are a cancer on society and rots brains, and that I should watch Arte even more. TF1's right-wing lean is now split between Macron and the far-right.

Radio:
snip

Yeah, no surprise, I only listen to Radio France.

Newspapers and magazines:
snip

No surprise, far-right rag Valeurs Actuelles had 49% support for the far-right. As for the rest, well, it's clear confirmation that Mélenchon coalesced the left very well.

Various TV shows/channels:
snip

*pretends to be shocked* as regular CNEWS viewers lean to the far-right.

Tag yourselves, I'm the Valeurs Actuelles reader for Jadot

[Leading Political Consultant Ma Anand Sheela]

Dédiabolisation means Le Pen is now subject to the Poher '69 threshold, below which you don't even get to walk away with a shred of dignity.

[Leading Political Consultant Ma Anand Sheela]

Dédiabolisation means Le Pen is now subject to the Poher '69 threshold, below which you don't even get to walk away with a shred of dignity.

Oh no, too bad, so sad

[Leading Political Consultant Ma Anand Sheela]

Is the expectation that Macron's coalition wins the most seats in the National Assembly but loses its majority?

To who lol

[Leading Political Consultant Ma Anand Sheela]

LR and PS are in meltdown, which may leave dozens of seats on the table for LREM, and no one has ever managed to make the losers' revenge thing work in the legislatives on the scale needed to deprive Macron of a majority under these conditions. Le Pen's core demographic is also not famous for flocking to the polls at low-turnout elections. Can we at least try not to get distracted by fantasies and shiny one-off poll results? The odds are on LREM's side here.