French Elections Re-Run: 1969 (R1)

[Hash]

The 1974 runoff between Mitt'rand and Royer is also open.


I vote for Poher, an excellent acting President and possibly the best candidate to never become President. 

[Associate Justice PiT]

     Pompidou.

[big bad fab]

Pompidou, even if I don't like his cultural and education policies.

Rocard was too much on the left at that time.

[Хahar 🤔]

No PCF votes!

[big bad fab]

No PCF votes!

Duclos is a quite "heavy" communist... not as fun as Marchais or Lajoinie.

[Хahar 🤔]

No PCF votes!

Duclos is a quite "heavy" communist... not as fun as Marchais or Lajoinie.

Well, yes, but he did almost make the runoff.

[big bad fab]

No PCF votes!

Duclos is a quite "heavy" communist... not as fun as Marchais or Lajoinie.

Well, yes, but he did almost make the runoff.

The situation was a bit weird in France at that time. The socialists were in tatters. "68" translated in elections wasn't very clear. There was a will to keep on with an "homme providentiel", but he was retiring at that time...
1969 and 2002 will remain as oddities in French electoral history. But even if a surprise occurred each time,  the final results were "normal".
And Duclos would have been trounced by Pompidou, even more than Poher.

[Хahar 🤔]

No PCF votes!

Duclos is a quite "heavy" communist... not as fun as Marchais or Lajoinie.

Well, yes, but he did almost make the runoff.

The situation was a bit weird in France at that time. The socialists were in tatters. "68" translated in elections wasn't very clear. There was a will to keep on with an "homme providentiel", but he was retiring at that time...
1969 and 2002 will remain as oddities in French electoral history. But even if a surprise occurred each time,  the final results were "normal".
And Duclos would have been trounced by Pompidou, even more than Poher.

Why did the Communists continually endorse Pompidou?

[big bad fab]

No PCF votes!

Duclos is a quite "heavy" communist... not as fun as Marchais or Lajoinie.

Well, yes, but he did almost make the runoff.

The situation was a bit weird in France at that time. The socialists were in tatters. "68" translated in elections wasn't very clear. There was a will to keep on with an "homme providentiel", but he was retiring at that time...
1969 and 2002 will remain as oddities in French electoral history. But even if a surprise occurred each time,  the final results were "normal".
And Duclos would have been trounced by Pompidou, even more than Poher.

Why did the Communists continually endorse Pompidou?

The communist campaign about Poher-Pompidou was that they were "blanc bonnet et bonnet blanc"... i.e. exactly the same.

[Хahar 🤔]

No PCF votes!

Duclos is a quite "heavy" communist... not as fun as Marchais or Lajoinie.

Well, yes, but he did almost make the runoff.

The situation was a bit weird in France at that time. The socialists were in tatters. "68" translated in elections wasn't very clear. There was a will to keep on with an "homme providentiel", but he was retiring at that time...
1969 and 2002 will remain as oddities in French electoral history. But even if a surprise occurred each time,  the final results were "normal".
And Duclos would have been trounced by Pompidou, even more than Poher.

Why did the Communists continually endorse Pompidou?

The communist campaign about Poher-Pompidou was that they were "blanc bonnet et bonnet blanc"... i.e. exactly the same.

Not Pompidou, Mitterand. I don't know how I got them confused in my mind.

To me, that appears to be a great factor in the Communist decline.

[big bad fab]

No PCF votes!

Duclos is a quite "heavy" communist... not as fun as Marchais or Lajoinie.

Well, yes, but he did almost make the runoff.

The situation was a bit weird in France at that time. The socialists were in tatters. "68" translated in elections wasn't very clear. There was a will to keep on with an "homme providentiel", but he was retiring at that time...
1969 and 2002 will remain as oddities in French electoral history. But even if a surprise occurred each time,  the final results were "normal".
And Duclos would have been trounced by Pompidou, even more than Poher.

Why did the Communists continually endorse Pompidou?

The communist campaign about Poher-Pompidou was that they were "blanc bonnet et bonnet blanc"... i.e. exactly the same.

Not Pompidou, Mitterand. I don't know how I got them confused in my mind.

To me, that appears to be a great factor in the Communist decline.

They didn't see that Mitterrand was slowly crushing them.

And they couldn't do anything else than endorsing Mitterrand: it was the 1970s and 1980s, not the 1930s when communists could attack the "social-traîtres".

Besides, from 1988 until 2007, in each presidential election, its bad result hasn't made the PCF able to influence really the run-off.

And remember that in 1981, in some communist local organizations, some apparatchiks openly give orders to vote Giscard: there are evidence of this. So, the official endorsement isn't very important...
(and some RPR members voted for Mitterrand: even Pasqua has acknowledged it).

[Хahar 🤔]

No PCF votes!

Duclos is a quite "heavy" communist... not as fun as Marchais or Lajoinie.

Well, yes, but he did almost make the runoff.

The situation was a bit weird in France at that time. The socialists were in tatters. "68" translated in elections wasn't very clear. There was a will to keep on with an "homme providentiel", but he was retiring at that time...
1969 and 2002 will remain as oddities in French electoral history. But even if a surprise occurred each time,  the final results were "normal".
And Duclos would have been trounced by Pompidou, even more than Poher.

Why did the Communists continually endorse Pompidou?

The communist campaign about Poher-Pompidou was that they were "blanc bonnet et bonnet blanc"... i.e. exactly the same.

Not Pompidou, Mitterand. I don't know how I got them confused in my mind.

To me, that appears to be a great factor in the Communist decline.

They didn't see that Mitterrand was slowly crushing them.

And they couldn't do anything else than endorsing Mitterrand: it was the 1970s and 1980s, not the 1930s when communists could attack the "social-traîtres".

Besides, from 1988 until 2007, in each presidential election, its bad result hasn't made the PCF able to influence really the run-off.

And remember that in 1981, in some communist local organizations, some apparatchiks openly give orders to vote Giscard: there are evidence of this. So, the official endorsement isn't very important...
(and some RPR members voted for Mitterrand: even Pasqua has acknowledged it).

But what if they had run their own candidate in 1965? At that time, there was still support in the West and among the working class for the Soviet Union. If they hadn't endorsed Mitterand at the time, could they have kept their support, like the Italian Communists did?

[big bad fab]

No PCF votes!

Duclos is a quite "heavy" communist... not as fun as Marchais or Lajoinie.

Well, yes, but he did almost make the runoff.

The situation was a bit weird in France at that time. The socialists were in tatters. "68" translated in elections wasn't very clear. There was a will to keep on with an "homme providentiel", but he was retiring at that time...
1969 and 2002 will remain as oddities in French electoral history. But even if a surprise occurred each time,  the final results were "normal".
And Duclos would have been trounced by Pompidou, even more than Poher.

Why did the Communists continually endorse Pompidou?

The communist campaign about Poher-Pompidou was that they were "blanc bonnet et bonnet blanc"... i.e. exactly the same.

Not Pompidou, Mitterand. I don't know how I got them confused in my mind.

To me, that appears to be a great factor in the Communist decline.

They didn't see that Mitterrand was slowly crushing them.

And they couldn't do anything else than endorsing Mitterrand: it was the 1970s and 1980s, not the 1930s when communists could attack the "social-traîtres".

Besides, from 1988 until 2007, in each presidential election, its bad result hasn't made the PCF able to influence really the run-off.

And remember that in 1981, in some communist local organizations, some apparatchiks openly give orders to vote Giscard: there are evidence of this. So, the official endorsement isn't very important...
(and some RPR members voted for Mitterrand: even Pasqua has acknowledged it).

But what if they had run their own candidate in 1965? At that time, there was still support in the West and among the working class for the Soviet Union. If they hadn't endorsed Mitterand at the time, could they have kept their support, like the Italian Communists did?

Interesting, indeed.

The communist candidate would have done well in 1965 and may have made it to the run-off (even if it's not sure: this was the first televised campaign, Lecanuet did well and Mitterrand wasn't worse than de Gaulle).

But the PCF wouldn't have known, after 1965, how to take benefit from being his majesty's opposition. They were too much a "parti protestataire" (see Le Pen after 2002: he wasn't able to do anything with his "victory").

And, after 1965, even if Mitterrand was personally taken out of the political hell, the socialist left wasn't in better shape than before 1965.
In 1968, Mitterrand, Mendès-France, Mollet, Savary, Rocard were bad at controlling events.

Historians now see Mitterrand's bid and result in 1965 as a masterpiece but, at the time, it wasn't really a strategic step with all the 20 next years already planned in Mitterrand's mind.

Mitterrand just dropped on an opportunity to erase all his previous mistakes (the so-called "attentat de l'Observatoire") and all his Fourth Republic past (an opportunistic political stand and his Algerian policy "vive l'Algérie française").

In retrospect, the big event was the "programme commun" and the "candidature unique de la gauche" in 1974 (Mitterrand... with a big, big score in the first round and almost a victory in the second round).

[Hash]

Mitterrand just dropped on an opportunity to erase all his previous mistakes (the so-called "attentat de l'Observatoire") and all his Fourth Republic past (an opportunistic political stand and his Algerian policy "vive l'Algérie française").

The Observatoire bombing was great. Typical Mitterrand. Best example of being a total attention-whore.

[big bad fab]

Mitterrand just dropped on an opportunity to erase all his previous mistakes (the so-called "attentat de l'Observatoire") and all his Fourth Republic past (an opportunistic political stand and his Algerian policy "vive l'Algérie française").

The Observatoire bombing was great. Typical Mitterrand. Best example of being a total attention-whore.

Nowadays, contrary to what I learnt "at school" (!), historians tend to think that it wasn't Mitterrand who organized everything and that there was a real (even if dumb) attempt to kill or hurt him.
But at least, Mitterrand was a master at making an opportunistic use of this event to come back to the frontpage !

[Hash]

historians tend to think that it wasn't Mitterrand who organized everything and that there was a real (even if dumb) attempt to kill or hurt him.

lol