Le Pen shocks France as far right hits historic heights

Discussion in 'Western Europe' started by DonGlock26, Apr 23, 2012.

  1. DonGlock26

    DonGlock26 New Member Past Donor

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    Le Pen shocks France as far right hits historic heights


    Far-right National Front candidate Marine Le Pen obtained a surprising 18% of the vote in the first-round of France’s presidential election Sunday night. But who will those votes go to in the second round?
    By Sarah LEDUC (text)

    Having secured nearly one in five votes cast in the first round of France’s presidential election on Sunday, far right National Front candidate Marine Le Pen has the potential to swing what is likely to be a close second round on May 6.

    But for the moment, Marine Le Pen is not asking her supporters to choose between incumbent centre-right President Nicolas Sarkozy or Socialist challenger François Hollande. Instead, she is basking in the glory of her surprisingly strong showing – more than 18% of the vote – and touting her party’s central message: that the two main parties interchangeably represent the “elite”, while she is the one true alternative to the status-quo in French politics.

    “Tonight is historic,” Le Pen gushed to her supporters gathered in the 15th district of Paris on Sunday. “We are the only opposition to the ultra-liberal, libertarian left-wing.”

    Smiling and putting her hand to her heart, the National Front leader led the room in singing the French national anthem. A little girl, carried away by the festive atmosphere on election day, ran through the crowds carrying a tricoloured flag.


    Across the room, Jean-Marie Le Pen, the aging former leader of the party (and father of Marine) looked on with pride. “This is the start of a long road to a future victory,” he told a group of journalists. “Marine is the only one offering a path of change.”

    Marine, the face of the new far right

    More than 500 supporters came out to celebrate Le Pen’s strong first-round showing on Sunday night. Couples, families, and groups of friends brandishing “Marine for President” banners and decked out in “I Love Marine” pins and red-white-and-blue outfits and makeup, sipped white wine.

    The mood was one of pride and accomplishment. “Marine defends the values and traditions of France. That’s why I voted for her,” said 22-year-old Jérémie. “I handed out pamphlets, I did everything I could, and it paid off.”

    A more seasoned National Front loyalist, 42-year-old Jean-Christophe, explained his reasons for supporting the candidate. “I’m against legalising immigrants without papers, no exceptions….We’re not able to welcome them properly, so we should offer them aid in their own countries,” he said.

    Others were eager to point Marine Le Pen as a symbol of an evolving, more inclusive far-right party. Whereas her father, who acted as party president from 1972 to 2011, was known for inflammatory racist and anti-Semitic statements, Marine ran a campaign tightly focused on economic protectionism and an exit from the Eurozone.

    “People need to stop calling us fascists, Nazis, and racists – it’s ridiculous,” exclaimed Carl, aged 46, from Corsica. “I like everyone, no matter what the colour of their skin is!”

    A 'turning point' in French politics?

    According to her supporters, Le Pen’s historically strong performance Sunday night catapults her to the centre of the French political scene, making her a force that cannot be ignored by Sarkozy, Hollande, and their respective parties.

    “It’s a major turning point in French politics,” said Marion Maréchal-Le Pen, Marine Le Pen’s niece. “The candidates in the second round will be obligated to consider our policy proposals and solutions.”

    Le Pen is expected to clarify her position on the second-round face-off on May 1, just days before the final vote on May 6. National Front Vice-President Louis Alliot suggested on Monday that Le Pen would not formally endorse either candidate "as things stand".

    But some National Front voters may feel they have no other option. Antoine, a 46-year-old Corsican, said that his priority was to prevent the left from taking over the presidency and therefore guaranteeing France “a future like that of Greece”. He, as well as the four friends who accompanied him Sunday night, will therefore vote – grudgingly – for Sarkozy.

    Others will stay home. “Sarko and Hollande are the same,” one Le Pen supporter told France24.com. “They’re both defenders of executives and big bosses, not the working class – unlike Marine. I’ll stay in bed for the second round.”

    According to a poll published by Ipsos, a French market research company, 18% of National Front voters will vote for Hollande in the second round, while 60% will opt for Sarkozy.

    22%, however, have not yet decided.


    http://www.france24.com/en/20120423...nt-nicolas-sarkozy-francois-hollande-election


    I think more and more Europeans are deciding to vote to remain European rather than become Eurabia. They are also rejecting the failed ideology of socialism.



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  2. Anders Hoveland

    Anders Hoveland Banned

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    I think the votes the National Front has been receiving says more about peoples concern over immigration levels, growing crime problems (from the children of these migrants), resentment towards the EU, and frustration with UMP conservative party, than it does about their actual ideological beliefs.
     
  3. frodly

    frodly Well-Known Member

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    It seems that some Europeans(the stupid ones) forgot the lessons of what happens when you vote for racist scum who espouse the virtues of the "nation."
     
  4. alexa

    alexa Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    She targeted the poor and I am sure will have told them the source of their problems was as you write above. I hear she also softened the party, for the time being. How are they doing on their pro Israeli stance. When they get that right they will be well received by the anti Islam extremist network

    source: The Cold War on British Muslims http://www.middleeastmonitor.org.uk/downloads/documents/the-cold-war-on-british-muslims.pdf

    Hope you have embraced her to your bosom. How long till Europe reaches 1930 levels of fascism - not long I think. Let's hope France keeps it together and that Hollande proves himself or I do worry for the direction France will be cajoled into.


    and why pray tell me, do all you anti-islam extremists need to be collectively pro Israel?
     
  5. DonGlock26

    DonGlock26 New Member Past Donor

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    Why do progressives need to mask their failures by accusing their opponents of being totalitarian socialists from the mid 20th century?



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  6. alexa

    alexa Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    No answer to a genuine question then. It is true that the anti-islam network is also extremely pro Israel. It doesn't even matter if people are anti semetic as many are, as long as they are pro Israel. You can see from the quote I gave above that this network described how it would be good to get Le Pen involved but it was necessary for the organisation to be pro Israel.

    I repeat a justified question. Why do all you anti islam extremists have to be pro israel extremists as well. Breivik included. ... and I am presuming you are one from your attempt to defend yourself with nothing. What is the connection?
     
  7. frodly

    frodly Well-Known Member

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    Who did any such thing? She has little in common with Stalin, but she does have a decent amount in common with totalitarian nationalists from the early to mid 20th century!! We found out how that worked out last time. Not well.
     
  8. ryanm34

    ryanm34 New Member

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    Disenchantment with the UMP and the failure of Sarkozy to deal effectively with the countries economic problems seem more to blame than xenophobia.

    I don't like le Pen or the National Front but she has gone a great deal to soften the image of the party with french voters and young people moving away in public perception from the outright racisim of her father to a broader question of immigration and the EU.
     
  9. frodly

    frodly Well-Known Member

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    So veiled racism instead of blatant racism? Is that better?
     
  10. ryanm34

    ryanm34 New Member

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    No matter how often you repeat "nazi's were socialists" it will not make it true.
     
  11. ryanm34

    ryanm34 New Member

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    I don't approve of racism full stop but veiled racism seems to be better electoral politics and that was the point I was trying to make.

    Fears of 'Eurabia' are not driving this, economic problems and simplistic promises that halting immigration will return france to her former glory are .And le pen is exploiting the economic fears of the french people to further herself and the party but to do that she has had to soften the tone and broaden the issue because french people aren't really all that gone on fascism and its minions.

    And again if the UMP and Sarko were doing a better job you would not see the disenchantment of party supporters and the drift to the NF.
     
  12. Xanadu

    Xanadu New Member

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    All people world wide are walking in the same trap called politics. Politics, over a century going on, and caused all problems there are today, people keep believing that politics solve their problems, but it all will only become worse.
    They all haven't learned from what happened in Germany (also because the details were never told, how Germany was taken over) Exactly the same is going on.
    The French voted in large numbers last sunday, they believe politics will solve the problems there are today, but it was politics (imperialistic based ideology from top of power) that caused all the problems over de last decades.
     
  13. clarisse150

    clarisse150 Member

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    In my opinion, Marine Lepen can't be president... The bigest majority of the French people hate her very much, people thought she's racist, extremist and dangerous; and, the people who want her for Président never said it, 'cause that's a big shame to be with the National Front...
     
  14. Viv

    Viv Banned by Request

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    She hasn't a prayer.
     
  15. Colonel K

    Colonel K Well-Known Member

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    It's an article of faith with the American extreme right. It's isn't true, but they must believe it or acknowledge their racist nationalist corporatist brethren.
     
    ryanm34 and (deleted member) like this.
  16. clarisse150

    clarisse150 Member

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    And, now, she's got only 18% in the elections... And she's the must hated politician of France...
     
  17. MisLed

    MisLed New Member

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    Nazis are leftists but you don't get to fascism until you go thru socialism.

    But what i wanted to say was WHY do they call the national front extreme right. They WERE extreme left and are evolving to something more palatable it seems. At least it would mean the survival of the french in the face of this muslim threat.
     
  18. clarisse150

    clarisse150 Member

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    They haven't choice to be called "extreme right"... They say they aren't in the extreme right, they say they are a patriot party and don't want be a party of extreme right... That the analysts who call them "extreme right".
     
  19. Bleipriester

    Bleipriester Member

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    Yes, "Nazi" were no no socialists. They had some socialist things like workerholidays but they were capitalists.
     
  20. MisLed

    MisLed New Member

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    which analysts. AP? Our so-called analysts here? right and left mean different things in different places. It's better to look at their platform. I've found that the predominant media label many things that are left as right wing in order to influence american who know no better.
     
  21. ryanm34

    ryanm34 New Member

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    Fascism is categorised by political theory as being right wing that is not indispute.

    Nazis are most often categorised as right wing though a few have argued that they are better categorised as being radical centrists No one seriously contends they were left wing or socialists. Although the catch cry has become popularised by the american right in an effort to distance themselves from it

    The Nazi party while originating as a socialist party were moved to the right and fascism under the leadership of Hitler who was a greater admirer of Mussolini's fascist Italy. The socialist wing was gradually marginalised and eventually purged. They were not socialist when they ruled they were authoritarian and right wing. Not left wing or socialist.

    The NF are characterised as right wing in France. And no right and left don't change depending on the location of the party.

    Feel free to provide a french source claiming the opposite or continue to deny reality.
     
  22. clarisse150

    clarisse150 Member

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    All the analysts of the French politics say that!... And, every the other politicians call Marine Lepen's party "extreme right"...
     
  23. MisLed

    MisLed New Member

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    you just did.
     
  24. ryanm34

    ryanm34 New Member

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    Where? Identify which part of what I wrote was untrue.
     
  25. Munqi

    Munqi New Member

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    national socialists.

    = socialists that were nationalists instead of internationalists. Thats the only difference between nazis and socialists.

    So when you're out there protesting on the street demanding that rich people need to lose their rights. Just remember that that is the core philosophy and ecomonic policy of adolf hitler.
     

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