see, this demonstrates that "socialist" voters can be relied on to vote for the center-right in sufficient numbers, as expected - although one should also point out that plenty of them seemed to prefer the national front to the republicans. fascism doesn't fit well in our traditional spectrum; it leans left on a fair number of economic issues. that's where they're getting a lot of the increased support from in the first place. it's not beyond the pale to suggest that the national front is threatening to displace the socialists on the LEFT of the french spectrum.
what remains untested is whether or not republicans will vote for socialists to defeat the national front. this strikes me as a more difficult proposition.
i think we can safely conclude that the republicans can defeat the national front in a run-off. but, if the run-off is between the socialists and the national front? i'm not sure that ends well.
we've seen the collapse of the soft left all over the world in the last couple of years. the socialists are really in an existential crisis, here. by meandering in the center, they've allowed the far right to take over key leftist constituencies.
i think that to fix this is more than cosmetic. it may take more than a generation. it may require dissolving the party. and, frankly, hollande may want to think about stepping down asap, and even about the party not running in the upcoming election at all.
here's the reality: there's a lot of useful idiots running off their mouths about this or that.
but, the fn is very closely aligned with the kremlin. that's the actual truth. that's the actual political reality.
whatever happens with anything else, having france pull out of nato (and that is the one promise you can expect them to keep) would break the global order into pieces.
it would be the biggest russian victory since stalingrad, and the most profound political event since the fall of the berlin wall.
www.theguardian.com/world/2015/dec/13/front-national-held-back-in-france-but-its-trajectory-is-on-the-up#comments