France - General discussion
 

I'm mainly starting this thread because of the French presidential election but it's a general political thread.

So the circus of the presidential election is really kicking off tonight with the first debate between the 3 socialist candidates to candidacy.

What are their differences? Well…

Ségolène Royal is a national socialist, a left-wing conservative, she supports traditional and familly values, she's tough on crime, etc.

Dominique Strauss-Kahn is a liberal socialist, he supports an open market economy and a liberal society.

Laurent Fabius is a radical socialist, he's on the very left of the party, he's anti-liberal and shares many ideas with the communist party.

One of those 3 will become the official socialist candidate after a vote held on 16 November.

and he's stupid loool *sorry, I just don't like him*

may be I'm little bit feminist, but I'd like Ségolène to be the socialist candidate
I wanna see a debate between her and Nicolas Sarkozy, cuz' they both have good ideas (and bad ones :p ) and it'd be interesting to see how they manage to defend their opinions
but we will see what happen on the 16th (my sister's birthday yay lol)

Haku this thread is a great idea
I hope I can answer whenever I want, sometimes I just don't find my words in english to express my opinion

It's no problem, i profoundly dislike Laurent Fabius as well, he's the main reason why the 'no' won in the referendum on the EU constitution, son of a bitch, LOL.

I've always liked Dominique Strauss-Kahn, i more or less agree with his socio-liberal views.

And i have to admit that i don't really like Ségolène Royal, her traditional values don't really agree with me. :p

From your description I'd say Dominique Strauss-Kahn is the lesser of two...or rather three evils. :p

I second that!! son of a b*tch!!

btw, Dominique Strauss-Kahn afraid me :eek: in a physical way lol

but, we have to wait and see who the socialist militants (hmmm same word in english?) will choose
I hope this time, there'll be no Front National and we can vote in a democratic way (reminds me bad memories from 2002!! I was so shocked!!)

Since i've presented the main socialist candidates, i thought i would present the main conservative candidate Nicolas Sarkozy.

Nicolas Sarkozy is hardly a "conservative" though since he proposes major changes for French society. Nicolas Sarkozy is a radical liberal, he has a very hard line on crime and immigration (his ideas are similar to Ségolène Royal's in that respect even though they are political opponents), he's rather pro-American and supports economic reforms based on the American model.

On a side note, Nicolas Sarkozy (full name Nicolas Paul Stéphane Sarközy de Nagy-Bocsa) is the son of a Hungarian aristocrat who fled Hungary in 1944 when the Russian army invaded the country and installed a communist regime. So Nicolas Sarkozy doesn't really like communists and soviets. :p

So according to the press none of the socialist candidates took a real advantage in yesterday evening's debate, they all held their ground.

Ségolène Royal didn't crumble due to her inexperience, she was able to look like she knew what she was talking about, she still showed however that she had a rather superficial understanding of many topics. But she spoke simple and people like her for that.

Dominique Strauss-Kahn was definitely the most at ease, he displayed an impressive knowledge of social and economic matters and appeared reasonable in what can be done in those areas.

Laurent Fabius was his usual extreme-left self, his radical ideas were probably well received in the leftmost part of the population, but he must have scared the shit out of everyone else.

Article on Liberation.
Short summary on BBC.

I read on the free newspaper 20 minutes that the socialist debate was not interesting at all, there'll be another one in Clermont-Ferrand tonight

Plus, there was an article which deals with Jacques Chirac, it said that he may wanna "get in the race" for presidential elections :confused:
here's the link it's in french, if someone wants a translation I can do it later ... I have no time right now! lol
anyway, it says that he'll tell more about it in 2007 so let's wait and see

Yeah, Jacques Chirac has not said that he won't run again, he will announce his decision in early 2007. If he does run again, it will be as an independant since the UMP will nominate Nicolas Sarkozy.

*****
Another rogue UMP member, Nicolas Dupont-Aignan, has made it clear this week that he also will run as an independant against the official UMP candidate Nicolas Sarkozy. Nicolas Dupont-Aignan is just funny. :laugh:

*****
And since we're talking of less known candidates, i'll introduce the one i support:

Christian Chavrier from the Federalist Party.
Their program is "a federal France in a federal Europe" and i totally agree, an autonomous Normandy within a federal EU, that's what i want too. :yes:

"Ni à gauche, ni à droite ... Devant!" good slogan
I'll read that later

today I read that the debate of Clermont Ferrant was "the same", they defended their ideas and Laurent Fabius was the most appreciated (kind of normal, cuz' Clermont's mayor is pro Laurent Fabius)
there was a pic attached to the article, and I realised that Laurent Fabious looks like Mr. Burns in the Simpsons looool

anyway, I'm thinking Jacques Chirac is too old (may be sick) to run again
but it's only my opinion :p

Plus, there's another article about Arlette Laguiller but I'm so tired to read it now ;)

France is the mother of all crooked politicians ;)
I guess it goes with the terittory...

To deny that Armenians suffered genocide will be crime and you will be accused of being against that.Oh,thats what i call the freedom of speech!i wanna go to France and get arrested!And seeing that it is done to get the Armenian votes in the country,just makes me wanna puke.Please dont let us enter EU,the land of freedom,cause we dont respect the human rights(just the same as youre doing now) and freedom of speech that was supposed to be strictly defended by the French people!?

If you deny that Armenians suffered genocide in France, you won't be arrested. Don't worry.
Our jails are full...so if, at least, you don't transport 500 kg of drug in your car, you've few chances to go to jail.

By the way, congratulations for your Nobel Prize of litterature: Orhan Pamuk ;)
Have you already read him?

good luck! I'm doing my best to get arrested and it never works lol may be I'll try to drive with 500kg of cocaine in my truck ;)

as an exemple, few months ago in Lyon (my town hehe) there was a demonstration against the armenian memorial which is built on Antonin Poncet place. Most of demonstrators were turkish, and there was police to protect them, it was totally legal
there was also demos for the pro-armenian memorial
and it's ok, everybody has the right to have its own opinion and we have to respect that
About the armenian genocide, we will never agree so chill out :heh:

Last night, with my friends we had a little chat about presidential elections and we talked about François Bayrou
he's never on tv or I'm blind? I remember that he was seriously involved in european elections few years ago cuz' he wanted french people to vote
anyone has some news about him?

so what about the freedom of speech you were all defending crazily?you were shouting at me me that everyone has to say their opinion and when the other side does that,its only"yeah,we have to respect"?is it just a thing for us and you can do whatever you want when youre in the big EU?What the f*ck is that 500 kg drug in my truck?i dont know anything about it!

and an example from me,on the first day of Ramadan(of which month today is the last),some people in France attacked some mosque,and you do guess it,the attackers were French.Damage to the mosque was modest despite the fact four fires were set inside the Penhars Mosque, one of two Muslim places of worship in Quimper.Racist insults were scrawled on walls of the mosque there, according to the prefecture of the Aude region.

another example,this is a mosque attacked in France
is it still ok_?

fanoff, about the cocaine joke, it was humour ... may be I suck at kidding but, heh, I have a try
and I so don't get what you mean with your freedom of speech!!
the unforgiven = stupid
you don't want me to respect your opinion? I can curse but I don't want to

about the mosque attack, wtf?!
explain your point of view please cuz I really don't understand what you wanna show
you said that there's an expression of freedom? to attack mosque? it's just dumbness!!

It's not about you: it was just an example to explain to you that here, to g to jail you have to do a lot more to be sent to jail....but may be check the back of your car, who knows...;)*just kidding*

Did I forbid you to express your opinion?

Now you, you can say what you want but if your government deny the genocide of Armenians, this is another story..about the consequences in the relationships between states.

About your racism in France, just know that here in the schools we have special meals for kiddies when there is pork in the menues...they have special meat for them....
Monday or Tuesday , when it will be the end of the Ramadan, Muslim people have their free day (it's the law)...

You seem to think we have censorship against Muslims, I would say it's actually the opposite which stays: a theater or modern opera piece has to be played recently.
It was a modern piece so , in the story, it was showed Buddha, Jesus Christ and Mahomet with the cut head...okay ...it was a symbol...

There were such menaces towards the theater that the performance was canceled.

Now , in the new indications from the Ministry of National Education, it's Forbidden to study "Zadig" of Voltaire.

Zadig was a text which was written by Voltaire in . At a moment , he was joking a little about Muslim religion to , INDEED, criticize the Christian Religion. You understand that he couldn't do it directly at this time without being condemned.

So, now it's forbidden to study Zadig to not hurt the Muslim sensibility!!
Voltaire is at the base of our actual society: he belongs to the category of writers who, by their books and their ideas, were at the origin of the French Revolution.
But now.....we CENSURE him and ourselves!....

So really Fanoff....buy a plane ticket, come to live into France during 1 year....and after, we'll just observe if you would like to just come back to live into your own country !!...

If you insult a Muslims here and it's proved that it's deliberated, you have more problems than if you insult a Christian!

It can be a burnt mosque (as it can be are a lot of crimes and racist insults from Muslims towards non Muslims here!!.....)
Are those things accepted by the French Law ? No...it's condemned!!

Is it still Okay?

haku, thanks for the poll
so François Bayrou is here hehehe
I had seen on tv last night that Jean-Marie Le Pen is mad (oh really? lol) cuz' he considered Philippe De Villiers as a "vote thief" lol, may be people open their eyes and they don't wanna vote to FN anymore

Unfortunately it doesn't seem to be the case, Le Pen has always gotten around 15% in the presidential 1st round, and apparently he'll get the same next year. Even 5 years ago when he managed to reach the 2nd round, he didn't get much higher results than usual, it's just that the left wing was devided between 15 candidates or something, that was just insane and that allowed Le Pen to finish second above all of them. We'll see if the left wing makes the same mistake this time.
What surprises me actually is that Le Pen didn't make his daughter run instead of him, she has a cleaner image and would probably get even more votes, maybe next time.


News: Nicolas Sarkozy has announced the official election dates:

Presidential 1st round: 22 april
Presidential 2nd round: 6 may
Legislative 1st round: 10 june
Legislative 2nd round: 17 june

just my point of view but I think Le Pen try a last time to fulfill his dream before letting his daughter do the job
it's just normal, previous elections show him he can have a little trust in victory :p
btw, I prefer killing myself than vote for FN hehe

Me .....I would prefer to vote Communist than to vote for FN hehe...;) I like my little health:D

c'est la luuuuuttteee finale!! lol
no, really committing suicide sounds great to me :p you know I'm kind of rebel hehehe
I will never understand how people can vote for FN, may be I'm not enough open-minded

i wanted to mean not only Armenian Memorials get damaged in France,and not only by us Turkish people.;)

New socialist debate tonight. Le PS promet qu'il sera moins chiant que le premier. :p

yeah, like finding swastika on graves ;)
Plus, I never said that Turkish are evil or whatever

So the second socialist debate was much more lively.

Ségolène Royal has mentioned once again her proposal to send young offenders to military detention camps, a rather radical and controversial idea for a socialist. Who said women would bring a softer touch in politics? :p The old Margaret Thatcher or the modern Condoleeza Rice have showed that this is a myth, female politicians are just as harsh as male ones.

The three socialist candidates promise to legalize gay marriage and adoption, so i may vote for one of them just for that.
Like for the abolition of the death penalty, that kind of social progress can probably only be made when socialists are in power, and conservatives won't touch it once it's done.

hmmm I hope they'll really do that, cuz' I fear they might use this argument to gain some votes :grustno:

today, I've seen one of the FN's slogan : être français, ça s'hérite ça se mérite *pukes*
it's like being stupid, it's in the genes :p

Le meeting passionné du Zénith tourne à la dispute entre présidentiables :D

Nice article for those who don't like Sarkozy, with an anti-Sarkozy video at the bottom of the page.

http://www.liberation.fr/actualite/s.../214113.FR.php

Last night, for their investigation, French Police has taken 4 teenagers from 14 to 17 years old.
Saturday, almost one year after the riots which took place in France, some days after than an hommage was given to the victims, one bus full of people was burnt. People could escape except one woman who is right now in the coma,because she is burnt at 70%.

It's so funny as game! :(

this is just so sick!
I wonder why people done such things *sighs* obviously there's a problem with education and lack of respect
I will never understand this kind of drama, some people really need to open their eyes
it's a way too good to share with the others, to help, to learn etc etc instead of being violent and dumb

Social Supa Crew a funny link with the socialist politicians
Offtop:
je passe du coq à l'âne! sorry sorry

So yesterday i watched a long interview with Strauss-Kahn on iTele and i have to say that i agreed with pretty much everything he said, except when it came to EU enlargement where he said he supported Turkey's membership, that was a big disappointment. It's hard to find a politician who thinks exactly like yourself. :p


In other news:

Chevènement announced he'll run for president, no surprise there… I hate the guy, even more than Fabius.

The antiliberals are trying to find an agreement for a single candidate, that doesn't seem very likely to happen at the moment.

On a personal level, I think that Strauss-Khan is the best candidate for the Left.
I think that Ségolène Royal could have some good ideas sometimes and that she has a BIG courage , in the French political world: she says what she thinks without be afraid by the taboos.... I mean in France especially you have to practice the "Politically Correct" speech.
So I think she was enough courageous to dare to tell some kinds of things which were hurting in the Left World.
But I think that , if you dig a little more, she isn't enough solid about the economical aspect.

Fabius, I really can't bear him for long time and I don't know why he sounds always "wrong/fake/insincere" to my ears when he speaks.

About Strauss-Khan...even if there are some little things I don't like in him as a person, I think he has very good knowledge about the economical aspect.

~~~
Some little anecdotes:
Around 20 years ago, i was working with a friend who was still as student.
She was a very kind and simple girl .

One of her best friend was the daughter of Strauss-Khan.
So, once, it was just at the opening of Euro Disney, she was invited by her friend (the daughter) to come with the family to Euro Disney.

It was the inauguration of Euro Disney so the company had invited a lot of V.I.P to stay a week-end : the visit of the park + the super hotel.
All was FREE and paid by the company.

I remember how my friend was shocked by Strauss-Khan who was criticizing with a big disgust the Bedroom, saying that there was not enough Fruits there to say Welcome to people when they arrive in their bedroom.
He was criticizing everything: the hotel , the food, the attractions, the people working there...nothing was enough good for him!

Personally, it always makes me smile a lot , people who "fight" for inequalities and live themselves in the most expensive areas of Paris like Little Bourgeois..

We call that here :"The Caviar Left".....:D

My friend, her, was just so admirizing of all this Luxe, all these marvellous things which where offered to her ...for free....

~~
About Ségolène:
Another of my friends is gymnastic teacher in the schools of Paris.
Once, she was at the swimming pool teaching to kiddies how to swim.
As she is enough energetic, one of her friends, another gymnastic teacher came and told her: "Take it easy with this one because she is the daughter of Ségolène Royal"...
My friend answered "Ségolène or not Ségolène I don't care!"...
So he explained to her that Ségolène wasn't liked at all by the teachers cause she was tolerating absolutely no remark about her kiddies.

And he explained too this little story:
The daughter of Ségolène has to go with her class in an "open-class" during 2 weeks. It means that the full class with the teacher moves to the mountain or to the sea to have some special activities there..

Before to leave, the teachers organized a meeting with all the parents in explaining some important rules. Ségolène was there cause she was a parent + the representing of the pupils parents. At this time, she was Minister of Family I think.

One of the important rules is that a kind of deal is necessary to install with the parents: they can write to their children but they don't have to call them at the phone nor to visit them. Because , it isn't easy for the organization and because , if they do it, it breaks the kind of balance which is tried to be installed by the teachers: babies will cry cause they want to see their mums and so on...

So Ségolène was there and said to the other parents: "Yes! Of course, it's very important to respect this rule for the good rhythm of the child!".

The class went to the "open-class"..and of course, Ségolène was the only one who was calling her daughter each noon and each evening...;)
As she was a Minister , nobody dared to say anything....

And the must of the must is that...as she was a Minister of Family, Ségolène decided that it would be a good thing for her job to visit an "open-class" to check the conditions of living of the pupils of the French school...
So Our Ségolène ask for a shopper/helicopter and she arrived , guess where?....to the "open-class" where was her daughter.... :D

I understand her feeling of mother but this story always makes me smile cause it shows that "whatever you're from Left or from Right" , there is always a big difference between the words and the acts ;)

I totally agree with you
the only one who can be proud of acting as he thinks is Le Pen ... dumbness all the way :p

omg!! papie fait de la résistance!! still alive? lol

I read that DSK's popularity increased in last polls and that Jack Lang supports Ségolène Royal cuz', in his point of view, she's the only one who can be elected at 1st round by socialists
so 1st round on the 16th of November and I guess the second one is on the 23th (not sure here)

Thanks for the anecdotes nath, always nice to know how they behave behind the scenes.


I was reading what was said during the debate last night, and oh my… Strauss-Khan said that he was seeing the EU expanding "around the Mediterranean"?! Did he blow a fuse or something? What the hell went into him, we're not trying to build a new Roman Empire, the days of Mare Nostrum are over. I guess that's bye bye DSK.

Now that's different, Clémentine Autain (one of the antiliberal candidates) has revealed in the press that she was raped when she was a student… What an odd thing to bring up during a campaign.

I read in "20 minutes" that Ségolène thinks that the debates were unfair cuz' DSK and Fabius know Elkabach better than her
for her, he gave some tips about the questions etc etc here's the article
and I read that Bruno Gollnisch has to pay 10 000 euros cuz' he insulted Jews hehe great to hear that
I'm also glad that he's no longer a teacher in university Lyon 3 :bebebe: *whistles* son of a b*tch lol