Posted on 02/10/2007 9:31:32 PM PST by Rodney King
No longer a joke – France is having to take Le Pen's threat seriously
By Henry Samuel Last Updated: 1:56am GMT 15/11/2006
Besides his penchant for champagne and singing outmoded French songs, far-Right leader Jean-Marie Le Pen is known to like a practical joke.
So when he strode purposefully out of his private office at the National Front's presidential convention outside Paris this weekend towards the press tent, camera crews in tow, nobody seemed overly surprised when he veered off at the last minute into the lavatory.
Jean-Marie Le Pen National Front leader, Jean-Marie Le Pen, at his party presidential convention in Le Bourget, Paris
The cameras were still rolling when he reappeared with a grin, chin jutting forth, to carry on with the presidential show.
At 78, Mr Le Pen can afford such low farce: his popularity ratings have never been better.
An IFOP poll in this weekend's Le Monde showed that 18 per cent of the French say they will "definitely" vote for the National Front chief.
That is nine points more than at the same period before the 2002 election, in which he horrified Europe by coming second to Jacques Chirac. advertisement
Mr Le Pen is convinced that his fifth presidential campaign since 1974 – and probably his last – will end in the ultimate electoral earthquake in April's elections: "My goal is not the second round, it's the third: the presidency," he said as he prepared the formal launch of his presidential campaign in Le Bourget, on the outskirts of Paris, yesterday.
Around him in the party's Bleu-Blanc-Rouge hall, party faithful, enacted the traditions of French rural life, playing boules and tombola and tasting local delicacies, such as oysters, Muscat and Corsican cured ham brought by regional National Front representatives.
T-shirts and caps were aligned on one stall with the slogan "Love it [France] or leave it" alongside champagne bottles and lighters with labels of Mr Le Pen smiling in front of the Elysée Palace.
Before 2002, the image would have raised a laugh. This time, his rivals are taking the threat extremely seriously.
The former paratrooper's cause has been helped by a mood of introspective nationalism sweeping France, rocked by last year's suburban riots, a surprise No vote in a referendum on the European constitution and profound disillusionment in its politicians.
His virulent anti-immigration stance, promise of "national preference" but also defence of French sovereignty by, for example, bringing back the Franc, have struck a chord.
"I feel the country's great anxiety in my bones. There are departments like the 93 (Seine Saint-Denis) that are losing a part of their population – the true French, but also law-abiding immigrants who don't want their children dragged through the maelstrom of delinquency and violence," he says.
Observers say that the younger faction of "frontistes", epitomised by his daughter Marine, who condones gay marriage, has given a more progressive face to the brash Le Pen père.
Analysts say that despite his rising ratings, Mr Le Pen's chances of victory in France's presidential elections next year are slimmer than in 2002 because this time the race is dominated by two relatively young candidates: the Socialist Ségolène Royal, 53, and Nicolas Sarkozy, 52, the leader of the ruling centre-Right UMP party.
Both promise change and both speak of a clampdown on security and immigration, a key issue since riots in the rundown immigrant suburbs rocked the country a year ago.
Mr Le Pen is dismissive of both, claiming that they are hijacking what have always been National Front policies. He speaks of Miss Royal as Madame "Nunuch" or Dumbo, and Mr Sarkozy as the Chameleon.
"Their attempt to imitate policies I have been promoting for years is proof that the 'Lepen-isation' of mentalities is well under way. But the people will always prefer the original to the copy," he said.
The popularity of Miss Royal and Mr Sarkozy, and fears of another sudden Le Pen breakthrough, are expected to encourage more people to vote than five years ago.
Mr Le Pen admits that Left-wing sympathisers are more likely to vote tactically in the first round to avoid a repeat of 2002, when he ousted Lionel Jospin, the Socialist candidate.
His greatest hope is for a split in the mainstream Right: although Mr Sarkozy is almost certain to lead the UMP party, the prime minister, Dominique de Villepin, and the defence minister, Michele Alliot-Marie, say they may run, egged on by Jacques Chirac, whose hatred of Mr Sarkozy is well documented.
Mr Le Pen shrugs off suggestions that the hardline Mr Sarkozy is sapping his electorate.
The UMP president's credo of la rupture – a clean break with past politics – is, Mr Le Pen says, laughable, given that he has been in the government for years.
His daughter, Marine, who has been put in charge of campaign strategy, chimes in: "The National Front has won the ideological battle, and, as former Socialist president François Mitterrand said, an ideological victory always precedes a political victory.
"The big question now is, will voters buy these fake revolutionaries who come from the system but claim to want to change it, or will they go for the real thing (the National Front)?"
fpress@telegraph.co.uk
I have spent seven years of my life at sea; I have sailed the oceans and stared at an infinitesimal part of the billions and billions of stars in the heavens. My beliefs are simple ones. I believe in the nation and the family. Together with the nation, the family is the crucible for what little possibilities there are for human happiness. Society must have certain fundamental values or else there can be no personal development. -- Le Pen
bump
On the surface, this guy sounds like someone we'd like, but he's also very anti-America IIRC.
Does he really have a chance to make the next round?
Has Royal bombed out that badly?
I like Sarkozy at least he's pro-America
That's because the Left is the Left everwhere, but the right is different from nation to nation.
As well it should be.
Especailly in nations that are not part of the Anglosphere.
I could almost say France really needs someone like him to grow their balls back...
I think that part of the problem in France is corruption. I read an article this week in the WSj that stated that the new head of TOTAL SA is still under investigation for the Oil for food scandal and that he has already entered into a deal with Iran for an off shore natural gas field. Total is involved with every anti US dictator in the world and is obviously directing France's foreign policy.
I rooted for LePen (there goes my nonexistant political career) over Chirac last time.
Sarkozy seems to have the testicular fotitude France needs, as little as I know about French politics.
Hey Royal v. LePen, (if it came to that) I'd take LePen.
Also all the ballsy French leaders are not ethnically French. Another point for Sarkozy.
Sarkozy's Hungarian or something, isn't he?
...the French Ronald Reagan...
Unfortunately, he doesn't have the advantage Reagan had...a popular R in normally D California...
Go Le Pen!!!
Reagan80
No, TOTAL combined with ELF, formerly government owned. They are one of the instruments of French foreign policy.
He's a fascist scumbag.
Vive Le Pen!
Sounds suspiciously like the official state motto of collaborationist Vichy France -- "Travail, Famille, Patrie", or "Work, Family, Nation."
Perhaps not such a surprise from the man who dismissed the Holocaust as merely "a detail."
Maybe yes, maybe no. But Le Pen is actually a fascist. I don't bandy that word about -- unlike so many others falsely given that label, he comes directly out of the fascist collaborationist movement in France.
"The same people who are in favour of quickie divorces are trying to weld together the ancient nations of Europe in a perpetual marriage. What are they going to do if we want to leave the EU? Send in the Wehrmacht?" - LePen
I need to save that one for later.
The Center-Right in Europe is not the same as the Center-Right in America. Some of those folks are WAY out in right field.
Not to nitpick, but 'Champagne' is to be capitalized. Definitely media bias. The Frenchies have made a product for centuries that the Brits cannot and they haven't gotten over it!
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