FIRST: Hollande is no centrist. Hé is a Socialist who has moderated his positions to the center of the LEFT. Just a lighter shade of pink.
Sarkozy’s conservative U.M.P. party portrayed the primary outcome as evidence of intellectual bankruptcy within the opposition.
“It is the perfect summary of the great misunderstanding that the Socialists are constructing with the French,” Jean-François Copé, the U.M.P. party leader, was quoted as saying Monday in Libération. “That is to say that nothing that has been proposed is feasible given the global context as we know it.”
France better think over whether or not electing the Socialists is a wise idea when the welfare state needs to be dismantled. They can look to Spain and see how (un)successful they were.