Result reflects Europe-wide shift to the right [The Financial Times on Le Pen]

The Financial Times ^ | April 21, 2002 | Richard Wolffe in Washington, James Blitz in Rome, Haig Simonian in Berlin, L. Crawford in Madrid

[crystalk]

BUMP to that! Le Pen would be the best thing that could happen right now, for Jews in France.

[Diddle E. Squat]

We need all the help we can get to annihilate the muslim cultists from the face of the earth. On we go!

Gonna try again, since your annihilation of the Jews 60 years ago failed?

[1234]

dunno whether country is falling apart; however, some sugest that these arabs "breed like flies"....
any idea where this phrase originates?

[Great Dane]

#29......... most rightwing Euro's are only slightly right of center, even the ones called extremist.

[BellStar]

Well....yeah.....It was Euro based Arabs who blew up the World Trade Center Parking Garage and a few years later Flew into the World Trade Center on 9/11/01.

[vance]

LePen is an anti Semite. Just what Europe does not need now. On the other hand the socialists are tired and corrupt. Their so-called message is bankrupt. What is needed is a conservative-type, entrepenurial candidate with something new to say. Europe is bogged down in boring ideologies. Dangerous, too.

[LarryLied]

The ADL doesn't like Le Pen? Perhaps they find the Muslims who are engaging to overt, violent acts of anti-Semetism more to their liking? No?

The ADL says nothing about Fidel Castro, the guy who sent thousands of troops and hundred of tanks to drive Israel into the sea during the Yom Kippur war. That Fidel trained PLO terrorists and let Arafat use the Cuban embassy in Beruit as his headquarters doesn't bother the ADL either. But Le Pen? A threat to civilization itself!

[monkeyshine]

Le Pen will lose by 80% I think. No leftist in his left mind would ever vote for Le Pen (and it will be hard for him to vote for Chirac). The French take their politics way too seriously.

This is French politics, and the defeat of Jospin does not indicate a shift to the right at all. I don't know the exact numbers, but between Chirac Le Pen they don't even have 50% of the electorate. French politics is so fractionalized and splintered, that Chirac with 19% and Le Pen with 16% made the top 2... while Jospin had to share his votes with many other leftists, and ended up losing. It's kind of like Gore losing some key states thanks to Nader.

[Phillip Augustus]

Not sure, but Charles De Gaulle once observed that they breed like "rabbits".

[Phillip Augustus]

Not exactly. There were other right-wing French politicians in the election as well, such as Megret. In fact, Chevenement, a leftist, took a very right-wing position on immigration. Le Pen will lose 60-40.

[monkeyshine]

Le Pen is anti-immigration. He is like the Buchanan of French politics (but more successful), and appeals to the rural provinces of France.

But you're right, him making the second round doesn't really mean a rise in anti-Arab feelings. He's always placed fairly well in national politics -- that is, above 10%. It's just a numbers game. Many potential Jospin voters stayed home, while the Le Pen voters came out. Jospin also had to share his votes with myriad other French leftists, sending two rightists into the run-off.

But with Arabs in France running around burning synagogues and making a lot of noise, and the perception that they refuse to integrate with French culture, it fuels the anti-Arab (anti-immigrant) sentiment, just like many Americans (i.e. Buchananites) feel about Hispanic immigrants, only on a grander scale (because France is an ancient country not founded on immigration, and is much more protective about its language and culture).

[Southack]

"Everything I hear on t.v. is that the guy is an anti-semite. So which is it, anti-semite or anti-arab?"

Either, as far as the liberal socialistic media in Europe is concerned, any slander against Le Pen is a good slander.

As for me, Viva Le Pen!

[Lazamataz]

I am GREATLY pleased about the rightward shift in France.

You have freepmail.

[monkeyshine]

I think it's hard to pin the immigration issue as a 'rightist' issue exclusively. I think many social leftists are still French purists in terms of language and culture, and the perception that their north African immigrants are not integrating into French culture makes this a swing issue in France, more so than in the USA, because of their sense of self-importance, history, culture and language.

[monkeyshine]

Le Pen will not be invited to the WH unless he wins, which I will give you good odds against. However, Chirac might be what France needs right now.

[OldFriend]

In other words, the pipples are no longer amused!!!

[ProudGOP]

Too bad we don't have any French posters

heh-heh-heh

French Freepers...

Now thats funny

[OldFriend]

LePen said he was first and foremost a Francophile!!! In a way you have to admire the man...he recognizes that the muslim immigration is destroying his country. Actually, muslim immigration is destroying the civilized world.

[McGavin999]

I just found an interview with him, the guy sounds pretty scarry to me.

[okie01]

"Maybe they are associating the far right with anti-semitism, but the leftists in Europe are very vocal in their disdain for Israel."

It is the left that has turned on Israel. And anti-Semitism doesn't necessarily have anything to do with it. Something larger, even more pernicious, may be at work here...

The West is turning on Israel because it is losing confidence in itself.

Highly recommended.