L'élection présidentielle de 2017, second tour

May 7, 2017 12:10 AM

Polling stations across France opened this morning for the presidential election's second round of voting between Emmanuel Macron and Marine Le Pen (though the vote began in the Pacific). The final turn of a twisty campaign was a leak of emails from the Macron campaign on Friday. The opinion polls, historically quite accurate in France, indicate that Macron is the overwhelming favorite. His party, En Marche, is also polling well in the June legislative elections. Though the establishment has flocked behind Macron against the far-right Le Pen it has not gone as smoothly as was expected, which is Jeremy Hardin's topic in the essay Whose Republican Front?
posted by Kattullus (152 comments total)

If you want to follow the results as they come in tonight and don't want to scroll through liveblogs, the French Wikipedia page about the election results is updated pretty quickly.
posted by Kattullus at 12:17 AM on May 7, 2017 [2 favorites]

I can honestly say I've never before been anxious about the outcome of a French election but a lot of things have changed in 2017.
posted by Nerd of the North at 12:18 AM on May 7, 2017 [45 favorites]

Mod note: A couple deleted. Hey, folks, if you want to discuss the French election in good faith, you're in the right place! If you want to talk about the US, or just joke around, I'll ask you to find another spot for that. Thanks.
posted by taz (staff) at 12:29 AM on May 7, 2017 [37 favorites]

I am irrationally terrified that somehow all the polls will be wrong and President Le Pen will break the EU and possibly the world. This is just a reaction from Brexit and Trump, not something I genuinely believe will happen, but I will be so grateful when today is over.
posted by Aravis76 at 12:40 AM on May 7, 2017 [31 favorites]

While waiting for tonight's results, I recommend taking a look at Hardin's essay. It's not exactly a heartening read but it does a good job of placing the election in a French context, away from Trump and Brexit.
posted by Kattullus at 12:50 AM on May 7, 2017 [7 favorites]

Another useful read: Five things you need to know about France's vote
posted by Mister Bijou at 12:56 AM on May 7, 2017 [2 favorites]

One minor but funny error in that Al Jazeera article. The Front National was founded in 1972 and not 1942. Mind you, Jean-Marie Le Pen's political beliefs were well represented by France's rulers at that time.
posted by Kattullus at 1:15 AM on May 7, 2017 [22 favorites]

"Pretty astonishing how the Front National, UKIP, Trump, Geert Wilders have unhackable emails."
posted by Aya Hirano on the Astral Plane at 1:30 AM on May 7, 2017 [97 favorites]

Talking with a member of the French voting public yesterday about just this - the anxiety and terror that LePen might win. And Macron's biggest positive is that he's not LePen - ugh!

Through FB a week ago I read through a chilling discussion about how voting is pointless, that both sides are terrible, so might as well sit it out. It's this attitude that gives me the queasy feeling - indifference rarely helps the side least intent on fucking everything up.
posted by From Bklyn at 2:18 AM on May 7, 2017 [6 favorites]

My future son-in-law is French. He was disappointed with all the candidates, so I told him, "If you can't hold your nose and vote for the lesser of two evils, you will get the greater evil."
posted by Miss Cellania at 2:38 AM on May 7, 2017 [74 favorites]

Along with their voting papers, French voters all get a list of declarations from each party in their mail - a folded sheet of A3 printed on both sides. Here is the list for the first round - and here are the final two for Le Pen and Macron. The details will mean more to French speakers - but note Le Pen's logo makes no mention of her party. Instead we get a rose (normally a socialist symbol) shown as blue and appearing in the form of a sword. We also see her in rather stately looking poses - signing a latter (with a 4 colour biro made by French company Bic) and shaking hands with the president (I think) the president of Chad. Neither Le Pen nor her propaganda are amateur hour.
posted by rongorongo at 2:41 AM on May 7, 2017 [16 favorites]

I am also terrified for this election.

I think I may be developing a generalized phobia about elections and voting, and I sometimes wonder if that's the point.

France, with your long Modern history of contentious and surprising politics, show us a way forward!
posted by GenjiandProust at 2:43 AM on May 7, 2017 [8 favorites]

In my head, this scene from Casablanca seems terribly relevant. Vive la France!
posted by valkane at 3:01 AM on May 7, 2017 [8 favorites]

There Are No “Macron Leaks” in France. Politically Motivated Hacking Is Not Whistleblowing.

It seems France is less vulnerable than the US and UK, but I won't be happy till the votes are counted. And then come the parliamentary elections..

I heard a comment that the mainstream politicians own this disruption through their decades of accepting corruption and disregarding the people, and I guess we all agree with that to some greater or lesser extent, but next the pundit said: Macron is doing what Obama did: he is running on his personal integrity, and it does mean something that the person in charge is honest and serious, but we all see what happened then in the US, if the other branches of government don't change, voters will be even more disillusioned afterwards.
posted by mumimor at 3:36 AM on May 7, 2017 [8 favorites]

Don't fuck it up don't fuck it up don't fuck it up...

(I've been hearing claims that Macron planted a bunch of obviously fake shit for hackers to find, this discrediting the leak. Which, I don't know if that's going to pay off, if it's even true, but it sounds clever at least.)
posted by tobascodagama at 6:30 AM on May 7, 2017 [3 favorites]

It looks like the Macron campaign may have outsmarted the hackers by deliberately mining their catch with dummy documents.

Which might explain the stilted timing of the dump; knowing that it'll fall apart on examination, they're salvaging what they can by letting its unexplained presence be the message.
posted by acb at 6:40 AM on May 7, 2017 [12 favorites]

The possibility of a Le Pen victory has been enormously exaggerated, at least in the British press.

Unfortunately Macron probably means more time in the doldrums; a basically conservative, mainstream President who is hamstrung by lack of parliamentary support in any case. Put France on the list of countries where no real good news is to be expected for several years.
posted by Segundus at 6:41 AM on May 7, 2017 [1 favorite]

Put France on the list of countries where no real good news is to be expected for several years.

I think the state of the world right now is such that "France did not elect the right-wing conservative ratbag after all" would itself be good news.

A fun observation on Twitter, concerning the people who hung an anti-LePen banner on the Eiffel Tower: "There's bad-ass then there's hanging off the Eiffel Tower to protest a Nazi bad-ass."
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 6:45 AM on May 7, 2017 [50 favorites]

Oh, man. That image just made me burst out crying. I thought it had all finally dried up, and I was just basically a pillar of salt at this point.
posted by taz at 6:49 AM on May 7, 2017 [8 favorites]

I'm cautiously optimistic about Macron. I'd be happy to hear someone pick this analogy apart, but I do see a lot of similarities between Macron and Trudeau, and I'm overall pretty happy with the Trudeau government in Canada.

They're both young, which is the obvious one, but still important. They are both also an interesting mix of essentially being mainstream politicians, but having a pretty strong break with the old political order. Macron is easier to identify here, running his own party and all. But its important to note that Trudeau inherited a broken and moribund liberal party, and he did a lot to heal the divisions, reinvigorate the party, and modernize it.

Finally, in spite of how it looked from the outside, I would say that at the time of the election most Canadians elected Trudeau not for being Trudeau, but for not being Harper. There was a lot of skepticism about his being the son of a former prime minister, and whether he really had the mettle to be prime minister. And whether or not you approve of Trudeau's performance, I think those fears have largely receded.

Macron will have the same shot. Hopefully he will win and Le Pen will be expelled from politics, and then he'll have a chance to demonstrate what he's really about.
posted by Alex404 at 6:57 AM on May 7, 2017 [7 favorites]

"Pretty astonishing how the Front National, UKIP, Trump, Geert Wilders have unhackable emails."

Have you tried hacking their emails? Anyway, I thought most of their dirty laundry was already on the line. If there's more, bring it on.

I assume Macron will win, but I don't see that it will do France much good. If he can't make things nice in a reasonable amount of time, it will simply add fuel to FN machine. I again refer people to Christophe Guilley. For those who read French, this Ipsos poll is interesting
posted by IndigoJones at 7:01 AM on May 7, 2017 [1 favorite]

Blandine as she left mass: "I'm voting Le Pe [sic] to piss people off. I don't believe she'll solve anything, I just want to piss people off."

I'm just about fed up with humanity.
posted by bluecore at 7:35 AM on May 7, 2017 [23 favorites]

I'm just about fed up with humanity.

That's probably about how Blandine feels.
posted by roolya_boolya at 7:43 AM on May 7, 2017 [4 favorites]

I wonder how many Germans in 1933 voted for the NSDAP just because those smug liberals/cabaret-going hipsters/do-gooder Social Democrats annoyed them. This may be the way the human race annihilates itself; in paroxysms of reflexive stupidity.
posted by acb at 7:44 AM on May 7, 2017 [55 favorites]

I'm not exactly seeing the long term advantage for Russia of continuing to destablize the EU. Certainly the failure of a Western European political block built around liberal social-democracy is categorically less threatening that a return to the old soviet bloc dynamics and it's pretty clear that if the EU/NATO were to go away that Germany would actually have to rearm. Would Putin really want to deal with a technologically superior and well-armed Germany on their flank?

Keeping Germany and France enmeshed with each other seems like it's preferable than a return to the old European power dynamics.

Plus right now having the EU be relatively strong for negotiations with the UK seems like it actually advances Russian interests. The UK immolates it's own economy, the Tories make the UK into an even more attractive landing spot for Russian Billionaires, and the EU becomes less anglo-centric and aligned with the US.
posted by vuron at 7:55 AM on May 7, 2017 [2 favorites]

Would Putin really want to deal with a technologically superior and well-armed Germany on their flank?

Russia's thinking geopolitically. It's an ongoing insult that parts of its hinterland, such as Ukraine, the Baltic states and Finland (and, arguably, eastern Poland) are not under its control. Righting this historic wrong and restoring the sacred destiny of Holy Russia is orders of magnitude more serious than the minor diversion of helping a few of Vlad's ex-KGB buddies get to play at being English dzentelmeni.

And Germany doesn't have anywhere near the natural resources of Russia. It didn't during the Third Reich when it controlled half of Europe, and it certainly doesn't now.
posted by acb at 8:07 AM on May 7, 2017 [2 favorites]

The Guardian is liveblogging the French election.
posted by Kattullus at 8:13 AM on May 7, 2017 [1 favorite]

I wonder how many Germans in 1933 voted for the NSDAP just because those smug liberals/cabaret-going hipsters/do-gooder Social Democrats annoyed them. This may be the way the human race annihilates itself; in paroxysms of reflexive stupidity.

Yep. There's a reason that "cutting off your nose to spite your face" is an expression. There's nothing in this world that will lead people to eagerly embrace self-destructive behavior quite like spiting someone else.

Ten thousand generations of human development -- and ten thousand years of civilization -- haven't yet bred it out of us.
posted by darkstar at 8:33 AM on May 7, 2017 [16 favorites]

The Guardian is liveblogging the French election.
The FN voters interviewed by the Guardian are from Never, and, as expected, they put immigration (rather than "globalisation" or "finance") as a top concern. Nevers has a very small number of immigrants (about 5100 in
posted by elgilito at 8:39 AM on May 7, 2017 [2 favorites]

(sent by mistake) a urban area population of 100000). 2/3 are retired and from Southern Europe or Switzerland. More than half of the doctors of the local hospital are immigrants and not exactly threatening. I'm not sure how one can actually reach these kind of voters.
posted by elgilito at 8:45 AM on May 7, 2017 [11 favorites]

I wonder how many Germans in 1933 voted for the NSDAP just because those smug liberals/cabaret-going hipsters/do-gooder Social Democrats annoyed them.

Hitler was already chancellor by that point, and the wave of outright violence against centrists and leftists in the weeks before the election - not to mention the fire - were very much his thumb on the scale. Even with those efforts, Hitler did far worse in this election than he desired, and he had to severely intimidate the other parties into voting in favor of the enabling act.

Within weeks, there were no other political parties.

It's.... not a great comparison to this election.
posted by Pogo_Fuzzybutt at 8:52 AM on May 7, 2017 [9 favorites]

> It looks like the Macron campaign may have outsmarted the hackers by deliberately mining their catch with dummy documents.

I wonder if French law enforcement and intelligence got involved with this. If so, there may be more surprises mixed in with the documents than some ridiculously fake emails. The timing of the dump works well for law enforcement purposes because anyone in France sharing copies of the files between midnight Friday and 8:00 pm Sunday of election weekend is violating French law. (There's a moratorium on campaigning and reporting on the campaigns during this period.)
posted by nangar at 8:57 AM on May 7, 2017 [5 favorites]

Votes have been counted from Caribbean France (voted on Saturday). Less of a walkover for Macron than you'd hope: about ¾ for Guadelope, Martinique & St Martin, slightly less for Guyana and St Barthélemy.
posted by ambrosen at 9:03 AM on May 7, 2017 [3 favorites]

Russia's thinking geopolitically.

But not very well, and not very long-term.

And Germany doesn't have anywhere near the natural resources of Russia. It didn't during the Third Reich when it controlled half of Europe, and it certainly doesn't now.

Raw materials are importable. Germany has a GDP well over twice Russia's, manufacturing output about quadruple Russia's, a long history of excellent military training. And Germany could have functioning, miniaturized thermonuclear weapons inside a couple-few years of their decision to start the program. The idea of Germany spending three or five percent of GDP on defense should have Russian strategists crying.

Destabilizing NATO and the EU are, from any perspective more than a couple of years long, profoundly stupid things for Russia to do. Russia benefits enormously from having a calm, pacified, and relatively lightly armed western Europe. Having instead a twitchy, heavily armed Poland next to a twitchy, heavily armed Germany next to twitchy, heavily armed France and Czechia and so on would not serve Russian interests very well.

tl;dr: Do you want a gigantic, high-tech, nuclearized Bundeswehr? Because this is how you get ants.
posted by ROU_Xenophobe at 9:04 AM on May 7, 2017 [38 favorites]

(The German federal election in question was in 1932, so I read acb's comment - perhaps erroneously - as musing about how many of those Germans - seeing what they had wrought from their vantage in 1933 after Hitler had been made Chancellor - had voted for the NSDAP the previous year out of spite for their fellow countrymen.

/derail)
posted by darkstar at 9:10 AM on May 7, 2017

signing a latter (with a 4 colour biro made by French company Bic)

Henceforth to be known as "Le Pen."
posted by spitbull at 9:25 AM on May 7, 2017 [17 favorites]

I dunno, aren't fantasies about a well-armed Germany a bit of a derail in a French-election-thread?

The Russian government shares values with most of the European far-right, which everyone knows and acknowledges. I guess they all imagine that a nationalist, divided Europe would get on just fine with Russia and mostly spend time killing brown people.
posted by mumimor at 9:27 AM on May 7, 2017 [7 favorites]

anyone in France sharing copies of the files between midnight Friday and 8:00 pm Sunday of election weekend is violating French law.

Does that apply to citizens, or just reporters?
posted by corb at 9:30 AM on May 7, 2017 [1 favorite]

I think voters should opt for Macron because, based on my experience with Cosmic Encounter, he obviously must be four times as large as any other single candidate, and will therefore crush them in any head-to-head one on one battle.

(It makes as much sense as the people who say they are voting for Le Pen because she is "descended from Joan of Arc", anyway.)
posted by kyrademon at 9:31 AM on May 7, 2017 [8 favorites]

From the Guardian live blog:
The perils of polling day: in order not to disturb five baby blue tits born between the two rounds in a nest occupying a disused letterbox in the main front door of the mairie of the small village of La Lande-Chasles (population 115) near Angers, voters are being asked to use an alternative entrance to the polling station, reports BFMTV:

Photo
posted by spitbull at 9:42 AM on May 7, 2017 [17 favorites]

> Does that apply to citizens, or just reporters?

Both. Saturday morning, the electoral commission released a statement emphasizing that relaying the contents of the leaked documents is covered under the campaign moratorium, this applies to ordinary citizens as well as news organizations, and violators may be prosecuted.
posted by nangar at 9:52 AM on May 7, 2017 [2 favorites]

Does that apply to citizens, or just reporters?

The leaked documents seem largely unremarkable but the national elections commission urged French media and citizens not to republish their contents under strict rules barring any form of electioneering the day before the vote and during the election day itself.

Source: Grauniad Live updates
posted by Mister Bijou at 9:53 AM on May 7, 2017 [2 favorites]

So we can expect results starting in about an hour? I've never followed a French election before and I don't know how long it takes for results to start rolling in.
posted by chainsofreedom at 10:00 AM on May 7, 2017

#MacronLeaks:

The Propagation... featuring 4Chan, Disobedient Media, Jack Posobiec (Pizzagate), Wikileaks.

It's in French at Liberation
posted by Mister Bijou at 10:10 AM on May 7, 2017

How can Macro govern without a party? The National Assembly elections will be more consequential.
posted by My Dad at 10:20 AM on May 7, 2017 [1 favorite]

So we can expect results starting in about an hour?
Two estimates will be available at 8:00 pm: 1) Estimates from pollsters based on representative poll stations and corrected for bias, and 2) official vote counts. Estimates are usually accurate but are "only" estimates. Early vote counts tend to favour the Le Pen vote because poll stations close later in the cities (where Le Pen is typically weaker) and these votes are counted later (by 10-11 pm) (in the first round this difference lead to "fake news" cries from US right wingers who just don't get how French elections work).
Belgian newspapers have already some estimates, btw.
posted by elgilito at 10:23 AM on May 7, 2017 [2 favorites]

My Dad: How can Macro govern without a party? The National Assembly elections will be more consequential.

According to the only poll so far, his En Marche party will be the biggest party in the French legislature after the June elections.
posted by Kattullus at 10:24 AM on May 7, 2017 [5 favorites]

I'd thought that exit polls wouldn't be released for another 30 minutes, but here's a tweet from Europe Elects. Maybe it was leaked, or something?

Average of early exit polls:

Macron (EM-*): 64%
Le Pen (FN-ENF): 36%

posted by adrianhon at 10:27 AM on May 7, 2017 [1 favorite]

"The lamps are going out all over Europe, Russia, and America, and we shall not see them lit again in our life-time"

A pox on the resurgence of the far-right across the world!
posted by blue_beetle at 10:32 AM on May 7, 2017 [9 favorites]

I wonder if French law enforcement and intelligence got involved with this.
The French have previously permitted remote voting. Not this time. And that is allegedly as an attempt to thwart Russian hacking. To vote you need to turn up in person with your passport or ID card (or pre-arrange a proxy vote with the help of the Gendarmarie).
posted by rongorongo at 10:36 AM on May 7, 2017 [6 favorites]

Linked by Nate Silver, so this tweet of unofficial exit polls may be more legit:

The unofficial exit polls #presidentielle2017:
Ipsos: EM 63 / MLP 37
Harris & BVA: EM 63.5 / MLP 36.5
Ifop: EM 66 / MLP 34

posted by adrianhon at 10:38 AM on May 7, 2017 [2 favorites]

As an American, I never thought I could be this emotionally invested in a French election. Or quite literally praying for a conservative emissary of the finance industry to win an election in any sphere. The world is a surreal place these days, and I guess one has to appreciate whatever small victories they can find.

Is this going to be the new normal, giving up hope for genuine progress and simply praying that regressive politics won't win out? I feel like I've been reduced to the Kubler-Ross stage of bargaining, grasping at supplications which might recruit divine help toward stopping the forces of hatred from dividing and burning the world again.
posted by prosopagnosia at 10:42 AM on May 7, 2017 [13 favorites]

A rejection of le Pen is the most important aspect to this election. Center left and center right operating together with nationalists on the right relegated to the extremes and presumably a resurgent left led by Melanchon on the left pushing against any rightward drift.
posted by vuron at 10:43 AM on May 7, 2017 [6 favorites]

Or quite literally praying for a conservative emissary of the finance industry to win an election in any sphere.

That Macron is not a movement conservative, not holding aloft the tribal symbols of the Right and attacking those of the Left, but rather a pragmatist, is the key difference. Unlike the self-proclaimed Right, he isn't going to smash up (gay rights/renewable energy/cycling/&c.) because the tears of the vanquished taste so sweet to his electorate.
posted by acb at 10:47 AM on May 7, 2017 [14 favorites]

Is this going to be the new normal, giving up hope for genuine progress and simply praying that regressive politics won't win out?

Sadly, this has often been the normal in many parts of the world.
posted by roolya_boolya at 11:00 AM on May 7, 2017 [2 favorites]

I don't like the idea that the only good kind of winning looks like "a Juggernaut who agrees with me."
posted by rhizome at 11:00 AM on May 7, 2017 [5 favorites]

Allons enfents! Every percentage point in the margin of victory now is a further repudiation of xenophobia.

NON A LA F. HAINE!!!
posted by darkstar at 11:02 AM on May 7, 2017 [3 favorites]

French state TV vote estimate: Macron 65.1%, Le Pen 35.9%. Also, the BBC has predicted that Emmanuel Macron will in the French Presidential Election.
posted by adrianhon at 11:02 AM on May 7, 2017 [9 favorites]

Le Monde and Liberation both calling it for Macron with 65% of the vote. Ouf !
posted by theodolite at 11:03 AM on May 7, 2017 [9 favorites]

There have already been resistance movements prepared re: Macron's promised employment law "reforms" (read: getting rid of most employee protections but tossing a consolation prize of getting unemployment immediately upon quitting as opposed to having to wait a little bit to receive it). These are the reforms people were in the streets about a year ago, btw. Macron wasn't in the government for long, but he sparked a lot of the anger we've seen this election – see also Mélenchon. I should add, if you know France, you've seen the anger – you wouldn't know it from reading non-French media who have indeed done their darnedest to paint Macron as Trudeau-like. I'll never understand how anyone can say with a straight face that one can be pro-liberal economy (aka capitalism as unhindered as possible) while also being pro-socialist. That's not centrism, that's a bald-faced lie. Also: I voted Macron in the second round. Hamon in the first. No pile-ons please. We are able to plan resistance before an election and still choose to bar the route to fascism.

Results will be coming in any time now as poll stations officially close at 8pm.

On preview, ouf indeed. Now to get to work.
posted by fraula at 11:07 AM on May 7, 2017 [29 favorites]

Well, the French system has been a hindrance to youth employment for decades. I can understand why people who have vulnerable (and less vulnerable) jobs will protest reform, but it is well documented that the model we have in Denmark, where it is easier to get fired but your benefits are far better leads to higher pay and more jobs for everyone. The danger is if Macron implements the worse protections without the higher benefits. Also, among the benefits here are not only higher unemployment benefits but also education and employer paid job-finding assistance.
posted by mumimor at 11:15 AM on May 7, 2017 [7 favorites]

It seems there was a record low voter participation, and a record number of blank votes. Link to Le Monde
I'm not very good at French, looking forward to more insightful comments
posted by mumimor at 11:26 AM on May 7, 2017

France 24 has live results in English.
posted by roolya_boolya at 11:29 AM on May 7, 2017

France has no voting booths on the small Spanish island where I live, and so my wife (a French citizen) and I flew to Palma this morning so she could vote. After the first-round polls predicted a Macron landslide in the second round, she was toying with the idea of not bothering, but once Melenchon's faction called for abstention, and she thought for 5 minutes about what happened to Hillary, she decided she had to go vote.

Unlike in 2012, when the lines ran around the block, no one was voting this year and the French consul was there receiving everyone's ballot and shaking their hand. I was worried that the low turnout would give Le Pen a chance to pull a Trump.

We got home just in time to see Le Pen concede on French television. I'm feeling a lot more relief than celebration. But in Le Pen's concession speech, she said that the election results mark the end of the old political divisions, and the beginning of a new struggle between the "patriotes" and the "mondialistes". Looks like "globalists" are going to be the new designated enemy of the fascists. We'll see if that turns out to be another dog whistle for "Jew", like her father's tirades against the "cosmopolites".

And then she announced that she'll be creating a new political party to continue the struggle. Now I understand why she resigned as president of the Front National last week. Looks like we need to buy more plane tickets for the legislative elections in June.
posted by fuzz at 11:32 AM on May 7, 2017 [27 favorites]

Live updating election results map from NY Times. Reddit live thread.
posted by adrianhon at 11:36 AM on May 7, 2017 [1 favorite]

> But in Le Pen's concession speech, she said that the election results mark the end of the old political divisions, and the beginning of a new struggle between the "patriotes" and the "mondialistes". Looks like "globalists" are going to be the new designated enemy of the fascists. We'll see if that turns out to be another dog whistle for "Jew", like her father's tirades against the "cosmopolites".

Go right ahead, you pathetic Vichy asshole. Run as a naked fascist and lose as a naked fascist, just like you just lost as a thinly veiled fascist!

Oh my god I had forgotten what it's like to feel relieved by the results of an election. Thank you, France, for saving the world.
posted by You Can't Tip a Buick at 11:39 AM on May 7, 2017 [48 favorites]

Yesterday was Free Comic Book Day. Matt Furie (who created Pepe the Frog, which since became the symbol of the alt-right) gave away a book which killed off Pepe.

I wonder whether those who explained Brexit/Trump in terms of “meme magic” and the alt-right having better sorcerers will explain Le Pen's failure to win in terms of this ritual sacrifice of their god.

Or, alternatively: WHERE IS YOUR MEME MAGIC NOW, KEK-HEADS?
posted by acb at 11:42 AM on May 7, 2017 [14 favorites]

Go right ahead, you pathetic Vichy asshole. Run as a naked fascist and lose as a naked fascist, just like you just lost as a thinly veiled fascist!

Problem is, there'll also be fewer voters in 2022 who remember the reality of the Vichy regime, and more who think something like “well, I'm not cool with gas chambers and death camps, but she's not promising those, and a strong, tough leader could sure sort (blown-up threat/problem) out...”
posted by acb at 11:45 AM on May 7, 2017 [6 favorites]

Vive la France!
posted by nubs at 11:46 AM on May 7, 2017 [7 favorites]

et les pommes de terre frites
posted by tel3path at 11:53 AM on May 7, 2017 [3 favorites]

Well, that's a relief. I can't say I'm super-optimistic about Macron as president, but hopefully I'll be pleasantly surprised.
posted by Kattullus at 12:01 PM on May 7, 2017 [4 favorites]

Looks like "globalists" are going to be the new designated enemy of the fascists. We'll see if that turns out to be another dog whistle for "Jew", like her father's tirades against the "cosmopolites".

In English, at least, it absolutely is that.
posted by tobascodagama at 12:02 PM on May 7, 2017 [21 favorites]

et les pommes de terre frites

Et les oeufs lancés.
posted by mandolin conspiracy at 12:04 PM on May 7, 2017 [2 favorites]

🇫🇷!
A relief that continental Europe seems to be able to vote in a sensible manner.
posted by bouvin at 12:10 PM on May 7, 2017 [9 favorites]

A little more precision, please

because egg and chips would taste pretty good right now for a celebratory dinner
posted by tel3path at 12:11 PM on May 7, 2017

And then she announced that she'll be creating a new political party to continue the struggle.

I.e., F.N. v 2.0 did better than v 1.0, but marketing suggests the product line maxed out its potential, so it's time to re-brand. The next time around, it will not only be a few more years separated from Vichy France, but will also have dropped the now-toxic F.N. label.

It'll be the same old fascism but in a glossy new package, and maybe they can convince another 15% of the electorate to buy it. The viper has merely shed its skin, but still lives under the porch.
posted by darkstar at 12:15 PM on May 7, 2017 [15 favorites]

Just back from a hurried dash, the result of which is chilling in the icebox. Because you can't toast the downfall of the fash with warm champagne.

And for FUCK's sake, England. Given the chance of a sane, centrist, non-compromising option, look what people do.
posted by Devonian at 12:20 PM on May 7, 2017 [13 favorites]

I can't say I'm super-optimistic about Macron as president, but hopefully I'll be pleasantly surprised.

Yes. Any victory against fascism is a victory.
posted by GenjiandProust at 12:23 PM on May 7, 2017 [16 favorites]

as a wise man said ...
posted by philip-random at 12:28 PM on May 7, 2017 [1 favorite]

This was a repudiation of MLP. Notice how her percentage of the electorate went up maybe 10-12% going from a multiparty race to a 2 party race. That seems to suggest that she can't even capitalize on normal right-wing party supporters and that the number of burn it all down types on the left is fairly small.

And this was in an election where virtually everything was in her favor. The Socialists are deeply unpopular right now which seems to result in a rightward shift every so often. With the collapse of the mainstream right under scandal MLP should've been able to capitalize on that normal pendulum effect and broaden her appeal. However Melanchon seemed to prevent the anti-globalists from all shifting rightward and Macron was able to catapult himself into popularity.

Moving forward Macron will almost certainly push center right policies which will run straight into opposition from the left and it seems clear that the far right will be toxic in terms of forming any sort of coalition government. The pendulum will shift especially if Macron overreaches and presumably the impending self-immolation of the UK economy will probably tamp down some of the anger at the EU as going it alone clearly isn't going to be seen as a way to grow your economy.
posted by vuron at 12:32 PM on May 7, 2017 [9 favorites]

> et les pommes de terre frites

Quoi, il y a aussi une élection en Belgique?
posted by kleinsteradikaleminderheit at 12:35 PM on May 7, 2017 [9 favorites]

And this was in an election where virtually everything was in her favor.

Well, except that she espoused a lot of despicable ideas that, thankfully, a majority of the French found despicable.
posted by From Bklyn at 12:50 PM on May 7, 2017 [3 favorites]

Well, that's a relief. I was worried France would leave the EU. That would truly have been a blow for the EU.
posted by jouke at 12:52 PM on May 7, 2017 [2 favorites]

I have a bottle of champagne, but it's a magnum, and even if I force my daughter to share it will be too much. So now I'll make myself a cocktail of joy from whatever is in the cupboard
posted by mumimor at 12:53 PM on May 7, 2017 [2 favorites]

Also, if anyone French is online, you have all of my hugs and kisses right now
posted by mumimor at 12:54 PM on May 7, 2017 [7 favorites]

Just got back from the count at my polling station - always good to see that my neighborhood being strongly against Le pen, but boy are those void ballots a pain to count.

A big sigh of relief for France. Taking a deep breath before the parliamentary elections in a months. I'm still not over Le Pen making 11M+ votes
posted by motdiem2 at 1:03 PM on May 7, 2017 [8 favorites]

If I owned a EU flag (and a flagpole) I'd be flying that flag now. Sweet relief.
This outcome does not mean that everything is fine, but it does mean that everything has not gone to shit in a very specific way, that I was worried about.

Not yet, at least.
posted by Too-Ticky at 1:19 PM on May 7, 2017 [6 favorites]

And congratulations, French almost-neighbours.
posted by Too-Ticky at 1:20 PM on May 7, 2017

I went counting too and we had a lot of blank ballots, more than I've ever seen, even though I've been doing election counting for going on 15 years now. One of the other counting tables had a really funny void ballot: someone had printed the top picture on this page, picturing George Brassens, Léo Ferré and Jacques Brel, and had written "Démerdez-vous" (Sort it out yourselves") at the top.

I'm relieved at the result, of course, but I can't help compare it to Chirac's result in 2002, and the race was a lot closer this year, which is seriously frightening.
posted by snakeling at 1:23 PM on May 7, 2017 [12 favorites]

Checked out facebook: all of my radical left friends are really sad that Macron won, and are building up new conspiracy theories. They prefer the facho to the banqueur. This is where I say goodbye.
If you believe that le Pen will be better for the workers and the poor than Macron, you are worse than ignorant, you are stupid.
When I did my PhD, I studied the Weimar Republic, and it was depressing to see how the radical left consistently undermined the legitimacy of the republic. Through my studies, I understood my grandparents much better, they had started out as leftists during the 30's but had moved towards the middle during/after WW2, even as they risked their lives for the left. Both embraced the New Labour of the 90's, and my grandfather didn't live to see its failure. Gran did, however, and became rather radical (again) during old age. But she always held on to the supremacy of democracy over other forms of government.
At the end of the day, Mélenchon, Sanders and Corbyn (and more) are not committed to democracy. They believe it is necessary to turn over government completely and impose radical restrictions on public life. They look at functioning social democracies and deem them inefficient. I get their critique 100%, look at the failure to regulate the bankers after 2008, or the disgusting growth of wealth among the 1%. But history tells us this doesn't work.
What really works are common goals and a sense of common efforts. To get there, we need both sticks and carrots, so I will always participate in demonstrations and also in negotiations. I believe we need to know our strengths, and not be put down by imagined enemies.
I feel that today, we can't really trust our elected politicians, and I understand why some of my peers are looking to the outliers, such as Corbyn. But these guys have been in politics forever and have never, ever been succesfull. Why would they suddenly now know what to do? What we need is not the old left, but someone different.
Obama was that different person, and I don't hold it against him that he couldn't convert all of congress. Macron might be similar. We are not going to get change in one stroke.
posted by mumimor at 1:51 PM on May 7, 2017 [55 favorites]

To sum it up, there is no alternative.
posted by SageLeVoid at 1:59 PM on May 7, 2017 [2 favorites]

Checked out facebook: all of my radical left friends are really sad that Macron won, and are building up new conspiracy theories. They prefer the facho to the banqueur. This is where I say goodbye.

Same. And, given the propensity of some hard leftists to engage in anti-Semitic dogwhistling ("bankers", "Goldman Sachs", and of course, as above, "globalists"/"globalism"), I'm beginning to suspect that some of them don't merely prefer the fasciste to the banqueur but in fact simply prefer the fasciste.
posted by tobascodagama at 2:33 PM on May 7, 2017 [10 favorites]

Some comments, in no particular order:

1. Le Pen did not just lose, she got trounced. She was polling at > 40% no so long ago and her final results will be far below that. Her awful, histrionic performance during the debate and her pitiful attempts at attracting Mélenchon voters by repeating "insoumis" ad nauseam did not work. There will be some reckoning: the FN is deeply fractured and was held together by a little bit of flimsy Scotch tape: the possibility of a Le Pen win. After tonight, the FN hardliners, those racist, antisemitic, homophobic neo-fascists, who accepted her leadership out of loyalty for her dad, may no longer support a losing strategy led by a divorced woman and her gay friends.

2. The radical left who, out of sheer righteousness and ideological orthodoxy, still claims that Macron=Le Pen, are throwing out a whole lot of people with the bathwater - those millions of people of non-European origin living in France, French or not, who are the primary scapegoats of the Le Pen voters. There'll be some reckoning there too.

3. Those last-ditch efforts by the US alt-right, their Russian allies and French collaborators using the same combination of hacking, fake news and bots that did wonders in the US? They fell completly flat in France.

4. Macron is a very, very smart guy, and he led the best campaign possible given the odds. Only a few months ago he was widely ridiculed as a "media fad and a non-story", a "bubble" that would burst at any moment. But let's be frank: he got lucky that the conservative challenger Fillon torpedoed himself and behaved like a complete ass. Let's hope that Macron has what it takes to build the necessary alliances with the right people and turn the economy around.
posted by elgilito at 3:06 PM on May 7, 2017 [31 favorites]

I.e., F.N. v 2.0 did better than v 1.0, but marketing suggests the product line maxed out its potential, so it's time to re-brand. The next time around, it will not only be a few more years separated from Vichy France, but will also have dropped the now-toxic F.N. label.

Perhaps “l'Alternative Pour France”? It worked, somewhat, across the border.

Or they could borrow from the Swedes and call it “Les Democrats Françaises”. Or even go full Zhirinovsky and become “Les Democrats Liberales”

(Apologies for any errors; my Australian-high-school French isn't what it used to be...)
posted by acb at 3:09 PM on May 7, 2017

Mod note: Hello, friends. This is the thread for the French elections. If you want to discuss American politics, we have a very nice thread for that here. If you want to argue about who is the One True Leftist, try going outside and shouting at clouds for a while until the urge passes.
posted by Eyebrows McGee (staff) at 3:09 PM on May 7, 2017 [41 favorites]

I'm pretty dang relieved by this one, gotta say. Perhaps our timeline is shifting lightward.

As a Canadian, this is a little bit like seeing Mom really thriving in her new apartment downtown, while your Dad and brother are both off on a really dark bender and trashing their houses.
posted by mrjohnmuller at 3:20 PM on May 7, 2017 [36 favorites]

/r/france: Prise de température chez nos amis de Le_Canard*

*The_Duck i.e. The_Donald
posted by Freelance Demiurge at 3:29 PM on May 7, 2017 [2 favorites]

I hope our French friends don't mind an American movie clip: La Marseillaise scene from Casablanca
posted by hydropsyche at 3:35 PM on May 7, 2017 [2 favorites]

Okay: the American I am is really jazzed about this because "woo the obvious rightist didn't win". But I'm also very aware that it's not my country and I don't know what it looks like on the inside, so I'm only going to go with a tiny "yay".

Although I do note that Macron issued a video recently encouraging American scientists to come to France to continue climate change research because, basically, "I won't cut funding the way Trump is".

No champagne here, but I was already planning on making a Pounti Auvergnat for dinner tonight, so....hey.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 3:45 PM on May 7, 2017 [3 favorites]

FUN FACT: This is the first time in history that the President of France will speak better English than the President of America.
posted by acb at 3:48 PM on May 7, 2017 [35 favorites]

Although I do note that Macron issued a video recently encouraging American scientists to come to France to continue climate change research because, basically, "I won't cut funding the way Trump is".



Is Macron the first French president not to make a point of avoiding speaking in English?


I certain;y don' t recall any prior president doing that.
posted by ocschwar at 4:00 PM on May 7, 2017

He's not talking to French people with that invitation.
posted by rhizome at 4:11 PM on May 7, 2017 [1 favorite]

New Yorker: French Annoyingly Retain Right To Claim Intellectual Superiority Over Americans.
posted by effbot at 4:25 PM on May 7, 2017 [15 favorites]

I was aware that Le Pen had stepped down as the head of the National Front after winning the first election. It seemed like a transparent attempt to distance herself from the party. It turns out that she had only stepped down temporarily and now she's the head of the National Front again and they're going to change the party's name. Can someone who is familiar with french politics tell me how stupid she thinks the electorate is? Was she just trying to give cover to voters who would vote for her but not the Front?
posted by rdr at 4:41 PM on May 7, 2017

It turns out that she had only stepped down temporarily and now she's the head of the National Front again

Is she doing a Farage? "I tried to quit but they wouldn't let me".
posted by EndsOfInvention at 4:51 PM on May 7, 2017

> French Annoyingly Retain Right To Claim Intellectual Superiority Over Americans.

They kid, but this would have been way scarier without Trump. For better or worse, "don't do what the Americans did" is a powerful argument to make in Europe right now.

And while I'm eternally stuck being embarrassed for Germany while in the US and for the US while in Germany, I'm counting on this for the German election in the fall.
posted by kleinsteradikaleminderheit at 4:54 PM on May 7, 2017 [10 favorites]

Is she doing a Farage? "I tried to quit but they wouldn't let me".

They're just getting more blatant.
posted by rhizome at 4:55 PM on May 7, 2017

They who in folly or mere greed
Enslaved religion, markets, laws,
Borrow our language now and bid
Us to speak up in freedom’s cause.

It is the logic of our times,
No subject for immortal verse –
That we who lived by honest dreams
Defend the bad against the worse.

--Cecil Day-Lewis
posted by librosegretti at 5:12 PM on May 7, 2017 [17 favorites]

I hope Macron attempts to Putin-proof France. I am not sure even what that would mean, but jail terms for the Michael Flynns of France would be a start.
posted by benzenedream at 5:51 PM on May 7, 2017

We are still leading by example: an example of what NOT to do.

You're welcome, France!
posted by lydhre at 5:58 PM on May 7, 2017 [3 favorites]

The election of Donald Trump may have unearthed a basic contradiction at the heart of the international alt-right coalition: How can you claim to be the defender of national greatness and sovereignty if you have enabled the most destructive manifestation of ugly Americanism on the world stage since the Cold War?
posted by jonp72 at 6:13 PM on May 7, 2017 [5 favorites]

Well, thank christ for that, not the best choices, but at least the fascist lost. And, as I am compelled to do these days, here is my not so flattering portrait of Le Pen.
posted by Phlegmco(tm) at 6:25 PM on May 7, 2017 [3 favorites]

The runoff system worked well here.

People complain about having to vote for the lesser of two evils, but this system ultimately gave voters two options: The lesser of two evils, and the (far, far, far) greater of two evils.
posted by schmod at 6:47 PM on May 7, 2017 [6 favorites]

Vive la france! Here's to an election result that didn't leave me despairing...
posted by honey badger at 6:50 PM on May 7, 2017 [1 favorite]

People complain about having to vote for the lesser of two evils, but this system ultimately gave voters two options: The lesser of two evils, and the (far, far, far) greater of two evils.

That's where all the arguments against "voting for the lesser evil" break down. What if the "lesser evil" is several orders of magnitude less evil than the greater evil? It's like being in that Eddie Izzard routine, "Cake or death?," but instead of immediately choosing cake over death, people are like, "Well, I don't know... It might be fattening."
posted by jonp72 at 7:21 PM on May 7, 2017 [25 favorites]

You're going to die anyway, why not get it over with? And cake is vastly inferior to pie, everyone knows that. If this election were legitimate, pie would have been on the ballot.

More seriously, thank goodness there's a country with some goddamn adults voting in elections.
posted by medusa at 10:20 PM on May 7, 2017 [2 favorites]

FUN FACT: This is the first time in history that the President of France🇫🇷 will speak better English than the President of America.🇺🇸

Actually, I'm not sure I would have bet on Dubya to be more intelligible in English than Chirac (who I believe spent some time in the US when he was young).
posted by Segundus at 11:21 PM on May 7, 2017 [2 favorites]

Nothing better than waking up on Monday morning to find that, as expected, ma ma ma ma ma Macron won.
posted by MartinWisse at 12:52 AM on May 8, 2017 [3 favorites]

It was good to wake up to the news this morning in Australia and feel the knot in my stomach loosen, just a little. Later at work (aged care) while I served lunch to them a few old ladies expressed their relief at the result, and concern that people will forget what the Nazis did to their generation. And then we sang a few bars of the Marsellaise.
posted by valetta at 1:33 AM on May 8, 2017 [9 favorites]

I still think people are buying into the 'narrow escape' story far too readily. She was never really close; to win she's going to have to win it in the first round, ie 50% - and she barely made it through to the second round - 21% against both Fillon and Melenchon with 20%. People keep saying 'Oh, next time she'll win!' - no, next time she probably won't even make the second round.

Both sides of the media found it convenient to exaggerate her chances; some because they like her, some because she's a good way of scaring us into embracing the lame duck Presidency of an over-privileged Enarque banker.

I give it a couple of months till we're looking back regretfully on the good old days of Hollande.
posted by Segundus at 2:03 AM on May 8, 2017 [1 favorite]

Luckily someone's done the research to understand why the centre held: The waiter brings over more drinks. Tahar is in his 20s and a Muslim. He has a simple explanation for Macron's triumph. "These Le Pen voters are trapped in a exurban nativist bubble. They are out of touch with the needs and values of real French people, like me." He is right. There are deep forces at work here, which have caused the triumph of innumerable centrists around the western world over the past few decades.
posted by ambrosen at 2:24 AM on May 8, 2017 [7 favorites]

Brexit campaigners disappointed that Le Pen didn't win French election.

Maybe not so surprising if you think about the large overlap between Theresa May's Tories and Marine Le Pen's policy positions:

Want out of the EU? Check
Anti-immigration? Check
Strong and stable (law and order)? Check
Tighten borders? Check
Constantly bringing up WWII for no good reason? Check
Darlings of Trump? Check

The biggest difference seems to be foreign policy, in particular with respect to Russia. But give it a year or two and we'll probably see some convergence there as well.
posted by sour cream at 2:35 AM on May 8, 2017 [2 favorites]

For pro--Brexit The Sun and Daily Mail an election result in France is not worth putting on the front page.

UK newspaper front pages
posted by Mister Bijou at 2:39 AM on May 8, 2017 [3 favorites]

Nate Silver points out that the French polls were really off this time, off by much more than in the Brexit and the 2016 American election, underestimating Macron's victory by seven percentage points.

As far as I know the only time there's been a comparable polling error in France was when the pollsters underestimated Chirac's victory over Le Pen senior by about eight points. My pulled-out-of-thin-air explanation is that a lot of undecided voters where people who really didn't want to vote for the centrist candidate, but on voting day couldn't not vote against the fascist.
posted by Kattullus at 3:07 AM on May 8, 2017 [4 favorites]

Ha ha that New Statesman piece:

Deep in Macron Country

We must now confront an uncomfortable question. Why did so many French people vote for Emmanuel Macron? Was it a lack of economic anxiety, or a lack of racism?
posted by spitbull at 4:15 AM on May 8, 2017 [19 favorites]

Marine Le Pen lost to Emmanuel Macron and absentee/blank votes, securing the 3rd place in the two-candidate runoff.
posted by runcifex at 5:35 AM on May 8, 2017 [3 favorites]

Look at this picture. You just elected the Joker, didn't you?
posted by Segundus at 5:36 AM on May 8, 2017

My pulled-out-of-thin-air explanation is that a lot of undecided voters where people who really didn't want to vote for the centrist candidate, but on voting day couldn't not vote against the fascist.

/stares longingly across Atlantic
posted by saturday_morning at 5:47 AM on May 8, 2017 [6 favorites]

Marine Le Pen lost to Emmanuel Macron and absentee/blank votes, securing the 3rd place in the two-candidate runoff.

Is this verified to be the case?
posted by acb at 5:50 AM on May 8, 2017

acb, Wikipedia cites Ministry of Interior:

- Emmanuel Macron: 20,753,798
- Marine Le Pen: 10,644,118
- Invalid/blank votes: 4,069,256
- Abstention: 12,101,416
posted by runcifex at 6:01 AM on May 8, 2017 [5 favorites]

So this is the political equivalent of the Rabid Puppies finishing up behind “No Award Given”?
posted by acb at 6:13 AM on May 8, 2017 [4 favorites]

Bad news: FN doubled its 2002 result
Good news: FN did not expand support beyond its limited demographic and geographic base
posted by mandolin conspiracy at 6:44 AM on May 8, 2017 [2 favorites]

> "So this is the political equivalent of the Rabid Puppies finishing up behind 'No Award Given'?"

Be aware by this logic, U.S. presidential candidates losing to abstentions include both the winners and the losers in every election since Theodore Roosevelt squeaked just ahead of nonvoters in 1904.
posted by kyrademon at 6:58 AM on May 8, 2017 [3 favorites]

It's a none of the above box on the ballot, not just failure to vote. Turnout was slightly lower than the first round, but not hugely.
posted by ambrosen at 7:07 AM on May 8, 2017

Bad news: FN doubled its 2002 result
Good news: FN did not expand support beyond its limited demographic and geographic base

Défaite électorale et victoire culturelle du Front national (Electoral defeat and cultural victory of the National Front )
posted by Mister Bijou at 7:16 AM on May 8, 2017 [2 favorites]

> "It's a none of the above box on the ballot, not just failure to vote."

Are you certain? It's listed as:

Turnout: 35,467,172 / 74.56%
Abstentions: 12,101,416 / 25.44%
Registered voters: 47,568,588 (i.e. Turnout + Abstentions)

That would seem to imply to me that abstentions means those who didn't vote at all. "Blank and null ballots" was a smaller amount (4,069,256, or 11.47% of the Turnout) and if you only count those, Le Pen came in ahead of them.
posted by kyrademon at 7:20 AM on May 8, 2017 [2 favorites]

Marine Le Pen lost to Emmanuel Macron and absentee/blank votes, securing the 3rd place in the two-candidate runoff.

Si l’on additionne les 12 millions d’abstentionnistes et les 4,07 millions de bulletins blancs et nuls, on arrive à un total de 16,1 millions d’électeurs qui n’ont voté pour aucun des deux candidats au second tour. Soit près de 34 % du total. C’est moins que le score d’Emmanuel Macron (43,63 %), mais plus que celui de Marine Le Pen (22,38 %).

My translation: If you add up the 12 million abstentions and the 4.07 million blank or voided votes, you come up with a total of 16.1 million electors who voted for neither of the two candidates at the second round, That's to say, nearly 34% of the total. This is less than the score of Macron (43,63%), but more than that of Le Pen (22,28%).

Source: Le Monde
posted by Mister Bijou at 7:49 AM on May 8, 2017 [3 favorites]

Huge apologies, I'd misunderstood a couple of things I'd read on Twitter about it, plus one of the visualisations I saw.
posted by ambrosen at 8:03 AM on May 8, 2017 [2 favorites]

From mister bijou's Libération link above...

Les discours et pulsions xénophobes débordent les sphères toujours plus vastes des cadres comme de l’électorat du Front national. Les frontières idéologiques se brouillent: la gauche du gouvernement s’est inspirée d’une mesure défendue par l’extrême droite (la «déchéance de nationalité»), tandis que Marine Le Pen a plagié un discours prononcé par François Fillon, tant celui-ci puisait à une même source identitaire fondée sur un récit romancé de la nation française et une vision communautarisée de la société française.

Un ethnocentrisme nombriliste se fait jour, une conception dogmatique de l’ordre culturel et social se manifeste, y compris dans la rigidité républicaniste de gauche, d’un Valls ou d’un Mélenchon. Cette vision étriquée de la France et de la République a largement investi le champ politique, au point de participer à la recomposition les clivages entre gauche/droite/extrême droite…

Any translation errors entirely mine:

Xenophobic discourses and impulses reach beyond the spheres of the cadres comprising the electorate of the National Front. Ideological boundaries are becoming blurred: the left defined itself by being a measure of defence against the extreme right (the "decline of nationality"), while Marine Le Pen plagiarized a speech given by François Fillon, in which both drew on a romanticized account of the French nation and a communitarian vision of French society.

A self-absorbed ethnocentrism is emerging in which a dogmatic conception of the cultural and social order manifests itself, even in the left-wing republicanist rigidity of a Valls or a Melenchon. This narrow vision of France and the Republic has largely invaded the political field, causing a recomposition of the cleavages between left/ right/extreme right...
posted by mandolin conspiracy at 10:19 AM on May 8, 2017

I don't think I understand the geography of the election map. Is there somewhere I can read more about why the region that voted for Macron did so? Except around Paris and Strasbourg, the Macron vote doesn't seem to match a population density map.
posted by nat at 4:12 PM on May 8, 2017

I assume you mean the NYT map? Cities have generally voted for Macron: Paris has almost 90% support, Lyon around 85%, Toulouse 83%, Strasbourg 81%, Lille 78%, etc. In less populated regions, it's more complicated. And you can't really say that people voted for Macron, because a lot of people voted against Le Pen.

The Le Pen-heavy regions have historically been Front National's:

The North and Lorraine regions used to be heavily industrialised, mostly mining, and they've had high unemployment and poverty rates for decades now. They used to vote communist, and when the far-left disappointed them and the mainstream left and right ignored them, they heavily reported their votes to FN.

The south of France, especially the Côte-d'Azur, skews older, as people tend to retire to the south and sunny parts.

But even then, there's only 2 départements who had a Le Pen majority, and it wasn't very high.
posted by snakeling at 12:58 AM on May 9, 2017 [4 favorites]

Article by Gadi Evron on Hackermoon: Analyzing a counter intelligence cyber operation: How Macron just changed cyber security forever

Let’s quickly go over what happened, and then analyze the operation and why it is so… well, cool.

Important: We don’t know much at this stage, so I will assume a lot...

But remember, regardless of what actually happened, one of the major lessons of cyber security, as learned in Estonia a decade ago and endless times since, is that what people perceive matters as much if not more so than what the technical details of any attack may have actually been. And that further, attacks serve a purpose. The motivation can be political or otherwise, but they must be analyzed in context.

Further, as shown in this analysis, the power of cyber deception is in increasing the attackers’ costs. The burden of anomaly detection, figuring out what’s real and what’s not — is now on them. A few fake docs killed the election hack. Future attackers will have to sift through data. Cyber deception inflicts economic costs on attackers.

(Note, he includes a plug for his own company, Cymmetria, towards the end.)
posted by nangar at 7:57 AM on May 9, 2017 [4 favorites]

Thomas Taylor: The Domino Defect
posted by GhostintheMachine at 8:08 AM on May 9, 2017 [5 favorites]

The fact that Macron is able and willing to recite the opening dialogue from Molière's "Le Misanthrope" from memory, when purloined in public - probably bodes well. (But this makes me picture an ideal world where Borris Johnson restricts his speeches entirely to Homer - link from the same show)
posted by rongorongo at 1:05 AM on May 10, 2017 [1 favorite]

Well, this just happened: Earlier this week, Manuel Valls, the former prime minister and runner-up in the Socialist primary, announced his intention to run as an En Marche candidate in the up-coming parliamentary election. Members of La Republique en marche, Macron's newly formed party, pointed out that he would have to apply to run as an En Marche candidate and go through the same vetting process as other candidates. (The deadline to apply was yesterday.) Today, Jean-Paul Delevoye, head of the vetting committee, announced at a press conference that Valls had not met the party's criteria to be accepted as a candidate, and added "We are not in the recycling business".

The party's full list of parliamentary candidates is supposed to released tomorrow.
posted by nangar at 8:33 AM on May 10, 2017 [1 favorite]

rongorongo: The fact that Macron is able and willing to recite the opening dialogue from Molière's "Le Misanthrope" from memory, when purloined in public - probably bodes well.

It either bodes well... or France has elected Sideshow Bob for president.
posted by Kattullus at 2:48 PM on May 10, 2017 [3 favorites]

La Republique en marche's list is out. They're running candidates for 428 of 577 parliamentary seats. Of the candidates, 52% haven't held elected office before. Exactly half of them are women. (This was one of the party's stated goals.) Valls was rejected as a candidate, but they're not running a candidate against him. At a press conference announcing the release of the list this morning, the party's general secretary said "We haven't shut the door on the former prime minister's nose."
posted by nangar at 8:59 AM on May 11, 2017 [2 favorites]

The list includes 24 incumbent members of parliament. All of them are Socialist MPs who decided to defect to the new party.
posted by nangar at 11:26 AM on May 11, 2017

Macron names Le Havre mayor Edouard Philippe (Les Republicains) as his prime minister.
posted by Cash4Lead at 11:13 AM on May 15, 2017 [3 favorites]

The cabinet appointments are out. Another case of exact gender parity. Eleven female and eleven male ministers.

Partial list:

Economy – Bruno Le Maire, Republican
Labor – Muriel Pénicaud, served in previous Socialist governments
Budget – Gérald Darmanin, Republican
Foreign Affairs – Jean-Yves Le Drian, Socialist, defense minister in the outgoing government
Defense – Sylvie Goulard, MoDem
Justice – François Bayrou, MoDem
Interior – Gérard Collomb, Socialist
Environment – Nicolas Hulot, journalist and environmental activist
Digital Technology – Mounir Mahjoubi

The Democratic Movement, abbreviated MoDem in French, is a small centrist party allied with La République En Marche. François Bayrou endorsed Macron rather than run for president himself in the last election.

Mounir Mahjoubi headed the Macron campaign's IT department and was the chair of the previous government's Digital Technology Council before he left to join Macron's campaign. He's widely credited with thwarting attempts by hackers allied with far right to influence the French election. We don't know much about exactly what happened there, but it looks like the new government decided to create a new cabinet post so they could appoint him to it.

La République En Marche published an updated list of parliamentary candidates Monday. They're now running candidates in 511 legislative districts out of 577. The list still stays really really close to gender parity and includes more former MoDem people.
posted by nangar at 10:49 AM on May 17, 2017 [3 favorites]

If anyone's still following this hread, I'd like to make a correction. The position of secrétaire d’État chargé du numérique (roughly, State Secretary for Digital Technology) has existed since 2014. The only change here is that Mahjoubi will be reporting directly to the Prime Minister, not the Economy Minister.
posted by nangar at 6:28 AM on May 19, 2017 [3 favorites]

Final updated list of legislative candidates from LREM: They've got people running in 526 districts. Polls give the new party a shot at winning a majority. Legislative elections in France are tricky to poll. I don't think any of the polls out so far are reliable. We'll see what happens.
posted by nangar at 1:05 PM on May 19, 2017 [1 favorite]