French Presidential Election 22 April 2007 Thread

[afleitch]

Royal wins.

[afleitch]

Royal down 8? Ouch. Pleased to see Bayrou do well though

[afleitch]

Is it correct to say that those who 'do not express' will still vote, but they won't say why or are undecided? If so, who do you think they will 'break' for?

EDIT- good site, probably been mentioned on here before http://www.election-politique.com/pres1995.php it also has tv coverage of the exit polls from each round back to the 70's. (Miterrands victory in 1988 was heralded by the sounds of Dire Straits )

[afleitch]

Sarkozy-Bayrou would be interesting

[afleitch]

Segolene is simply covering her back. The bigger the programme the easier it is to focus on the popular aspects of it and let the more unpopular parts fall by the wayside. She doesn’t, despite her dip in the polls need to worry about anyone from the left ‘spoiling’ her candidacy. Sure, Bove is now running, but he’s seems to be taking support from Besancenot (and ideologically is in a bit of a grey area for many far leftists) and the far left have no one of significant stature (okay Robert Hue wasn’t great, but at least you knew where he stood) If anything it’s Bayrou who could be the dark horse if the public get a little frustrated with or simply bored by Sarkozy or Royal. Bayrou is well placed to pick up support should something happen during the campaign that causes Royal’s support to collapse. At the moment however I can’t see anything other than a Sarkozy/Royal run off.

[afleitch]

IFOP for ParisMatch. Monday- to be published on Thursday apparently

Round 1
Sarkozy 33.5 (+2.5)
Royal 26 (-1.5)
Bayrou 14 (+3)
Le Pen 10 (-3)

Round 2
Sarkozy 54 (+2)
Royal 46 (-2)

-----------------

This is the first poll since the launch of Royal's platform.

[afleitch]

Is Royal done?

The CSA poll could be an outlyer, particularly in comparison with another poll published that day (BVA - though not sure of the fieldwork) Either way it seems Bayrou is quite the dark horse. Should the current trend continue (which they won't) he would be level pegging with Royal in early March. If so they might have to start polling Sarkozy v Bayrou.

[afleitch]

Bayrou hits 20% in new poll. Still looking for the rest of the poll.

EDIT: ah here we go

http://uk.news.yahoo.com/05032007/323/france-s-bayrou-confirmed-third-man-new-polls.html

[afleitch]

Things have taken another turn for the unpredictable then. Btw, why so sure that Bayrou will collapse? (serious question, not even slightly loaded or anything like that).

Wishful thinking? Bayrou's continued bounce is probably helped with this weeks focus on agricultural issues in the campaign. The only downside is that he is perhaps peaking too early in the campaign.

[afleitch]

SCA survey

Sarkozy 26
Royal 25
Bayrou 24 (!)

[afleitch]

SCA?

Whoops! CSA

[afleitch]

I don’t expect any candidate to poll, on the day anything higher than the 20’s. It appears that Bayrou took support from Royal early on but is now eating into Sarkozy’s support. Royal has been flatlining for the past two weeks and more, but while not spectacular it may prove her salvation and passage to the second round. Though it should be noted that the IPSOS daily trackers have not noted this bounce (but daily trackers aren’t worth the money in my opinion) Ultimately Bayrou has been ignored by both Sarkozy and Royal in this campaign and has painted himself as a centrist against the left/right dichotomy. When he is finally targeted by both Royal and Sarkozy he may prove vindicated; ‘left and right gang up on Bayrou’ etc. As I mentioned previously, this week has seen the campaign focus on rural issues (with Royal photographed holding a lamb in true Lady T style) and Airbus. For Bayrou, ever the provencial farmer, this was going to be his week anyway. If he was still on say 10% of the poll he’d still get a few points bounce, but of course his familiarity is now much higher.

Also, what can often be forgotten is that this election will be the first of the post-Chirac era. Chirac was the ‘right’ for decades; RPR and UMP were vehicles for ‘Chiracisme’ and as most centre-right parties in the fifth republic have been personality based, the UMP will struggle to survive in it’s present form regardless of whether Sarkozy wins or looses (and I certainly can’t see any party establish itself ‘around’ Sarkozy!) Bayrou has also, successfully pressed the issue of economics. The UMP and the PS are still statist parties and despite the rhetoric wish to govern France on the statist model. Bayrou and the UMP while Europhile, are also free-market, but not trying to emulate the Anglophone free market system which is political suicide even for those who secretly support it.

[afleitch]

It's been a long time since they were, as long as I can remember. If Chirac does run, which he'll say on the 12th, he'll most probably run as an independent.

On Bayrou- that guy's a joke, he's rising in the polls because Royal is bombing it.

I disagree; both with your opinion of Bayrou and on why he's rising so fast Royal has actually been pretty stable in the polls these past two/three weeks, drifting between the mid to high twenties. It is Sarkozy who has seen his support dip from the low 30's to the mid twenties. Bayrou originally benefited from Royal's drift downwards, now he's teasing away support from Sarkozy with his centrist stance.

With Royal and Sarkozy now both trying to savage Bayrou (and keep this a left v right race perhaps) they are proving his point; that left and right have a stranglehold on the French political scene, both the moderate left and right and the far left and right.

[afleitch]

IFOP

Sarkozy 28%
Bayrou 23%
Royal 23%

[afleitch]

Things look to be quite open right now don't they? Anyone who makes any predictions now is official A Fool...

Btw, any figures for Le Pen and the far-lefties?

Le Pen scores 13% (I wonder what happens if he genuinely fails to reach the 500 mark?) Nothing about the 'lefties'; in other polls their fluctuating support and interchangeable seems to nothing more than 'statistical noise.' I strangely 'like' Besancenot though so I hope he's able to run

[afleitch]

I haven't been to find that IFOP poll anywhere. Could you give a link, afleitch?

http://fr.news.yahoo.com/11032007/363/sondage-francois-bayrou-rattrape-segolene-royal.html

It also says that should Le Pen fail to make the ballot we would have;

Sarkozy 34.5
Bayrou 25
Royal 24

[afleitch]

Btw, the newest Ipsos poll is something like 31/25/21. Is there a site that tracks poll numbers from all companies?

I use Le Monde, though they can be slow to update

http://www.lemonde.fr/web/vi/0,47-0@2-823448,54-848463,0.html

Once you are in the main 'Presidentielles' site, click on 'Sondages' and you get a nifty list of polling companies and polls for each round.

http://www.lemonde.fr/web/sequence/0,2-823448,1-0,0.html

EDITl Two links as im not sure which one will work!

[afleitch]

Merci

Some of the differences between the different polling companies are quite interesting.

True; also the high number of abstentions that seems to come with all presiential polls goin back a number of years makes things complicated. Le Pen has 'flatlined' but is a good 3, 4 points ahead of his support this time during the 2002 race. It is probably in Royals best interests for Le Pen to appear on the ballot,

Neither can Bayrou be equated with Balladur who began the campaign with around 30% and fell from then on into a tussle with Jospin for the second place spot (Jospin however rallied at the 11th hour and of course came in first - again the polls got it wrong) I don't think any of the four leading candidates are certain to go through but neither can any be ruled out.

[afleitch]

If Bayrou is the Condorcet winner, as the polls are now consistently suggesting, then democratic fairness dictates that he should become the next President. It's as simple as that.

Not sure that Bayrou would beat Sarko.

55-45 would be quite a margin for Sarkozy to recover.

And considering Sego has a hard time in the polls against Sarko if I was a Royal supporter, or more accurately 'anti-Sarko' then I'd think about voting Bayrou in the first round as he seems to be the only one able to beat Sarkozy in the second round.

[afleitch]

I think there is still the distinct possibility, at present, that Bayrou could actually top the poll. Od course we still have a long way to go and he could fade.

[afleitch]

Interesting. If Bove doesn't make it, will it help Royal make the second round, or will his numbers just collapse into the statistical noise and go to Besancenot or Buffet?

When he entered the race he mainly took from Besancenot and Buffet IIRC.

Yes - though in recent weeks seems to have lost support back to them, of course all figures for the far left are nothing more than noise.

[afleitch]

Time's reporting that a disgruntled advisor attacked Segolene as 'an incompetent amateur and egomaniac who was a danger to France.' With her only motive being 'personal glory' Oh dear, oh dear.

[afleitch]

With Bayrou you get substance. Sarkozy and Royal both have keen minds, and while I prefer Sarkozy over Royal neither are that endearing.

[afleitch]

Margaret Thatcher has been the victim of a partially self afflicted character assasination. She is the bogey-woman who symbolises what was wrong with the 80's and is rarely credited, or is credited grudgingly for what went right. Margaret Thatcher did help the aspirational working class; assisted places schemes and the right to buy scheme is monumental for example. She encouraged a long term strategy for the rebuilding and reshaping of a modern, and now succesful British economy and it is quite right for people such as Gordon Brown and Tony Blair to credit her (more so in speeches and in interviews than David Cameron has ever done) She was no saint, but neither was she the villain that was made out to be for political gain.

Privately Thatcher was no doubt well prepared for this portrayal; it had been created  long before she was PM and before she was leader. She voted in favour of the decriminalisation of homosexuality and in favour of David Steels abortion bill. In voting in favour of both she was in the minority in the Conservative Party. While she was Education Secretary she helped save the Open University from those in her own party who wished for it to be wound down, because she believed in aspiration and she saw the benefits of wide scale, accessable and free further education.

She was accused of being 'The milk snatcher' something that she has never shaken off and I think that for all her faults, and for all my personal disagreements with policy and style on this she has be defended.

Disregarding the fact that the previous Labour government had abolished free school milk for those in secondary eduction, and disregarding the fact that the abolition of free school milk in primary schools was already being openly tabled by the civil service when she became Education Secretary, Margaret Thatcher opposed the abolition of free school milk, and pressurised the Cabinet into dropping their proposals. She failed to win them over and in the tradition of collective cabinet responsibility she voted with her colleagues. She was only partially vindicated when her concerns and positions were finally published under the thirty year rule. Yet even today she is still the 'milk snatcher', and she's still alot of things. Some true, and some false and unjust.

It's time for politicians who owe their career to her downfall and who resort to the 'myth of Thatcher' to excuse or to deflect from their own failings in government and outside, to move on and to leave her alone.

[afleitch]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/6558949.stm

BBC article about Le Pen.

Talks about some of his supporters. Most shocking thing from it: a decent number of Muslims will vote for him.

And the reasons why don't, unfortunately, surprise me.