Sarkozy will win
At this point, with 10 days left before the 1st round, I don't see how the other candidates can turn things around. I am calling a Sarkozy win. It's not taking a big risk to predict that. He just played it too well : I mean this is a guy who says idiotic things every other day, and manages to get credit for them. And underneath the rhetorical flourishes, he's going to pardon Chirac and try to systematically destroy what is left of France's redistributive policies. It does not mean it will succeed, but... The funniest part is that all the ploucs and petits blancs who are going to vote for him out of "exasperation" as he said, are the ones who are going to suffer most from his neo-liberal policies. This marks the beginning of something (we got hints of it in 2002) : just like in the United Sates, the French lower classes now vote against their very own interests.
It is very sad indeed that it all proceeds from a gross misrecognition of France's real problems. I believe they are more institutional than social. The French can and do compete very well in the globalized economy. As in many other developed countries, the bottom 20% seem to be left behind and the government no longer seems interested in promoting proactive policies to retrain and retool. That is an expression of who really "owns" the State and the levers of power, so to speak. The top quintile is doing very well and will continue to do so for the foreseeable future. Strong euro, climbing stock market, shrinking taxes, cheap health care and cheap world-class education. What's not to love?
