(5 minutes read)
Pastoral-comical, historical-pastoral, tragical-historical, tragical-comical-historical-pastoral. For two consecutive days the Right has been utterly, brilliantly, totally, tragical – comical
The Executive Committee of the traditional-Right Les Républicains had intended meeting yesterday afternoon in their party HQ. Their objective? The removal of their increasingly-deranged Party President, Captain Eric Ciotti, from the command of The Good Ship Gaullism.
This was intended to be achieved by either forcing Ciotti’s resignation from the Party Presidency, or by throwing the scoundrel out (windows were not necessarily involved, though it is a tall building).
Timing was all-important. The Executive Committee had to move before their party sank into the vile slough of Ciotti’s alliance with Le Pen’s ultra-Right National Rally Party. This (d)alliance) would bring about The New-Right/Ultra-Right Reich and would, most importantly, save Ciotti’s electoral arse from being tanned by the Brownshirts. Alongside the political machinations, the televisual aspects of this alliance were being co-ordinated with that very dear friend of this blog, Vincent Bolloré. Yes, it’s the return of the evil, multi-media-owning, ultra-conservative Catholic billionaire who has long dreamt of the emergence of this new Reich to defend The True Christian West’s interests.
Ciotti, though, knew that the simple stuff usually works best. So he locked the Républicains HQ doors, warning of threats to Law ‘n Order, and ordered every member of staff out of the building.
The Républicains Executive Committee swiftly switched their revolutionary (possibly counter-revolutionary dependent on personal perspective?) meeting to the Musée social, historically the home of France’s co-operative and mutualist movements.
We soon learned the unanimous decision of the Républicain Party Executive: Ciotti was no longer a member of the Républicains Party.
The Republicains Party Secretary then produced a spare set of keys and opened the locked building.
The Executive also announced they’d chosen and endorsed candidates to fight every National Assembly seat, including Ciotti’s in Nice (with Ciotti no longer a Party member).
Ciotti became seriously agitated, tweeting that the alleged Républicains Pärty Executive meeting was in flagrant breach of Party rules. So he announced that he was, and remained, Party President. In that capacity he proposed choosing 80 fellow-swivel-eyed-mouth-frothers who’d would stand for His Party.
Last night, Ciotti emailed ‘his’ membership seeking support in his fight [as of today, 60,000 have signed up for the Le Pen alliance].
This morning the arse (and farce) rolled on.
Ciotti turned up at Républicains Party HQ. Ciotti said he would be working as usual, soon tweeting a film of himself ‘Au travail pour la France’ (note obligatory exclamation mark) settling (pro tem?) into his Presidential Chair. Alas no film has yet emerged of him lunching today with his new bestie, Jordan Bardella.
Questions: Did they eat salade niçoise? Will Ciotti be one of Bardella’s Ministers?
The Républicain Party’s Executive Committee now meets tomorrow to re-confirm yesterday’s decisions.
But where are the clowns? Send in the clowns. Don’t bother, they’re here. As for the lawyers, they’re here too. Tomorrow, a Paris Court will opine on Ciotti’s claim that he’s still a Républicains Party member.
[‘This fine farce should have a reasonably long run’ most reviewers say.]
A last word about Eye-Swivelling Ultra-Right folk being thrown out.
A moment’s silence (but not more) for Marion Maréchal (Le Pen’s niece). On Sunday she led Racist Zemmour’s Euro-list of candidates, winning 5 Euro-MPs. Yesterday, Zemmour threw her out of his Reconquête party, and with three of Maréchal’s chums walking too, Zemmour’s got left with one Euro-MP.
Maréchal’s crime? Urging the nation to vote for Marine Le Pen’s party (plus Ciotti and friends), and asking Zemmour not to stand candidates against Le Pen.
Zemmour accused Maréchal of ‘lying’, of ‘being surrounded by treachery professionals’, and (everything having happened within 48 hours of the Euro-elections) this was ‘a world record for treachery’.
Certainly historical for the Left
The Left’s hastily-mashed-up new Front populaire announced yesterday morning agreement on how to divvy up the seats:
- Hard Left France Unbound has 230 candidates (down from 328 in 2022, when Mélenchon nearly made the Presidential run-off)
- The Socialists fight 175 seats (up from their previous 70 recognising their near-second place in these Euro-Elections)
- The Greens have 90 (down from 100)
- The Communists 50 again.
The Left Party which previously held a seat in the last Parliament will name the person to fight that seat on 30 June.
[Pragmatic Political Power Note: In the last legislative elections, Mélenchon’s Hard Left won 75 seats, the Socialists 31, the Greens 23, and the ‘Democratic and Republican Left’ 22. So it’s almost certain these Legislative Elections will see the Hard Left as still the largest Left party, making them the Popular Front ‘leader’.]
Seats not ‘currently’ held by the Left were hard-fought-over with the parties attempting to ensure as many ‘winnable’ seats as possible would be contested by ‘their’ party.
After four days of increasingly tense discussions on the common programme and candidates – with Libération reporting that the description of the original Hamas terrorist attack and antisemitism were both ‘challenging’ for the Hard Left – this evening the four parties put out a statement that a deal had been done: we are urged to ‘rise up and join the new Front Populaire. Hope is here’.
Mélenchon is keeping his name in the public eye, even if (for possibly the first time) he’s being reticent(-ish) about his ambitions.
[Much Reviled Politicians Note: in May Ipsos asked who people LEAST wanted as President in 2027. Only one person is even more disliked than Mélenchon (64%), it’s the multiple-convicted racist Eric Zemmour (68%)]
Asked last night whether he wanted to be Prime Minister, Melenchon told TF1: ‘I know I can do it … I’m not counting myself out, but I’m not imposing myself’. He then parroted the formula suggested by Socialist Party General Secretary Olivier Faure, whereby the largest Left Parliamentary group will propose a Prime Minister [so that’s a win for the Hard Left].
Former Prime Minister Attal did his best today (and be prepared for its constant repetition) to big up Mélenchon, and ensure The Left cannot escape the downside of his name-check.
Attal said debates must be between ‘those identified as potential Prime Minister … so M. Bardella for the Far Right, M. Melenchon for the Far Left and their allies, and myself for the progressiste [ie progressive or forward-thinking] parties’
For once, happily, Mélenchon acted in the greater interest. He responded to TF1 and France2 (ignoring Attal) that the Left had no ‘proposed Prime Minister’ so the ‘Left’s party leaders’ would participate in such debates.
For Macron it’s tragical-comical-historical-pastoral
It’s increasingly difficult to understand if there’s method in Macron’s madness. All was supposed to be revealed two days ago, but then Macron’s appearance had been postponed a day.
By now, of course, we’ve completely forgotten the utter catastrophe that was Macron’s very personal Euro-Election-campaign.
So Macron’s long press conference yesterday was his first serious outing since that humiliating Sunday defeat. Macron explained the dissolution complaining, almost petulantly, that his minority Government hadn’t been able to govern or build durable coalitions. Also, National Rally’s victory in the Euro-Elections could not be ignored: so going back to the people was the only route to take.
Macron condemned the ‘unholy’ alliances of the Left and Far Right ‘extremes’: ‘Since Sunday night, the masks have been falling and the struggle for values has suddenly come into plain sight … The dissolution [of Parliament] is a litmus test differentiating those who only want success for their own little organisations and those who want France to succeed.’
Deriding Ciotti’s alliance with National Rally, Macron said rejecting the Right’s heritage of de Gaulle, Chirac and Sarkozy would lead to ‘a pact with the devil’.
Then he put down the democratic Socialist Left (formerly ‘republican’) for allying with a ‘far Left’, guilty (as he saw it) of
- anti-semitism [certainly true],
- communautarisme [I’m not personally hung up about this, but then there’s no true republican blood in my veins; though en même temps (coining a phrase) remember when a more thoughtful Macron wanted to bury the word communautarisme, saying ‘I am not at ease with that word … we can have communities in the French Republic [but] those affiliations cannot subtract from the Republic. They always add to it as an additional identity compatible with the Republic’], and
- anti-Parliamentarianism [the hard Left’s certainly been rambunctiously OTT in Parliament].
Macron made clear that his party’s campaign for the Legislative Elections would be ‘led by the Prime Minister’. Equally, Macron won’t debate with Marine Le Pen. High-handedly, Macron said his role was ‘setting the course’ and ‘providing a vision’ because ‘the President’s not there to campaign in these elections’ [said a man who was never off our screens during the Euro-Elections]
There’s a breathlesss hush in the close tonight
One opinion poll does not a summer make, but Elabe tonight reported:
- National Rally (Le Pen) 31%
- New Front Populaire (The Left) 28%
- Ensemble (Macron’s team) 18%
NB. It’s really difficult translating national poll analysis into individual Parliamentary seats, especially because of the two-round vote system. All guesses about the look of the future Parliament should be treated with extreme caution.
Background to the Legislative Elections 2024
To read much MUCH more about how the Legislative Elections actually work, it’s all available here
French politics today 
Leave a comment