It Has To Be Bayrou

François Bayrou would certainly beat either Tweedledum or Tweedledee on the second ballot, should he make it that far. He must.

The Blairite Royal might well use France’s UN Security Council seat to support, and indeed France’s formidable military might to participate in, a war against Iran (which would therefore suddenly re-appear on the agenda), and subsequent wars against Syria, North Korea, Venezuela and who knows where else. Sarkozy, a neocon to the American extent of the word, would certainly do so.

But Bayrou, a socially conservative, social-democratic Catholic whose recent overtures towards Euroscepticism represent a welcome recovery of patriotic spirit, certainly would not do so, and, in the very different circumstances of the post-Iraq world, might well be able, therefore, to prevent such wars altogether.

One should no more vote for Royal or Sarkozy than for Le Pen. Indeed, while Le Pen would certainly make France a thoroughly nasty place to live in, or even to visit, he would pose no threat to the wider world, and would indeed be a bulwark against any resurgence of neoconservatism, as well as being (like Bayrou) a bulwark against Islam.

Royal or Sarkozy, by contrast, would not be either such bulwark, but the very reverse, at least cheering on neocon wars all over the place, and pursuing the neocon aims (for so they are) of Islamising Europe and of dismantling social provision.

It has to be Bayrou.