The big losers out of Emmanuel Macron’s significant changing of the guard in the French parliamentary elections have been the Socialists, who lost a whopping 250 seats, ending up with only 29 MPs. This was seemingly a reaction to the high unemployment and declining national confidence characterising François Hollande’s tenure as president. However, Marine Le Pen, who finally won a seat in parliament after four attempts, will lead a much smaller group than she had hoped, with she and seven others representing the far right Front National (FN)1. To form a ‘group’ in the French parliament requires a minimum of 15 MPs, so FN cannot do that by themselves; they will have to join like-minded right wingers to do so1.
Marine Le Pen was rebuffed in the Presidential election, losing to Macron by a margin of 2 to 1. She was not helped by the realisation that she possessed similar attitudes to those of Donald Trump, with all the incompetence baggage that entails. It perhaps was also not helped by Le Pen having been filmed meeting Vladimir Putin, when she was in Moscow trawling for a loan from Russian banks, as French banks were not keen to lend her money because of FN’s past anti-Semitism and racism. There was also the hacking of Macron’s e-mail system as well as an assortment of rumours put out, presumably by the Russians, to try to damage Macron’s credibility2. On top of this, there are the revelations concerning the Trump regime and Russian hacking, his family’s self-enrichment, and alleged money laundering3. None of this would have gone down well with the French electorate, and it is suspected that is the reason Le Pen’s FN did much worse than expected.
Donald Trump and his chaotic regime in Washington have, in the long run, been the best thing that ever happened to the left (and the centre) in Europe. Long berated for being soft on everything, Trump has shown just what a mess a bunch of incompetent right wing crazies can make of a government. It may also be a bonus for the left in the USA, because as Trump drowns in his own narcissistic incompetence, the Republican Party seem intent on following him down the vortex, hopefully to obtain at least some form of realisation that you are to govern for your people, not your corporations.
Sources
- https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/jun/19/emmanuel-macron-promises-new-brand-of-french-politics?CMP=twt_gu
- http://www.blotreport.com/eu-politics/marine-le-pen-trumped/
- https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2017/03/28/trump-business-past-ties-russian-mobsters-organized-crime/98321252/
