Home is where the heart is

The man who many think was implicated in the Dominic Strauss-Kahn sting is back on the campaign trail. But doubts persist about where his loyalties really lie….and his entry into the 2017 Presidential race coul trigger a nightmare outcome for France.

Le Figaro’s front page here led yesterday with the news that most French Socialists want the sitting President Francois Hollande to have to win the right to be chosen as the PS Candidate for 2017 via primaries. Le Fig is a very right-wing newspaper, but the survey carried out for them is pretty robust: it shows that 75% of loyal PS voters want the Party to make him earn the right to be chosen.

And just when you thought fortunes couldn’t dip any lower for the man named after a low country, the survey also revealed that his Prime Minister Manuel Valls has over 50% more support to be the Presidential candidate than him.

In my area here (split between Communists and Front Nationalistes) Hollande is referred to as Le Zero. The Reds think he is a corporacratic collaborator, and the Le Pen army think he is letting Germany to be too dominant – while allowing in too many immigrants who undercut French workers. Marine Le Pen has high hopes of moving closer to the trade unions and exploiting their fears. If she pulled that off, she’d be the first European politician to repeat Hitler’s organised labour success in Nazi Germany. She’d be, in fact, a National Socialist. Maybe that’s what the Front’s new name is going to be.

We already know the new name of France’s conservative UMP: les Republicains. Yes, it’s the Sarko Kid on the comeback trail….the original corporacat will compete to get the 2017 candidacy. While this tells you quite a lot about the parlous state of French politics, it also represents an increasingly clear attempt by the corporate technocrats to close any doors anywhere in Europe still open to The Making of Mistakes; for Nicolas Sarkozy is very much their man.

As long ago as 2007, US commentators were writing that

‘….the current French Interior Minister [Sarkozy] and leader of the UMP conservative party is pro-American. He understands that the war on terrorism is the world’s fight and not one America should have to bear alone….he is vocally enthusiastic about the Anglo-Saxon economic model and keen to shake up the statist, government-centered French economy with a hefty dose of innovation and entrepreneurialism….’

Once elected, he was Washington’s star boy – and Wall Street’s favourite europower conduit. But then his neoliberal ideas about l’Anglosaxonisme ran into trouble, and by 2010 the US were ‘betting the farm’ on Angela Merkel’s much stronger hold on both the German people, and the real power in Europe.

Nevertheless, there remains the suspicion in many French and British minds that Sarkozy cooperated covertly with the Americans on the ‘Drown DSK’ mission. Certainly, the Elysee knew within seconds that Strauss-Kahn (left) was being sought on rape charges. And in the final months of his Presidency, Sarkozy had three private meetings with Goldman Sachs’ infamous CEO Lloyd Blankfein.

I’ve been chatting on and off with a New York source for some weeks now, on the subject of Sarkozy’s attempt at a comeback. It’s clear that the State Department doesn’t want any ‘mistakes’ in France. And in terms of stamping US/UK neoliberal corporatism onto France, Nicolas Sarkozy is easily the best shot they have.

It is alleged (but I have no physical evidence) that Sarko has access to US funds….hence his rapid rise from the ashes. And in this regard, of course, he has the firm backing of Christine Lagarde (right)…she who benifitted hugely from DSK’s demise. She who is, effectively, an American with a French accent. She who is tainted by the same money-for-power scandals as Sarkozy himself.

But it won’t be all plain sailing for Nico – not by any stretch. I have maintained for some time now that either Italy or France (or a combo of the two) will be iceberg that finally sends the EU to the Bottom. While Italy’s economic size would in my view create an insoluble problem for both Brussels and Frankfurt when it comes to the euro, it is France – and its commendable unwillingness to dump its citizen/community model – that will repulse any attempt by Troikas of every shape and size to impose an alien socio-economic culture onto l’Hexagon….and such implacable resistance will ultimately do for the European Union itself.

Electoral success for Sarko (followed by a clampdown in classic style on Islamist terrorism that shuts up everyone else as well) would therefore be the realisation of a CIA wet dream.

But here’s a scenario to terrify all those of good heart. If the PS sticks with Hollande, Marine Le Pen (left) can credibly say that the Left has no political chance. And if the Republicans choose Sarko, she can also say that France has no cultural chance. This will give her a solid basis for the Ukip effect…that is, attracting a sizeable number of disillusioned PS supporters – with the tactical support of the trade union syndicalistes for a common front against corporate colonialism.

Now as France has a proper election system wearing long trousers, there is no chance that she’ll suffer the same fate as Hairgel Mirage. I think it very likely that, if Hollande stays in the job and comes last in the first round, Marine Le Pen will win the run-off with ease. But if Sarkozy sinks without trace in Round One, then she will struggle to beat a strong PS candidate.

Too much is still in the air at this stage….and Narkozy (I’ve always liked that jibe at his recreational habits) must first of all win the primaries and be adopted. But it’s one to keep a beady eye on: if just one shred of physical evidence pointing at a US bankrolling op for Sarko were to come to light, he would be dead and buried.

Related from yesterday at The Slog: German economics 6 Anglo-Saxon Neolibs 0