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[Alx]

It's strange how hard it is to find the official campaign videos on youtube. Could only find Le Pen's.
Anyway if the movie "Wag the Dog" taught me anything, is that the first thing you need is good music. Unfortunately the only one who seems to master it to the tee right now is Fillon.

 

[sbkodama]

I wouldn't "just as bad", but bad, yes, for exactly the reasons you outlined in your post. You don't need to be a literal piece of shit to smell bad.

With the US having abdicated global leadership, the world needs Europe more than ever. Mélenchon is dangerous. I've seen many of his supporters say they don't agree with everything - and usually they cite his views on Europe. It makes total sense to not agree with everything your preferred candidate says, but to me Europe is too fundamental of an issue to just brush over.

I'm supporting Macron this time (Hamon is a lost cause, and they were the only two of the 5 that weren't corrupt or anti-EU), but it'd be nice to have other Frenchies post in here. I don't want this to be an echo chamber.

Don't be surprised to not see more frenchies post when the thread is clearly pro macron.

I still wonder why Macron doesn't play the Bayrou card more. The most common attacks he gets is "he's another Hollande", and all the defections of socialists to his team are strengthening that image. So it could help if he remembered people that he also has support from other parts of the political spectrum.

Lol who care about bayrou.

 

[Kurtofan]

bayrou, the guy who supported Hollande last time? yeah

 

[Alx]

Lol who care about bayrou.

More people than you'd think. We're in a situation where there is a large space left unoccupied in the center and moderate right. One expected Macron to fill it, but he's mostly stuck with the socialist label.
Besides Bayrou has all the experience Macron doesn't have, and is the main defendant of a different system than "left vs right" (if you rule out the extremes of course). He should be the best person to legitimize him.

bayrou, the guy who supported Hollande last time? yeah

Yeah, forgot about that. Maybe it wouldn't work that well in the end.

 

[Cabaratier]

Don't be surprised to not see more frenchies post when the thread is clearly pro macron.

It seems to me, as an outsider, that Macron represents the best option for Europe as a whole, and probably as well for France (from what I can tell). Le Pen and Fillon have very shitty programmes, Hamon I don't know much about, and Melenchon has this:

"Mélenchon, 65, a former stalwart of the Socialist party, which he quit in 2008 after 35 years, has no party. (...)

His programme is not for the faint-hearted. Money – whether a lack or surfeit of it – is the root of most evil. He proposes a monthly minimum wage of €1,300 (£1,125), 100% taxation for those earning more than €33,000 a month, and the renegotiation of EU treaties to escape the yoke of "economic liberalism. There are measures to protect workers' rights and "protect common property" such as air and water, and hundreds more proposals to create a France that is fairer, greener and more fraternal, in which individual desires and aspirations are yoked to the common good."

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2...nch-presidential-election-hard-left-candidate

That, to me, does not sound like a candidate I would want to run a large, important EU country like France (although the protection of workers and common property sound great). It seems this thread is 'pro-macron' in the sense that several voters agree with the above assessment. If you don't, why don't the anti-macron frenchies explain why?

 

[Chibrou]

Yeah, just lurking mainly.
I'm a left leaning guy but I don't have any firm allegiance to a definitive party or bloke.
Hamon seems like a nice and level headed guy but with abolute zero chance to win.
Maybe I'm not well enough informed on melenchon's program but his stance on the EU frighten me a bit.

That leaves me with Macron that I agree with on several issues, and the political tests that I took confirmed that.

Not much to add on daily basis, the snark and political analisys the usual posters provide seems enough for the life of this topic.

 

[Alx]

Yeah I've not met many people who "love" Macron (if any), for most he's just the safer and more reasonable choice compared to the others.
Plus the moral thing, not that Macron feels especially honest, but Fillon has the whole "fake jobs" thing and would probably still be favourite were it not for those.

 

[mo60]

Don't be surprised to not see more frenchies post when the thread is clearly pro macron.


Lol who care about bayrou.

Despite not living in france and not being french I think this thread is more pro macron then some people want it to be because all of the other candidates besides Hamon and Macron are either to extreme and/or corrupt for most people in this thread. I don't like a lot of things macron is proposing domestically in france especially on the economy but he seems the closest to me politically. Hamon I think is okay, but he's pretty irrelevant in this presidential election.

 

[Hypron]

Mélenchon also wants a universal tax, which would be rather inconvenient for those of us not living in France.

My brother who's probably going to vote for him (and spends too much time on jeuxvideo.com, coincidentally) told me we shouldn't worry about it because it'd very hard to enforce, but that doesn't sound reassuring to me.

 

[Alx]

I'll never understand that way of thinking. "Yes that program is ludicrous/dangerous, but there's no chance (s)he'll apply it anyway, so it's fine". Why vote hor him/her then ?

 

[DiipuSurotu]

Lmfao

If I recall correctly she didn't even ask the local authorities for permission to film this, thus making her clip illegal. The mayor sent her an invoice afterwards.

 

[sbkodama]

Hey you know some people don't care about the europe as it is today.
Some probably don't even understand why le pen is so high since the beginning.

 

[Diamond]

bayrou, the guy who supported Hollande last time? yeah

Should've supported Sarkozy instead? In retrospect, ok, it wasn't the smartest thing to do because we know how it went, but you have to remember the toxicity of Sarkozy's campaign 5 years ago. Bayrou did exactly what a lot of voters did : he voted more against Sarkozy than for Hollande.

 

[Hypron]

I'll never understand that way of thinking. "Yes that program is ludicrous/dangerous, but there's no chance (s)he'll apply it anyway, so it's fine". Why vote hor him/her then ?

Yeah, beats me. Although, he's not a Nazi and does seem to have a very strong dislike for Macron which doesn't leave many options on the table.

 

[azyless]

I don't know anyone who loves Macron, he's leaning to the right too much for my friends and family, but he's sadly the most reasonable option for a lot of left wing voters considering Hamon has no chance and Mélenchon wants to leave the EU. I haven't seen anyone in here being particularly "pro Macron" either tbh.
Edit: and I don't really know any right wing voters but I imagine they're running into the same "lack of realistic options" issue since Fillon doesn't necessarily appeal to the more moderate right, even without all the scandals. Hence why Macron is so high.

 

[G.O.O.]

Don't be surprised to not see more frenchies post when the thread is clearly pro macron.

We don't exactly have many options though

I think many here (including me) have sympathy for Hamon but he's running a terrible campaign. We're not fascists, so no Le Pen. Fillon is corrupted, so not for him either. That leaves us with JLM, and he has supporters, but I wouldn't call his ideas consensual. As for myself, I learned that as a left-centrist, discussing with mélenchonians - or even harder leftists - was very difficult because we don't have the same expectations in politics. Most of the time I don't even say I'll vote for Macron because I will have to explain that liberalism isn't all bad or that having worked in a bank doesn't make one corrupt.

 

[Cabaratier]

Hey you know some people don't care about the europe as it is today.
Some probably don't even understand why le pen is so high since the beginning.

Alright I'll bite.

1. What are the issues with Europe as you (or 'some people') see them?
2. Which candidate has suggested plans how to fix those issues?
3. How realistic are those plans and how likely are they to actually fix those issues?
4. What are the associated risks with those plans?

Personally, I voted left in my elections. When making my choice, I tried to follow those steps in deciding on parties and issues and ideas. When looking at France, I don't see anyone but Macron and Hamon (looking at this: http://www.newstatesman.com/world/2017/01/no-benoit-hamon-isn-t-french-jeremy-corbyn) who pass the test. Hamon can't win, so I would vote for Macron. What about my line of reasoning would you (or 'some peope') disagree with?

 

[sbkodama]

Alright I'll bite.

1. What are the issues with Europe as you (or 'some people') see them?
2. Which candidate has suggested plans how to fix those issues?
3. How realistic are those plans and how likely are they to actually fix those issues?
4. What are the associated risks with those plans?

Personally, I voted left in my elections. When making my choice, I tried to follow those steps in deciding on parties and issues and ideas. When looking at France, I don't see anyone but Macron and Hamon (looking at this: http://www.newstatesman.com/world/2017/01/no-benoit-hamon-isn-t-french-jeremy-corbyn) who pass the test. Hamon can't win, so I would vote for Macron. What about my line of reasoning would you (or 'some peope') disagree with?

The harmonisation is done by the bottom, you can be fine with it, some aren't.

 

[Sinsem]

Personally, I voted left in my elections. When making my choice, I tried to follow those steps in deciding on parties and issues and ideas. When looking at France, I don't see anyone but Macron and Hamon (looking at this: http://www.newstatesman.com/world/2017/01/no-benoit-hamon-isn-t-french-jeremy-corbyn) who pass the test. Hamon can't win, so I would vote for Macron. What about my line of reasoning would you (or 'some peope') disagree with?

Macron is not left, he's center-right. Liberalism never was a left value, left is socialism. And it's not because our fucking "socialist party" is not socialist that it magically put Macron on the left of the spectrum.
Hamon & Mélenchon are left. And Socialist Party's officials leaving Hamon for Macron shows again that this party is not leftist.
Poutout & Arthaud are far left.

Hamon & Mélenchon could run together, so I don't want anyone saying Mélenchon is far left and Hamon is not, because the values & ideas on which they built their programm are the same.
There are differences, but the 6th Republic, the European changes, the abolition of the Loi Travail, the creation of thousand of posts of civil servants, they're all there.
I could understand the reasoning coming from americans who seems to have never learned the difference between socialism & communism (Democrats are a center-right party, only Bernie was a leftist) but if you're French, you should know better.

Mélenchon wants to leave the EU

As stated a 100 times in this thread, he's not going to leave. He's going to renegociate and then ask through a referendum if the people want theses changes or want to leave.
We can have the debate "it's going to be Brexit again" again if you want, but it's simply false to state that he's going to leave the EU.
Same with "he's supporting Maduro" and "He's taking Russian money". Blatant lies.

 

[Magni]

If this is true, and seeing how adamant he is about giving the power to choose back to the people, then I'm not sure this will prove to be much of an issue.

We're already divided enough as it is with this election, we don't need to add some extra tension on top by holding a pointless referendum on EU membership. You don't need a "leave" vote to weaken the EU, just holding the vote in the first place will do that. No thank you.

Our generation has no idea how good we have it when it comes to Europe. Can it be better? Of course it can. Do we need to hold the rest of the continent hostage and/or burn it all down to make it better? Of course not!

Don't be surprised to not see more frenchies post when the thread is clearly pro macron.

That also works the other way around. If the non-pro-Macron Frenchies would post more, maybe this thread would be less pro-Macron?

Mélenchon also wants a universal tax, which would be rather inconvenient for those of us not living in France.

Wait really? Fuck me, I'm a dual-citizen US-France, I already get taxed for the US despite living in Japan. Tax treaties and FEIE make this a time burden, not an actual money burden, but who knows how Mélenchon would implement that.

 

[Deleted member 231381]

This thread will always be relatively pro-Macron because NeoGAF is predominantly American and predominantly Democrat, to which Macron is the closest analogue. More French posters might make some difference, but ultimately it will always be disproportionately skewed and that understandably deters some from posting.

 

[Funky Papa]

I'm a bit of a Hamon stan, though.

 

[Magni]

I'm a bit of a Hamon stan, though.

I'm really curious how Hamon would do if we had instant run-off instead of our current 2-round system.

I feel a significant chunk of both Mélenchon's and Macron's voters are backing those two because they see Hamon doesn't have a chance with the system as is.

 

[Slaythe]

I'm a bit of a Hamon stan, though.

Yeah me too.

He is a more realistic and possible "Melanchon", but this campaign has been about every thing else than the actual projects :/ .

 

[Green Yoshi]

The lives of young people hardly play a role in French culture and intellectual life either: in the media, in literature, in the public debate, it's just old people talking to old people about problems facing old people.

http://www.zeit.de/campus/2017-04/youth-france-front-national-louis-chauvel-interview

 

[KingSnake]

http://www.zeit.de/campus/2017-04/youth-france-front-national-louis-chauvel-interview

It's still fascinating how the old people (like Sanders and Mélenchon) are the ones who sell impossible revolutionary dreams to young people and they are just believing them.

 

[Deleted member 231381]

I'm a bit of a Hamon stan, though.

A victim of the two-round system - squeezed by Melenchon on the left and Macron on the right. France is one of the very few countries in the world to see how fucked up FPTP was, then go 'prenez ma biere' and proceed to invent an even worse system.

 

[Deleted member 231381]

http://www.zeit.de/campus/2017-04/youth-france-front-national-louis-chauvel-interview

That's an accurate picture of many more countries than just France.

 

[G.O.O.]

Old people are a safe bet.

Reminds me of people asking why everyone seemed more keen on buying old voters rather than young ones. The young are a pain in the ass to satisfy, it just doesn't pay to use time on that electorate.

 

[Deleted member 231381]

Old people are a safe bet.

Reminds me of people asking why everyone seemed more keen on buying old voters rather than young ones. The young are a pain in the ass to satisfy, it just doesn't pay to use time on that electorate.

It's not that they're a pain to satisfy, there's just less of them and their interests are more heterogeneous. You can group ages into different 'classes'. You have those between the ages of 18-25, looking for their first job and initial career progression, those at 25-35 looking at securing housing and setting up a family life with kids and the schools and so on that entails, those 35-55 who're mostly just concerned with getting taxes down, those 55-65 looking to retirement, and the 65+. Your economic interests change very rapidly early on and settle down later - your interests at 75 are basically the same as at 65, but your interests at 25 are wildly different to your interests at 15 (exaggerated example, but you get my point). The policies that satisfy 18-25 is not the same as the policies that satisfy 25-35, whereas the same rough policy outline suits absolutely everyone 65+. So, being a politician, you just go for the biggest block - it has the best effort/reward ratio. There are a *lot* more 65+ people than there are 18-25 people or 25-35 people or any other individual age bloc.

 

[Magni]

http://www.zeit.de/campus/2017-04/youth-france-front-national-louis-chauvel-interview

Heh, that's way more the case here in Japan than in France. True everywhere to some extent though.

A victim of the two-round system - squeezed by Melenchon on the left and Macron on the right. France is one of the very few countries in the world to see how fucked up FPTP was, then go 'prenez ma biere' and proceed to invent an even worse system.

The odds of MLP becoming president are way higher with FPTP than with the two-round system. It sucks, but not as much as FPTP does. Take a look at Mexican election results to see just how shitty FPTP is.

 

[Deleted member 231381]

The odds of MLP becoming president are way higher with FPTP than with the two-round system. It sucks, but not as much as FPTP does. Take a look at Mexican election results to see just how shitty FPTP is.

If you switched to a FPTP case tomorrow and every single party continued to run as they do now, probably yes. In the long-run, no. As it became clear that e.g. Hamonites would never win, they'd stop running and coalesce with Macronites, and as it became clear Melenchonites would never win, they'd stop running and coalesce with whatever other group, and so on. Eventually you'd end up with two or three major parties, against which the FN would struggle - something like UKIP in the UK. All the two-round system does is make it easier for strategic fuck-ups to happen. You might think "I won't make the second round, so it doesn't matter, but I will run in the first round to raise attention for my cause", do better than you expected, pull votes from your favoured candidate, and stop them reaching the first-round - a.k.a. why Jospin wasn't President. The 2R system discourages coalescing while still rewarding plurality winners - so it does make the FN more likely.

The American primary system is very similar to the 2R system, except each party has separate primaries rather than all running in the same primary. All the Republican centrist candidates overcompeted and put Trump through to the second round. If they'd known before what they did after, at least some of them would have chosen never to run, and Trump might not have managed to gain early credibility by establishing the opening lead he did. It was a strategic fuck-up, but 2R systems make strategic fuck-ups easier to make because there are more candidates and finer margins so easier to miscalculate.

Even IRV does this to an extent, but the fact it uses multiple rounds rather than two makes the strategic consequences smaller (usually). In general, IRV > FPTP > 2R.

 

[G.O.O.]

edit : nm, I can't read for shit

 

[Golden_Pigeon]

Macron is the most dangerous candidate to have against Le Pen and could lead to a Le Pen win, exactly like Trump against Hillary.

Very few working class people will vote for him since he represent the Al Khomri law. He is clearly very liberal (in the economical sense) and he represent the problem with the left since 80s: reducing the left/right opposition to position about cultural and societal issues. After almost 40 years of attack from the ruling class, the working class want to secure it s intrests.

I know i go against pool saying that, but Trump victory was going against pools as well.

I dislike Melanchon in so many ways and i will vote Hamon but i would have loved an united front with him.

 

[ebil]

Relevant:

 

[Ac30]

Relevant:

This is great, eat flour lmao

 

[harriet the spy]

I'm a bit of a Hamon stan, though.

Me too. He is a good guy, and the only to address (if imperfectly) the question of automation.

 

[Alx]

Among all the "who to vote for ?" online tests, Le Monde has an interesting one, since the questions aren't too obvious and don't reuse keywords of the candidates.
http://www.lemonde.fr/les-decodeurs...dats-a-la-presidentielle_5109544_4355770.html

In the end I'm not too surprised by my profile :

 

[Hypron]

Macron is the most dangerous candidate to have against Le Pen and could lead to a Le Pen win, exactly like Trump against Hillary.

How can you say this when Fillon is a candidate?

Actually, you're going pretty much against all data we have so far (by a far lager extent than Brexit or Trump's victory). Who'd do better in the second turn according to you?

It's not like Trump vs Hillary.

 

[Irminsul]

Among all the "who to vote for ?" online tests, Le Monde has an interesting one, since the questions aren't too obvious and don't reuse keywords of the candidates.
http://www.lemonde.fr/les-decodeurs...dats-a-la-presidentielle_5109544_4355770.html

In the end I'm not too surprised by my profile :

I'll test whether my French is good enough for that test, but who thought it would be a good idea to use the same colour several times, especially if one of them is an actual contender for the second round?

 

[N7.Angel]

It's not like I personally love Macron, it's just the only logical choice, between a racist, a thief and a man living in a dream...

 

[Alx]

I'll test whether my French is good enough for that test, but who thought it would be a good idea to use the same colour several times, especially if one of them is an actual contender for the second round?

Well the result is interactive, you're supposed to hover the cursor to see who's who. The colors are about general orientation of each candidate (left-center-right plus independents).
Of course I coud only do a screen capture.

 

[Ac30]

Well that's odd. I'm super pro-integration but it's not reflected here :/ Maybe I misunderstood some questions

 

[Alx]

Lol Poutou's campaign videos are completely crazy. (I just watched the one where he's crashing a detergent commercial and get kicked out... it doesn't seem to be on his YouTube account yet)

 

[VAD]

Among all the "who to vote for ?" online tests, Le Monde has an interesting one, since the questions aren't too obvious and don't reuse keywords of the candidates.
http://www.lemonde.fr/les-decodeurs...dats-a-la-presidentielle_5109544_4355770.html

I'm closest to Cheminade. Oh my god, I was telling everyone I was going to vote for him as a joke...

 

[DiipuSurotu]

Woooooow

Looks like Le Pen has some competition

 

[mo60]

Macron is the most dangerous candidate to have against Le Pen and could lead to a Le Pen win, exactly like Trump against Hillary.

Very few working class people will vote for him since he represent the Al Khomri law. He is clearly very liberal (in the economical sense) and he represent the problem with the left since 80s: reducing the left/right opposition to position about cultural and societal issues. After almost 40 years of attack from the ruling class, the working class want to secure it s intrests.

I know i go against pool saying that, but Trump victory was going against pools as well.

I dislike Melanchon in so many ways and i will vote Hamon but i would have loved an united front with him.

Fillon technically is the worst candidate to face le pen. Corrupt establishment vs corrupt anti-establishment is not a good combination in a runoff or in any election especially when voters want a change in government as we seen through the US presidential election last year.I'm not even sure at this point if enough centrist and left wing voters will vote for fillon in a fillon vs le pen matchup at this point to prevent le pen from winning. Fillon also won't be able to appeal much to those working class voters. Yes. Macron won't be able to appeal to working class voters but he can appeal to enough centrist and left wing voters to block le pen from the elysee palace and win the second round in a landslide.The race may be close in rural areas with Macron or Le Pen may win some rural areas against him but she probably would be crushed by Macron in suburban and city areas.

Macron is possibly the best candidate to face le pen while Melenchon is possibly second and fillon is third. Since Hamon is irrelevant I won't include him.

 

[Madouu]

If you are truly interested in understanding what are Mélenchon & Hamon projects for Europe, I recommend watching this very recent conference which includes Jacques Généreux and Thomas Piketty, both respected economists, who are very close to Mélenchon & Hamon respectively.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W-qHIyuwxQU

I am posting this because the last page contains a lot of approximations that are not reflective of both candidates real positions on the subject, and rather than endlessly debate and fail to convince a few with my words, I'd rather post what the people who actually worked on the projects are saying, maybe this way will give a bit of a clearer image to more people.

 

[Magni]

Among all the "who to vote for ?" online tests, Le Monde has an interesting one, since the questions aren't too obvious and don't reuse keywords of the candidates.
http://www.lemonde.fr/les-decodeurs...dats-a-la-presidentielle_5109544_4355770.html

In the end I'm not too surprised by my profile :

Europe and International Relations are my two biggest priorities this election, so this makes my choice even more obvious.

edit:

If you switched to a FPTP case tomorrow and every single party continued to run as they do now, probably yes. In the long-run, no. As it became clear that e.g. Hamonites would never win, they'd stop running and coalesce with Macronites, and as it became clear Melenchonites would never win, they'd stop running and coalesce with whatever other group, and so on. Eventually you'd end up with two or three major parties, against which the FN would struggle - something like UKIP in the UK. All the two-round system does is make it easier for strategic fuck-ups to happen. You might think "I won't make the second round, so it doesn't matter, but I will run in the first round to raise attention for my cause", do better than you expected, pull votes from your favoured candidate, and stop them reaching the first-round - a.k.a. why Jospin wasn't President. The 2R system discourages coalescing while still rewarding plurality winners - so it does make the FN more likely.

How long would it take to become clear? In the meantime, you'd get stuck with presidents with nowhere near a clear mandate from the people. Once again, looking at Mexico:

The most recent former President, Felipe Calderón, won with 36.38% of the votes in the 2006 general election, finishing only 0.56 percent above his nearest rival, Andrés Manuel López Obrador (who contested the official results). Former President Vicente Fox was elected with a plurality of 43% of the popular vote, Ernesto Zedillo won 48% of the vote, and his predecessor Carlos Salinas won with a majority of 50%. The current president, Enrique Peña Nieto won 38% of the popular vote.

The two most recent presidents were elected with <40% of the vote, and you have to go back five elections to actually get someone with a majority. It's a recipe for disaster.

The American primary system is very similar to the 2R system, except each party has separate primaries rather than all running in the same primary. All the Republican centrist candidates overcompeted and put Trump through to the second round. If they'd known before what they did after, at least some of them would have chosen never to run, and Trump might not have managed to gain early credibility by establishing the opening lead he did. It was a strategic fuck-up, but 2R systems make strategic fuck-ups easier to make because there are more candidates and finer margins so easier to miscalculate.

Completely disagree on this point. The American primary system (for presidential elections) is a mix of proportional and FPTP elections. Had there been 2R (or IRV), Trump might not have gotten the nomination. He was the Le Pen of the early primaries, leading the pack but never getting anywhere near a majority. But once everyone else dropped out, he had the momentum and the rest is history.

Even IRV does this to an extent, but the fact it uses multiple rounds rather than two makes the strategic consequences smaller (usually). In general, IRV > FPTP > 2R.

At least we agree on which is best, even if we don't agree on which is worst

 

[azyless]

Nice test :

Pretty much what I was expecting. I'd ideally vote Hamon but will most likely end up voting Macron.