If there is one 'winner' from last night's terrible events in Paris, it is France's anti-EU, anti-immigration far-right wing Front Nationale party leader Marine Le Pen. Having already ascended to the lead in yet another poll ahead of France's 2017 elections, Le Pen came out swinging this morning call for France to "re-arm itself," stating that radical Islam must be "eradicated" from France. She further demanded that border controls be made "permanent" and binational Islamists must be depreived of their French passport.
As Bloomberg notes:
- *FAR RIGHT PARTY LEADER MARINE LE PEN COMMENTS IN TV SPEECH
- *LE PEN SAYS FRANCE NEEDS TO CONTROL ITS BORDERS PERMANENTLY
- *LE PEN CALLS FOR PERMANENT BORDER CONTROLS
- *LE PEN CALLS FOR 'ERADICATION' OF RADICAL ISLAMISM IN FRANCE
- *LE PEN: FRANCE IS 'VULNERABLE', 'MUST RE-ARM ITSELF'
- *LE PEN: FRENCH PEOPLE ARE NO LONGER SAFE
- *LE PEN: BI-NATIONAL ISLAMISTS MUST DEPRIVED OF FRENCH PASSEPORT
Which is all fine if this was some extreme and unpopular party, but in fact...
Marine Le Pen Tops Another French Presidency Poll [8]
The Front National party in France are moving one step closer to seriously challenging for the country’s presidency. A new opinion poll reveals that their leader, nationalist firebrand Marine Le Pen, has topped yet another poll ahead of the elections in 2017.
The IFOP poll in conjunction with Sud Radio and Lyon Capitale gives Ms. Le Pen a lead under three different scenarios, reflecting the panic setting into the French political establishment which is considering a ‘grand coalition’ of centre-left and centre-right parties to keep the Front National out.
According to IFOP, if centrist politician Francois Bayrou and centre-right Nicolas Sarkozy ran, Ms. Le Pen would top the first choice in the multi-round election with 28 per cent of the votes. In second, the Republican Party’s Sarkozy (23), and in third, current president, socialist Francois Hollande (21).
As John Rubino noted previously [9], there are two reasons for the rise of National Front and other anti-euro parties:
1) The adoption of a common currency hasn’t delivered the broad-based prosperity that was promised. Instead, Germany has entered a golden age of soaring exports, massive trade surpluses and balanced budgets while most other eurozone countries have been unable to function with a currency they can’t devalue at will.
2) The European Union’s decision to counter falling birthrates with rising immigration from Africa and the Middle East has, in the opinion of a growing number of Europeans, produced a two-tiered society in which a shrinking layer of liberal, pacifist, aging “natives” sits atop a growing, restless layer of newcomers who instead of assimilating are trying to impose their culture on traditional Europe.
And then came the Paris attacks. The perps are Middle Eastern though it’s not clear what group they’re affiliated with. But no one seems to care whether it’s ISIS or al-Qaeda. Their ancestry is all that will matter in the next election, and any politician with an anti-euro, anti-immigrant platform will find a suddenly very receptive audience.
