French Fries Back On The Menu?

If the results go as expected in tomorrow's election, France may end its decades-long exile in political la-la land, and the French people will embark on the sort of rude awakening that befell Britain under Margaret Thatcher. "We have two days to liquidate the legacy of May 1968," says Nicolas Sarkozy, and you get the feeling he means it.

The Guardian attempts, predictably enough, to brand him as a radical right-winger and/or neoconservative, but Sarkozy would fit comfortably into America's Democratic Party, slightly to the left of Hillary Clinton, perhaps, and a bit to the right of Barack Obama. Which, under the standards by which France has been governed since les annees soixantes, makes him the slightly wet counterpart to Attila the Hun.

Please don't take this as typical American surrender-monkey bashing; any disdain I might have for the French was acquired during the years I lived in England, where they have been doing this sort of thing for centuries, and have understandably gotten rather good at it. But like many Americans and Brits (though the latter would seldom admit it), I also have a lot of liking and admiration for France and the French. I think of them in the same way many of them think of us: lovely country, lovely people, shame about the government.

I don't even have that many quarrels with their social policies. I think it's great if people only have to work 35 hours a week, if many people don't have to work at all, that there's cradle-to-grave security, that any group of workers can, if mildly aggrieved, shut down the country without fear of consequences. "Nice work if you can get it," as Ira Gershwin might have put it, but there's only so long a country can sustain itself on economic principles so abstract and imaginary that they call to mind the common joke among workers in the old Soviet Union: "We pretend to work and they pretend to pay us."

France needs another Socialist government, even if it's the watered-down socialism of Ségolène Royal, about as much as it needs another variety of smelly cheese. Ms. Royal, who comes across like a slightly overwrought cross between Nancy Pelosi and Oprah Winfrey, has been trafficking largely in emotion, sentiment, and symbolism. In other words, she'd be right at home on the Berkeley City Council, but presiding over 60 million Frenchmen and the world's sixth largest economy might be a bit beyond her grasp.

The worst - and I think most unfair - charge leveled against Sarkozy is that he is a racist, but there is little evidence of this. Himself the son of an immigrant, he has actively sought to improve the lot of immigrants, supporting affirmative action, the creation of the Council of the Muslim Faith, and appointing the country's first prefect to be both foreign born and Muslim. If followed through on, his promise to crack down on the feral populations of the banlieue, far from being an attack on Arabs and blacks in general, will actually benefit the majority now being held hostage by the criminal gangs who control the streets.

Similar charges were leveled at Rudy Giuliani during his tenure as New York mayor, yet by slashing New York's murder rate to a quarter of what it had been, Giuliani saved thousands of lives, the majority of them black and brown. Neither in New York or Paris do the thugs, vocal and visible as they might be, represent the dominant ethos of the minority community; those politicians who pander for votes by letting criminals run free are the worst sort of racists. Women residents of the banlieue in particular would benefit from Sarkozy's promise to clear out the racaille, and a fair number of them support him for precisely this reason, as recounted in this BBC story.

If Sarko wins, expect relations between France and the USA to warm considerably. It's not likely he'll be cozying up too closely to President Bush, who is increasingly seen not just in France but around the world as un canard more dead than lame, but Sarkozy is that rare brand of European politician who finds much to admire about America and Americans. If he manages to pull off what he proposes to do, the admiration is likely to become mutual.

A Glimmer Of Hope From Iran?

If this report has any substance to it (being that it's from the Guardian, it's never easy to tell), we'd better hope that President Bush is kept so busy by those pesky Congressional Democrats that he doesn't have time to say or do anything too rash with respect to Iran. Of course you could argue that the menacing noises emanating from Washington are what's prompted a groundswell of rational thinking aimed at peacefully toppling the religious fanatics currently steering Iran head-on toward a catastrophic collision with the West, but it's equally true that a military attack or even overly aggressive threats thereof will usually cause a people to coalesce behind their present leadership, no matter how incompetent or unpopular they are.

The grim reality is that unless Iran changes course of its own volition, war of some sort is probably inevitable. Maybe not immediately, but sooner or later, and because Iran is a more highly developed country than most US enemies of late, the collateral damage would be hideous even if nuclear weapons aren't involved. If on the other hand Iran can make a peaceful transition into modernity - and gradually outgrow its various vendettas, particularly against Israel - it could play a vital role in stabilizing the Middle East and heading off a potentially incendiary conflict between Islam and the West (the conflict at present is more between Islamism and the West, but in the ensuing polarization, all or much of Islam is likely to be dragged in).

People who've been to Iran recently say there is much sentiment for change, and little love, at least among younger and more progressive Iranians, for the Ahmadinejad government. With any luck, perhaps the USA and Iran can change governments at the same time and we can make a new start. Now if we can only find a functional candidate here in the USA...

Send In The Clowns

Oh, the Democratic candidates' debate wasn't that bad, actually. The raving lunatic fringe was well represented by former Senator Gravel, who ranted, raved and waved his hands about like someone's kooky grandpa who'd been at the cooking sherry, but he probably won some new fans with his willingness to come out swinging at the other candidates, most of whom were frantically making nice with each other.

Dennis Kucinich did his bit for the quietly demented, with perhaps his high point coming when he held up "My pocket copy of the United States Constitution which I carry with me always." The maddening thing about Kucinich is that he's right about some things (don't ask me to be specific at the moment, but he is), but probably does those causes more harm than good because he's so clearly a space cadet. I don't remember dropping acid with him back in the 60s and plotting to remake the world by abolishing money and getting everyone to love each other, but it wouldn't surprise me at all to find out that I did.

Edwards didn't do himself any favors, but probably suffered no real damage, either. He was slightly blindsided by a question about what good hedge funds did for America, and didn't improve matters by a folksy story about how his hardworking dad couldn't afford to take his family out to a restaurant. He's still going nowhere unless Clinton and/or Obama screw up royally.

The rest of the candidates were/are insignificant minnows. Somebody needs to tell Bill Richardson to shut up and go on a diet, but he probably figures - correctly - that he hasn't got a chance, so why put himself through the trouble. Why are Chris Dodd or Joe Biden even in this thing? Beats me, unless it's part of a strategy to pad their résumés for post-Senate employment.

That leaves Hillary, who did slightly better than I expected (not well enough to win me over, but I'm no longer promising to leave the country rather than vote for her), and Obama, who didn't do quite as well, largely, I think, because he kept himself on too tight a leash for fear of goofing up. He'll need to show a bit more confidence to get his message across.

All the candidates were lacking when it came to Iraq, falling over each other in their hurry to have been more against the war than anyone else and at an earlier date, an especially difficult feat for those who actually voted for it. But as much as the American public have turned against the war, none of the candidates has offered anything in the way of a solution apart from a Vietnam-style cut-and-run. The only debate is over how fast we should retreat; not a word was offered on what might happen to Iraq and its people in the wake of our withdrawal or what longterm consequences that might have on global or national security.

It's possible that there is no alternative, especially as long as there's no national will nor presidential leadership capable of seeing things to a more successful conclusion. But the Democrats' Congressional strategy of scheduling America's defeat a year or so in advance offers the worst of both worlds. If they're certain - as many of them are arguing now - that we've already lost, why one earth leave troops there to be sitting ducks for another year? And if there's still a chance that we can accomplish something there, why announce to the enemy the date on which we plan on surrendering? George Bush has undoubtedly made a colossal mess of this war, and unless he can pull some astounding rabbits out of a presently invisible hat, will go down in history as a disastrous president. Looking bad alongside the record he's compiled is no mean feat, but the Democrats are making a pretty good run at it.