Posted on 04/21/2002 4:35:10 PM PDT by Pokey78
TELEVISION cameras and reporters were thrown out of the campaign headquarters of Lionel Jospin, the French Prime Minister and Socialist candidate last night as staff wept in near silence over the defeat of their chief. The Socialists just did not want the nation to see their grief. The “Workshop”, as M Jospin called the red-draped one-time theatre, entered a state between shock and disbelief after word filtered earlier in the evening that the Prime Minister had been eclipsed by Jean-Marie Le Pen. “This isn’t happening. This isn’t happening,” said Cecile Pernod, one of the young campaign staffers, as the news sank in after 8pm. Others began hugging each-other, knocking plastic coffee cups off their working tables. The television announcement of the Socialist defeat triggered a gasp of disbelief and M Jospin withdrew to his fifth floor office. A crowd of several hundred supporters gathered outside in the street, on the Right Bank, not far from the the Pompidou modern arts museum. The anger was palpable as many vowed revenge against the far right in parliamentary elections next month.“Chirac is going to pay for this. The country will punish the Right for doing this,” said one middle-aged man who said he had always backed the late President Mitterrand. Security guards kept the doors firmly closed to the media as ministers came and went, many of them voicing sorrow for M Jospin. “This is an extraordinarily cruel blow for Lionel,” said Martine Aubry, a former deputy Prime Minister who left the Government two years ago. “He worked hard for the country and this is what happened.” Over two hours after the polls closed, the cameras came on again and M Jospin appeared on the stage, along at the podium behind his slogan “Présider Autrement” (A different presidency). Trembling and looking even greyer than usual, M Jospin clenched his jaw and gracefully accepted defeat. A huge cheer went up, interrupting him. Pleading for silence, he talked of the “thunder clap” that had struck last night with the rise of the far right. “After five years of work devoted entirely to the service of our country, this is profoundly disappointing for me and for those who accompanied me.” The defeat was a result of rightwing demagogy and the fragmenting of the Left, he said. He added: “I accept full responsibility and am retiring from political life.” The hall erupted with emotion, forcing the Prime Minister to appeal for silence as he completed his sentence...“retiring from political life after the end of the Presidential elections.” Lionel Jospin was born to a middle-class Protestant family in 1937 in the Paris suburb of Muedon. He was a product of the elite Ecole National d’Administration, where he became a Trotskyist. He joined the Internationalist Communist Organisation (OCI) and took the code-name Comrade Michel. He became an economics professor and in 1971 joined Francois Mitterrand’s new Socialist Party. Retained covert links to the OCI until the mid-1980s. M Jospin, addressing supporters after results showed President Chirac would face far-right leader Jean-Marie Le Pen in the runoff, said the result if confirmed was“a thunderbolt” and “a very worrying sign for France and our democracy.” “I assume responsibility for this defeat fully and I will draw the conclusion by retiring from politics after the end of the presidential election,” he said. He urged his party to start preparing for the parliamentary elections in June.
Talk about a sense of entitlement! It's not surprising after the disaster the left has made of France internally(as well as being an international laughing-stock), that the electorate would swing right. Let's hope the conservatives can provide leaders with wisdom.
It seems to me that the country just punished the Left, dude.
There you go. The beauty of being a leftist is that you are under no obligation to accept facts you dislike.
Soon they'll convince themselves that this was really a smashing victory and be as happy as clams.
What?!!!
Someone get Al Gore to call up M Jospin and tell him to take it back. There's got to be a French province where some minorities were alleged to not have had their votes counted. Time to contest the election.
You can't tell anymore what some words mean because of the way the media has abused them. Someone middle of the road in the US with solid values is considered a far right wing fanatic ----it's hard to know what the media means in the case of Le Pen. So far I've only read he's against handing France over to the Muslims and that's why he's far-right.
Sure, pal...you'll make 'em pay all right.
Ain't it funny how the French always forget how ball-less they really are?
The difference between the French and Americans is simple...we have a right to be arrogant...the French are...well, they're French. Their arrogance is based on a false premise.
Geez, even a French Socialist loser understands defeat better than algore.
Just what I was thinking. Jospin should investigate "Les Chads 'Anging."
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