The New Lawn

France has a brand new lawn!

Keep off the grass! No littering!
THIS MEANS YOU!
Nikolas Sarkozy has been working steadily to become president of France for the last 5 years. He manipulated, destroyed people, used friends and enemies and
cultivated some of the most powerful allies in France to achieve his goal.
During the campaign, he quoted Socialist leaders, compared himself to Mitterand to reach out to Left. He blatantly ranted about undesirealble foreigners who
practice polygamy and slaughter goats in their bathtubs to appeal to the basest eacist instincts of the Far Right. During the campaign, his marriage dissolved in a violent rage. His wife filed charges against him and yesterday it was revealed that she did not vote in the election and they have not been seen together for months.
Now that he has it, maybe he will cool it a bit. He seems to be the ever clever politician today offering the position of Foreign Minister to Socialist Bernard Kouchner as well as reaching out to other prominent Socialists to fill positions in his government.
This has angered his party, the UMP. He resigned his position as head of the party only yesterday and today there are muffled cries of traitor from those who were expecting the apples of power to fall into their laps.
Whether the Socialists take the positions is a matter of conjecture.
The Party is in disarry. The Socialist Party is being reformed by its roots and the old wood at the top is furiously trying not to be lopped off. The statistics proved that the base of the party is young France. They overwhelmingly voted for Segolene Royal.
Old France voted Sarkozy. The old "elephants" of the party seemed to be in shock that Madame Royal had the force and power to fight such a fierce campaign. She found herself often trying to deal with the conflicting statements released by her own party members without consulting her. Near the end of the campaign, she stated that she was only going to listen to herself and follow her own course. In spite of all this, she finished strong and instead of walking away like Jospin did, she began to fight back the night of the defeat. First, she did not make her speech of concession from Socialist Headquarters. She refused to go there and went to the Latin American Center and stayed for a few hours on the balcony evoking critics to try to compare her to Evita Perone, but it was a great move and her speech was strong and full of the future.
As she gave the speech, I watched the face of Dominque Strauss-Kahn droop into a scowl of disapproval. He knew that she was seizing the reigns of power in the party and the machine she had built was going to push him aside.
In the press, she is called The Pink Panther or the Gazelle to counter the name Elephants that has been given to the old guard. They had no plan to win and it was her machine that put the platform together, the force of her personality that propelled it and her sheer tenacity that pushed it so close to winning.
This woman has captured the imagination of France and has entered into the realm of legend. I really believe she is going to reshape the Socialist Party into a true party of the young and the future and I even think she is going to ditch the term Socialist and become something completely different.