The Croydonian (Free subscription) | yesterday
Yes, they are French . First up, do not ring a 15-17 year old boy on his mobile, as a rather loathsome 22% admit to using it in the loo. Compared to 8% of the wider public. Equally, 32% of girls 12-17% are looking for trouble as they use their mobiles in the bathroom. 4% of the Plain People of France use their mobiles in the cellar. Presumably the rest cannot get a signal. 41% of Gauls use their mobiles...
French Politics (Free subscription) | 12/06/2009
As is well-known, Ségolène Royal would like to build a broad-based coalition on the left stretching, as she has put it, from "Besancenot to Bayrou." The alliteration works, but further details of how this might be accomplished have been slow to materialize. A couple of days ago she proposed an alliance with MoDem in the first round of the regionals. The PS (Hamon, Hollande)...
Jane Is The One (Free subscription) | 12/03/2009
David Miliband (you know, bloke with daft haircut who doesn't know the first thing about politics and is the British Foreign Secretary) has decided to sit down and have halva with Hezbollah . Now there's a good idea. Not. He says there are nice democratic Hezbollah MPs in Lebanon and they are OK to talk to because they are different from the horrid terrorist ones who kill people. He should know that...
French Politics (Free subscription) | 12/01/2009
Ségolène Royal is opening her Web site up for personal ads -- la solidarité participative , she calls it. I hope she has someone who can monitor the posts more closely than Eric Besson is monitoring his site (see previous post). Otherwise, bravitude could quickly turn into téméritude , pour ne pas dire lubricitude.
French Politics (Free subscription) | 11/28/2009
Manuel Valls, looking for a constituency to back his candidacy , tried to woo Les Gracques, a group of center-left high civil servants: Entre les Verts, le PS, le MoDem ou Villepin, il y a une compétition pour savoir qui incarne politiquement cette alternative. C'est pour ça que je plaide pour qu'on parte des questions de fond. Interesting to find not only MoDem but even Villepin included...
The Daily Beast (Free subscription) | 11/27/2009
Ségolène Royal is polarizing her country's Socialist Party-and leading its revival. Eric Pape on what the French Rogue can teach Republicans about 2012. Stop me if you've heard this before: A beautiful, attention-grabbing high-profile...
French Politics (Free subscription) | 11/22/2009
Daniel Cohn-Bendit and François ("T'es minable") Bayrou have buried the hatchet and shaken hands for the sake of the climate. Dany even ironized that he hoped Ségolène Royal might crash their meeting.
Guide2PoitouCharentes (Free subscription) | 11/21/2009
Angouleme’s popular summer rock festival, the Garden Nef Party could yet be saved, as regional president Ségolène Royal steps into the debate over funding for the 2010 edition.
Scotsman.com (Free subscription) | 11/19/2009
A POWER struggle between French politician Ségolène Royal and a former ally has thrown the opposition Socialist Party into turmoil, offering relief to president Nicolas Sarkoz
French Politics (Free subscription) | 11/18/2009
Vincent Peillon is refusing to quit his courant , which Ségolène Royal insists is hers . Plus belle la vie! Royal cashiered Hollande without a fuss and may have thought she could do the same with Peillon. No such luck. And so we will have at least another week of PS soap opera.
French Politics (Free subscription) | 11/18/2009
France is getting to look more like the United States every day. Ségolène Royal wanted to hand out "contraception passes" to high school girls. Her regional government would pay for the pills, and the school nurse would distribute them. Advanced, enlightened, a little risqué: how very French. But then Paris got wind of the scheme and invoked parental authority, family...
French Politics (Free subscription) | 11/16/2009
Here is the Web site of the embryonic "coalition" that Peillon, Cohn-Bendit, and Sarnez tried to get off the ground in Dijon this weekend. Ségolène Royal crashed the part and referred to it as "my flock." (h/t MYOS)
Guide2PoitouCharentes (Free subscription) | 11/14/2009
Despite being denied permission from the government for the plan, Ségolène Royal has pressed ahead with a controversial initiative to offer a ‘contraception pass’ to teenage girls across the Poitou Charentes region.
French Politics (Free subscription) | 11/14/2009
Wasn't it Vincent Peillon who was prepared to go to court to block Martine Aubry's victory over Ségolène Royal in the party leadership contest earlier this year? He has cooled considerably on Ségo since then, to the point of denouncing her presence at a meeting he organized as "unwanted." Peillon is attempting to put himself at the center of a broad coalition of Socialists,...
Guide2PoitouCharentes (Free subscription) | 10/27/2009
In an open letter published this week, president of the Poitou-Charentes region Ségolène Royal has openly criticised the LGV Poitiers-Limoges high speed rail project
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