Masks off - red blogule to Segolene Royal's imposture

Let us consider my fellow French citizens as junkies, eager to give up their illusions but still hooked to them and asking candidates for yet another fix...
Segolene Royal comes to them and tells them : "I'm listening to what you say. I will give you a dose even bigger than the one you're dreaming of. You will feel good today and tomorrow will look brighter - actually, I'm sure things will get better for you.
Nicolas Sarkozy tells the French : "I'm really listening to what you say, and I understand that what you mean is not give me more but get me out of here. I won't push you down any further, I will help you up.
The sales pitch is less sexy but a little bit more responsible.

As you noticed earlier in this excuse for a blog, I don't precisely like Mr Sarkozy. But I know he is the only one who can put the country back on track. And I know he is now under the strict control and scrutiny of the UMP's centrist majority, the very people who will actually do the job with him, but people who won't stay with him if he happens to deviate from the healthy line (ie Sarko confirmed several times he won't touch to France's secularism).

I seriously considered voting for Bayrou one year ago. Back then, I was sure he had a chance, the same way I knew back in 1996 Blair could win the following year, to the great surprise of my British friends. But the man proved once again to be a disapointment ; a good man but a loner, not a leader. His surrealistic "debate" with Royal confirmed my worries : this man of dialogue drowned in Sego's autistic monologue.

But last Tuesday, Royal eventually met someone who exposed her sideral vacuity. I often compare her to Dubya : both are impostors and fake compassionate conservatists, but at least Bush is a good actor and he knows both the role he has to play and the man he truly is. Sego doesn't even know who nor what she is. She is actually running away from this confrontation and discovered the way of persuasing herself she exists in a selfpersuasive mantra technique : she routinely picks up things that sound nice everywhere and adds them to her speech, which grows into something as huge as implausible and inconsistent, and when someone says a trifle loud something looks a trifle too much she withdraws it. No one stopped her during the Socialist Party's primaries, no one stopped her during the campaign, and someone eventually said "get real", someone eventually imposed her first actual debate.
Even then, Sego refused any contradiction (no, not true, you're lying), she denied the right to answer (you don't have the right to answer, no). But Sarko kept focusing on the content while Sego sticked to the appearence, putting all her weight in one attack carefully planed. Sarko already knew Sego would attack because she warned her staff before. The question was when. She knew Le Petit Nicolas would raise the issue of the disabled children (he actually delivered the very same words a couple of days earlier in a prime time interview), and her strategy was to strike at this precise moment. She did a pretty good job in pretending to choke on what he said as if it were the first time she heard it, and she convinced many observers of her courage and sincerity. But she also lost many sympathisers who considered her as... sympathetic (66% of voters before the debate, 53% after - Opinionway poll). And women are not fooled : they don't like her and prefer to vote for Sarko (49% vs 38% - TNS Sofres barometer).
Masks are off and I do hope French citizens will vote with more discernment in 2007 than US citizens in 2004.