[!@#$%!]

Originally Posted by pantophobia

well even that is hard to say and how a population thinks, the recent French elections, over 85% of the voting population turned out, and Nicolas Sarkozy still won both rounds

i remember back 4 years ago that who ever won the democratic ticket would win the election and kick the incumbent out, but what happens, the far right camp mobilized stronger then the left and they won, so much is on the population itself perpetuating it's own decline

well i think they voted sarkozy for a reason, or a number of reasons, namely
1) they have a stagnand economy that's losing competitiveness
2) they have a high standard of living but also high unemployment
3) whats her name offered more of the same, government-created jobs, etc-- more "tax and spend".
4) free enterprise has a problem with socialistic france, and a lot of french managers and entrepreneurs go to england or the u..s. to start businesses, which feeds the unemployment cycle and dependence of government funds, but government funds come from the tax payers who are unemployed etc.
5) many french see islam as a threat because france is not a "multicultural" nation-- it's not about race, it's about "being french" and many muslims refuse to adapt. and they think sarkozy might be the answer to that. i dont know.

regardless, you need to think about this, france has a lot of parties represented in their senate and the national assembly, so those 85% of people also elected legislators of all kinds.