James Forsyth had a great post yesterday on Ségolène Royal and the Machiavellian schemes within the socialist party designed to do everything to stop her. What is interesting about the Royal case is that it is, at the same time, very different and very similar to the Clinton (Hillary) case. Ségolène is very popular, the French believe that she is the face of change and that she is trustworthy. More importantly, polls show that she can win the French Presidential next year. Hillary is much more of a polarizing figure and Americans are most inclined to believe that everything that she does is motivated by politics rather than by conviction. Amazingly, the two women have the same problem and it is how to convince their party that they will be good candidates and that they are about substance and not style. The French Socialists have waited for so long for somebody who could challenge Nicolas Sarkozy and stop him from becoming president. However, now that the French people have picked one of them for that role, they are having second thoughts because she is a beautiful woman and because as we all know, charm and feminine qualities are always presumed to be that a woman is weak and a lightweight. Hillary Clinton hasn't even declare her candidacy that already Democrats and the sanctimonious pundits are challenging her authenticity and her sincerity by arguing with incredible bad faith that she is more cunning and more superficial than any of the presidential candidates that they have chosen in the past.
All of these facts lead me to the following conclusions. The left political class is a lot more misogynistic than the right. The fact that the leftist political ideology is in general more about compassion and other good feelings and about government doesn’t help leftist women rise to the top. It put the emphasis on their gender or rather the prejudices that an electorate have about it such the belief that a woman can't be tough and can't send protect the country against its enemies and wage necessary wars. It is in my opinion for that reason that Hillary Clinton will never say that she was wrong to vote for the authorization that made it possible to go to war because once she does that, she becomes a wimp and a weepy woman who will never be able to fight terrorism and to protect America against its numerous enemies. Ségolène Royal is facing the same problem for she can't totally agree with her party's policies without becoming another soft leftist woman who believe that all we need is love and without losing the hearts and the vote of the French who want to believe in her. In short, Ségolène and Hillary face obstacles, which are magnified not only by their gender. They come from the left of the political spectrum, which is facing an identity crisis since terrorism became a major political issue and since it became clear that people have as much a need for justice as they do for order. The big question is whether they will overcome those obstacles. I don't know, but if I was force to bet my life on somebody it would be on Ségolène Royal because her task is less formidable that Hillary and because the French electorate is a lot more ready for a radical change than the American electorate. After 14 years of Mitterrand and almost twelve of Chirac, the French are desperate for something new and they may well chose Ségolène as long as terrorism doesn't become the first issue on their minds.
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