Berkeley Forum

The French presidential runoff between the center right candidate Nicolas Sarkozy and the Socialist Segolene Royal will be held on May 6^th. Mr.Sarkozy is the leading by a few points in most opinion polls and if the same trend continues until Election Day, we will have a centrist, pro-American president in France. Sarkozy has proven to be tough on crime as France’s interior minister. He has also demonstrated his understanding of the global economic system by not wanting to isolate France economically and thus encouraging French businesses to enter the globalized world markets faster than ever.

Moreover he has not been an American basher as most European politicians seem to be . He understands America’s role as the world’s only superpower and the sole protector of the Western way of life.

Sarkozy has criticized American efforts in Iraq but he is more willing to lend his support to American led NATO efforts of reconstructing Afghanistan and the war on terror in central Asia. Ms.Royal in the other hand has no clear foreign policy plans except bashing anything American. Her isolationist economic policies will not suit a country which claims to be the political leader of the EU.

The French people have a great decision to make. They can choose to elect a man who remembers the dark day s of communism and has nit yet forgotten the role played by the U.S to keep his country safe. Or they can vote for a radical socialist whose only plan is to lecture about how evil American influence is.

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