Team Infidel
Forum Spin Doctor
New York Daily News
May 7, 2007
By Linda Hervieux, Special to The News
PARIS - A tough-talking immigrant's son was elected president of France yesterday, trouncing the first female contender after a blistering campaign that riveted the nation.
Conservative Nicolas Sarkozy beat Socialist Segolene Royal by a decisive 53%-to-47% margin in a historic face-off drawing 86% of eligible voters to the polls - with many of them citing fear as their main motivation.
Police were on alert last night in response to Royal's warning that a vote for her rival, the nation's former top cop, was a "dangerous choice" that could unleash anew the riots that swept France in fall 2005.
Anti-Sarkozy demonstrations were reported in Lyon and Paris, with sporadic outbursts in its suburbs.
In Paris, an estimated 5,000 protesters clashed with cops trying to clear them out of the Place de la Bastille - which is associated with leftist protests - hurling rocks and bottles as cops lobbed tear gas.
In Lyon, France's second-largest city, police used tear gas to disperse protesters in the central square.
Sarkozy, 52, is hated in minority communities for calling the angry young people who rioted in 2005 "scum" and threatening to clear them out with a powerful hose called a Karcher. He shrugged off Royal's warning and shot back that she was "having a bad day."
Last night, Sarkozy reached out to his critics, promising to be the "president of all France" and urging his supporters to "extend a hand to a France united."
"I want to say to every one of you, I will not betray you, I will not lie to you, I will not disappoint you," Sarkozy told thousands of jubilant revelers at the Place de la Concorde.
Earlier, across the Seine River, there were tears and anger among Royal's dejected supporters, who denounced Sarkozy as an autocratic Napoleon whose call for hard work and economic overhaul will ruin the French joie de vivre.
Royal, 53, wished Sarkozy well "in his mission" and urged her supporters not to give up. "Something has begun that will not stop," she said in a brief speech.
As the first French president born to an immigrant parent, Sarkozy has made much of his father's flight from Communist Hungary, casting himself as an outsider even though he served as outgoing President Jacques Chirac's interior minister.
He was seen as the most international candidate and last night promised "friendship" with "our American friends."
May 7, 2007
By Linda Hervieux, Special to The News
PARIS - A tough-talking immigrant's son was elected president of France yesterday, trouncing the first female contender after a blistering campaign that riveted the nation.
Conservative Nicolas Sarkozy beat Socialist Segolene Royal by a decisive 53%-to-47% margin in a historic face-off drawing 86% of eligible voters to the polls - with many of them citing fear as their main motivation.
Police were on alert last night in response to Royal's warning that a vote for her rival, the nation's former top cop, was a "dangerous choice" that could unleash anew the riots that swept France in fall 2005.
Anti-Sarkozy demonstrations were reported in Lyon and Paris, with sporadic outbursts in its suburbs.
In Paris, an estimated 5,000 protesters clashed with cops trying to clear them out of the Place de la Bastille - which is associated with leftist protests - hurling rocks and bottles as cops lobbed tear gas.
In Lyon, France's second-largest city, police used tear gas to disperse protesters in the central square.
Sarkozy, 52, is hated in minority communities for calling the angry young people who rioted in 2005 "scum" and threatening to clear them out with a powerful hose called a Karcher. He shrugged off Royal's warning and shot back that she was "having a bad day."
Last night, Sarkozy reached out to his critics, promising to be the "president of all France" and urging his supporters to "extend a hand to a France united."
"I want to say to every one of you, I will not betray you, I will not lie to you, I will not disappoint you," Sarkozy told thousands of jubilant revelers at the Place de la Concorde.
Earlier, across the Seine River, there were tears and anger among Royal's dejected supporters, who denounced Sarkozy as an autocratic Napoleon whose call for hard work and economic overhaul will ruin the French joie de vivre.
Royal, 53, wished Sarkozy well "in his mission" and urged her supporters not to give up. "Something has begun that will not stop," she said in a brief speech.
As the first French president born to an immigrant parent, Sarkozy has made much of his father's flight from Communist Hungary, casting himself as an outsider even though he served as outgoing President Jacques Chirac's interior minister.
He was seen as the most international candidate and last night promised "friendship" with "our American friends."