Left-wing Melenchon polling ahead of far-right Le Pen in France's parliamentary elections
Le Pen to lose to leftist in French assembly vote: poll
French far-right leader Marine Le Pen looks set to lose to far-left leader Jean-Luc Melenchon in parliamentary elections next month, dealing a blow to the National Front's hopes for a strong national score, an opinion poll published on Sunday showed. The rivals are running head-to-head in Le Pen's political backyard, the northern working-class town of Henin-Beaumont, in national elections where she hopes momentum gained in the presidential vote will deliver the party its first parliamentary seat.
An Ifop-Fiducial
poll showed that Le Pen would win the June 10 first round with 34 percent of the votes against 29 percent for Melenchon but would be beaten 55-45 percent by Melenchon in the June 17 second round.
Not winning the parliamentary seat on her home turf would be a humiliation for Le Pen, who came third in the first round of presidential elections in April, behind winner Francois Hollande and his predecessor Nicolas Sarkozy.
"My objective is to catch up with her, to leave her behind me, and to eliminate her politically," Melenchon told radio France Info.
Melenchon said Le Pen represented a form of "obscurantism that only exists by pointing the finger at people based on their religion or the color of their skin".
"For them, the problem is the immigrant. For us, the problem is the banker," he said and called on all those who are "angry, without being fascist" to join the leftist front.
http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/05/20/us-france-election-lepen-idUSBRE84J06E20120520
Best of luck to Mr. Melenchon in defeating Le Pen's far-right National Front. He is accurate to mock the NF's penchant for blaming immigrants and foreigners rather than blaming bankers and the elite of their own country. Our own teabaggers tend to do the same thing.