Socialists go Pink

The French Socialists overwhelmingly voted for Segolene Royal to be their candidate for the Presidential elections next year. 60.6% of the Socialist voters opted for the woman whose name sounds like a product (Segolene Royal - now even stronger... warning may contain artifical additives) over Dominique Strauss-Kahn and Laurent Fabius. Notwithstanding what had appeared to be cracks in her policy arguments (see ideas on Iraq), she cruised to victory and now appears posed to face Sarkozy next year.

It is to be hoped that next year's battle will not focus on man vs woman but on sound policy arguments. Segolene has sufficient times to fill in the gaps that have tainted her run to victory.

One big positive for Segolene is her think-tank site called Desirs d'avenir - which fully recognises the role of interactive media like fora, blogging and updated news sites in the creation of a democratic campaign. Let's just say that for now J'accuse would vote for Segolene (even with the name that gives me the impression of a very strong glue).