La vie en rose

One in five Frenchmen voted socialist/communist. Which isn't even up to Marine Le Pen's totals;

FRENCH Prime Minister Manuel Valls scrambled to find positives in first-round local election results yesterday, in which his ruling Socialist Party was beaten into third place.

Marine Le Pen’s fascist Front National (FN) came second in Sunday’s vote with 25 per cent of the vote, just behind Nicolas Sarkozy’s conservative UMP party and its allies, who took 29 per cent.

The Socialists and their allies won just 21.5 per cent, according to the Interior Ministry’s official results.

Silver lining for the lefties being;

The Communist Party and Front de Gauche scored about 9.4 per cent, well up on the 6.5 per cent won last year in the municipal and European elections.

Putting up un front courageux;

But Mr Valls said yesterday that he was “pleased in some way” that the FN support was not as high as expected.

“The extreme right, though it is too high, is not at the forefront,” Mr Valls claimed.

It's only about twice your size, Manny. If you subtract the Communists from the left coalition.