At risk of arousing as little interest & agreement as my earlier material on this, I& #39;m posting a few more thoughts on the Jean Castex issue: France& #39;s new Prime Minister, nominally under Macron.

The new situation is world-unique.
Born of France& #39;s specificity.
(15 tweets - sorry.)
First, you need to understand France& #39;s also unique constitutional structure.

Usually countries are led by EITHER President OR Prime Minister (PM). In the (not so rare) cases where they have both, the President is more like a constitutional monarch. The PM then sets the course.
Not so here.
In the (counter?)revolutionary constitutional order set by genius statesman-lawgiver Charles de Gaulle 1958, the President - directly elected - is semi-omnipotent - far more so (technically) than even a US President.
Curiously, this does NOT make the PM a mere extra.
In theory he certainly should be - & often has been. But precisely because the President is so powerful - specifically: unlike an eg British PM, the Parliament cannot "fire" Presidents, but they (amazingly!) can "fire" (dissolve) Parliament - the PM becomes a separate instrument.
Sometimes that instrument gets hijacked by the Parliamentary majority - as when Presidents Mitterand, then Chirac, had to "cohabitate" with opposition majorities - thus becoming absurdly weakened in the process, as the "enemy" majority & PM then set France& #39;s political course.
But VASTLY more interesting - & this is of course why I now bore you with this thread - is when the PM becomes an instrument for the President (& others) to subvert his own parliamentary majority - which ironically happens to be his own party, but has now grown inconvenient!
Macron& #39;s Presidency was from the start abnormal.
His first PM also came from the enemy "normie" Conservative Right. However, that PM was a "Juppéiste" - globo centre-right if you will - so the ideological clash w Macron& #39;s own party seemed minimal.
Still, it was already bizarre.
It was bizarre, because - to be 100 % honest - it barely seemed necessary, & also because several key ministers in that govt already - notably the (Ă­n France) all-important Education minister (remember how politics is downstream from culture?) - were even further hardliners.
But back to Castex.
Castex is no "Juppéiste". He& #39;s a "Sarkozyste".
A soft-identitarian "social Gaullist" like former President Sarkozy, especially in his final 2 Presidency years.

That& #39;s night & day.
(Not fully comparable, but think Lindsay Graham vs Matt Gaetz.)
I already hear the scepticism of my French subscribers: They& #39;ve seen it all before.
This, they& #39;d argue, is classic pre-election re-centering - voter schmooze - to deny Ms Le Pen the centre.
What they don& #39;t recognize is: Macron is now 100 % independent of his own lefty majority!!
Does he need them to pass legislation?
No. He could co-operate ad hoc w the Right (& possibly will up to election).
All his reticent backbenchers know this.
He can also, if they truly rebel, still dissolve Parliament for an early new election, though time& #39;s running out for that.
But more crucially yet: He has ZERO credible presidential competitor on the Left.
The 2 foremost are respectively so extreme/weak that everybody knows that were either pushed to 2nd round, Ms Le Pen would win against them.
MLP is the left& #39;s NIGHTMARE.
& so... it& #39;s stuck w Macron.
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