Macron re-elected in France

Before the caveats, it is only fair to acknowledge the scale of President Macron’s achievement.
Not enough is being made of this, but this is the first time ever that a governing president of the Fifth Republic has been re-elected.
Yes, presidents have retained the Elysée before. But both François Mitterrand in 1988 and Jacques Chirac in 2002 were effectively in opposition in the period running up to the vote.
In both cases, actual government was – as a result of mid-term parliamentary elections – in the hands of the president’s foes. Though in office, Mitterrand and Chirac were politically impotent – but that helped when the wheel turned again and they found themselves back in favour.
As for Charles de Gaulle’s victory in 1965, he’d never been elected by the people in the first place.
So, Emmanuel Macron is the first president in modern times who, after running every aspect of foreign and domestic policy for a full term, has once again won the trust of the people.
When you consider France’s longstanding relationship with government – which is essentially to cheer ’em in, then chuck ’em out at the first opportunity – this is no mean feat.
He has done it by two methods, the first of which bodes well for the next five years, the second less so.
The results suggest that hidden beneath the seething mass of social media caricatures – the arrogant Parisian rich, the angry provincial mob – there are millions of French people of the middling type who feel that Emmanuel Macron has not been at all a bad president.
These people appreciate that unemployment is no longer a political issue, largely because of Macron’s reforms. They think his handling of Covid was competent, and they agree that pushing back the age of retirement is inevitable.