DSK down and out

Dominique Strauss-Kahn has admitted on French television that his liaison with a chambermaid in New York was 'une faute morale', and that he will not be able to challenge for the Presidency.

Presumably he will have done some private polling and concluded that what with a few other little 'fautes' pursuing him, even the tolerant French electorate will not put up with it all. He will be 68 at the time of the next election and that is probably too old.

DSK's big advantage, of course, was that he wasn't Nicolas Sarkozy. But strangely, his troubles rather obscured his policies. Had he stood, it would have been a case of whether you could put up with all the baggage or whether you couldn't, not whether you liked his policies.

In fact DSK is an old fashioned corporate socialist. He likes big government, plenty of interference, and mistrusts free trade. Pretty well exactly what France doesn't need now.

Who will benefit from all this? Sarkozy, of course, who should have an easy run into a second term (barring disasters) and Marine Le Pen, who is likely to beat one of the lacklustre socialist candidates to become the contender.