the net result of 1968 for the left was 13 years in the doghouse).
doesn't seem right to me. It's true there was a backlash immediately after '68, but it died down, and the '70s were not dominated by the right in terms of share of general thinking and political discourse. It was simply the constitutional advantage of the right that enabled it to hang on to government. Alain Peyrefitte (a well-known Gaullist of the day) is often quoted as having said : "If we don't do anything silly, we're in power till 2000".
I think it's fairer to say that the near coup d'état of 1958, and the constitution of the 5th Republic that was written then to give de Gaulle (and later his hangers-on) a stable, comfortable ride in power, gave the right 23 years of uninterrupted government, during which they were only really threatened by... May '68...
But I still don't see why you think May '68 was responsible for the left's difficulties beyond, say, 1971-2 (Epinay, the Programme Commun). The bourgeoisie that was scared by '68 wasn't going to vote massively for the left anyway. And the right did have the advantage of being firmly ensconced in power, holding all the levers of command of the state since the very inception of the constitution. That was the way I saw it at the time, anyway, and I wasn't alone (which doesn't mean I'm right... ;))
The non-commie left really started to dust itself off in 1974 with the rallying of most of the PSU to Mitterrand's PS but only after 6 years of complete utter chaos. Already, the same dynamic as today and as in 2002 between the non-commie extreme left and the PS.
So yes, it did take time in those years to pull what is now the PS together (and maybe now not so together...) My memory is still, though, of an ongoing movement with its thrust and logic (if you were for elections, not revolutions), and not of total chaos. I don't feel that kind of upward movement today...
Perhaps that's why it's less the extreme left (commie or not, today, it doesn't matter) that bothers me as the lack of focus and thrust of the PS. The fact is it's easy to imagine no party discipline behind whichever candidate is chosen. And that, of course, would facilitate a hopelessly split vote in the first round, and a Le Pen/Sarkozy second round.
Jérôme's point seems solid to me, though : that the voters on the left might inject some discipline after the 2002 experience...
