Reasoning like this is validating the rightward drift. It is tantamount to giving up on the left and its values. It is attempting to settle for the lesser evil and neglecting to draw a line and take a stand. The end result will be, we will all be on the right, and wondering why we are being led further and further to the right. (See Tony Blair and Britain).

But a lot of this talk of Bayrou is based on the perception that Royal is a dud, her campaign has failed, she can't win, etc. That has been carefully fostered by the Sarko-sympathetic media with the intention of cloaking him with an aura of inevitable victory and infecting the left with defeatism. Bayrou plays cannily into the gap by pretending he has one foot on the right and one on the left, and we shouldn't be taken in by that.

I don't know the answer to this question, but how much of the Republican Party could Chuck Hagel have brought with him if he'd allied with Gore? Currently Bayrou runs a small rump party that owes its electoral existence to the UMP. He's a centre-right maverick who has seen some good poll numbers that may or may not have been exaggerated. It's also a mistake to see him as more than that.