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- WORLD, Page 79World NotesFRANCESurvival Politics
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- As a scowling Prime Minister Michel Rocard watched, one
- communist National Assembly Deputy after another dropped a small
- mahogany ball in a green urn on the Speaker's platform. Once
- allies of Rocard, the communists now sided with the opposition,
- and were voting in favor of censuring the government. But Rocard
- survived, 293 to 284.
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- Since Francois Mitterrand became President in 1981, his
- fragile alliance of socialists and communists seemed destined to
- rupture. The dispute ostensibly centered on a new social
- security tax, but the motives of the communists go deeper.
- During the past nine years, the communists have watched their
- electorate dwindle. By breaking with the socialists, the
- communists hope to revive their party's identity as the true
- champion of socialism.
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