Robert Zaretsky,
RealClearWorldOn Sunday night, as the returns were being counted in the first round of the French presidential primary for the conservative Les Républicains party, the nation's political landscape shuddered not once but twice. Taking by surprise commentators and pollsters, former Prime Minister François Fillon came in first with 44 percent of the vote, outdistancing the favorite, former Prime Minister Alain Juppé. But -- and here the earth shifted a second time -- he also doubled the score of his onetime boss, former President Nicolas Sarkozy, who finished a distant third.
