As the French prepare to go to the polls to elect a new president, they have every reason to feel perky. The top 40 companies on the Paris bourse have been pulling in record profits. The TGV, France's homegrown high-speed railway train, has just reached the dazzling world-beating speed of 575 kph (357 mph) on the new line from Paris to Strasbourg. And after 12 torpid years under 74-year-old President Jacques Chirac, voters are about to hand power to a fresh, dynamic younger generation.
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