Is Paris Turning?

The two men are as different as Laurel and Hardy. Conservative Philippe Séguin, 57, is corpulent and earthy, with a resonant bass voice and an addiction to unfiltered Gitanes. Socialist Bertrand Delanoë, 50, an avowed homosexual, is soft-spoken and ascetic-looking with a gift for irony and a penchant for slim cigarillos. Séguin, a former Minister of Labor and ex-president of the National Assembly, is a man of national ambitions who dreams of occupying the Elysée Palace. Delanoë, apart from one term in Parliament, has spent his entire political career as a party activist and Paris city councilman. But the men...