I have long recognized that I know absolutely nothing about the politics of countries other than the US and the UK, and almost everyone non-French weighing in on such things knows as much as I do.
"We" scoff at the opinions/knowledge of mostly clueless American swing voters when they express themselves to a NYT reporter, and those people know much more about American politics than almost every generalist US pundit knows about France.
Our politics is often incredibly stupid, and so is the politics of France and every country. If you don't have any sense of the stupid bits, you don't really have any sense of what's happening, ever.