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Demonstrations are a daily ritual of French life. These days, however, those normally charged with keeping the order are the ones defying it, as police officers hold protests to demand broader freedom to defend themselves amid an increasing number of attacks on their ranks.

The incident that sparked these demonstrations was the Oct. 8 commando-style fire bombing of four officers charged with guarding a surveillance camera installed to discourage drug dealers in Viry-Châtillon, a low-income suburb south of Paris. Trapped in their cruiser, two of the officers were badly burned and one 28-year-old recruit had to be placed in an artificial coma.

It was just the latest violent attack in France to undermine confidence in the administration of Socialist President François Hollande. His much-maligned handling of the economic, security and identity crises that have rocked the country during his five-year mandate has left him facing near certain annihilation at the polls – should he be foolish enough to seek another term.

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Beyond that, all bets are off with only six months to go before the next presidential election. Nearly a year after Islamic terrorists mowed down dozens of Parisian café patrons and concertgoers, a combination of fear and frustration – what the French call le ras-le-bol – has made the increasingly crowded race for the Élysée Palace impossible to call. As this year's U.S. presidential circus shows, anything can happen when voters are in a foul mood. France may hold the same lesson in 2017.

France elects its president through direct suffrage, with the top two first-round finishers moving to a runoff election two weeks later. Opinion polls predict that far-right National Front Leader Marine Le Pen will come first in the initial round. But majority opposition to her extreme views means her second-round opponent, no matter who it is, is more likely to become president.

Right now, however, the race for that second-round spot is wide open. Next month, the Republican Party presidential nominee will be chosen in a primary open to all voters, a first for France. The winner will automatically become the front-runner for the presidency – that is, unless former Hollande protégé Emmanuel Macron launches his own Élysée bid in the coming weeks.

The Republican primary is a two-horse race between former prime minister Alain Juppé, a 71-year-old moderate who looks and acts presidential, and Nicolas Sarkozy, 61, the polarizing former president who lost in 2012 and has now veered sharply right in keeping with the public mood. Mr. Juppé has much higher favourability ratings, but Mr. Sarkozy's supporters are more enthusiastic.

No one can predict who will turn out to vote in the presidential primary. Enough distraught Socialists, fearing their party's eventual candidate stands no chance of making it to the second round, could vote in the Republican primary to ensure a Juppé victory. They could stomach (albeit with difficulty) a Juppé presidency, while the idea of another Sarkozy term makes them deeply nauseous.

Watching Mr. Juppé, however, two words come to mind: Jeb Bush. The early front-runner for the U.S. Republican nomination, Mr. Bush's patrician demeanour ultimately proved to be out of sync with the populist times. Mr. Juppé is also plagued by a previous conviction stemming from an illegal fundraising scheme. So far, none of Mr. Sarkozy's scandals have left him with a record.

The wild card is Mr. Macron. The dashing 38-year-old former investment banker and ex-economy minister under Mr. Hollande slammed the door on the Socialist government this year. He has formed a new political "movement" aimed at uniting France's free-market progressives. Stridently pro-Europe, pro-free trade and socially liberal and inclusive – he argues that "no religion is a problem" in France – Mr. Macron is the country's current political sensation. Polls show most voters want him to run for president. Most pundits expect he will. But not even Mr. Macron seems to have yet figured out whether he should do so by seeking the Socialist nomination or as an independent candidate.

Amid the infighting on the left and right, the far-right consolidates its support with each new terrorist arrest or attack on the police. Feeling the heat from Mr. Sarkozy, who proposes an extension of the ban on ostentatious religious symbols in public schools to all workplaces and universities, Ms. Le Pen now calls for banning the veil and kippa from all public spaces, period.

In French, such political one-upmanship is called la surenchère. And in this impossible-to-call presidential race, there is plenty of it.

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