Nicolas Sarkozy has been elected President of the Republic of France, and he has a triumphalist video. The White House is of course pleased and I, of course, am not.
A year or so ago this blog was being attacked by French people opposed to the Iraq war. They said that as an American, I was naturally reactionary, and that they, being French, were naturally revolutionary.
This was naturally unconvincing. Given their supercilious attitude, I would not be at all surprised if these very same French were Sarkozy voters, now showing their true faces.
I am sure I am being unfair and unnuanced, especially by using a Vichy motto as the title of this post, but in the matter of fighting trolls, all is fair.
The motto in question was apparently parodied as trouvailles, famine, patrouilles. I like that.
Axé.
coldhearted scientist وداد 
As you might’ve seen on my blog, I completely mis read the mood in France, nothing should really surprise me by now.
Well done for bringing the Vichy references, I didn’t know of this phrase, it reminds me of the “Kinder, Kirchen, Kuchen” ideé. Ahh well.
Aha, I’ve just been to your blog and it is true, the opposition was even gorgeous – I had never seen a clear picture of her before. Kinder, Kirche, Kuche, yes. There was a Spanish knockoff of that too, for Franco’s time, which escapes me at the moment.
I’m king of the worlddddddd!
Nothing beats a blockbuster. Following it, I’ll agree that he will do good to the French people that supported him in the elections.
Or maybe not. Le Pen didn’t even make it to the second round. Oh well. Where has the right come to.
Who knows? The rioting North Africans are an embarrassment to France, if they know it or not. England looks aloft with its distant pride. Germany looks on with a silent tight lip wondering if the Turks will do the same thing. America understands contradictions of race, equality and “Americaness”; so, this becomes an intellectual bait and switch, a reason to praise ourselves for our civil ingenuity. But race and riots have different connotations for everybody as always.
Sarkozy was elected to fix the economy. So I am leaning towards the possibility that he could be a Ronald Reagan or a Rudy Giuliani. Or better yet, let’s say he will be a Reagan in foreign policy and EU politics and a Giuliani domestically.
This is a wild estimate. But France will be cautious of America still, as all of Europe is. Remember, their leaders come from a highly educated and discerning class, In my opinion they will hold all their cards until it is an absolute imperative that they play at least one. The political pundits on television are clueless. This election does not automatically change anything. The stupidities of the Bush administration, not to mention scandals such as Enron, have made the entire world take a step back from our campfire. I
Well, any President of virtually any country will be more statesmanlike and aware than the current U.S. one. Sarkozy, Reaganesque, sure, and that isn’t a good thing – Reagan’s administration is the one that started our economy down the current disastrous neoliberal road. Many urban French liked Reagan as they now like Sarkozy. Xenophobia + desire for low taxes + belief that by getting the immigrants out and reducing social programs *they* as individuals will suddenly turn up rich. (I am of course still being unnuanced and sarcastic here – but I think I’ve got my finger on something.)
I think the Cold War ending under Reagan gives him brownie points from the European stand point.. I mean, Germany would have been obliterated in minutes, with the rest of Western Europe next in the firing line. So, I can appreciate what they see in Reagan . . . in that sense.
The French are screwed. They have lowered their retirement age, and no young French person can get a job. I don’t think they will ever get the immigrants out. They make up as much as 10 percent of the population total population, and last I heard, NO POLITICAL REPRESENTATION in any local, departmental or national government.
But yes, you do have your finger on something. I have a tendency to think about the politicians before the people. But the ghost of Ronnie Reagan and the sputtering and tittering of the Iron Lady in a wide brimmed hat is still among us.
Ah yes, Reagan, the Cold War, and the French. I seem to remember Parisian Reagan fans in the early 1980’s. And should Reagan really get credit for ending the cold war? How about Gorbachev, the Russians, and the Germans … didn’t they more or less do it?
Yes. But we had all the guns, and all that American Yankee talk and swagger that had been building up since the WWI. Amazing how King George II ripped that apart in a couple of years.
A well, it is a new century.