A little more clarity, please
Nicolas Sarkozy’s holiday, which ends tomorrow, has been a fascinating, possibly depressing experience for those interested in France. For what emerges is a picture of a sad, incomplete person. The photographs at the start of the holiday of him playing in the water with his family quickly gave way to shots of him alone, running, or going back to France for a few hours, alone, or going to have lunch with the Bushes, alone while every time and elsewhere, his wife was in town with her friends shopping. When it rained they went into town to the local video-hire shop. There is a pall of boredom over the whole holiday as though they are there against their will.
When he goes out running, Sarkozy knows he will find the press, and that seems to be a relief for him - given how many times a day he does it. His attitude to the press in his own country is well-known: he talks to them in the familiar “tu”, as if they were mates, yet whips them into line when they write things he doesn’t like – going as far as having the editor of Paris-Match sacked for publishing photographs of his wife with her lover. Where most politicians merely enjoy the limelight, Sarkozy clearly cannot live without it. It has become an obsession. While on holiday he has made on average two press communications a day. From here it looks as though he has a better relationship (one-sided, certainly) with the press than with his wife. At least they seem interested in what he says – for the moment at least.
The French press call the town of Wolfeboro where the Sarkozy family spent their holiday, “huppé”, meaning trendy, well-heeled. A reporter in the Boston Globe (Boston being only two hours’ drive from Wolfeboro) says: “It’s where we go when we don’t have enough money to go some place better.” Americans, bemused, are quoted in that paper as asking “Why does he come here when he’s got the Cote d’Azur and St Tropez so much nearer?” Maybe, they say, we’ve got it all wrong about how great France is.
There is a gulf as wide as the Atlantic between what some of the French press (and the many on-line commentators to their articles) write about all things American and what appears to be the reality. When Sarkozy had his incident with the two photographers in the middle of lake Winnipesaukee a week ago, there was much huffing and puffing over here about paparazzi, intrusion of private life, when are these ghastly aberrations of humanity going to be brought to heel. It sounded like a bunch of retired colonels in Surrey. Behind it all is a generalized confusion lumping anyone with a lens with the photographers hounding Princess Diana. That’s the image the French press, which prides itself of being free of the stench of the gutter, unlike its British counterpart, wants to give. Reports in other papers suggest the reality is rather different: it turns out that one of the photographers is a local guy who does photos of weddings, the other is reported as working for AP, but nothing in the real world suggests that he chases le pipole on the back of a Vespa.
Public personalities in the States understand that they are where they are in part thanks to the press, and mostly work with it: their European counterparts fondly imagine they can exist without it. As an American journalist remarked, had it been Kennedy (Sarkozy is sometimes compared with JFK) he would have invited the photographers on to his boat, handed them each a glass of wine and offered to sign the photos. These particular two photographers were not hounding a desperately fleeing Sarkozy, they were out in the lake waiting. Certainly they were there to take photographs of this media-hungry man but it was Sarkozy who told his man-on-the-wheel to go over to them. The photographs of the incident don’t show the other pipole on Sarkozy’s boat jumping up and down, pointing and screaming in rage about intrusion, covering their faces: the women are lying back soaking up the sun probably wondering what petit Nicolas is getting worked up about now. Outbursts of towering rage are nothing new chez les Sarkozy. Rachida Dati, Minister of Justice back in France, was the only English-speaker in the French party and had to explain to the photographers what her boss was shouting about: possibly she even understood that legally he was at fault for boarding their boat uninvited and taking one of the cameras.
In case readers feel I am too critical of the French press, I should point out that much of the best information about this incident, and about Sarkozy’s holiday generally, comes from an excellent on-line newspaper, rue 89, composed mainly of journalists who left Libération last year. It is an excellent source of alternative but well-informed news and opinion.
Meanwhile it is left up to one of France’s best bloggers, Versac, to wonder at the French press’ somewhat hypocritical attitude towards the pipole, titillating readers’ interest while at the same time hiding behind the law insisting on the right to privacy. Le Monde, for example, published a list of Sarkozy’s fellow house guests (Sarkozy and his family are there as guests of the person renting the house, apparently Roberto Agostinelli). They include “Rachida Dati, Minister of Justice, Henri Proglio, CEO of Veolia, [a French multinational, formerly called Vivendi, whose principal businesses are water, the environment, energy and transport] and several friends of Cecilia Sarkozy, including Mathilde Agostinelli, head of communication for Prada [the company whose frocks so often adorn the back of Mme Sarkozy] and Agnès Cromback, head of Tiffany, France.” Versac wonders why the paper gives that information but does not, for example, say that Mme Dati is “having a liaison with Henri” [Proglio of Veolia], something apparently “all Paris knows”. Living in France Profonde, I wouldn’t know, but if it is the case I agree with Versac that if you are going to say something, say it. This mealy-mouthed half-speak, which allows the journalist to feel superior to his readers, is counter-productive, particularly now, with the omnipresence of the internet. I also believe it is important that, if it is true, everyone know the inexperienced Minister of Justice is having a “liaison” with the CEO of a firm which, under its former name of Vivendi, had its fair share of run-ins with national and international justice. And perhaps that this potential conflict of interest is happening under the nose and with the blessing of the president. It says much about “transparency”.
One of the good things about rue 89 is that they make a regular feature of including the audio or video recordings, so you get the complete interview and not an edited version. The audio account of one of the photographers, for example, in which he calmly describes Sarkozy’s bewildering attitude: it is neither outraged nor self-justifying, simply expressing his own surprise at the unexpectedness of it all.
August 16th, 2007 at 11:32 am
“A sad, incomplete person” - based on what criteria? It sounds to me as though you are playing at “psychologie de supermarché”. If not, then you are trying to cut a man of value down to your size. In which case it is you who, if not sad, is at the very least incomplete.
August 16th, 2007 at 6:38 pm
To me the “sad, incomplete person” sounded compassionate. I believe a lot of citizens will find this vulnerability very appealing indeed. Just as plenty of us enjoy his not being an ‘énarque’. All this is in the line of the President saying he is “un petit français de sang mêlé”. He may jolly well be sad, bored with his holiday, and this is all as it should be. And if he fails as a president, it may be even more endearing.
August 16th, 2007 at 7:20 pm
@ Tim : Most american stories on rue89 are provided by Guillemette Faure, who also writes for le Figaro, RTL and others (she has an excellent blog). I’d love to hear her talk about what she writes for which media.
@ marie-france : Sarkozy is not an énarque because he FAILED the entrance competitive examination. He’s not an outsider.
August 17th, 2007 at 12:10 pm
john harris says ” a man of value”? based on what criteria. Why are all defenders of le petit nicolas unable to accept any criticism of their man. To retort it is you who is sad is something a child says. Respond with sound argument not inane comments.
August 17th, 2007 at 4:30 pm
precisely he is a sort of failure; he also had bad marks at his school leaving exams I’d be interesred to know at what stage he “tried” to be chosen for ENA
August 18th, 2007 at 10:29 am
Disliking the present President of the French Republic , his obsessive ego, his social backgound which he puts forward much more than any of his predecesors, and his mediatic methods , is certainly no good argument against him. But one might express some concern about his action. after all, he is the one who has insisted on being judged through his results. Three months after his election, what has been done ? Not much. On the political side, the so-called “ouverture” seems to be just the result of the individual trajectories of those socialists who have realised that they would have little chance to get back to power with the next 5 or 6 years at least . In spite of everything which has been said, neither Bernard Kouchner, nor Eric Besson, nor Hervé Morin are the incarnation of any promiing synthesis between left and right, as it was suggested: one has just got the impression that they were at the service of their personal careers. The appointment of Rachida Dati , Fadela Amara and Rama Yade is symbolically important, but not much has been not yet apart from the symbol. On the European side M. Sarkozy, as soon as he was elected, expressed concern for Europe, but his voluntarist method did not create any impetus for the European institutions. He has affirmed recently his liking for Blair and Bush, and his trip to America confirms his Atlantism, but what good is there in prising Blair and Bush at the time when their politics in Irak is in total bankrupcy ? If M. Sarkozy wants to praise American democracy, he would be better inspired not to side too much with a discredited president, and he would be better inspired to court Hillary, as he cleverly did when he courted Merkel before her access to power in Germany. Financially and economically, we have not seen much : Sarkozy has promised to alleviate the taxes, but his promise to those contracting loans has just been rejected by the Constitutional council. The Abyssal French Debt is still Abyssal. The law of universities, which has been announced a major step, proved to be a minor reform, without ambition, and it is another case, like the negociations about “service minimum” where M. Fillon ’s governement (?) has shown all its limits in front of the unions. What remains is a stronger grip on the institutions, and the promise of a super presidential power - backed by a project of reform of the constitution which, if it were successful, would render de Gaulle jalous - a complete control on media, which has been performed quite well and much ahead of the May 07 elections. This will guarantee, no doubt, a silencing of criticisms.
Everyone has compared M. Sarkozy to Napoleon . That is right, but there was just a mistake on the numbers. The proper comparison is to Napoleon III, not I, and I advise a reareading of Victo Hugo famous charge againt “Napoleon le Petit”.
August 18th, 2007 at 11:21 am
If Mr Colm-Ireland had looked more closely, he would have seen I wrote “you who, if NOT sad”…. Otherwise, I cannot reply because he provides no “sound argument”, just another “inane comment”. That said, I cannot see proper justification in Tim King’s writing to show that Sarkozy is an incomplete man. Based merely on one incident, that would seem to presume too much.
Regarding Marie-France’s remark about his being a failure because he didn’t get into ENA, I have a friend who tried three times to get into one of the Grandes Ecoles: he then went on to get a scholarship to study in Florence, another to spend a year at the LSE and now lectures internationally on economics and has had three books published - and he is not yet forty. Not bad for “something of a failure”.
August 18th, 2007 at 11:41 am
Actually, I think it is possible to pick up Tim King on a few points where he is being less than objective. “There is a pall of boredom” is supposition even if it is often true that very active people dislike holidays. Meeting journalists “seems to be a relief” for him - supposition again. “Had it been Kennedy” he would have offered the photographers drinks. Again, supposition: Kennedy has become sanctified tohugh in everyday life he was far from being a saint.
I may add a further retort to Mr Colm-Ireland. In his eyes it is not acceptable for those who do not share his political views to express theirs. Also, I dislike the discrimination implicit in references to Sarkozy’s height. That is silly.
August 19th, 2007 at 1:30 pm
Please read again what Tim King wrote in “Universités and Grandes Ecoles” .If you had had to live through the French system of selecting the best civil servants you would have understood that my calling Sarkozy a failure was meant ironically, largely. I have been unable to discover if Sarkozy ever was in “classe préparatoire” for a few weeks or even months. If he was it must have been out of curiosity. Then it is impossible to say that he failed ENA, entry to which can only be achieved after years of heart and soul numbing.
August 20th, 2007 at 11:50 am
Mr Scalpel makes some forceful, heavily one-sided points. He would seem to be something of an idealist: reforms won’t take effect in a day and an abyssal debt won’t be absorbed not even in five years. Traditionally, July and August are dead months as far as government and much else are concerned in France. This year, at least, they worked during July. As to university reforms, so many ministers have broken their teeth on this one - it is ironical that student unions have no representatives taken from future students, only from those who have already profited (or not) from the system - that it is essential to tread carefully. I think a few steps have been taken in the right direction. This idea of an obsession with greed for power, a monstrous ego, a tightening grip on all State institutions: we heard this over and over again during the Presidential campaign from - no Brownie points for guessing - the Socialist Royal, who is, according to many ex-collaborators, a much more tyrannical and sectarian person than Sarkozy. It is amazing what a pretty face can do for one!
August 20th, 2007 at 1:20 pm
Just responding to Mr Harris on a couple of points. Firstly the remark about “le petit nicolas” was meant as a reference to the little school boy from the books that my wife reads to our son and not in relation to Mr Sarkozy’s height. Apologies if i wasnt clear. As for the remark about Mme Royal’s pretty face i think it is a bit rich to give about about smart comments about Sarkozy when it was Royal who was subjected to the kind of comments one normally reads in tabloids about popstars. The fascination and details in the press and blogs about her broken jaw, hairdos and outfits during the course of the campaign was plain old sexism. Read some of the posts on Charles Bremners’ Times blogs over the past few months for lots of examples.
Regarding the reform arguements going on,i have to find myself in agreement with Mr Scalpel. It is not the pace of the reforms which as Mr Harris says are happening at a quiet time of the political calendar its the reforms themselves. Already we are seeing some repositioning from Sarkozy on issues which he addressed during the election campaign. The shift on the golden parachutes to top executives is one. His first “reforms” of the tax system have done little by way helping your average Frenchman. The centerpiece of the new law sets a cap on each household’s overall tax bill at 50 percent of income. This includes income taxes, property taxes, local taxes, the wealth tax and two taxes that were levied to shore up the social security systems. (This cap already existed, but it had been set at 60 percent.)
This might sound reasonable, but according to the French government’s own estimates, very few people will benefit. In a total population of 62 million, there are only 234,397 households whose tax bill exceeds 50 percent of income. And 201,864 of these households will receive an average tax break of only 649 euros (or less than $900 at the current exchange rate of $1.37 to one euro). As with the Bush Administration’s tax cuts, the big winners in France will be at the very top. According to the Finance Ministry’s estimates, the 1,081 households whose net worth is over 15.5 million euros will each get the equivalent of more than $344,000. So Sarkozy’s “modernization” looks pretty good from the top, especially since the new government sweetened the deal with the completely superfluous near-abolition of the estate tax. http://www.thenation.com/doc/20070827/stancil
So then we turn to his reform of the markets to make French companies more competitive and better placed to compete in a global market. Yet he then turns around to the sumit of E.U. leaders and demands the removal of any mention of “free and undistorted” competition. So surely we are entitled to ask what does he stand for and is he the man to lead France down the road of reform.If his only worry is his wife then I for one have my doubts but hey i am looking forward to the debate.
August 20th, 2007 at 1:41 pm
Just to clarify when i mentioned Charles Bremner’s blog i meant the posts from the readers in relation to Mme Royal and not the blogs themselves.
August 20th, 2007 at 2:27 pm
I’m flattered Mr Colm thought my remarks about Sarkozy smart! I must show the wife! There is no doubt that Royal did benefit enormously by being a glamorous woman. Whether another Socialist candidate could have done better in the long run is a matter for conjecture. Like it or not, we’ve got Sarkozy for five years and I hope very much that he will set France on the path to at least partial recovery - and there are many factors at play, not least public opinion, of which he is only a part. I take Mr Colm’s point about the tax reform but, please, a little patience! Mitterrand, as you will remember, pushed through a great parcel of reforms in his first year (1981-2) in office after which he suddenly, by force of circumstance, became right-wing.
August 23rd, 2007 at 9:35 am
If I am an idealist, then Mr Sarkozy is one. For he has promised to move quickly to reforms and behaves as if he expected quick results, and he actually did start some reforms, there is no doubt about this, although my claim is that many of these are either inefficient or pure facade ( as the one on universities, which solves nothing). Of course the famous “100 days” limit is not enough to judge, but if we do not start looking at what he does, what will be the limit ? One year ? Two ?
August 28th, 2007 at 11:37 am
What could be done to resolve the very real and fundamental problem of the universities? As I see it, they need funding by private industry and selection. Without selection, they won’t get the funding and the teachers’ unions are resolutely opposed to selection (while sending their children whenever possible into “classes préparatoires”) on a matter of principle (equality) and are opposed to private funding thus disadvantaging students from poor familes whereas teachers themselves are comfortably middle class.
August 28th, 2007 at 12:47 pm
It was the students’ unions and the National Council for Higher Education and Research which blocked the reform proposing to select which graduates go forward to take a masters. The idea of selecting which school-leavers go to which university was not even raised. You are right that there is something clearly wrong: the idea of selection being un-republican is a blind-spot which means while there is the alternative of grandes ecoles, universities will never improve. My personal fear is that way of thinking may, in different forms, also make reforms of labour etc also impossible, and that is the real problem for France. How to reform while remaining quintessentially French.