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As always, ever since I reached legal age, I've declined to exert my right to vote at the first turn of the presidential ballot. Indeed, and despite the gazillion of candidates (from the far-left to the far-right), elections in France are eerily similar to those in the Soviet Union: no matter the outcome, a Socialist gets elected.This one being no different than before, I frankly couldn't be bothered.
However, the spectacle of the (official) Socialist candidate during the big
Make no mistake: I have absolutely no consideration for her opponent. I made my mind on Sarkozy a long time ago. Things like this helped me to get the picture. That, and - for instance - his willingness to confiscate guns from their legal and registered owners while letting the jihadist rampage freely during the two weeks of nationwide riots (the 2005 Allah Akbar Tour), or his big push on speed cameras (and fines) assorted with a strategic deployment of police forces to hunt down the vicious honest citizen whenever and wherever he commits the heinous crime of driving his car, in order to give some breathing space to the various victims of society in the Gaza-on-the-Seine strip, so these downtrodden sons and grandsons of immigrants (AKA Fully French Folks) could carry on with gang rapping any broad guilty of being white in the aptly named (as far as the police is concerned) "no-go zones".
All the while talking his way up to his biggest PR hoax: that of appearing as a zero-tolerance Law and Order hero.
Sarkozy is all talk, no walk. Or worse: talk, but walk the other way. A politician as cunning and deceitful as Chirac, only younger.
From his opponent however, the (official) Socialist Royal, one can definitely expect that every single bad political, social and economical idea would be devised and enforced, no matter the cost, and no matter annoying parameters such as "Reality" and "Facts" that do tend to get in the way of Great Social Experiments for the Greater Good of l'Humanité -- and are frankly the only things preventing us from reaching the well overdue Workers' Paradise.
So there was no need to bust a gut figuring this one out: when it comes to Sarkozy's program, one can expect a lot of uncertainties - and therefore the possibility that he won't be that bad (“establish a Social VAT”? That's just for the show I expect?). With Royal in the seat however, one can rest assured that she would have been a total disaster, and certainly the last nail in France's coffin.
With that in mind, I therefore went to cast my vote. Against Royal. I actually considered using one of Royal's ballots, just writing in front of her name "I vote against ...", but that would have nullified it. Reckoning that democracy can infringe freedom of speech (well, yeah), I picked up the Nicolas Sarkozy ticket and got on with the affair.
Tonight the other
Consider this: having been through various domestic issues, where Sarkozy basically pledged to be everything to everybody - I shall confess that this surge of hypocritical paternalism got my blood pressure higher already, but then I remembered that talk is cheap, particularly for this guy - to which he added a large spoon of nationalist bravado (when will a French ever learn the difference between Patriotism and Nationalism? Here's the open question for you) and three cheers for the EU (Leaves the room. Closes the door. Raises his fists. Screams. Takes the Name of the Lord in vain. Repents a bit. Goes back to the video feed on the computer screen), Mr. New President just had a few words for, quote, "our American friends".
Hey, Sarkozy is pro-American right? I mean, he's had his picture taken with the Evil Texan W. Ain't that a proof?
You know, like when it was Jacques C. formerly-known-as-the-French-President, who was the very first head of state to rush to America right after 9/11? And wasn't that a proof too?
Anyway, Sarkozy's American friends shall be delighted to learn that La "France will always be there for l'Amérique", because La France is your friend, BUT Sarko starkly reminds them American friends of ours that friendship implies:
"(...) accepting that your friends might think differently [big cheers from the crowd at this point, prompting Mr New President to repeat the following five words twice - Ed] and that a great nation like the US of A has a duty not to obstruct the struggle against climate change, and on the contrary to take the lead in this fight, because what's at stake is the fate of all mankind."
And that is all Mr. Sarkozy, New President of La France, had to say to his American friends.
Six years on, thousands of people slaughtered by Islamic fascists in New York, Bali, Madrid, London, Israel, Afghanistan and Iraq, thousands of attempts to kill even more civilians and soldiers foiled around the globe, the Long War raging on several fronts with thousands of courageous and dedicated men and women in the line of fire while Iran is steadily making its way to the Holy Nukes of Allah and consistently boasting its commitment to use them, and YET Nicolas Sarkozy, hereafter President of the French Republic, advises the USA to finally get to the really serious problem.
You see, Sagacious Sarko identified the Peril of our Time : the weather's been really nice lately(2) (by the way, somebody ought to tell this guy that this is usually what happens when one comes out of an Ice Age. It's less cold. And therefore, warmer. I know, climatology is such a complicated science that you end up letting Al Gore try to understand it for us, just so we can make fun of him(3).)
A couple of weeks ago, the essential Kenneth Timmerman(4) quoted CIA director Michael Hayden:
"Let me be very clear," CIA Director Michael Hayden told ambassadors from the European Union last month over lunch at the German embassy.
"My countrymen, my government, my Agency and I believe that we are a nation at war. We are in a state of armed conflict with al Qa'ida and its affiliates. We believe that this conflict with al Qa'ida is global in its scope. We also believe that a precondition for our winning this conflict is to take the fight to the enemy wherever he may be."
General Hayden's frank and detailed presentation to the Europeans was aimed at defusing tensions created in part by a European Parliamentary "temporary committee" investigating the CIA's program of "extraordinary renditions" of terrorist suspects.
It was also aimed at rebuking those Europeans demagogues, such as French president Jacques Chirac, who have accused President Bush of single-handedly creating trans-Atlantic tensions,
inciting the Muslim world, and violating the Geneva conventions and international standards of human rights.
"Let me advise you to please NOT assume that the current American approach to the Global War on Terrorism is the product of just one administration or just this president,"
Hayden warned.
From what I've seen of the new European demagogue tonight, I'm afraid I can echo Director Hayden's warning, and advise my American friends to please NOT assume that the late French approach to America was the product of just one administration or just the former president.
Don't throw away that “F the French” tee-shirt just yet.
1. I do credit Sarkozy for the big plunge taken by the National Front, since he managed to rally a big chunk of their voters in his favor. This should rid us of those far-right socialists for a bit, which is definitely matter to celebrate.
2. In all honesty, I guess it can make some kind of twisted sense: on any given sunny day, the French can lose up to 15,000 innocent civilians, if memory serves.
3. Remember the time we let him figure out all that stuff with personal computing and he came back like he invented the Internet? What a scream! Though not as funny as when he finds that polar bears can't swim, I give you that.
4. I very strongly recommend his book " The French Betrayal of America" (so much that I'm ready to send the style of this sentence to hell by using the qualifier "very" right in front of "strongly". Ain't that a proof?
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2221 - Star-Wolf
Star-Wolf France
Idem en ce qui me concerne, non pas par flemme, encore que, mais vu la pléthore de médiocres en course pour l'Elysée depuis plus de trente ans, et 2007 n'ayant pas fait exception à la règle (quand je vois les scores de Philippe de Villiers, je me dis que le frenchie de base se cogne royalement de l'avenir de son pays et de ses marmots), j'ai préféré ne pas trop suivre cette parodie de campagne. Je savais que ça allait se jouer entre la cruche et le nain, mais de toute manière, n'avions-nous pas été incités dès le départ à choisir entre ces deux-là ?
A la même période, je faisais mes premières armes sur le dernier Command & Conquer. La vie est une question de priorités.