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| March | 27 |
| 2007 |
My CNE colleague, Jacob Arfwedson, has a terrific and sobering piece in the Wall Street Journal Europe about Nicolas Sarkozy:
French presidential hopeful Nicolas Sarkozy is often portrayed in the foreign press as a maverick who advocates market reforms and pro-American positions. Yet a month before the first round of elections, his rhetoric smacks ominously of traditional Gaullist and statist ideology.
His campaign speeches have become diatribes against capitalism and global free trade, and his constant calls for interventionism bode ill for France should he reach the ultimate pinnacle. In a March 6 speech in the Parisian suburb of Cormeilles, for instance, he used the word "state" more than 70 times and the verb "protect" more than 40 times in outlining his economic program. When he did talk about issues such as capitalism, innovation or entrepreneurship, it was only in dismissive or disparaging terms.
Do read the whole piece.
MessageSpace
There is a great gap fixed between what a politician, especially in France, has to say in order to get elected and not only what she believes but also, and much more importantly, what she will actually do once in office.
A fascinating insight into the nature of the political process Joshua.
Now if you could just get round to answering those questions you ignored earlier:
When will you be apologising for claiming that Paul Oestreicher is "no more Jewish than Dr. Goebbels"?
When will you be supplying the reasoning and facts behind your claim that the BBC could have averted the Holocaust?
When will you be explaining what you meant by your reference to British mothers' "tainted milk"?
Thanks.
Snide and sneaky as ever, I see our gentile obsessive has returned.
Many thanks for your assistance in my quest to persuade the Jews of Britain to leave for safer and cleaner shores.
Oh, and don't forget to get back to me when Oestreicher eventually is called to glory. I wouldn't want to miss the opportunity to go and spit on his grave.
Great. And the answer to those questions is what, exactly?
I don't know who this Joshua guy is but he is in essence correct WRT Sarko/France. As I just wrote on my blog a real free marketeer is unelectable and Sarko is by far the best of a pretty bad bunch.
Yes that may be faint praise but it's not much worse than the choice Britain will probably face between Brownian OldNuLabour and the Nouveaux Conservatives
Time and again we get disappointed when new French Presidents are elected who suddenly revert to the traditional Gaullist anti Americanism, anti British, anti Israel, Socialist positions - despite what they claim when running for office. All the post De Gaulle French Presidents - Pompidou, Giscard, Mitterrand, Chirac and most probably Sarkozy always make statements about becoming closer to America, etc. and yet once they are in office they revert to varying degrees of chauvinism and Gaullism (this includes even the Socialist Mitterand).
There were those who in 1969 thought that by virtue of his once being employed by the Rothschild bank, Pompidou would reverse the blatant pro Arabism of De Gaulle. Needless to say, he did no such thing and actually intensified the French tilt by selling arms to Libya and cutting deals with the PLO.