France General Discussion

[Antonio the Sixth]

Le roi a parlé...

Today in Versailles Castle... The President is now able to speak before the parliament, without any possibility of reply. What a republican symbol !

[Antonio the Sixth]

Wow...

Hear this ! Online Sarko-bashing on France Inter...

[Hash]

Frédéric Mitterrand is rumoured to become Minister of Culture tommorrow, replacing the snob Albanel (who reminds me of the snob lady in Les Visiteurs). Mitterrand is the crook's gay nephew who used to do stupid shows for TV5 and is now director of the Villa Medicis in Rome.

Fred supported Jacquouille in 1995, but was an early supporter of the MRG.

[big bad fab]

Frédéric Mitterrand is rumoured to become Minister of Culture tommorrow, replacing the snob Albanel (who reminds me of the snob lady in Les Visiteurs). Mitterrand is the crook's gay nephew who used to do stupid shows for TV5 and is now director of the Villa Medicis in Rome.

Fred supported Jacquouille in 1995, but was an early supporter of the MRG.

Journalists are still fascinated by ministerial reshuffes under Sarkozy: many, many rumours, many, many names dropped (to mess the left or the MoDem) even if they are completely impossible (but Frédéric Mitterrand will be minister), many, many incompetent guys but useful in the medias....

Sigh....

Juppé, reviens !

[Hash]

Frédéric Mitterrand is rumoured to become Minister of Culture tommorrow, replacing the snob Albanel (who reminds me of the snob lady in Les Visiteurs). Mitterrand is the crook's gay nephew who used to do stupid shows for TV5 and is now director of the Villa Medicis in Rome.

Fred supported Jacquouille in 1995, but was an early supporter of the MRG.

Journalists are still fascinated by ministerial reshuffes under Sarkozy: many, many rumours, many, many names dropped (to mess the left or the MoDem) even if they are completely impossible (but Frédéric Mitterrand will be minister), many, many incompetent guys but useful in the medias....

Sigh....

Juppé, reviens !

Yes, it was on Québecois radio this morning.

Of course, the media has released 600 names. Serge Letchimy, the PPM Mayor of Fort-de-France; Bernard Accoyer etc...

[Antonio the Sixth]

Frédéric Mitterrand is rumoured to become Minister of Culture tommorrow, replacing the snob Albanel (who reminds me of the snob lady in Les Visiteurs). Mitterrand is the crook's gay nephew who used to do stupid shows for TV5 and is now director of the Villa Medicis in Rome.

Fred supported Jacquouille in 1995, but was an early supporter of the MRG.

Depressing...

[Hash]

Yay, cabinet shuffle

Shuffled minister

Michèle Alliot-Marie is now Minister of State, Minister of Justice
Brice Hortefeux is now Minister of the Interior
Xavier Darcos gets Labour
Bruno Le Maire gets Food, Fisheries and Agriculture
Luc Chatel adds Education on top of being spokesperson

New ministers

Frédéric Mitterrand (Ind) gets Culture and Communications
Michel Mercier (MoDem) gets Rurality and Territorial Development
Christian Estrosi gets Industry
Henri de Raincourt gets Parliamentary Relations

Secretaries of State:

Jean-Marie Bockel (GM) is Secretary of State for Justice
Rama Yade gets Sports. Human Rights joke is abolished.
Valérie Létard (NC) gets Sustainable Development
Hubert Falco gets Veterans
Pierre Lellouche gets European Affairs
Nora Berra MEP gets Seniors
Marie-Luce Penchard gets Overseas
Benoist Apparu gets Housing

Barnier, Dati are MEPs. Christine Albanel, Christine Boutin, Yves Jégo, Bernard Laporte, André Santini (NC) and Roger Karoutchi are out.

Nora Berra is the daughter of an Algerian soldier. Marie-Luce Penchard is actually from the DOM-TOMs and is black, so she certainly isn't a bad choice. Good idea to get somebody who actually knows the place aside from the Guadeloupe ClubMed in the job.

[big bad fab]

Nice to see Apparu (young UMP MP from Marne), Chatel, Le Maire promoted.

Awful to see the joke of Frédéric Mitterrand (why not Roger Hanin, minister of security ?),
and the return of stupid and vulgar Estrosi.

And be prepared to have some diplomatic troubles inside the EU with Lellouche as European affairs secretary of state !!!
All the more after the technocratic, German-speaking, efficient, clear Le Maire...

Hard to see that Morano is still Family secretary of state, she who declared she would be glad to carry the children of her own daughter...

Hard to see that Wauquiez isn't promoted.

Hard to see that titles of ministries are more and more lunatic...

[big bad fab]

Marie-Luce Penchard is actually from the DOM-TOMs and is black, so she certainly isn't a bad choice. Good idea to get somebody who actually knows the place aside from the Guadeloupe ClubMed in the job.

Are you sure ?

She's the daughter of Lucette Michaux-Chevry...
Remember this "nice" old crap, specialized in undiplomatic words, pork and killing of political friends ?

[Antonio the Sixth]

Where goes Xavier Bertrand ?

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Where goes Xavier Bertrand ?

He's been Secretary General of the UMP for the past few months, meaning he left government.

Marie-Luce Penchard is actually from the DOM-TOMs and is black, so she certainly isn't a bad choice. Good idea to get somebody who actually knows the place aside from the Guadeloupe ClubMed in the job.

Are you sure ?

She's the daughter of Lucette Michaux-Chevry...
Remember this "nice" old crap, specialized in undiplomatic words, pork and killing of political friends ?

Anyways, I'm of the opinion that a local is somehow better than a metropolitan like Jégo (who was incompetent).

For Mitterrand, I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt. The only thing I know of him is the time he was a TV5, where he was decent if not boring.

[Bunwahaha [still dunno why, but well, so be it]]

Anyways, I'm of the opinion that a local is somehow better than a metropolitan like Jégo (who was incompetent).

For Mitterrand, I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt. The only thing I know of him is the time he was a TV5, where he was decent if not boring.

Ow, ow, ow...

Here I disagree. First on Jégo. At the beginning of the conflict in Guadeloupe, I've been also thinking, what the hell this guy does here?? But events shew that in fact it was Fillon ( so, Sarkozy??) who totally messed up all the points there, and that Jégo just understood very well and very fast what was happening there, and he quickly gave the right solutions, the solutions that the govt finally approved after a big general strike that just give more strength to the movement of protests in the country (what a good management sirs Fillon and Sarko...) and some solutions which from the point of view of all the experts where the only one available and were legitimate. Jégo has been great there and people of Antilles liked him for his competences in this affair, we had with him a good guy for dealing with the social movements and who could have even given some force to the govt because of the psychological adavantage he had now the people of Antilles respected him... What a shame he is fired, was he too popular and thus unpleasant to Sarkozy?? Anyway, his firing is nothing but stupid.

And concerning Mitterand, Fredo, I'll agree with fab here. To me that guy in the govt is maybe a bigger mistake than Rachida Dati. The guy is mainly someone who love the provocation and who have a certain contempt for the popular culture, outside of the fact that I don't like this kind of things, at an epoch where the govt has to do nothing but to play low profile toward popular movement and culture, it is nothing but an error, to have him in the govt. Plus the guy has some references in the realm of the culture but he doesn't seem at all to be done for politics, if ever politics is still considered has being something serious. Anyways, on the both board, it's a mistake for me.

Concerning the rest of the new govt. Well, Chatel at Education Nationale? Isn't that a playground for the school and student unions?? Then, Darcos, he is a good guy for who I have enough consideration, but that same unions of school and students have put him a washing machine, he seems clearly burned, and he is asked to do what?? To deal with all the unions of the country now?? Hell! So good choices...

Then, well, other than that, I'm not sure that Hortefeux that would lead the same policy as the one of Sarkozy at ministry of interior is a good choice, not sure at all, a kind of policy of quotas and that give a big part to repression that I anyways disapprove.

Other than that, Alliot Marie at justice is better than Rachida Dati, for sure, but for me it's not a wonderful choice for this minister too. Ultimately I think Jospin would be a great minister of Justice, he has in the same time the rigidity of principles and some fair compassion, but well, Jospin minister in a Sarkozy's govt, we should be back to reality...

Other than that Rama Yade at sports and youth is very good I think. Seems also we still need a minister of indignation with Wauquiez... Then, Lemaire seems a good choice for one side of the agriculture realm, Brussels, but for the other side, speaking with workers of the agriculture I'm not sure such a technocrat is a good point, especially in our period. Then, well, we've sharkies like Apparu coming, why not, we'll see, I think that guy would have been a good spokesman of the govt and that Chatel worn out for this, he would have given some good energy.

Well, good luck to this govt, may it does good things, autumn could be hot.

[big bad fab]

Anyways, I'm of the opinion that a local is somehow better than a metropolitan like Jégo (who was incompetent).

For Mitterrand, I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt. The only thing I know of him is the time he was a TV5, where he was decent if not boring.

Ow, ow, ow...

Here I disagree. First on Jégo. At the beginning of the conflict in Guadeloupe, I've been also thinking, what the hell this guy does here?? But events shew that in fact it was Fillon ( so, Sarkozy??) who totally messed up all the points there, and that Jégo just understood very well and very fast what was happening there, and he quickly gave the right solutions, the solutions that the govt finally approved after a big general strike that just give more strength to the movement of protests in the country (what a good management sirs Fillon and Sarko...) and some solutions which from the point of view of all the experts where the only one available and were legitimate. Jégo has been great there and people of Antilles liked him for his competences in this affair, we had with him a good guy for dealing with the social movements and who could have even given some force to the govt because of the psychological adavantage he had now the people of Antilles respected him... What a shame he is fired, was he too popular and thus unpleasant to Sarkozy?? Anyway, his firing is nothing but stupid.

Yep, the chain of real events inside the government isn't clear yet, but it may be Sarkozy's cabinet (so... Marie-Luce Penchard, among others !), on the content, and Fillon, on the method, that have messed it up, not Jégo himself.
Jégo did what he can with, first, no instructions from Paris, then instructions already out-of-fashion due to strikes and fightings. He was on location, on the frontline, and nobody helped him or trusted him to take the decisions on its own.

If Sarkozy uses and drops every young UMP, there will be nobody left in 2013 (after a 2012 defeat) or 2017 to succeed him.... except "unsarkozystes" like Copé, Pécresse or Baroin.
And, as Pécresse may lose next year in Ile-de-France and as Copé will be gunned all the time, the right isn't in a good prospect...

[Hash]

Martine Billard, a Green MP for Paris from the ecosocialist wing of the Greenies, has left the Greens to join the PG. She criticizes the party's shift towards the centre under DC-B and apparently the PG is also a ecologist party now.

Interestingly, a number of ecosocialists from the Greenies seem to be on the verge of following suit. We could see some important members of the Green left moving to the PG and the Greenies re-orienting towards the centre as a result under DC-B's leadership.

[Antonio the Sixth]

Martine Billard, a Green MP for Paris from the ecosocialist wing of the Greenies, has left the Greens to join the PG. She criticizes the party's shift towards the centre under DC-B and apparently the PG is also a ecologist party now.

Interestingly, a number of ecosocialists from the Greenies seem to be on the verge of following suit. We could see some important members of the Green left moving to the PG and the Greenies re-orienting towards the centre as a result under DC-B's leadership.

Interesting trend... will that hurt or favor the Greens ?

[Bunwahaha [still dunno why, but well, so be it]]

Funny.

Difficult to translate for English speakers...

Hacking or would some Google developers be trying humor?

[Bunwahaha [still dunno why, but well, so be it]]

Ségolène Royal received, like other big French politicians before her a matter of time ago, a letter that threaten her of death, with a big bullet in it. Would she be that Machiavellian??

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Sarko suffered a 'minor' seizure Sunday while jogging in Versailles. He spent the night under observation at the Val-de-Grace military hospital and left the hospital this morning up and walking. They assured us it's a inoffensive seizure which can happen to people under intense physical pressure (aka, running or jogging) and/or stress (aka, working).

While its medical effects are minor, most medias are interested in whether this will change his 'hyperpresident' style.

Some on the looney left seem to be certain that this was a media fabrication to boost his approval rating.

[Bunwahaha [still dunno why, but well, so be it]]

Some on the looney left seem to be certain that this was a media fabrication to boost his approval rating.

Haha. Who and what did you hear exactly about this?

[Hash]

Some on the looney left seem to be certain that this was a media fabrication to boost his approval rating.

Haha. Who and what did you hear exactly about this?

Newspaper comments [not LeFigaro.fr] (often overrun by the PG and Communist idiots).

I remember in the Euros the PG hacks were "we'll win 30% of the vote". As I say, they all live in 1946.

[big bad fab]

Some secretaries of state may well be added to the 39 member-list of Fillon-government.

Maybe Lefebvre (Sarkozyst loyalist).
Maybe Leroy (Nouveau Centre).
Maybe Giacobbi (PRG deputy from Corsica).
Maybe Tron (Villepin follower).

This list is striking, when you've lived the Mitterrand years.

Don't you think Sarkozy's governments look more and more like Miterrand's ones,
with over 40 members (up to 46 under Mitterrand I think),
with some useless and weird portfolios,
with all the minorities represented inside the majority (PSU, MRG, Verts, PCF,...),
with all the wings of the main party represented ("les courants du PS", "les sensibilités de l'UMP"), but with a clear grip of the President's wing,
with some men of "ouverture" (former members of the opposition),
with some men and women of "civil society",
with many members here only because of what they are, not because of what they can do...

Chirac and Giscard's governments (including Jospin's one, even with "gauche plurielle"), were a bit more of one colour, more "political", less diverse.

[Bunwahaha [still dunno why, but well, so be it]]

Well, concerning the list:

Seems Lefebvre is no more sure since this week-end.
I would be surprised Tron accepts. Through, you never know.

Sarkozy, campaign 2007: I'll have a tiny team, 15 ministers maximum. We have now to finish with overcrowded governments...

Then, what I'll say on this govt won't be very original. The time where ministers had a real power is out with Sarkozy, definitely, seems the guys are really here just for medias, communication, real ideas and decisions coming from Elysée. Even if Mitterand was very directive I think he had still some strong ministers, who carried something in term of ideas, oppositely to Sarkozy.

[Hash]

Lefebvre in government is to give that idiot a job after Santini returned to his seat. As a loyalist and attack dog, he needed some kind of thank you.

Leroy is a younger centrist to take over Santini's old job, Public Function, since Santini was getting a bit old and corrupt.

Giacobbi is a good choice politically. He could have been one of the PRG's likely candidates in 2010 for the regionals in Corse (where the UMP won in 2004 only because the PRG was divided between Giacobbi and Zuccarelli, two rivals and also Renucci and a Communist) and he's (or his family name is - Giacobbi have held office in Haute-Corse since 1898) a big name in Corse.

Sarkozy, campaign 2007: I'll have a tiny team, 15 ministers maximum. We have now to finish with overcrowded governments...

Aha, he said ministers. He still has 15-16ish ministers, but IIRC, he never talked about secretaries of state! Mitterrand cabinets had a lot more Ministers (plus a lot of secretaries of state).

[Bunwahaha [still dunno why, but well, so be it]]

Sarkozy, campaign 2007: I'll have a tiny team, 15 ministers maximum. We have now to finish with overcrowded governments...

Aha, he said ministers. He still has 15-16ish ministers, but IIRC, he never talked about secretaries of state! Mitterrand cabinets had a lot more Ministers (plus a lot of secretaries of state).

Héhé. Yes, yes. . That's why I added the second sentence he also said, the exact word he said in French was "pléthorique" IIRC, secretaries of state fall in this formula.

[big bad fab]

My point was that Sarkozy is influenced by Mitterrand's behaviour. The Giscard's comparison is a dubious one.

Surprises, even for your own side,
putting the debate on a different sibject when you are deadlocked (remember 1984 and a constitutional debate to get out of the school question),
acting outside when the French debate is politically dangerous,
governments to please wings, local barons, etc

Of course, he's more in charge, he talks far more than Mitterrand. But I think Attali has had some influence on the young Sarkozy, more than Chirac.
BTW, Chirac has himself been influenced by Mitterrand after 1986...