Charles Bremner on Yesterday the latest Sarko's show on French TV:
When Pierre accused him of ignorance over the lives of ordinary people, Sarkozy replied: "I am not going to put ashes on my head, excusing myself for not being a worker at Renault."
And, not to be forgotten, Sarkozy took his usual swipe at the President of the United States. Defending his multitude of simultaneous reforms, he said: "Take my friend Barack Obama... He went with just one reform and look what has happened to it."
Also worth noting: In neither the talk show nor the interview that preceded it, did anyone mention Muslim veils, which shows that this is not one of the matters that are really worrying people.
Sarkozy's performance, imposed on TV in a way that only Silvio Berlusconi could rival, has naturally been mocked by the Socialists and other opponents. But it scored surprisingly good reviews in the press today. The most unusual one came from Laurent Joffrin, Editor of Libération,who is Sarkozy's bête noire. "The President defended his policies with indisputable mastery," he wrote.
I have to admit that Sarkozy's Obama obsession betrays his "Americacentrism." Anytime, Sarkozy hits Obama with just words (can he do anything else?), I want to say to him, "It is so unnecessary. Don't worry, you are his equal. You have so much in common that it is scary." That said, I believed that if these two could switch roles, their countries would be better off for it. Sarkozy would make a better American president for he likes action and has his political vision is more in tune with the American compact. Obama would, undoubtedly, make a better French president, for he is so good with the symbolic and representative side of power, which the French want their republican monarch to be great at to reassure themselves that although the king may relate to and understand them, he is better than them in the sense that he has great skills and that therefore his majesty is unquestionable and his great powers well used.
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