Fausta's Blog

American and Latin American Politics, Society, and Culture

By

Sarko leaving? For the UK?

Taxes must really be awful in France that the UK’s looking good by comparison,
Sarkozy’s plans ‘to dodge new 75% French tax rate by moving to London with wife Carla and setting up £1bn private equity fund’
Fraud police found details of move and business plan in raid on home
Sarkozy is under investigation for corruption in France
He will be latest Frenchman to escape potential top French tax rate of 75%
Couple would become London’s most high profile Gallic celebrities
Sarkozy would hope for fund support from French entrepreneur Alain Minc

I thought a ‘£1bn private equity fund’ would be more of a Villepin thing, but, hey, we’re living in hard times.

No word if the perineum is getting a workout.

Share

By

The real scandal in this “Report: Sarkozy calls Netanyahu ‘liar’” story

The headline and lede read,
Report: Sarkozy calls Netanyahu ‘liar’
Microphones accidently [sic] left on after G20 meeting pick up private conversation between US, French presidents. Sarkozy admits he ‘can’t stand’ Israeli premier. Obama: You’re fed up with him? I have to deal with him every day!

Yes, this is bad enough. The real scandal, however, is this: The reporters went along with a request that they abstain from, well, reporting,

The surprising lack of coverage may be explained by a report alleging that journalists present at the event were requested to sign an agreement to keep mum on the embarrassing comments. A Reuters reporter was among the journalists present and can confirm the veracity of the comments.

A member of the media confirmed Monday that “there were discussions between journalists and they agreed not to publish the comments due to the sensitivity of the issue.”

He added that while it was annoying to have to refrain from publishing the information, the journalists are subject to precise rules of conduct.

“Precise rules of conduct”: don’t embarrass some on vital Middle East issues, but make sure to report that Herman Cain asked a woman out to dinner and stuck someone with a bill.

27880
Share

By

Carla Bruni pregnant, in time for the next election?

carlasarko

Bloomberg headline: Sarkozy’s Wife Fends Off Questions on Speculation She’s Pregnant

French first lady Carla Bruni- Sarkozy, the 43-year-old wife of President Nicolas Sarkozy, again fended off questions on whether she’s pregnant.

“You are doing your job in asking, and I’m doing my job in not responding,” she said today in an interview with Paris- based RTL Radio. “I try to protect my private life as best I can. I think people understand.”

She declined to answer a similar question in an interview in the Le Parisien newspaper earlier this month. Speculation that Bruni-Sarkozy is pregnant was first reported in celebrity magazine “Closer.”

If true, Italian-born Bruni-Sarkozy’s baby would be the first for a French incumbent head of state since Empress Eugenie gave birth to Louis-Napoleon Bonaparte at the Palais des Tuileries in Paris 155 years ago. Sarkozy may seek a second term in the May 2012 presidential election.

So far, it looks like Sarko’s going to have to wait until after the baby’s born for a bounce, Carla Bruni-Sarkozy’s ‘pregnancy’ fails to bring husband baby bounce
Nicolas Sarkozy has held on to his title of the most unpopular president in the history of the Fifth republic, dashing any hopes of a Bruni-Sarkozy baby boost to his re-election chances. There’s still time, though,

Ms Bruni-Sarkozy is said to be preparing for an October delivery just seven months before France goes to the polls for the 2012 presidential elections.

particularly if she has twins, as long as the Sarkos don’t overdo the lifestyle bit,

His champagne lifestyle with Ms Bruni-Sarkozy, a multi-millionaire heiress, is also known to have made him intensely unpopular.

Perhaps the Sarkos are taking a hint from the “champagne lifestyle” critics – apparently Carla’s 300euro shopping trip is being described as a “shopping spree”. Back in the day 300 euros would have been enough to pay for 1 blouse, if that.

And there’s no point in firing the newsmen, either, even when they call him a child-king and her a maneater. The advertisers are already having fun with the pregnancy, which is yet to be officially confirmed.

En fin, maybe all that perineal tectonic training was well worth the effort.

Sing it, Carla!

Blogging on more serious topics shall resume shortly.

26195
Share

By

The French are revolting! VIDEO

French strikes: 3.5 million take to streets to protest pension reform
More than three million people took to the streets of France in protest at pension reforms, with distant echoes of May 1968 as students and schoolchildren swelled numbers to record highs. The students went since the teachers and staff of the schools and universities were out protesting, and the parents dragged their kids for the same reason – they all can strike until they’re blue in the face and the government’s broke all the same. Not only that, the cost of doing business in France makes it counterproductive to conduct business.

This is the third general strike in a month.

If you’re in France and need to get any work done, might as well give up for the duration of the strike and keep reading more blogs as you are doing now.

Check out the Al-Jazeera report,

Noticias 24 (link in Spanish) has photos of the more colorful demonstrators,

The photo prompted a Noticias 24 commenter to ask if it was a strike or a gay parade. Better not tell Paladino.

23511
Share

By

Lula skips the UN, heads to G20

Brazil’s president Lula, who is a master at self-promotion and bringing his country to the spotlight, is skipping this week’s zoo meeting at the UN:
Cameron, Lula Absence Shows UN Losing Ground to G-20 Summits

World leaders are cutting back their visits to the United Nations General Assembly session this week as they find the Group of 20 and other smaller gatherings more effective venues to debate international problems.

British Prime Minister David Cameron and Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, whose countries both sit on the UN Security Council, won’t be in New York. Nor will Russian President Dmitry Medvedev and Prime Minister Vladimir Putin. Chinese President Hu Jintao is skipping the UN week, handing off the duty to Premier Wen Jiabao.

“The UN is where you give a speech but there’s no group meeting,” said Jeffrey Shafer, who organized Group of Eight meetings as President Bill Clinton’s “sherpa” or personal representative to the gatherings. “The G-20 will have a more focused agenda than the UN, and it shows the primacy of the economic agenda.”

French President Nicolas Sarkozy made a one-day appearance in New York yesterday to speak to a session on fighting developing-nation poverty. Like German Chancellor Angela Merkel, who is staying for two days, Sarkozy will leave before the major speeches start Sept. 23 from the podium of the General Assembly hall.

“It’s the 80-20 rule,” said Michael Hodin, an adjunct senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York. More issues are being decided at smaller groups, including the Group of 20, which holds its next meeting in Seoul in November, Hodin said.

“If you’re dealing with something in the G-20, you’re already dealing with the 80 percent of world leaders who can make a difference,” he said.

Sarko’s even saying the UN is passe,

Sarkozy, whose country has the G-20 chairmanship next year, has called the UN anachronistic. “We can’t confront the 21st century with the institutions of the 20th century,” he said in May.

Particularly when those institutions have become forums for anti-capitalist, human rights violating tyrants.

In other UN news, Obama’s there today.

23111
Share

By

Life ain’t hell to Michelle, says Carla

In today’s episode of the Real Desperate Housewives of the Heads of State, after a book came out claming that Michelle Obama said that her life is hell,
Bruni denies Michelle Obama likened White House life to ‘hell’

France’s first lady Carla Bruni denied Monday that her U.S. counterpart ever told her that life in the White House was “hell.”

“Of course Michelle Obama never said such a thing,” the former model told CNN at the French mission in Midtown. She arrived Monday at the United Nations on the arm of her husband, French President Nicolas Sarkozy, who was attending a summit on global development.

Of course.

Carla Bruni and Michelle Obama are starting to be as amusing as Prince Charles.

23091
Share

By

‘Don’t ask! It’s hell. I can’t stand it!’ UPDATED

World-Famous Fashion Icon and Busy Mom Michelle Obama™ told Carla Bruni it’s not easy being queen:
‘It’s hell. I can’t stand it!’ Carla Bruni reveals what Michelle Obama REALLY thinks of being First Lady

Michelle Obama thinks being America’s First Lady is ‘hell’, Carla Bruni reveals today in a wildly indiscreet book.

Miss Bruni divulges that Mrs Obama replied when asked about her position as the U.S. president’s wife: ‘Don’t ask! It’s hell. I can’t stand it!’

I think we can help Michelle Obama out in the next Presidential election, but Ed Driscoll wants to know

How will it all play out on the campaign trail this month and next, where Obama had apparently hoped his wife would be an asset during the midterms?

Hopefully not well.

After all, I want to get my fries and eat them, too.

But instead be prepared for the media toadies to present Michelle as a victim: her self-sacrifice should be appreciated by all of us thankless “little people”.

Would you like some fries with that?

UPDATE
Well, that sure didn’t take long:
Michelle Obama: French Embassy said she never told Carla Sarkozy life is “hell”

23023
Share

By

All showbiz, all of the time

Anyone who had any doubt what Carla Bruni is about should just read this,
Woody Allen starts Paris shoot with Carla in the wings

Director Woody Allen began shooting his latest movie in Paris on Monday, with French first lady Carla Bruni-Sarkozy waiting in the wings to take her first major film role.

Despite a starry cast including Oscar-winner Marion Cotillard and American talents Owen Wilson and Kathy Bates, pre-publicity for “Midnight in Paris” has focused on the supermodel-turned-singer’s big screen debut.
…
Bruni-Sarkozy revealed last year she had been invited by Allen to feature in the film, but President Nicolas Sarkozy’s 42-year-old wife admitted she is not an experienced actress and is not quite sure what to expect.

“I’m not an actress at all. Perhaps I’ll be completely hopeless but I can’t miss an opportunity like this one. When I’m a grandmother I’d like to be able to say I made a film with Woody Allen,” she told an interviewer.

Tearing herself away from film parts and tectonic training, Carla found time to entertain foreign dignitaries last week, among them big-haired Chantal Biya, first lady of Cameroon:

No word as to whether the two first ladies headed out for Big Macs after the official Bastille Day ceremonies.

In other presidential showbiz news, after flying the dog in a private plane, the Obamas completed a speed vacation, where they went out for ice cream.

21743
Share