Archive for the 'French politics' Category

Sarkozy drunk or not

Seems there’s a bit of a scandal when the new President of the Republic Nicolas Sarkozy gets a bit drunk before a press conference, can’t imagine why.
In his defence he had just emerged from a meeting with Vladimir Putin, and I’m sure the ‘entente cordiale’ demanded that he have a couple of drinks.
What do you [...]

tout devient possible

Well, after months of uncertainty and years of stagnation, France has chosen Sarkozy to be the new president. Congratulations France, congratulations Sarkozy!
‘Together, everything is possible’ (ensemble, tout devient possible) was the motto on which the campaign was based. An attractive little phrase, but only time will tell whether France really want to pull together to [...]

Presidential elections in France

Yesterday evening I happened upon a TV interview with Segolene Royal, one of the two main contenders in the forthcoming French Presidential Elections. This did little to cheer me up, and while I am poorly placed to offer political commentary, I’m going to anyway.
Now as always my comments come with the proviso that I might [...]

French election commentary

Well, given the excitement in the news about the forthcoming French elections I suppose I had better start passing commenting on the contenders and the general political situation. Since I’m far from being an expert on French politics, the occasional entries will be either brief, or interspersed with irrelevant commentary in an attempt to make [...]

First date

After years of worrying about our daughters’ potential boyfriends and future boyfriends, the problem is about to come to a head, but not in the way we expected.
Older daughter has a never ending stream of admirers, whispered phonecalls, giggly chats and so on, but apparently none of the contenders meet her demanding requirements. One particularly [...]

Politics trans-Atlantic style

Usually, down here in the remote wastelands of rural France, the world of politics passes us by. No bad thing I have to say. Occasional murmurings about Jacques Chirac and his lack of activity reach us, as France prepare for next years presidential elections, and the Economist likes to remind us every week that Tony [...]

How to run the French economy

Following my enormous success with a earlier brief comments on politics in France – I am number one in Google for the expression ‘CPE strike’, which seems a bit excessive – I thought I had better turn my eye once again to politics.
I don’t want to return to the CPE problems, since the CPE has [...]

CPE – strike in France

I’m not usually one to bring a political angle to my blogging, but today I think I will make an exception. Hundreds of thousands of French are on strike today, marching around the city centres, so I will appear either ignorant or stupid if I claim to be reporting about life in France while not [...]