Photo censorship

Read the story on the Larry Clark exhibigtion HERE.

There's now a homoerotic aspect to the story. A daily paper interviewed (HERE) a guy named Marcel Rufo, a media-friendly child psychologist, about the ban on minors. He disagreed with the ban, and said that instead, the Dieux du Stade rugby beefcake calendar should be off limits to minors because it's much more pornographic and degrading, including scenes of dom-sub, etc. Is Rufo uncomfortable with homoeroticism? Or, as the head of the club that produces the calendar says, because Rufo is a fan of a rival club, and of a more traditional rugby, where the only oil you'd find on a player is motor oil from his tractor?

The news from France

Via Google Translation, an article from Le Parisien:

MONTPELLIER
The "great men" of George Frêche are controversial
Claude Massonnet | 08/18/2010, 7:00

The first five statues depicting political characters selected by the historian Georges Frêche, president of the Agglomeration of Montpellier (Hérault), will be erected this morning in a climate of intense controversy. The five monumental statues 3.5 m high are the emblematic figures of Roosevelt, Churchill, de Gaulle, Jaures and Lenin.

They were sculpted by François Cacheux his workshop in Maine-et-Loire, and then cast in bronze in the Paris region.

A former Maoist

"I chose these men because they have played a decisive role in the destiny of the world. And because I have a deep admiration for what they have done, including Lenin during the Russian Revolution. Jean Jaures is the only one who did not run a country. But he brought us so much," analyzes Georges Frêche, Left-wing President of the Languedoc-Roussillon regional council. The former Maoist, who made his career in the Socialist party before being expelled in January 2007 after his statements about blacks in the France national football team, is the instigator of this rather crazy project.

A second shipment expected in late September will complete the collection with Golda Meir, Mao, Gandhi, Mandela and Nasser. "General de Gaulle should not be standing alongside Lenin or Mao. While the national government is reducing spending, local government is installing statues at the expense of taxpayers, "denounced Arnaud Julien, the departmental head of the UMP, which is preparing to respond on the ground. The Green Party of Montpellier has said that they intended to remove these statues as soon as they become able to do so.

The first five "historic" works will be installed this morning in the neighborhood of Odysseum between a gokart track, a bowling alley, and the aquarium. Official justification: to make the younger generation think about the history of political ideas.

Georges Frêche is hesitant to bring Stalin in his team. "It's too early. He is still regarded as the butcher of Europe,"lamented the former mayor of Montpellier, who plans to inaugurate the square when all will be complete.

Le cumul des mandats explained

Marc explains the news from France.

The cumul des mandats means elected officials holding multiple offices. It's shocking for Americans, but common in France. Here, you can run for office while already holding another office. The public say they oppose it, and recent laws have limited it, but when those members of the public enter the voting booth, they seem to have no problems with their full-time mayor also being a full-time member of a regional council and a full-time member of the national and European parliaments. Part of it is habit, part of it is status, part of it is financial calculation: having your mayor as a minister can bring pork to town, and having your mayor as an MP can be handy for getting a traffic ticket canceled.

What prompts my rant of the day is this story from 20 Minutes, in which I learn that one limitation on the cumul des mandats isn't really one. You see, there is a limit on the total compensation an elected official can earn from his offices. He can hold multiple offices, but he can only collect a limited amount of cash for doing it (he still keeps all his other benefits, office expenses, travel expenses, etc.). But according to the article, he can transfer any excess compensation over his limit to another elected official! Huh? The compensation is for doing his job, not money owed to him that he can give away to others. This is such BS. Vive la France!


http://www.interieur.gouv.fr/sections/a_votre_service/elections/les_elections_en_france/cumul-mandats

http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cumul_des_mandats

A novel form of police brutality...

Marc explains the news from France...

Read the story HERE.

Although I do post a bit on the reflex of the French "youth" to riot and loot whenever a complete stranger who happens also to be a youth happens to kill himself while running away from the cops (typically without a helmet or license on a speeding stolen off-road motorbike operating on the street), I strongly feel that the revolt against the police is largely motivated by the abuse of police power in France, where a cop can beat up a guy coming out of the police station and get as punishment a simple 6-month unpaid leave.

But the case linked to above takes the cake. After the case of the young woman arrested in her bedroom and taken handcuffed to the police station in her PJs because she may have witnessed an assault in front of her lycée, we have the case of three young men from Marseille who, during a cigarette break in front of the school, got into an argument with a schoolmate in which some foul language and insults were used.

Girl calls mom, who happens to be a police officer in another city. Mom arrives with a group of twelve cops in three vehicles, forces her way into the lycée, and arrests the three guys. They're taken to her police station, which has no jurisdiction for this lycée, are entered in the national crime registry, fingerprinted, photographed, and have a DNA sample taken.

This is nuts... but will be even nuttier will be the consequences. I'm betting that there will be almost none.

While Paris burns, Sarkozy plays cards

Marc explains the news from France.

Nicolas Sarkozy took a big hit in yesterday's second round of regional elections. In continental France, he saved only Alsace for his party, the rest of the country giving a comfortable majority to the left.

And as is typical, normal, expected in France when the President loses an election, there will be a remaniement ministériel, a cabinet reshuffle. A few of the ministers that lost (and they all lost) will be sacked. Others will move from one ministry to another, in one of the regular games of musical chairs that so delight the French political press. Some government departments will be moved from one ministry to another. Ministries will change names. Millions will be spend changing the signage on government buildings, on business cards, on letterhead.

And nothing will really change. And that's how it's supposed to be in France.

It's the Césars!

Marc explains the news from France

Ugh. Tonight's the César awards, presented by the imaginary Académie des Césars" (French had to copy the Oscars, by inventing an institution just to award them). The Académie (not française, but des Césars), uses the term "nommé" for "nominee". You see, the French get their panties in a twist for the oddest things. While they see nothing wrong about saying "mail" instead of "courriel" for e-mail, and while they delight in doing their "footing" (jogging) wearing their "jogging" (track suit), their skin crawls when you say "nominé" for "nominee".

Why is this a problem? Well, because "nominé", despite its perfectly French looks, is an illegal alien. Search for "nominé" + "barbarisme" in Google and you get over 8000 hits. And almost all those riled up about this will tell you that the "right" term in French is "nommé".

Except, of course, that this is total BS. "Nommé" is the past participle of "nommer", a verb that means "to name". A civil servant is "nommé" to his position, for example. In the context of an award, it would mean the winner of the award, not a nominee. "Untel est nommé au César du meilleur acteur" would be far more likely to mean that Untel won the award, not that he was one of a number of candidates.<

And there you have the right "right" word. A far better choice would be "candidat".

Total, a French national champion

Marc explains the news from France

The story HERE.

A strike at refineries and depots of French oil company Total has created a strong likelihood for gas shortages in France. Total supplies about half of France's gas supply. The firm is the result of a takeover by privately owned Total Fina of state-owned Elf Aquitaine under the approving eye of "Socialist" prime minister Lionel Jospin. This is part of a philosophy of the French elite that France needs international "champions", powerhouses in each economic sector. This usually means that French firms need to merge. More recently, we've seen this in the takeover of state-owned Gaz de France by privately owned Suez in the field of energy and public services.  When a company is looking to be sold, the French government will impose as many impediments as possible to a foreign partner in favor of a French one.

One consequence is that there are inevitably more job losses in France, where all the duplication of central services is concentrated.  So why would the elite in the press and politics push these "solutions"? The answer, I think, is that it keeps the top jobs and the levers of patronage in the hands of the French elite, which moves so easily from government to the "private" sector and back.

Another negative outcome is what we're seeing with Total. By concentrating the country's refining and storage capacity in the hands of one firm, the country is more vulnerable to social unrest.

A history of the merger of Total, Petrofina, and Elf HERE.

Nadine Morano has some identity issues

In which Marc explains the news from France.

The "national great national debate on national identity of the nation" launched by Nicolas Sarkozy and run by the traitor Eric Besson has run its predictable pre-electoral race-baiting, immigrant-hating, Islamophobic course... or rather, has been nipped in the bud before more members of Sarkozy's party made more blatant racist "gaffes". Instead of the final major conference to sum up the results of the regional events (in short: immigrants bad, Muslims bad, foreigners bad, Africans bad), the process was aborted in the form of a cabinet seminar, in which various members of the cabinet yelled at Besson for fraking things up.

Among the fraking-uppers was Nadine Morano, minister of Family Affairs. During this long debate period, she said: "Moi, ce que je veux du jeune musulman, quand il est français, c'est qu'il aime son pays, c'est qu'il trouve un travail, c'est qu'il ne parle pas le verlan, qu'il ne mette pas sa casquette à l'envers" (What I expect from a young Muslim man, when he's French, is that he loves his country, that he finds a job, that he doesn't speak slang, and that he doesn't wear his baseball cap backwards.).

Today, Nadine Morano, the minister of moralizing (I'd say more, but she has a history of suing people who tell the truth about her), was questioned about the end of the debate. One of the "outcomes" of the cabinet seminar was the establishment of a blue-ribbon panel to think about the issues raised by the debate. The interviewer cited Georges Clemenceau, who said that the best way to bury an issue was to name a committee to study it. Morano replied: "Clemenceau a le droit de dire ce qu'il souhaite. C'est son analyse, pas la mienne" (Clemenceau is entitled to think as he pleases. That's his analysis, not mine). Nadine, a government minister, seems to ignore the identity of one of the most famous names in French history, the namesake for one of France's only aircraft carriers, prime minister during WWI, Clemenceau, The Tiger.

Message to Nadine: he's dead. He's been dead for some 80 years.

Education Minister admits plagiarizing text from internet...

Marc explains the news from France...

The story HERE. (The photo shows an arrow, not a penis.)

The theft of intellectual property by the party and government of Nicolas Sarkozy (the one who wants to censor the internet in France to prevent illegal downloading) continues. Education Minister Luc Chatel has admitted stealing from a website called Wikiberal the answer he gave to a MP (noted homophobe from Chatel's party, Christian Vanneste). 

The question referred to school vouchers... which is ironic in France, where Catholic schools already are financed in large part by tax dollars (they pay the teachers' salaries). This is just one of the many facts about France that make me guffaw when the Frogs go on about the lack of separation of Church and State in the USA...

Back to our subject: so the Minister of Education is copying stuff off the web for his homework. Okaaay.

Sarkozy pouts because cool-kid Obama doesn't want to play with him

In the story below, we see that the Petit Nicolas has issues because Obama refused to give him his personal cell phone number or something. There'll be no bromance between Barack and Nico. What kills me in this story is this quote: "Obama est au pouvoir depuis un an et il a déjà perdu trois élections partielles. : « Obama est au pouvoir depuis un an et il a déjà perdu trois élections partielles. Moi, j’ai gagné deux législatives et les européennes. Qu’est-ce qu’on aurait dit si j’avais perdu ?" (Obama has been in power for a year, and he's already lost three by-elections. I've won two legislative elections and the European elections. What would people have said if I lost them?)

And this: "Le niveau de pression dans une société est le même, que vous fassiez une réforme ou dix. Mais, si vous n’en faites qu’une, la pression se met sur cette réforme. C’est ce qui se passe avec Obama et la réforme de la santé." (The level of pressure in a society is the same, whether you carry out one reform or ten. But if you only do one, all the pressure is on that reform. That's what's happening with Obama and health reform.)

Story in Le Parisien :
DIPLOMATIE
Sarkozy déçu par son «copain» Obama
Le chef de l’Etat français espérait entretenir un dialogue privilégié avec son homologue américain. Mais leur relation est marquée par une réelle froideur.

Nicolas Sarkozy aurait tant voulu construire une relation privilégiée avec Barack Obama. Pouvoir lui téléphoner quand il le souhaite, le rencontrer régulièrement en tête à tête lors des sommets internationaux, échanger idées et stratégies. « Quand Obama sera en fonction, je le vois plutôt comme une aide que comme un problème.

Vous avez vu le monde, il est vaste, on peut être deux, trois ou quatre », disait-t-il à son propos, début 2009. Mais, depuis l’installation du président américain à la Maison-Blanche, le locataire de l’Elysée a dû se faire une raison : il est traité comme un leader parmi d’autres, ni plus ni moins. « Au début, cela l’a affecté, reconnaît un proche. Maintenant, il en a pris son parti, mais une forme d’irritation persiste encore. »

Le chef de l’Etat trouve que l’opinion internationale est bien trop clémente envers Obama qui, pour l’instant, n’a pas montré grand-chose. En privé, Sarkozy ne loupe pas une occasion d’égratigner le président américain, celui qu’il appelait son « copain » pendant la campagne présidentielle. Au début du mois, devant quelques journalistes, il se lâche : « Obama est au pouvoir depuis un an et il a déjà perdu trois élections partielles. Moi, j’ai gagné deux législatives et les européennes. Qu’est-ce qu’on aurait dit si j’avais perdu ? » Et d’ajouter à propos de la façon de gouverner de son homologue : « Le niveau de pression dans une société est le même, que vous fassiez une réforme ou dix. Mais, si vous n’en faites qu’une, la pression se met sur cette réforme. C’est ce qui se passe avec Obama et la réforme de la santé. »

Le président américain «est froid avec tout le monde, c’est dans sa nature »

Sur le plan international, les critiques de l’Elysée sont féroces. « Lui accorder le prix Nobel de la paix était une erreur, assène un conseiller. Sa politique de la main tendue vis-à-vis des pays jusqu’ici tenus à l’écart ne lui a valu que des claques en retour. La Corée du Nord, l’Iran : il n’a que des échecs. »
A quelques jours de l’ouverture du sommet de Copenhague (du 7 au 18 décembre), Paris trouve Washington bien trop timide au sujet de la lutte contre le réchauffement climatique. Hier pourtant, la Maison-Blanche a annoncé qu’Obama se rendrait le 9 décembre à Copenhague « afin de donner un élan aux négociations ». Nicolas Sarkozy, qui se rend aujourd’hui à Manaus (Brésil) et demain à Trinité-et-Tobago, dans les Caraïbes, veut convaincre les pays amazoniens et ceux du Commonwealth de faire pression sur les Etats-Unis. Avec comme objectif final une « réduction mondiale d’au moins 50 % d’ici à 2050 par rapport à 1990 » des émissions de gaz à effet de serre. Pas gagné.

Néanmoins, même si les frictions se multiplient, la guerre est loin d’être déclarée entre les deux pays. « Sur de nombreux dossiers antiterrorisme, traque policière, renseignement, retour des investisseurs en Irak , le couple Sarkozy-Obama fonctionne parfaitement, observe Nicole Bacharan, politologue, spécialiste de la relation franco-américaine. Pour Obama, Sarkozy reste un allié indispensable. Il est froid avec lui, mais il est froid avec tout le monde, c’est dans sa nature. »

Hooligans, and the response thereto

Marc explains the news from France.

The stories HERE and HERE.

Emeute MAILORAMA distribution d'argent 14.11.2009 Annulé
envoyé par feartrip. - L'info video en direct.

So this "marketing" company Mailorama wants to do a promotional event. They decide to copy a stunt done elsewhere (USA, USA!) by giving away cash in the street. A scandalous idea for the French political elite, who want to downplay the desperate financial situation of many French people (see the Yes Men getting Sarkozy's BFF Patrick Balkany explaining that "poor" people in France are simply those who buy foie gras in bulk just below), who want to deny that the French are just as greedy as those corrupt Anglo-Saxon capitalists, and who want to blame those that exploit poverty rather than work to eliminate it.

yes men VS Balkany par lelabtv
envoyé par lelabtv. - L'info video en direct.

(This reminds me of the scandal caused during a Socialist government by a rent-to-own firm. The deals offered by the firm were dreadful in financial terms, with purchase plans that were usurous, but that at least offered those without access to credit a possibility to obtain some goods that society tells them they must have, like color TVs. Rather than worry about the financial illiteracy of the French, an illiteracy shared by much of the political class, or the existence of poverty, the government of the time blamed those that would "exploit" poverty by offering the poor a choice.)

Anyway, the giveaway was announced for last week behind the Ecole Militaire, not far from the Eiffel Tower. A huge crowd arrived. The police told the organizers that the situation was dangerous (natch), so the organizers called off the distribution. A riot ensued, with a car burned, stores pillaged, the police attacked, etc. Typical French civism, in short, and totally predictable when you tell a bunch of greedy and/or poor people they're not getting the handout they were promised.

The Ministry of the Interior says it's going to prosecute the organizers. The organizers say they had a permit from the Police. The police say they didn't give a permit, and couldn't ban the event because it's only a minor infraction to distribute money in public (yes, it's against the law to distribute money in public in France... only the State can do that, when it serves its interest, for example with the special grant families with children receive for Christmas). Oddly enough, the police manage to ban all sorts of events when it suits them.

Basically, they fucked up, and now the State is going to sue, sue, sue those responsible (well, those they claim are responsible).

Now on to our other story. Last month, the match between the Paris Saint Germain and the Olympique de Marseille football teams was called off at the last minute. There were questions about a mini-swine flu epidemic on the Paris team, but the Federation decided to wait until the day of the match, after many Parisian thugs had arrived in Marseille or were on their way there, to cancel the match. As is typical during a Paris-Marseille match, there was rioting, but even more so than usual.

Similarly, last weekend there was a match between Egypt and Algeria. Algeria lost, so of course, there was rioting in Marseille.

On Friday, the PSG-OM match will be held again, and 1000 riot police will be on hand to try to limit the damage.

All this to say... when the fuck will the State ban football matches, or at least make the instigators of this violence (the football clubs and their Federation) pay for the damage caused?

Nicolas Sarkozy single-handedly tore down the Berlin Wall

Marc explains the news from France.

The story HERE.

Actually, that article does a pretty good job of deflating our pathetic inferiority-complex president.

HERE is another, where poor Alain Juppé gets caught out. When you tell a lie, it's best to make sure your accomplices are on the same page. (I say "poor", but of course Alain has done pretty well for himself, as a felon convicted for misuse of public funds....)

This morning on TV channel France 5, he said he was in Berlin on the night of 10-11 November, not on 9 November, the day the Wall fell, although he claims not to remember exactly (one of the most momentous events in recent history).

Earlier, on a video on the Bordeaux city website (after stealing from the city of Paris as Mayor Chirac's right-hand hatchet man, he's moved on to fresh meadows in Bordeaux), and on his municipal blog, Juppé confirms the 9 November date. And other evidence indicates that Juppé went to Berlin on 16 November...

"The National Debate on National Identity"

Marc explains the news from France.

Right-wing (or far-right) nationalism remains strong in France. The Left has abandoned the discourse and symbols of French nationhood and the progressive values they (can) represent to the right. François Mitterrand introduced proportional representation, in large part to encourage the development of the National Front and thus weaken the Right on its right flank. Similar encouragement is now given by Sarkozy to the NPA, the far-left party fronted by postman Olivier Besancenot.

Every time an election comes round, the Right returns to the issue of national identity, playing on fears of Islamic extremism, communautarianism (growth of ethnic or other non-universal/national identities), and immigration. We've got an election next year (to the regional councils), so it was time for someone in the government to play the nationalism card.

That someone is Eric Besson, "minister for immigration, integration, and national identity" (yes, the French national identity is so weak that it needs a minister to defend it). Besson is a traitor, who joined the Sarkozy campaign after serving as a top advisor to Ségolène Royal (in which quality, he wrote: "La France est-elle prête à voter en 2007 pour un néo-conservateur américain à passeport français ?" (Is France ready to vote for an American neocon with a French passport?). His reward has been a series of top government jobs in the Sarkozy administration, and support in creating his own political movement (Les Progressistes)*, designed to give right-wing Sarkozy's majority an imaginary left-wing component (also

As Minister of Immigration, he has undertaken a series of measures, including a "big lie" campaign that claims that French law does not punish those who assist illegal aliens (for example, by being a good Christian and feeding the hungry). This, despite a series of ongoing cases where people who have fed or lodged illegal aliens (for example, their spouses, children, or parents) have been prosecuted.

Besson's latest gimmick is a "Debate on National Identity". He has been assisted by comments from Sarkozy about French identity being tied to "the land", a Leitmotiv of the far right that hearkens back to Pétain and beyond.

While many people think that the question "what does it mean to be French today?" is a good subject of debate, most also see this "debate" for what it is, a partisan political move aimed at garnering support for the government from the racist and xenophobic right before the upcoming elections.

The main tool of the debate is a website, which has already been roundly criticized for unauthorized use of statements from various left-wing politicians in an effort to create an illusion of consensus. For the party of HADOPI and the defender of property rights, this online theft of intellectual property is particularly piquant. Many contributors to the site have seen their posts deleted by particularly ruthless moderators, whose goal is apparently to further this illusion of consensus on the threats to French identity and the means to protect it.

*Another former Socialist who turned his coat to support Sarkozy is Jean Michel Bockel, mayor of Mulhouse, who was also given a ministerial position and support for creating yet another pseudo-party, "La Gauche moderne", to give Sarkozy political cover on the left.

No one wants to be seen as a Parisian

Marc explains the news from France

Read the story HERE


Some background: in France, license plates identify your car, but have nothing to do with payment of tax. You can buy the physical license plate anywhere you want (often you'll get them from your car dealership or from a key-making shop).

An annual tax was imposed many years ago, with the aim of financing programs for the elderly. Of course, none of this money was given to the elderly, and it simply became a revenue source for the départements.

A few years ago, in one of the delightful pranks played by the national government on local governments, the central government simply eliminated the car tax, obliging the départements to raise property taxes and professional taxes to compensate. This same sort of prank is being repeated this year, with the professional tax being eliminated on order of the central government, but without any financial compensation to local governments.

Because proceeds from the car tax never actually went to the elderly, and had been eliminated anyway, when the right-wing wanted to make the French people feel guilty for having neglected the elderly during the recent heat wave that brought a few thousand seniors to an early death, the central government imposed a new payroll tax on employers, corresponding to a day's wages. Employers were authorized to make up for this tax by making their employees work for one day without pay. That has proven to be a fiasco, but the tax remains. No one knows is the money collected is actually going to help the elderly, but history leads us to believe that it's not (not when there are 250,000-euro showers to install for Nicolas Sarkozy).

Anyway… licence plate numbers used to be attributed to one owner for one car by the prefecture (the central government office in each department). When you sold the car, the new owner had to get a new number and have a new plate made up. The code number of your département was part of the licence plate number, and served as handy identification for the origin of the car owner. Those bearing a 75 for Paris were treated to insults ("Parigot, tête de veau, Parisien, tête de chien" was particularly popular). A popular département was 54, because that provincial département had a particularly low car tax, and was used by rental car companies for registering their vehicles (like US credit card firms being based in SD or DE). Once the car tax was eliminated, this practice ended, and the code 54 as the "mark of the tourist" disappeared.

Last year a reform was introduced to associate the license plate number with the car, not the owner. Thus, a car would have the same license plate number throughout its lifetime, and whatever the location of the owner. A single national registry was created, eliminating a role for a département number on plates.

This caused a furore among local politicians. The département as an administrative unit is under constant attack, with the conventional wisdom being that France has too many administrative units, with regions that are too small and too weak (the German Laender are the only reference in this debate). So the officials from the départements were furious that their code numbers would no longer appear on plates. After months of lamentation, the following compromise was reached: owners would have the option of adding a regional emblem and the code number of département (as long as the département was within the region shown). This is totally symbolic, non obligatory, and a major wankdoodle.

Now, to our story. New cars are being registered under the new system, and used cars will soon be subject to it too. And new car dealers are observing that many Parisians are refusing to use the 75 code on their car. They prefer to show the region from which they and their family come. This is part of a great tradition of refusal of Paris from Provincials. They may have to come to the capital for their studies or their career, but they dream of going home. Young postal workers and teachers are exiled to Paris, dreaming of the day when they have enough seniority to request a transfer "back home". Life-long Parisians prefer to register to vote in the village of their country house, despite the fact that they often miss out on an election (there are no absentee ballots in France). And so, Parisians can now pretend that their cars are really from back home.

Even worse is the case of the northeastern suburbs of Paris, the département of the Seine-St-Denis. Their code number 93 has shown the greatest decline in use, with a strong movement to replace it with the code from the West Indian départements from which many suburbanites come. Others prefer a 75 plate, hoping that will lead to fewer traffic stops by the police.

The codes showing the greatest growth are for Corsica and Brittany. For Corsicans, it is a sort of cheap activism. And for Parisians, having the code of the place where you have your vacation home is a good way of appearing more like a local, and less like a target for vandalism or terrorism.

The 250,000-euro shower (that was never used)

Marc explains the news from France.

Read the story HERE.

Until the Lisbon Treaty comes into effect, European Union countries take turns presiding the EU, with a new country taking over every six months. A report from the Cour des Comptes (think General Accounting/Government Accountability Office) to the Senate criticizes the extraordinarily high cost of the recent French presidency, where our belovèd President Nicolas the Short blew the bank.

The cost of the 6-month presidency? 175 million euros, over twice the price of any previous presidency in France or elsewhere in the EU. Sarkozy spent an additional 16 million on the Mediterranean Union summit (the MU is his "brainchild"), where the dinner cost over 5000 euros per person, and the installation of a shower for Sarkozy's exclusive use (and which he never used) cost 250,000 euros.

And the crap logo supposedly designed by Philippe Starck for the sum of 57,000 euros...

The "inhabitants" of the Fréjus quarter are unhappy

Notice how they're all young men? Where are the indignant women?

Pauvre "importateur" d'Halloween en France

Marc explains the news from France.

Read the article from Le Parisien below.

(And more about Halloween in France HERE)

So there's this guy who "discovered" Halloween in the the early 1990s, and had the great idea of registering "Halloween" as a trademark in France (this would be illegal now, I think, under UE intellectual property law).

And for a while, thanks to heavy promotion, Halloween, previously mostly a holiday for the Anglo-Americans in France, (sort of) took off. Trick or treating was attempted, but it's hard to get enthusiastic about begging for candy when most people aren't prepared to give you any. And is there really a demand for jack-o'lantern cakes from the bakery? The Catholic church got into the act, condemning this foreign devil's holiday, when we all know that Halloween is just the prelude to All Saints Day, a public holiday in France, and the trigger for a 10-day school vacation that allows children and teachers to make it to Christmas intact.

According to the "importer" of Halloween, it was the Iraq war that killed off any hopes for Halloween in France. The US Congress decided they weren't going to eat any French fries, and the French nation decided they could live without an American holiday. The fact that it was a totally artificial marketing ploy, of course had nothing to do with this reaction.

The guy's hoping that a post-recession Obama regime will lead to a rebirth of Halloween in France.

Good luck... but don't you dare ring my doorbell, kids!

----

M. Halloween a laissé tomber les citrouilles

RAPPEL DES FAITS. Il a importé dans notre pays la fête anglo-saxonne des sorcières et des citrouilles chaque 31 octobre. En 1995, Philippe Cahen dépose la marque Halloween en France de retour d’un voyage à New York, et la décline en guirlandes et bonbons. Aujourd’hui, le phénomène est moribond dans l’Hexagone.

Quatre ans déjà que les citrouilles ne lui rapportent plus d’oseille. En 2005, il a fermé son entreprise de conseil et d’exploitation de brevets industriels, propriétaire de la marque Halloween.

« Le brevet n’a pas survécu à l’abandon de la société. Personne ne l’a racheté. Depuis, je ne tire plus aucun revenu de cette fête. Il ne me reste plus que le grand plaisir égoïste d’avoir senti venir les choses. Grâce à Halloween, j’ai eu mon quart d’heure de célébrité, comme dirait Andy Warhol », résume-t-il.

Ce Géo Trouvetou jure que les royalties Halloween ne l’ont pas enrichi. « J’ai investi, sans grand succès, les bénéfices dans d’autres brevets, notamment de jouets, et en particulier une boîte mystérieuse », confie-t-il.

Aujourd’hui, l’expert âgé de 59 ans, qui signe encore parfois ses courriels d’un nostalgique « Cordialloween », est un « prospectiviste indépendant ». « Je fais de la prospective à l’horizon 2020-2030 pour le compte de grandes entreprises », explique-t-il. Il s’intéresse par exemple à la voiture d’après-demain.

En ce moment, il se pose une question qui fait trembler les vendeurs de masques de Dracula : « Halloween va-t-il ressusciter ? » « Ce qui a tué cette fête en France, c’est le développement du sentiment antiaméricain, anti-Bush au moment de la guerre en Irak, en 2003. Avec Obama, ça change. En outre, après la sortie de crise, les Français vont avoir envie de refaire la fête. Dans deux ans, ça pourrait repartir », espère-t-il…

QCM (que de clichés mornes)

Du Télégramme :

Dimanche après-midi,
a) un jeune homme
b) un homme mur
c) une jeune femme
du quartier de La Gabelle, à Fréjus, s'est tué
a) à moto.
b) en voiture.
c) à cheval.

Mohamed
a) 20 ans,
b) 40 ans,
c) 60 ans,
selon Var Matin, aurait tenté
a) d'échapper à un contrôle de police.
b) d'éviter d'écraser un petit lapin.
c) d'amener une femme en train d'accoucher à la maternité.

Il aurait percuté un arbre dans sa fuite.

La nouvelle de ce décès a entraîné
a) une montée de violence dans le quartier.
b) une prise de conscience des risques de la moto.
c) un soulagement du fait que personne d'autre n'ait été blessé.

a) Des vitrines ont été cassées et des poubelles brûlées.
b) Une collecte de fonds pour la famille du défunt a eu lieu.
c) Les jeunes sont restés chez eux pour réviser avant leurs examens.
Ainsi que "des engins du chantier de rénovation de la cité", indique la préfecture, citée par Le Parisien.

a) Il n'y aurait eu aucun contact entre le deux roues et les véhicules de police,
b) La voiture de police aurait volontairement renversé la moto,
c) Les policiers auraient descendu le motocycliste grâce aux tireurs d'élite,
toujours selon la préfecture.

(On apprendra aussi que la moto n'était pas immatriculée, et son usage était interdit sur la voie publique.)

PSG-OM

Guess what? You cancel a stupid football match that attracts stupid hooligans and you do it only 7 hours before the start of the match and you get a bunch of hooligans with nothing better to do than to hooliganize. 

Equality in the board room: Copé's a dipshit

Marc explains the news from France

The story HERE.

Jean-François Copé, near the top of anybody's list of the politician they would like to slap, has just proposed a bill to ensure that at least 40% of a public company's board members be female. He cites Norway as a model. That's probably a very good model, but he neglects to note that Norway also has a very good record for equality in politics, which is not the case in France.

Copé is the head of the majority in the French National Assembly. His party, the UMP, and its predecessor the RPR, were dragged kicking and screaming to gender parity in politics when such laws were enacted under Socialist governments.

These laws have been somewhat effective. They apply to all elections which take place by list of candidates. In such elections, male and female candidates must alternate. Men tend to be at the top of each list, giving them a slight advantage. Incentives to gender parity also apply to legislative elections, by means of financial penalties for parties that do not present 50% of each sex nationally. Here, women tend to be assigned to seats that the party knows it cannot win, decreasing the presence of women in the National Assembly. Some parties (including Copé's UMP) simply prefer to pay a fine -- or rather, receive fewer taxpayer subsidies (yes, parties are subsidized by taxpayers in France... it's supposed to decrease corruption: HAH!).

In bodies elected by list, women represent:
48% of members of regional councils
44% of Members of the European Parliament
47% of members of city councils (cities of more than 3500 inhabitants).

In bodies not elected by list, women represent:
10% of members of departmental councils (conseils généraux)
12% of Members of the National Assembly
17% of Senators.


A recent reform of the Senate electoral law will result in a significant drop in women Senators.
As stated above, parties prefer to take a hit on their subsidies than guarantee the presence of female candidates for the National Assembly.
And just a few days ago, Copé's boss, Nicolas Sarkozy, proposed a reform of the regional and departmental councils that would combine the roles of regional and departmental councillor into a single elected official, elected under the rules of the departmental council (single-member constituencies) rather than the regional council (regional party list).

So, for the sake of Monsieur le Député Jean-François Copé, I will translate a famous English saying: "les gens qui habitent des maisons de verre ne devraient pas commencer à lancer des pierres".