Will Nicolas Sarkozy's oui vote be French with tears?
10th May 2007
Keith Waterhouse
Daily Mail
He that is without a Oui vote for Nicolas Sarkozy, let him cast the first cobblestone.
And don't think he won't. The first fusillade of cobbles was being uprooted from the Place de la Bastille within two hours of Sarkozy's election as France's new President.
There were 592 arrests across France, 730 vehicles burned and 78 police officers seriously injured.
Tear gas and water cannon liberally to hand, naturally. And that was only on Sunday.
Serious troublemakers will have ringed Wednesday May 16 in their diaries, and laid in supplies of whitewash to daub shop windows with the slogan 'Sarkozy Fascist'.
This is when the president-elect officially begins his reign of terror, as Paris's vociferous student wing would have it.
As a leading cobblestone-thrower explained: "We hate Sarkozy. He has no interest in anyone without money and wants to turn France into a consumerist, racist society just like America."
Consumerist? Apart from Venice and the legions of touts hanging around the pyramids of Cairo, I have never encountered a more ferociously consumerist crowd than the French - the only nation I know that keeps its money under the mattress.
As for racism, what does our student cobblestoneheaver imagine sparks off the annual riot season in the housing estate stews of Paris and Marseilles?
I cannot pretend to know Paris well. I prefer Brussels, which so long as you keep well away from the EU, skyscraper-infested end of town, is a compact and agreeably provincial kind of city. But every time I do go to Paris it seems to be harbouring a grievance of some kind.
The last time I was there, there was a strike of architects. Have you ever heard of striking architects?
Neither had I, but there they were, downing drawing-boards and marching angrily through the city, brandishing slogans scrawled on blueprint paper.
Sarko, or Monsieur Maggie as I suppose we shall have to get used to calling the new President, seems to have put his finger on the almost indefinable seething discontent of a country where architects go on strike, and where it is all but impossible to get fired and thus all but impossible to get a job.
He has summed up his own manifesto in a sentence: "I will restore the value of work, authority, merit and respect for the nation."
So bang goes the 35-hour week, for openers, which has done so much to contribute to France's image of a sulky teenager who refuses to get out of bed in the morning.
But perhaps that one sentence manifesto should be expanded to two sentences, the other one being: "Trouble ahead."
A promised new law requiring unions to guarantee a minimum of public services in a country where striking is a national hobby will not endear him to the I'm-all-right-Jacques among the French bluecollar workers - or non-workers, as they more usually seem to be.
Nor, in the troublesome housing estates where throwing cobbles gives way to heaving paving slabs (haven't they ever heard of Tarmac?) will he fare much better.
So, outlook stormy. But I trust our Ambassador in Paris will be keeping Tony - copy to Gordon, please - fully briefed on what promises to be a fascinating first 100 days (why do leaders always require 100 days to achieve what the good Lord managed in seven?).
At the very least, as our politicians are fond of saying, valuable lessons will be learned.
Milestone
Will our EU masters still allow us to play cricket?
How very jolly decent of Brussels to allow us to hang on to our pounds and ounces. Not to mention our yards, feet and inches.
Should we send them a thank-you card? Or perhaps a dozen red roses? (Florists were the only Brits to approve of metrification. It meant they could flog their flowers in tens instead of dozens.) It took us 25 years but we got there in the end.
True, greengrocers will still have to label their apples and bananas in metric and imperial weights, but from a crime attracting a £2,000 fine (how much is that in euros?) the act of dual labelling is reduced to a mere eccentricity, like road signs in Welsh.
What other demonstrations of overwhelming generosity may we expect from our masters on the European Commission? Will we be allowed the right to play cricket, drive on the left and drink warm beer? A word of caution in response to Europe's word of condescension.
The present dual-labelling arrangement, due to disappear in 2009, will now - spokesperson speaking - be granted an 'indefinite extension'.
Define indefinite.
dailymail.co.uk
10th May 2007
Keith Waterhouse
Daily Mail
He that is without a Oui vote for Nicolas Sarkozy, let him cast the first cobblestone.
And don't think he won't. The first fusillade of cobbles was being uprooted from the Place de la Bastille within two hours of Sarkozy's election as France's new President.
There were 592 arrests across France, 730 vehicles burned and 78 police officers seriously injured.
Tear gas and water cannon liberally to hand, naturally. And that was only on Sunday.
Serious troublemakers will have ringed Wednesday May 16 in their diaries, and laid in supplies of whitewash to daub shop windows with the slogan 'Sarkozy Fascist'.
This is when the president-elect officially begins his reign of terror, as Paris's vociferous student wing would have it.
As a leading cobblestone-thrower explained: "We hate Sarkozy. He has no interest in anyone without money and wants to turn France into a consumerist, racist society just like America."
Consumerist? Apart from Venice and the legions of touts hanging around the pyramids of Cairo, I have never encountered a more ferociously consumerist crowd than the French - the only nation I know that keeps its money under the mattress.
As for racism, what does our student cobblestoneheaver imagine sparks off the annual riot season in the housing estate stews of Paris and Marseilles?
I cannot pretend to know Paris well. I prefer Brussels, which so long as you keep well away from the EU, skyscraper-infested end of town, is a compact and agreeably provincial kind of city. But every time I do go to Paris it seems to be harbouring a grievance of some kind.
The last time I was there, there was a strike of architects. Have you ever heard of striking architects?
Neither had I, but there they were, downing drawing-boards and marching angrily through the city, brandishing slogans scrawled on blueprint paper.
Sarko, or Monsieur Maggie as I suppose we shall have to get used to calling the new President, seems to have put his finger on the almost indefinable seething discontent of a country where architects go on strike, and where it is all but impossible to get fired and thus all but impossible to get a job.
He has summed up his own manifesto in a sentence: "I will restore the value of work, authority, merit and respect for the nation."
So bang goes the 35-hour week, for openers, which has done so much to contribute to France's image of a sulky teenager who refuses to get out of bed in the morning.
But perhaps that one sentence manifesto should be expanded to two sentences, the other one being: "Trouble ahead."
A promised new law requiring unions to guarantee a minimum of public services in a country where striking is a national hobby will not endear him to the I'm-all-right-Jacques among the French bluecollar workers - or non-workers, as they more usually seem to be.
Nor, in the troublesome housing estates where throwing cobbles gives way to heaving paving slabs (haven't they ever heard of Tarmac?) will he fare much better.
So, outlook stormy. But I trust our Ambassador in Paris will be keeping Tony - copy to Gordon, please - fully briefed on what promises to be a fascinating first 100 days (why do leaders always require 100 days to achieve what the good Lord managed in seven?).
At the very least, as our politicians are fond of saying, valuable lessons will be learned.
Milestone
Will our EU masters still allow us to play cricket?
How very jolly decent of Brussels to allow us to hang on to our pounds and ounces. Not to mention our yards, feet and inches.
Should we send them a thank-you card? Or perhaps a dozen red roses? (Florists were the only Brits to approve of metrification. It meant they could flog their flowers in tens instead of dozens.) It took us 25 years but we got there in the end.
True, greengrocers will still have to label their apples and bananas in metric and imperial weights, but from a crime attracting a £2,000 fine (how much is that in euros?) the act of dual labelling is reduced to a mere eccentricity, like road signs in Welsh.
What other demonstrations of overwhelming generosity may we expect from our masters on the European Commission? Will we be allowed the right to play cricket, drive on the left and drink warm beer? A word of caution in response to Europe's word of condescension.
The present dual-labelling arrangement, due to disappear in 2009, will now - spokesperson speaking - be granted an 'indefinite extension'.
Define indefinite.
dailymail.co.uk
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