Well, the french have something against them: They are French!
LOL!
Gosh Closet Queen:
You certainly do spend a lot of time with Tommy Tomorrow. Do you also read books without pictures?
Qui sont unilateraliste? C’est la France et l’Allemagne! haha I love how these rules change when France and Germany are involved. Perhaps they should take the matter to the UN security council for a vote? Non? Nein? Ja? Oui?
BRUXELLES - La zone euro est sortie mardi à l’aube plus divisée que jamais de la crise provoquée par le dérapage budgétaire de la France et de l’Allemagne, qui sont parvenues à former une coalition majoritaire pour mettre entre parenthèses le pacte de stabilité de leur monnaie unique.
A l’issue de plus de huit heures de discussion, les ministres des Finances de l’Eurogroupe sont parvenus à un accord qui ulcère quatre pays et constitue une cuisante défaite pour la Commission européenne, gardienne de ces règles de copropriété
lefigaro.fr/debats/20031125.FIG0086.html
Some interesting stuff regarding French military and defense strategies…
Est-ce que le minist&re de la D&fense change assez rapidement pour s’adapter au nouvel environnement s&curitaire du XXIe si&cle?& Cette question, qui figure en t&te du m&mo adress& le 16 octobre 2003 par Donald Rumsfeld & ses principaux collaborateurs face & l’enlisement des États-Unis en Irak, s’adresse & l’ensemble des d&mocraties. Et notamment & la France qui s’est convertie & l’arm&e professionnelle en 1996, puis s’est engag&e dans une relance majeure de son effort militaire & partir de 2002 sans d&battre ni r&examiner au fond les principes, les sch&mas, les modes d’organisation et de gestion h&rit&s de la refondation de la politique de d&fense d&cid&e par le g&n&ral de Gaulle au d&but des ann&es 1960.
D’o& trois constats et trois propositions, afin d’essayer de sortir de la tyrannie de la non-d&cision en r&pondant & trois questions: que voulons-nous faire? avec qui? dans quel cadre?
Fred, you might want to translate that into something, we can read. French is not a very significant international language any more, so I haven’t bothered with it since high school.
Mr. He:
Okay for the first one, the Germans and French are over the legal limit for deficits again this year and are creating a crisis by trying to say the rules do not apply to them. I am laughing because this is the same France and Germany that put such great store on international treaties and law and groupings and multilateral blah blah blah until it causes them a bit of inconvenience then… whoops those rules were not meant for them or there are extenuating circumstances or it’s only temporary blah blah blah.
Second article is long and dry but raises issues that I think are key. France has the same security issues that the US does, recognizes this but then fights the US about the efforts in Iraq (last part not in the article)? It seemed to me that by the very admission that these asymmetrical security threats exist for which it is perhaps poorly prepared, France would seek to cooperate MORE not fight the US. Those were my conclusions and opinions.
It’s just like in the US, they set the rules and then change, ignore or suspend them when they see fit. 
Ah mein Freund:
But… the US has not set itself up as the banner of multilateralism and respect for international law for all nations to fly to as has Germany but to a far greater extent France. Just could not help engaging in a little of my own schadenfreude. Lovely word that… Lovely language German. Was just trying to explain to someone the concept of wehmutlichkeit. Care to share?
EU Bank Governor Trichet’s comments in today’s Le Figaro…
La BCE, qui conduit la politique monétaire pour les douze pays membres de la zone euro, poursuivait : «Le non-respect des règles et procédures prévues par le pacte de stabilité et de croissance risque de miner la crédibilité du cadre institutionnel européen et la confiance dans une gestion rigoureuse des finances publiques.» M. Trichet avait tenté, en vain, la semaine dernière, de faire preuve de pédagogie : «Le pacte a des fondements très solides sur le plan économique. Si vous commencez à faire des déficits, il y a plus d’inconvénients que d’avantages», faisant valoir que les tensions inflationnistes ainsi provoquées risquaient d’annuler sur la durée l’effet positif sur la demande. Il concluait : «A quel stade marque-t-on la limite ? C’est une question d’opinion. Mais il y a une limite. Les Européens, à tort ou à raison, ont décidé d’avoir une limite et ils l’ont fixée dans le traité.»
So where does it end? Let Germany and France get away with a bit more than the treaty allows this year and what’s to stop the other countries from running deficits next year or France and Germany have a bit more deficit next year since they got away with it this year? All good questions that our law-abiding, multilaterial, respect for international treaty friends would do well to ask themselves.
While one may speculate about what Halliburton is or is not getting through its connections with Cheney, no one can outdo the French when it comes to cronyism and corruption. More about one of Chirac’s good amis here.
As negotiations between French and American officials aimed at resolving the Executive Life affair drag on, we take another close look at the complex dealings behind it, and the entwined roles of Crédit Lyonnais and François Pinault, one of France’s richest businessmen
FRANÇOIS PINAULT is a friend of Jacques Chirac, the president of France. His family controls Pinault-Printemps-Redoute, a quoted group with interests in retailing and luxury goods. It also owns the Chateau Latour vineyard and Christie
MOD, can we please have a yawning emoticon to insert at places such as this.
There was also a fascinating article in yesterday’s Wall Street Journal detailing how French banks are the largest lenders to a number of unsavory regimes including Iran, Sudan, Somalia, etc. while Germany is the lender of choice for North Korea and Libya. Very interesting, very interesting no?
The editorial’s conclusion was that it almost seemed that French foreign policy or lending was dictated by blocking US foreign policy interests. That said, I am sure anyone can draw their own conclusions.
For something a little closer to home. A gift from our French amis courtesy of the very liberal BBC.
It has been one of France’s biggest political and financial scandals of the last generation.
It has left a trail of eight unexplained deaths, nearly half a billion dollars in missing cash and troubling allegations of government complicity.
Taiwan did not actually want the frigates, but was convinced
And yet 10 years after it first broke, the full story of the “frigates-to-Taiwan” scandal has still to be told.
While investigating judges in Paris have been able to uncover the secrets of a host of other “affaires”, from the Elf slush-funds to the details of President Jacques Chirac’s private travel, the Taiwan connection remains off-limits.
A government order banning judicial access to key documents for reasons of state security has twice been renewed, most recently in June last year.
As a result, a criminal enquiry launched in 1997 remains stalled.
But the suspicions continue to grow: Who has what to fear from the truth? Why, when the Taiwanese government is doing all it can to uncover what happened, does France stubbornly refuse to do the same?
NOW to quote our liberal friends, I wonder why? Interesting. You draw your own conclusions.
lefigaro.fr/international/20 … G0095.html
Too bad our French friends spent so much money flying around countering the US led efforts to get support for the action in Iraq that they have bankrupted their foreign policy establishment. That, however, should only disappoint Third World dictators since it will be good for the rest of the democracy-loving world.
En pointe contre la guerre en Irak mais &puis&e par le manque de moyens financiers, la diplomatie fran&aise est & bout de souffle. Les quelque 9 300 diplomates et autres agents du Quai d’Orsay, ainsi que les 6 000 professeurs des lyc&es fran&ais & l’&tranger, sont appel&s & faire gr&ve aujourd’hui pour protester contre leur manque de moyens. L’&v&nement est sans pr&c&dent dans l’histoire s&culaire de la diplomatie fran&aise.
Au quotidien, le d&nuement r&gne, & tel point que le Quai d’Orsay a v&cu trois jours sans papier au mois d’octobre. &Il n’y a plus un kopeck, a d&clar& Yvan Sergeff, un responsable du syndicat maison (majoritaire) USMAE. La moiti& des ascenseurs sont en panne, il n’y a pas d’argent pour les r&parer.&
Le pr&avis de gr&ve, mondial, concerne m&me les ambassadeurs, ce qui pourrait donner lieu & des situations in&dites. Le statut des diplomates n’indique rien sur le droit de gr&ve. Le gouvernement a cependant rappel& qu’il pouvait demander & un agent gr&viste de remplir son service, ne serait-ce que pour assurer &la continuit& des missions essentielles de l’Etat&. &Une gr&ve, dans cette maison, n’est pas une affaire banale&, a reconnu le ministre, Dominique de Villepin.
Sarkozy in 2007? Will he? Should he?
PARIS (AFP) - Le ministre de l’Int&rieur Nicolas Sarkozy a assur& lundi soir & Paris que “par les temps qui courent”, il ne voulait “se f&cher avec personne”.
Cette petite phrase de M. Sarkozy, qui ne cache plus ses ambitions pr&sidentielles, a &t& lanc&e tout & trac au milieu d’un discours consacr& au sujet plut&t aust&re de l’intelligence &conomique.
Le plus populaire des ministres du gouvernement Raffarin intervenait lundi soir, & la place du Premier ministre, en cl&ture d’un colloque consacr& & l’intelligence &conomique & l’Ecole militaire, organis& par l’Assembl&e nationale, l’Institut des hautes &tudes de d&fense nationale (IHEDN) et l’Institut des hautes &tudes de la s&curit& int&rieure (IHESI).
Raffarin veut replacer la Pologne dans la marche europ&enne
Le Premier ministre fran&ais Jean-Raffarin s’est efforc& aujourd’hui & Varsovie de rassurer les Polonais, inquiets de leur place dans la future Europe &largie, et de r&tablir une relation de &confiance& entre les deux pays apr&s des mois de tensions.
lefigaro.fr/international/20 … G0174.html
Interesting attempts by the French to patch things up with Poland after telling them to “shut up” but … it does raise the second question. What will be done about the voting system in the European Union. Poland gets 27 votes as does Spain (40 million population each) while nations with 60 million France, UK and Italy get 29 and Germany with 80 million gets 29 as well. This voting system was a French idea. Now they have to live with it, but is reform here possible? After all, how can the EU allow 80 million people 29 votes and 80 million (Spain and Poland) 54 votes? How is this fair?
And how is it “democratic”?
It can very well be, as it ensures that 2-3 big countries can’t gang up on the rest.
If you look at the US, it seems odd that California and Rhode Island has the same number of senators. Not very democratic, if you ask me, gentlemen.
[quote=“Mr He”]It can very well be, as it ensures that 2-3 big countries can’t gang up on the rest.
If you look at the US, it seems odd that California and Rhode Island has the same number of senators. Not very democratic, if you ask me, gentlemen.[/quote]
My question was not meant to imply that it was NOT democratic… it merely asked how it is democratic.
The US Senate does have 2 senators from every state. However, the US Congress is comprised of two houses, and the number of representatives from each state serving in the House of Representatives is determined by the various states’ respective populations. This system is part of the checks and balances built-in to the US system of Democracy which seeks to balance the rights of the majority with the protection of the minority.
But, in the system described above for the EU, I don’t see how this balance is built in. In this system, it appears that despite equal numbers of people, an unequal number of votes are allotted.