We'd like to thank the Reverend for recognizing our partnershipIt's a love in, French style. Sarko the American, as he is called by his voters, is 
all smiles, welcoming his cheeseburger eatin' pal to the land of gourmet everything in hopes of getting an Elvis autograph. Former President Chirac's supposedly moral opposition to the Iraq War is long forgotten and Freedom Fries are no longer on the menu on Capitol Hill. American newspapers have stopped calling France "The "petulant prima donna of realpolitik" that was leading the "axis of weasels" during their pump up to the War and are only too happy to find a foreign leader who will be caught photographed with their very own dear leader.
Bush also seems as captivated as the British were as he heaped praise on
French first lady Carla Bruni, describing her as "a really smart, capable woman". "I can see why you married her," he told the French president in Paris.
Ignoring (or enjoying) Bush's oogling of his newlywed wife, Sarkozy strapped on the spurs and tried to out-cowboy the king as they launched new threats against those who have the audacity to oppose their pectoral implants. Maybe Bruni gets off on such machismo as she sings on her new album, "You are my drug/ More deadly than Afghan heroin/ More dangerous than white Colombian." Maybe we should take her literally? From Sarkozy:
"Iran getting a nuclear bomb is unacceptable, that's clear. It's an unacceptable threat for the stability of the world," Sarkozy said, standing shoulder-to-shoulder with Bush at a press conference after talks in Paris. "A nuclear-armed Iran is incredibly destabilising," added Bush, just hours after Tehran rejected new demands to halt uranium
enrichment in return for economic and diplomatic incentives.
But Super Sarkozy, ever conscious of not wanting to appear a Tony Blair-style Lap Dog (possibly appealing to Cheri but not Carla!), is careful to appear his own man, recently inviting American Pariah, Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad to France's national Bastille Day celebrations in July.
Let's remember that this is Syria, a country that the Americans recently aided the Israelis to illegally attack.
Ever sharp press conference journalists capitalized on this and asked President Bush what message he would send to President Assad if he had the chance, "My message would be, stop fooling around with the Iranians." He went on, urging Syrian leaders "Stop harboring terrorists," and to "make it clear to their Iranian allies that the West is serious when we talk about stopping them from getting nuclear weapons."
Bush's attack dog, Condoleezza Rice also flexed her pecs and said Wednesday
she hoped Paris would send the right message to Damascus. Speaking while heading to Paris for an Afghan donor conference, Rice said she assumed France would encourage Syria to take advantage of the indirect peace talks with Israel brokered by Turkey, and live up to its obligations not to interfere in Lebanese affairs.
In other words, obey or else.
Confusing signals? How should Syria interpret these signals from the country that sent them Canadian Maher Arar, who was sent to Syria under the extraordinary rendition program. The Ottawa engineer was jailed and tortured in Syria at the request of the Americans as an alleged terror suspect but released months later without being charged. A Canadian judicial inquiry cleared him last year of any terrorist links and Ottawa awarded Arar compensation of $10.5 million. Do our dirty business for us and keep quiet?
Perhaps the biggest irony of all is that Syria is perhaps everything the Bush regime wants the Muslim world to be, secular and non-fundamentalist.
Confused? It gets worse.
Between shots of Viagra, Bush and Sarkozy threaten Iran about their Nuclear programme, yet France's cowboy kid also makes statements like, "Preventing a confrontation between Islam and the West is helping Muslim countries, as France proposes, to access the energy of the future: nuclear power," he said. Failure to do so, he warned, would lead to "an explosion of terrorism."
In fact, since he was elected, Sarkozy has been aggressively pursuing a new policy to build nuclear reactors in Muslim countries and of course win lucrative contracts for France's huge energy concerns in the process. A dance that may yet see him stepping on his buddy's toe in his cowboy boots.
After signing a memorandum of understanding with Libya in the summer,
Sarkozy struck a preliminary cooperation accord with Morocco last month. He also discussed nuclear power during trips to Algeria in December and Saudi Arabia in January. Between them, state-controlled nuclear power giant Areva and Electricité de France are also talking to Jordan, the United Arab Emirates, Turkey, Yemen, Egypt, Qatar and Tunisia. Regional cooperation on nuclear power is a pillar of the president's diplomatic pet project - a Mediterranean Union gathering countries in North Africa, the Middle East and southern Europe into a bloc.
Egypt has jumped onboard and said in October that it would build several civilian nuclear power stations to meet its "growing energy needs." It ratified the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty in 1981 but said earlier this month it would not sign on to an additional protocol that would allow the UN nuclear watchdog the right to make intrusive short-notice inspections of nuclear facilities. Something its nuclear neighbour, Israel, also rejects.
If the French don't do it, someone else will. Egpyt already has nuclear cooperation offers from China, Russia and Kazakhstan.
So in the end is it once again greed? Do as I say, not as I do and don't dare take your business elsewhere? Want French Fries on Capitol Hill and cooperation from the Americans? Well send more troops to Afghanistan. Want to be taken off the pariah list? Buy a French reactor. Behave or beware.
But it can't all be terrible, we can't write off Spain's neighbour just yet, even if the French may have a current penchant for line dancing and a cowboy president. But can you imagine, even dare to contemplate photos of an American first lady like the nude pictures of Carla Bruni? On second thought, when Barbara Bush springs to mind, you almost have to thank the Americans for their puritanism.
all smiles, welcoming his cheeseburger eatin' pal to the land of gourmet everything in hopes of getting an Elvis autograph. Former President Chirac's supposedly moral opposition to the Iraq War is long forgotten and Freedom Fries are no longer on the menu on Capitol Hill. American newspapers have stopped calling France "The "petulant prima donna of realpolitik" that was leading the "axis of weasels" during their pump up to the War and are only too happy to find a foreign leader who will be caught photographed with their very own dear leader.Bush also seems as captivated as the British were as he heaped praise on
French first lady Carla Bruni, describing her as "a really smart, capable woman". "I can see why you married her," he told the French president in Paris.Ignoring (or enjoying) Bush's oogling of his newlywed wife, Sarkozy strapped on the spurs and tried to out-cowboy the king as they launched new threats against those who have the audacity to oppose their pectoral implants. Maybe Bruni gets off on such machismo as she sings on her new album, "You are my drug/ More deadly than Afghan heroin/ More dangerous than white Colombian." Maybe we should take her literally? From Sarkozy:
"Iran getting a nuclear bomb is unacceptable, that's clear. It's an unacceptable threat for the stability of the world," Sarkozy said, standing shoulder-to-shoulder with Bush at a press conference after talks in Paris. "A nuclear-armed Iran is incredibly destabilising," added Bush, just hours after Tehran rejected new demands to halt uranium
enrichment in return for economic and diplomatic incentives. But Super Sarkozy, ever conscious of not wanting to appear a Tony Blair-style Lap Dog (possibly appealing to Cheri but not Carla!), is careful to appear his own man, recently inviting American Pariah, Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad to France's national Bastille Day celebrations in July.
Let's remember that this is Syria, a country that the Americans recently aided the Israelis to illegally attack.
Ever sharp press conference journalists capitalized on this and asked President Bush what message he would send to President Assad if he had the chance, "My message would be, stop fooling around with the Iranians." He went on, urging Syrian leaders "Stop harboring terrorists," and to "make it clear to their Iranian allies that the West is serious when we talk about stopping them from getting nuclear weapons."
Bush's attack dog, Condoleezza Rice also flexed her pecs and said Wednesday
she hoped Paris would send the right message to Damascus. Speaking while heading to Paris for an Afghan donor conference, Rice said she assumed France would encourage Syria to take advantage of the indirect peace talks with Israel brokered by Turkey, and live up to its obligations not to interfere in Lebanese affairs.In other words, obey or else.
Confusing signals? How should Syria interpret these signals from the country that sent them Canadian Maher Arar, who was sent to Syria under the extraordinary rendition program. The Ottawa engineer was jailed and tortured in Syria at the request of the Americans as an alleged terror suspect but released months later without being charged. A Canadian judicial inquiry cleared him last year of any terrorist links and Ottawa awarded Arar compensation of $10.5 million. Do our dirty business for us and keep quiet?
Perhaps the biggest irony of all is that Syria is perhaps everything the Bush regime wants the Muslim world to be, secular and non-fundamentalist.
Confused? It gets worse.
Between shots of Viagra, Bush and Sarkozy threaten Iran about their Nuclear programme, yet France's cowboy kid also makes statements like, "Preventing a confrontation between Islam and the West is helping Muslim countries, as France proposes, to access the energy of the future: nuclear power," he said. Failure to do so, he warned, would lead to "an explosion of terrorism."In fact, since he was elected, Sarkozy has been aggressively pursuing a new policy to build nuclear reactors in Muslim countries and of course win lucrative contracts for France's huge energy concerns in the process. A dance that may yet see him stepping on his buddy's toe in his cowboy boots.
After signing a memorandum of understanding with Libya in the summer,
Sarkozy struck a preliminary cooperation accord with Morocco last month. He also discussed nuclear power during trips to Algeria in December and Saudi Arabia in January. Between them, state-controlled nuclear power giant Areva and Electricité de France are also talking to Jordan, the United Arab Emirates, Turkey, Yemen, Egypt, Qatar and Tunisia. Regional cooperation on nuclear power is a pillar of the president's diplomatic pet project - a Mediterranean Union gathering countries in North Africa, the Middle East and southern Europe into a bloc.Egypt has jumped onboard and said in October that it would build several civilian nuclear power stations to meet its "growing energy needs." It ratified the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty in 1981 but said earlier this month it would not sign on to an additional protocol that would allow the UN nuclear watchdog the right to make intrusive short-notice inspections of nuclear facilities. Something its nuclear neighbour, Israel, also rejects.
If the French don't do it, someone else will. Egpyt already has nuclear cooperation offers from China, Russia and Kazakhstan.So in the end is it once again greed? Do as I say, not as I do and don't dare take your business elsewhere? Want French Fries on Capitol Hill and cooperation from the Americans? Well send more troops to Afghanistan. Want to be taken off the pariah list? Buy a French reactor. Behave or beware.
But it can't all be terrible, we can't write off Spain's neighbour just yet, even if the French may have a current penchant for line dancing and a cowboy president. But can you imagine, even dare to contemplate photos of an American first lady like the nude pictures of Carla Bruni? On second thought, when Barbara Bush springs to mind, you almost have to thank the Americans for their puritanism.
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