PrintNovember 2, 2007
Long Live Sarkozy!
When I saw this video, I stood up in awe and ran downstairs to tell my husband the news: "France is back!" French President, Nicolas Sarkozy, may have just inadvertently fired another "shot heard around the world," declaring a male revolution against the feminization of politics and media the world over. Long live Sarkozy!
When Leslie Stahl, of 60-Minutes prominence, reduced herself to the level of backyard-fence gossip, and asked the President of France a very unladylike personal question about his private relationship with his wife, the man did the most manly thing I've seen in mixed company in a long, long, long, long time. He rose, shook the "lady's" hand in perfect gentlemanly fashion, and stripping himself of the microphone, he gallantly walked off the set, leaving Ms. Stahl stunned and possibly a bit breathless. In so doing, President Sarkozy has earned a bountiful helping of my respect and admiration (not that easy to come by, I must admit).
I was so impressed that I decided to find out more about this intriguing new breed of Frenchman. The guy comes from terrific stock.
Members of Hungarian nobility, his father's family had their vast landholdings and castle seized by the Soviets very shortly after the Red Army "liberated" their Country in 1944. Nicolas' father managed to escape, however, counting himself fortunate, even though he brought out nothing but the shirt on his back.
Rather than join the "People's Revolution," Sarkozy Sr. went to France, and straightaway enlisted in the French Foreign Legion, perhaps the fiercest fighting force France has ever produced. Instead of crying over the spilt milk of war's misfortunes, Sarkozy Sr. served his new Country, and after his military discharge, he met and married a beautiful Parisian law student, who herself came from a prominent mixed Jewish/Catholic family. Nicolas was the couple's second child, born in 1955.
Even though Nicolas' father pretty much abandoned him when his parents divorced, it's not hard to see that noble, fierce, fighting man's blood coursing through his son's veins now. President Sarkozy credits his grandfather, most of all though, with imparting strong traditional French values to him, both through his Catholicism and his rather staunch Gaullist political views.
Whether President Sarkozy can indeed bring France back from the decayed state of her self-imposed, socialist delusion is yet to be seen. But from this side of the big pond, it looks as though the French may have finally come to their senses, and recognized once again the true bond of like-thinking liberty lovers in their Country and ours. Lest our youth have forgotten, it was French money and mercenaries that helped us American patriots win our own independence. And their generous gift of Lady Liberty has graced our own New York harbor for more than a century.
Still, from where I'm sitting, the best thing France has ever done here personally just might be the single act of manly gumption their President performed in that now-famous 60 Minutes interview. By politely, but firmly, refusing to lower his important Office to the level of backyard-fence gossip, he may have single-handedly signaled the end of catty instincts given free reign by media elites who can't even recognize self-restrained, gentlemanly civility when it smacks them in the face.
Allowing the predominantly female trait of gossip-loving into the newsrooms, the boardrooms and the assembly lines, is no more acceptable than it would be to bring the predominantly male traits of cursing and hard drinking into those same places. And nobody with one grain of common sense should think otherwise, in my opinion. You don't see male media folks guzzling Budweiser on camera or cursing their guests. Neither should a civilized society of equal opportunity have to be subjected to a hostess with a gossip streak a mile wide.
So, to all our American men, who have been cowed by the unisex armies of overbearing loud-mouthed gossips, I say it's high time you throw off the shackles of politically-correct indulgence and join the Sarkozy revolution. You too can be real men again, and all the real women will love you for it. Catty gossip has no place in the public discourse, and simply standing your ground and saying so, in no way makes you a "Male Chauvinist Pig," or even a borderline "sexist." It simply makes you a self-respecting gentleman of the highest order.
Vive la difference! And long live Sarkozy.
