French media tweak taboos

  This picture is an example of "vulgar voyeurism". That is the view of Jean-Pierre Mignard, the lawyer of Ségolène Royal. Maître Mignard has just gone to court on behalf of the former Socialist presidential candidate to demand that Paris Match recall this week's edition and pay damages.

Match splashed pictures of Royal on holiday in Corsica on its cover and inside pages. The pictures, according to Royal, are a gross invasion of her privacy. "This is photographic harassment," she said. 

Here we have another example of the conflict between France's legally-enforced tradition of privacy and increasing curiosity over the lives of politicians and celebrities.

More on Match in a second, but the latest Royal pique over intrusion has coincided with an interesting media sortie into parallel but more delicate territory. This involves Dominique Strauss-Kahn, the popular Socialist and chief rival to Royal for the presidential nomination.

Thanks to President Sarkozy, the highly-regarded DSK [here with Royal] has all but sewn up the next job as chief of the International Monetary Fund (July 11 post). The media have been full of tributes to the genial social-democrat, but until today the portraits only hinted at a possible character problem. The nearest was le Figaro, which used code, calling him "too charming (trop séducteur) and Epicurean, jealous of his freedom".

But yesterday the newspaper version of Libération hooked into debate on French media sites about a risk that Strauss-Kahn might run in puritan Washington. This springs from his Gallic gallantry towards the opposite sex.   

Jean Quatremer, Libération's esteemed Brussels correspondent, raised the matter with un-French bluntness.

The only real problem for Strauss-Kahn is his relationship with women. Too much in a hurry, he comes close to harassment. This is a trait known to the media but no-one mentions (we are in France). The IMF is an international institution with Anglo-Saxon morality. A single misplaced gesture, one over-precise remark and there is a media frenzy.

In the light of scandals involving "inappropriate" behaviour by Washington officials, the French media have a duty to point out DSK's Don Juan danger, said Quatremer. His words, first on his blog and yesterday in the paper, have stirred a flurry of argument. Marianne magazine's site accused Quatremer of gunning for Strauss-Kahn and "crossing the line" into matters that should not be aired in public. Rue 89, the excellent online news site run by leftish journalists, asked: "Is it shocking to say that Strauss-Kahn is un dragueur (a pick-up artist/womanizer) ?

Daniel Schneidermann, Libération's media commentator, recited the story without taking sides. He asked: "Should the French media anticipate the hypothetical aggressiveness of their Anglo-Saxon colleagues? A gulf had now opened between bold reporting on the French internet and "the traditional media who as usual carefully avoid the subject."

Back to Royal and the Match item, captioned  "Nothing better for healing the blues than sea and sunshine."  Olivier Royant, the Editor of Match, defended the pictures, saying "the summer holiday destinations of leading politicians are the subject of legitimate news in France, as in the rest of the world."

Royal, like Sarkozy and many others, plays it both ways with France's traditional taboos over reporting private life. In the past, she has invited Match to photograph her at work and play. She shocked colleagues in the early 1990s when she invited the magazine to her hospital room to snap her with her new-born  daughter.

Since her campaign ran into trouble last winter, Royal has attacked the media. She has sued publications and writers for mentioning her troubled relationship with François Hollande, the Socialist party leader. Yet she has just used the media to announce that she had thrown out Hollande, her partner of 30 years and father of their four children, because he was unfaithful.
 
Match's relative boldness in publishing the beach pictures contrasted with the magazine's squeamishness over Sarkozy's private life. The current editor does not want to suffer the fate of Alain Genestar, his predecessor, after he published pictures in 2005 of Cecilia Sarkozy and the man with whom she was having an affair. Genestar was fired by Arnaud Lagardère, Match's owner and one of Sarko's closest friends.

But there are limits to Match's transparency. Like all the French media it has never mentioned that the woman for whom Hollande left Royal is a reporter on Paris Match.

[offending photos of Royal (right) and Clémence, 21, her elder daughter] 

  /

Comments

[terry]

Strauss Kahn coming to Washington? He's gonna be like a rooster in a henhouse. The female to male ratio (for whites) is 3-1. It's 5-1 if he is more liberal in his tastes. Either way, Sandrine better hide.

From my experiences in Washington, I noticed how women tend to be a little more aggressive than areas where the male-female ratio is even. Perhaps, the "gallant" Strass-Kahn will find out that he is lower on the food chain in our capitol.

[azloon]

i guess we'll just have to wait for the "female politicians gone wild" video

[John Gregory Flinn]

The pictures from 'Match' say that Me Royal has come to Corsica, single and with her daughter to gather strength and (make a) comeback...!

Perhaps she is planning a coup of the (remaining) PS now that most of her rivals have deserted for M.Sarkosy's rapture – oops,sorry - rupture project!
To oust her erstwhile partner would be doubly sweet for Segolene. Perhaps she will promise some kind of 'new-PS' programme of modernisation ....

As for DS-K, I think 'trop seducteur' means what it seems!
Although the fears of 'inappropiate behaviour' may well prove unfounded.
Judging from the Paul Wolfrwitz scandal some kind of nepotism has to be involved before the anglo-saxon sense of “morality” is transgressed.

[Daniel Strohl]

" ...to demand that Paris Match recall this week's edition and pay damages"

Apart from the lawyers's fees, this seems to be free publicity for our national mermaid. However, if the move to court is really based only on protection of her private life, Mme Royal may make this credible if, in case of damages paid by Paris Match, these (net) damages would be credited on the account of a charitable association. There are plenty of them lacking money.

[rocket]

As for DSK- I guess we'll have to address him as Big D in the future. Does this apply to our homegrown Dominique on this blog 2?

[Frank Schnittger]

Perhaps the puritan WASPs (white anglo-saxnn protestants) in Washington will make an exception française? Is it IMF or IVF (in vitro fertilisation) he is heading up? Or is it the World Sperm Bank?

[Daniel Strohl]

Frank,

We have also got another similar acronym : IVG - Interruption Volontaire de Grossesse (abortion)

[azloon]

Clemence (SR's oldest daughter) is obviously the photo object that paris match wanted to feature. initially, when i did a quick 'once over' of the blog entry, i thought that the photo of clemence was her mother. comparing the two, i now see that there are areas of the anatomy where gravity is harder at work. oh, well. c'est la vie.

was strauss-kahn ever a possibility for SR? i am surprised, CB, that you could have co-mingled these news items without speculating about the two of them getting together. now, NS has yanked SK in other directions and we can only imagine what could have been.

incidentally, if SK were american, the press would be referring to him as a 'sex addict," rather than as 'un drageur." no mention was made of his marital staus. which is?

my wish for him: he comes to the u.s. and gets laid to his heart's content. there is a prominet precedent for this: ben franklin, yes, our famous forebear, and the inventor of electricity, who went to paris in the 1770s, and 'screwed his brains out' for several years as an ambassador to the french court.

may SK be so blessed.

[rocket]

Her body looks wretched. I understand why she is suing.

And that smile. Is that thing superglued onto her face?

[Roger Goodacre]

I'm a little out of date: is DSK no longer with his wife, the fragrant Anne Sinclair (a high profile TV current affairs journalist, who also happened to be very easy on the eye, certainly in her younger days)? Although French women can be remarkably, and admirably, tolerant in matters of the heart, at least from my observation, I'd be surprised if Anne Sinclair took serial philandering lying down, so to speak.

[christopher muir]

Puritan WASPs? The erotically imaginative Washington call-girls' Madame has now released her long telephone lists of allegedly dedicated customers. So far, one hypocritical politician has been snared by the index. God, the senator reportedly insists, will see him through this widely publicised act of unfaithfulness to his wife. All manner of electronic experts are trying to trace the owners of the exposed telephone numbers. Unfortunately this is part of the complex American mosaic. President Sarkozy, it seems, sees many good things associated with America. He'll have to import the good with the bad. You can't have one without the other. As a consequence, the French press may start intruding more forcefully into the private lives of wayward French politicians and "celebrities". Undoubtedly le bon Dieu would then be in great demand.

[Sandrine]

"no mention was made of his marital status. which is?"

Azloon, Strauss-Kahn is married.

"Either way, Sandrine better hide."
Why, I'm not that desperate you know ! This guy is ugly... and old ;o)

"Her body looks wretched. I understand why she is suing."

Rocket : it's disgusting. But I shouldn't be surprised. Nothing new sous le soleil...

[paul]

This is old hat. Several papers and books have alluded to this. Indeed the French compere for whom this is not a taboo (viz books) has shared the same hobby abnd lmet the minister in the course of his 'duties'. Of course the faithful old Canard never demeans itself to mention this. By the way every recent French president (except De Gaulle)has been competeively womanising. Michèle Cotta memorably interviewed for the presidential elections her two former lovers Chirac and Mitterrand. Surely this is well known?

[paul]

This is old hat. Several papers and books have alluded to this. Indeed the French compere for whom this is not a taboo (viz books) has shared the same hobby abnd lmet the minister in the course of his 'duties'. Of course the faithful old Canard never demeans itself to mention this. By the way every recent French president (except De Gaulle)has been competeively womanising. Michèle Cotta memorably interviewed for the presidential elections her two former lovers Chirac and Mitterrand. Surely this is well known?

[rocket]

Sandrine

"Either way, Sandrine better hide."
Why, I'm not that desperate you know ! This guy is ugly... and old ;o)

Why am I not surprised at your hypocritical response to my remarks about Segolène or anything that touches her royal loserness.

Is this something that you learn in l"école des fonctionnaires" or is it of your own invention.

As for being old. This is probably one of the most discriminating comments that someone can make concerning age and you didn't miss a beat when you made it.

I hope you don't confuse the word "beat" in english and accuse me blindly of " je ne sais quoi!" But I wouldn't be surprised, given your "antécédents"

What are you.. a young beauty?

There is a social justice in all of what you say because one day you too will be old and wretched unless this is already the case.

I'm beginning to like this Cartesianism more and more every day.

[Maggie]

Rocket, how can you say that 'her body looks wretched ' ?
She has had four children !!! with that in mind I say she looks very good .
And no this is not because I am not a fan of hers either, it's because I know how, after each child it get's progressively more difficult to bring the body back to some sort of decent shape.

[azloon]

christopher muir and 'le bon Dieu:'

yes, we all know of the 'foxhole" conversions, and the 'deathbed' conversions. now we are bracing for a spate of 'sexbed' conversions, aka 'little black book' conversions.

[Sandrine]

"This is probably one of the most discriminating comments that someone can make concerning age and you didn't miss a beat when you made it."

Ok, you obviously missed my smiley at the end of my sentence which meant that I was JOKING !!! It's a private joke between Terry and I. Sorry if you misunderstood it !

You, in the contrary, weren't joking at all, you really meant what you said, and I still think it's disgusting to say that, whether it's Angela Merkel or Ségo or any other woman.

"What are you.. a young beauty?"
Have I ever said that ? Where and When ?

"you too will be old and wretched"
Oh my gosh, thank you so much for giving me that kind of information! Décidément, I learn something everyday here...

[rocket]

I don't mean to insult any aspect of women on this blog as per appearance as my own body looks wretched now as the years have taken their toll (smile). I just don't think she looks that great.

I get a chuckle out of people who discriminate because of age. We are all are on the same runway to eternity

[rocket]

I don't knock Merkel because she doesn't try to sell her body to win an election

[Sandrine]

er, I don't remember when Sego sold her body to win an election. I must have missed that moment !

[Daniel Strohl]

Rocket,

"We are all are on the same runway to eternity"

Quite true !

[azloon]

this is appropos of nothing (sorry maggie):

below is a link to a YouTube ditty featuring steven colbert, an amusing american satirist, whose name is pronounced here as "kohl-bear." so, his daily tv show, "the colbert report" is humourly referred to as "the kohl-bear repohr," as in proper french pronunciation.

this particular piece is about the dismantling of the american telephone giant, AT&T in the early 80s (Ma Bell, it was called -- as in mother), and the gradual reunification, over the next 25 years, of the separated parts.

the whole subject is a bit ludicrous if you can follow it. first, this large monopoly is disintegrated by court fiat, then slowly allowed to reintegrate through a series of huge financial transactions which enrich investment banks, and shareholders, among others. this is, i'm afraid, the essence of american capitalism -- love it or leave it.

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-2004785759717366066

[azloon]

OK, IT'S TIME TO GO VERY MUCH OFF TOPIC.

ok, CB? maggie?

a person can only read so many cerebral replies to cerebral posts (is this form of discourse a french disease, maybe western or simply human?) without feeling that we need a little more SOUL on this blog.

after getting my camper ready for a trip into the high mountains of colorado this week, i poured myself a glass of chateau cantenac (2003 st. emilion grand cru -- rating: B-) and put my "25 most played" songs from my itunes library on my sound system.

sitting out on my deck, i sipped the wine as i watched thunderstorms moving through the night sky, and soaked in the beauty of the scenery and the music. does it ever get any better than this? not much.

as we discuss here about french vs. north american educational systems, sego, NS, and dubya, how awful is it to be a tourist in france, i imagine that all of us are looking for many of the same things -- and that our favorite music tells alot about us. one poster here said he'd have had no problem paying 600 pounds sterling to see streisand perform in england. i guess we know what's really important.

so with this thought in mind, here goes -- the LIST:

1. "Think," aretha franklin, featured in film 'blues brothers' in which she sings a warning to her husband about re-joining the blues band. aretha, imo, should be declared a world heritage site.

2. "When you say nothing at all." alison krauss and union station (AKUS). a nice, country/folk sound that appeals to the melancholic irish in me.

3. "addicted to love," tina turner, performed live in paris (l'olympia?) to enthusiatic audience of her fellow french residents. this is what buddhism ought to sound like! i saw tina in phoenix awhile back. great 60-year-old legs.

4. "mistakes," robinella and the cc string band. country/folk sound that you've likely never heard of. helps to understand english (which i will denote with an asterisk on future listings).*

5. "money," barrett strong, one of the original motown talent set, mainly a writer, but here sings one of the greatest r&b songs of all time.

ok, 20 more to go. later.

p.s. i will burn a cd of the list of 25 for anyone who emails me (robfur@mac.com). you can download these yourselves for .99 cents per song though i think france has some problem with apple downloads. yes? probably $25 bucks well-spent. otherwise, email me.

[terry]

Daniel said:

Rocket,

"We are all are on the same runway to eternity"

Quite true !

I'm still in my thirties. You guys maybe on the runway. But I haven't gotten my boarding pass yet. And I still have to get through security.

[pouet]

Azloon,
I can't resist that. So here is my list :
- That's all right with me (Jerry Roll Morton version)
- Dialogo (Gyorgi Ligeti)
- Si tu t'imagines... (words by Queneau, sung by Gréco, I can't remember who is the composer)
- Je vous salue Marie (Georges Brassens, not really a religious song, but still a kind of prayer)
- Disapearer (Sonic Youth)

Ok I'm going to cheat a little:
- Back in the day (Erykah Badu)
- Le twenty two bar (Dominique A)
- Estampes (Claude Debussy)
- I want you (Marvin Gaye)
- Art of the fugue, contra punctus IV

This game can't stop...

[azloon]

Pouet -- Great list, many i haven't heard, but hope to find. i agree, this game can't stop. this is SERIOUS stuff.

ok, on to the next five (of 25 favorite) songs:

6. "Wedding Day," by rosie thomas -- a dreamy fantasy by a divorced woman singing of the 'road trip' she will take, satisfying all her secret desires, and having an experience as beautiful as her wedding day.

7, "You're Beautiful," by james blunt. ok, i admit it, i like europop. blunt, a former army officer in kosovo, is a good song writer.

8. "The Littliest Birds," by the Be Good Tanyas, an all-girl group from vancouver, BC. very seductive sound.

9. "Tracks of my Tears," by smokey robinson and the miracles. aside from "money" by barrett strong, this is the greatest motown song of the last millenia (i can't speak for other millenia).

10. "Big Yellow Taxi," by joni mitchell. i once used this music as a trailer to a radio essay i did about parking meters coming to papua, new guinea, in the early 1970s ("paved over paradise and put up a parking lot').

p.s. terry, to continue your analogy, 'patdown' are the best years. :)

[Daniel Strohl]

Terry,

Your post dated 16.7 11:41

Yes, no hurry - "Chi va piano va sano i va lontano" (my Italian is not of the best sort but I hope it is correct)

[Valentin]

Luckily we have you guys to speak for days d'affilée about looney tunes :)

I'd also say Metallica (Nothing else matters, acoustical), Nicole Croisille, or maybe Romane Serda avec Anaïs Nin, Alain Souchon's Allô maman bobo... Vesti la giuba sung by Caruso or Rachmaninov's 3rd piano concert (just to go back to cerebral stuff :P)

[azloon]

my list is seeming quite "lightweight" compared to pouet's and valentin's, but i started this, so i will finish:

11. "terra nova" by james taylor (with carly simon singing back up). carly split because of taylor's heroin addiction, but he's clean and sober now, and as wonderful as ever.

12. "diamonds on the soles of her shoes," by paul simon (with ladysmith black mambazo), from 'graceland," arguably the best american cd in the past quarter century.

13. "piece of my heart," by janis joplin (her sister laura, a psychologist, rented us our first, very tiny, house when we moved to arizona in late 70s). janis was a troubled soul, god bless her.

14. "sittin' on the dock of the bay" by otis redding. no notes required.

15. "i get around" by the beach boys. puerile, and classic.

[azloon]

valentin --

you 'got' looney tunes which i thought of too late to include in my "loons gone wild" post. muy listo. :)

[pouet]

That makes a lot to listen to. I don't know the Be Good Tanyas and Robinella, I'm going to look for it.

I would ad:
-"A ton étoile" Noir Désir
-"Killing me softly" (I prefer the Roberta Flack version)
-"Army of dreamers" Kate Bush
-"Elenkönig" Shubert
-"You've changed" Ella Fitzgerald

[azloon]

ok, i'm am off to the 3000m level in colorado in my camper for a week in the summer rains (referred to as monsoons here, which is more than a slight exaggeration measured against the south asian version).

so, rounding out the TOP 25 here on Raaadeeoh Bremmer, coming to you from the outer reaches of the cybervoid, and brought to you by the French Tourist Council -- whose motto is "you pay, we make nice":

16. "under african skies," by paul simon backed up by linda ronstadt (from tucson, arizona and whose brother was chief of police there), this song also from album "graceland," referred to earlier.

17. "send in the clowns," by judy collins, written by the song genius steven sondheim whose other stuff includes the musical "sunday in the park with georges (as in seurat). he also wrote lyrics for west side story, america's romeo and juliet.

18. "angel baby" by rosie and the originals, a one-hit-wonder. great slow-dance r&b classic. this is obscure. i had to download this from kazaa because it wasn't in the itunes library.

19. "here comes the sun," by nina simone, known to all french music fans, which got a nice brief bit in "before sunset' the great julie delphy/ethan hawke flic.

20. "reelin' and rockin," by chuck berry, recorded live in london's wembly stadium, album called "the london sessions." extremely sexual version of this classic song that you probably thought was about something else (until hearing this).

21. "late, late show," by dakota staton, from the 1950s, great vocal jazz piece.

22. "that'll be the day," buddy holly and the crickets. i could have picked 20 of his songs -- i was stricken the day in 1958 his small plane crashed in a cornfield in iowa. fans still stop there, much as they do at jim morrison's grave in paris.

22. "when will i be loved," by linda ronstadt (now married to mayor of oakland california, jerry brown, former governer and 60s radical)

23. "parchman farm,' mose allison

24. "long tall sally," by little richard (a true original)

25. "stand by me," by tracy chapman. cover of an old 50s song, and title of wonderfull small movie directed by rob reiner, of eponymous name.

well, that's all folks !!!! (as they said at the end of looney tunes......valentin???)

[azloon]

jouet -- thanks for joining in the music thread. perhaps some others here will "dare" to reveal their innermost musical longings. :)

[rocket]

azloon

Never had fear and never will

http://www.youtube.com/profile?user=rivierarocket

see favorites on the page

[Robert Marchenoir]

Anything by Gérard Manset.

[azloon]

rocket --

when i first saw the youtube page, i thought i was going to have to look at beautiful downtown tonopah again. :)

good to see beach boys there. used to take my middle son to arizona state fair every nov. 1 (his b-day) to see the annual free beach boys concert. the arena went wild -- and that was back in the days before concerts were the closest thing to god on the planet.

currently, in an internet cafe in telluride, colorado (elv 8800 ft) -- really nice place though more prosperous (read filthy rich) and touristy than on my last trip here four years ago.

spend last night in my camper next to noisy mountain stream. great for sleeping tho lots of black flies owing to huge rains (with hail) earlier in the day. thinking about a cushy hotel in town tonite.

where is spain?

[azloon]

oops. "in" spain?

[azloon]

valentin --

i will add to my endless comments about loons by remarking that sego looks a little like a loon in the photograph accompanying this article. i only made the association this evening.

perhaps, CB will confirm this using the photo of two loons in the sea of cortez which i tried but could not post here, but forwarded to him.

maggie, who consistently ignores my posts, could also comment on this since she was the one who exposited at length about these wonderful, mainly canadian, creatures. we will forgive any hint of cattiness, maggie.

SR is above the water surface a bit more than a typical loon, but she has that "straight ahead" look characteristic of loons. and, she and her spouse certainly exhibited the "wacky," noisy behavior associated with a loon pair. loons, however, loons don't throw each other out of the nest (they also mate for life which is not the same as monogamous).

[Maggie G]

Azloon,

I'm very sorry if you think I am purposely ignoring your posts (flattered even -- does this mean you have a crush on me?)

If I can think of something interesting to say, or feel strongly about a topic, I send a comment, otherwise I worry about making a fool of myself. (I've done it a few times)

Unfortunately I don't go by a 'nom de plume' here, like you, so anybody who knows me is going to recognize my signature and I worry about getting razzed. I've seen posts from two people I know on this blog, and I nearly died both times, wondering if they are regular readers. I happen to belong to a running / hiking group that will pounce on the slightest pretext to give you the shit-of-the-week award, so I have to be very careful. One of these nuts made a comment on the discussion about Barbara Streisand.

So you want me to comment on your suggestion that Ségolène Royal looks like a loon? Well, I'm comparing the two pictures here, and I'm sorry, but her nose isn't nearly long or pointed enough, and her face should be black, and her eye should be smaller and further back, and her mouth would have to be inserted onto the end of her nose.

Other than that, well, yes, I suppose there are some similarities. Though it looks likes she's doing the breast stroke, while the loon is duck paddling.

The picture I'm looking at is from "The Songs of Wild Birds", a book by Lang Elliott, which I bought in Boston last month, at the Harvard Museum of Natural History. It is full of beautiful bird pictures, plus a CD of bird songs, and the loon is the very first one.

I also got a second book by the same guy, "Music of the Birds" which also has a CD, and beautiful pictures (all of birds actually singing) PLUS extracts of poetry about birds on nearly every page. Here's one by Henry David Thoreau:

"The birds I heard [today] sung as freshly as if it had been the first morning of creation."

And here's one by Shelley:

"Teach us, sprite or bird,
What sweet thoughts are thine:
I have never heard
Praise of love or wine
That panted forth a rapture so divine."

[azloon]

maggie --

i didn't have a crush on you before (i was afraid you didn't like me -- remember fifth grade?), but now i do !!

what wonderful bird quotes -- i am clipping them and putting them on my refrigerator door. you must be a 'birder.'

re: anonymity. i posted here for a day or two as "robert f....), my real, full name, then went to my azloon screen name for reasons you mentioned. mostly, i don't care what anyone thinks of me anymore, their opinions of my opinions, etc., etc. a good friend has told me over the years that "what others think of you is none of your business." i think i am coming to understand him now at my advanced age.

"the littlest birds sing the prettiest songs," a line from a song in my top 25 (which. along with other stuff, according to valentin, 'anesthetized' dominique, and perhaps others here), is sung by the 'be good tanyas," from canada. very nice music. one women in the group was continually told by her mother to 'be good.' that would be tanya. :)

pls give us a report on "two days in paris" which presumably you saw in nice. was it subtitled?

[Valentin]

". One of these nuts made a comment on the discussion about Barbara Streisand."

LOL Maggie, you're certainly not improving your situation :)

[Terry]

Maggie:

"I happen to belong to a running/hiking group..."

Well, which is it? Do you run then hike? Or do you hike then run? Or do you sometimes just hike and skip the running?

I just happen to belong to a sitting/eating group. Usually, we just sit and eat. We also have a shit-of-the-week award, of which I am the sole arbiter.

I also have a crush on you. But I think I belong to Sandrine right now. Sorry.

[azloon]

if NS had only said he was in a walking/running group, he might not have received the ration of shit that he did.

maggie, i understand your previously expressed reservations after the mugging your post is receiving. :)

don't let the bastards wear you down.

[Sandrine]

"I also have a crush on you. But I think I belong to Sandrine right now. Sorry."

Terry, it was supposed to be our little secret !! :o)

"I've seen posts from two people I know on this blog, and I nearly died both times, wondering if they are regular readers."

Maggie, I'm just like you, I always hope nobody I know read this blog (especially people from my work). Sometimes, I regret having used my real first name and not a nickname. You can do like Rob (Azloon) and find something new...

[zyclop]

it's a bit late now as I look at the date today and all these wasted hours for reading all these very "interesting" [in the American way] comments.
I recommend reading other sources too:
http://www.tdg.ch/pages/home/tribune_de_geneve/english_corner/news
http://weather.smh.com.au/
http://www.straitstimes.com/
http://www.elpais.com/
http://www.corriere.it/english/
http://www.guardian.co.uk/
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/
and so on...
less time for yakk-yakk-yakk
helps may-be; or not.

[millier marc]

I'm living in 91 Paris south suburb.
I don't speak english very well but my opinion its better to ead the brit's press to know exactly what happen's in my douce FRANCE. sorry for the french journalists;;Le point ; TF 1..france 2. le figaro, l'express, all the Prvince's press except one ortwo. are for SARKO's circus..what's a shame...!!!!!!!
I'm regret the president CHIRAC..!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!