Sarkozy is too friendly for the Germans

 

This is not a shot from a romantic movie or a new Singin' in the Rain. It's a glimpse of the Franco-German couple in action and part of why Nicolas Sarkozy gets on Angela Merkel's nerves.

In the picture, the French President is giving the German Chancellor his usual warm embrace when he arrived in Berlin for one of their regular summits on Monday. Sarko is a physical guy. He comes in close. Grabs, hugs and back-slaps are his tools for connecting with people -- like Bill Clinton. Presidents Bush and Putin have both been subjected lately to the Sarko hand-pump with arm around the shoulders.

When you receive the Sarko treatment, you sense the desire to dominate as well as the friendliness. I experienced it backstage in a TV studio after interviewing him in May. The slight menace and Sarko's small stature inevitably bring Hollywood gangsters to mind. With women, there is a patronising side.

[Sarko welcomes yachtswoman Maude Fontenoy]

Merkel feels that Sarkozy has been pushing her around since he won the presidency in May and began trying to impose himself as boss of Europe. She has now had enough of his Tigger-like antics and her people are making it known that she resents the excessive greetings.

Le Parisien newspaper relayed the complaint today: "Angela Merkel, who is very reserved, does not greatly value the outpouring of affection from her French opposite number -- his way of kissing her on every meeting and touching her and handling her shoulders in front of the cameras."

The Germans might normally accept the Sarko style as Gallic warmth, but they see it as part of a power game in which the French president is breaking the rules of the Franco-German relationship. These require Paris and Berlin to treat one-another as equal senior partners, the "motor" of the European Union, even if their interests have diverged since the end of the Cold War.

In the past few months Sarko has, in German eyes, committed the following offences. He grabbed the limelight during Germany's six-month presidency of the EU last June and claimed as a personal triumph an agreement on a new constitutional treaty. He flouted the rules of the EU single currency by raising the national debt with tax breaks. He foisted a French candidate on Europe as next boss of the International Monetary fund. He brokered the release of foreign medical workers from Libya after all the groundwork had been done by the European Union. He imposed his French priorities in the revamp of the management structure of EADS, the Franco-German parent of the Airbus company. He is indulging in protectionism by creating French industrial champions, such as the energy giant born with the merger between Suez and Gaz de France. On Monday, Sarkozy instructed Merkel to drop German hostility to nuclear energy. The list goes on.

Old hands are not too fussed about the friction because French and German leaders usually get off to a bad start before settling into a decent working relationship. The climate between Jacques Chirac and Gerhard Schroder, the last pair, was execrable at the beginning, with the French leader restarting nuclear testing and bullying the German on EU spending. They were almost friends at the end. The usual image of the Franco-German partnership is an old bickering couple who always avoid divorce because they cannot live apart.

But Sarko would be advised to stop grabbing the Chancellor. Chirac showed the right way to greet a lady.

Comments

[starling]

*shudder*

I find the guy a bit of a creep (heck, even his NAME sounds like a Hollywood gangster!)

[VisitorHK]

Very amusing post! –

« Sarkozy instructed Merkel to drop German hostility to nuclear energy » -

In fact, the German headlines read : « Sarkozy asks Merkel to withdraw from her withdrawal from nuclear energy. »
The media enjoy the Sarko show! Nice photos…

[sarah]

Interessant cette analyse du Times!!

[Alice David]

I think we French(women) like Sarko's masculine energy. He is protective and it's sort of nice: But I can see why Madame Merkel does not appreciate it. But your account est très drôle, Charles.

[Tara_Lane]

I'm surprised Sarkozy didn't learn from Bush's faux pas with Merkel - - when Bush massaged (a visibly uncomfortable) Merkel's shoulders. Poor woman. Probably had no idea her position would bring her so much contact (literally!) with her world leader counterparts.

And also: What is Sarkozy doing to Fontenoy??? Someone please tell me it looks worse than it is. Good grief.

[Terry]

"Grabs, hugs and back-slaps are his tools for connecting with people -- like Bill Clinton."

Hugs and back-slaps weren't the only tools in Bill Clinton's repertoire. Let's just hope Sarko doesn't take out the same tools Clinton was so fond of using.

This is not the first time Merkel has been groped by another head of state either. Merkel gave our hamhanded president the "Beggar Off" after he started giving her a backrub. The video of the assault is here:

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-5384914920064411014&q=merkel+backrub&total=32&start=0&num=10&so=0&type=search&plindex=1

Maybe the word on Merkel is out that she's easy pickings. Perhaps Gordon Brown can get in on the action.

[e_widiner]

Perhaps advocating a change of the German legal law system, forced on to the Germans via Napoleonic Law, by implementing the british common law, darivat of Magna Carta librtatum, could actually unfreeze there tension there and liberate the Middle Europaeens from repeating a unsucsessfull pasture and on top gain Britain the global goal it needs to strife and successfully influence the future of Europe more positively for all participants in the EU and in the Global_Village

[John Hornsby]

According to a French TV programme about etiquette, Chirac got the 'baise-main' wrong: one shouldn't place one's left hand over the back of the lady's hand; nor should one actually touch her hand with one's lips, which should be prevented from doing so by the kisser's thumb.

[Ros]

Let's wait and see what he does when he meets the Queen - which will be her fate sooner or later ?

[Elizabeth]

You Brits don't even wrinkle the sheets, do you?

[azloon]

is sarko grabbing that yachtwoman's breast or is this appearance only?

she seems to be enjoying it, or else is too embarrassed to resist.

with each new outrageous revelation, my admiration for sarko grows. his behavior is that of an exuberant adolescent who really isn't sure what is the right thing to do in any given situation but isn't overly concerned about it.

boris yeltsin would approve.

(it wouldn' surprise me if sarko ends up on the first sex video featuring a 'sitting' major president)

.

[Helen]

I find Chirac's baise-main wwwwaaaayyy creepier than Sarkozy's (wo)man-handling ways. That's just funny. He always genuinely looks terribly excited to be meeting his fellow leaders!

[corinne]

The supposedly new France smells like old elephant's attitudes. For God sakes we are in 2007 and women are not cows, and machism is passé.....

[Frank Schnittger]

I don't know if this is all that serious. Bush has been rubbing people up the wrong way with his faux pas for years. Bill's repertoire was even wider. Some might regard it as a Franco-Latin conspiracy to undermine the uptight Anglo-Saxons - to hark back to an earlier theme. (Bush and Clinton were southerners and not true WASPs - white Anglo-Saxon protestants). Is there such an acronym as BLECS (Brown Latin European Catholics) we can use in opposition the WASP stereotype?

Brown, like Merkel, is a child of the Manse (Clergyman's child) and will also not appreciate the groping. I suggest Brown not wear a kilt at their first meeting. The Queen, will, of course wear gloves. She will not be amused.

[A. Schelberg]

Hilarious! It seems that it goes both ways: Yesterday, German newspapers reported rumours that it is Merkel and the German treasurer who are straining Sarkozy's nerves.

[Joan]

I think Nicolas is charming. I like to be touched, and I think Angela should like it too. I envy Cecilia such a husband!

[Robert Marchenoir]

Funny post, funny thread.

[A. Schelberg]

Hilarious! So, it is both ways: yesterday, German newspapers reported that it is Merkel and the German treasurer, who are getting on Sarkozy's nerves.

[Susannah Myers]

Is it just me, or is that picture of Sarko and Merkel pretty darn adorable? With her little orange suit and the ginormous umbrella and all -- it really *does* look like Singin' in the Rain.

[Jim P]

Hey, I like Sarko! So he projects a little masculine energy... so what? I can hardly wait for him to meet Condi Rice. But he needs to remember she has a temper and a black belt. Merkel was easy.

And don't compare him to Bill Clinton. Bill never paddled around a lake getting himself photographed with his shirt off.

You go, Mssr President! Viva la France!

[soso]

about Maud Fontenoy: he was giving her a decoration (Légion d'honneur or ordre du mérite I don't remember) and she had such a low decolleté (cleavage) this day that he searched for several seconds where he could attach the decoration; it made a lot of people laugh!

[azloon]

Bush and Clinton were southerners -- FRANK

you are right, sort of. but bush does have VERY deep wasp roots which he's done his best to hide, at least superficially. this ambivalence didn't stop him from yale and harvard and all the 'benies' that accrue from those elite associations. but really, he's a texas boy, a hell raiser, a beer drinkin', cocaine snorting, 'urinate off the balcony' at the wedding kinda guy. saved, regrettably, by his joining the army of jesus.

clinton is a good ole boy, but quite a nerdy one, not in the hell-raisin' southern tradition [which is closely akin to the texas (pron. 'tixas') 'kick ass' tradition]. Clinton was a mama's boy, played the sax, eagle scout, but apparently found at least one prominent outlet for his frustrations. blacks consider him the first and only black president of the u.s. he deeply identifies with blacks, grew up among them, went to church with them, were his best friends. aretha franklin spent more time at the white house than did the sec'y of state.

Hamilton Jordan, a highly prominent black democrat lawyer in DC, and clinton were best golfing buddies. reporters once asked jordan what the two of them talked about during golf and jordan smiled and said 'great pussy."

note: if blacks had occupied the majority of seats in congress, there never would have been the hue and cry about monica lewinsky, nor would there have been an impeachment attempt. blacks, even devoutly religious ones, have many fewer hangups about sex than do waspy whites. many of whom believe they are he product of a virgin birth.

[azloon]

[I envy Cecilia such a husband] Joan

perhaps that touching feels alot better when you are not one of a stable of females who are enjoying the same sort of attention.

[Monika]

"with each new outrageous revelation, my admiration for sarko grows. his behavior is that of an exuberant adolescent who really isn't sure what is the right thing to do in any given situation but isn't overly concerned about it."

Azloon comes very close to my own thinking (hilarious article, Charles!). Just watch him how he moves around when talking: nervously waving to and fro with cascades of shall-I-smile-or-shall-I-not-smiles.

And it is true, yesterday a German newspaper wrote that it's Merkel and her treasurer who were told the unnerve Sarko.

I must admit as a comparatively uptight German I never really got used to "faire la bize", I still prefer a short and firm hand shake.

[rocket]

Alice

"I think we French(women) like Sarko's masculine energy. He is protective and it's sort of nice: "

If I may say so I don't think the Germans are overly concerned about being protected by the French.

Azloon

"she seems to be enjoying it, or else is too embarrassed to resist."

Most likely too scared shitless to say anything for fear of having a tax audit if she does.

Joan

"I think Nicolas is charming. I like to be touched, and I think Angela should like it too. I envy Cecilia such a husband!"

Oh Pleeeeaaase!

Corinne

"The supposedly new France smells like old elephant's attitudes. For God sakes we are in 2007 and women are not cows, and machism is passé...."

I entire agree with your comments. Unfortunately in France, even in 2007 the male species still thinks that they can have the free hand and treat women like objects. Rather sad and backwards I find.

[Frank Schnittger]

Congratulations on Scotland's soccer win over France in the Parc des Princes, Charles. Scotland are now ahead of both France and Italy in the qualifying group - not a bad performance from a team which has been in the doldrums for so long. Any photos of you leaping about in a kilt?

[Unknown]

Given the choice of having a dinner for two with any world leader, I would strike the tactile Sarkozy and smarmy Bush immediately off my list of preferences.

[Gracie Dijkhuyzen]

For crying out loud,everyone is different when showing your hospitality or compassion whether in private or in politics!Stop this nonsense thinking,it's already a bad world,a little caring is badly needed this days!!!

[John Gregory Flinn]

"On Monday, Sarkozy instructed Merkel to drop German hostility to nuclear energy."

I think this originates from the interest Siemens have for EDF and which is not welcome in France. Because EDF, of course, is predominantly nuclear whereas Germany is in hock to the oxymoron 'Greens' and anti-nuclear. Something which Frau Merkel may want to extricate herself from.

Frank - your BLEC sounds like that old Guardian parody of the afrikaner description of black africans as 'blecks'.
No connection intended was there?

[Heinz H. Koenig]

I am glad there is a theme beyond the Nazi'ism in a British paper. I am not so glad about the shade Sarko's behaviour sheds over the true problems. The list of disagreement between Germany and France is long. Sarko attempts to live up to his nickname - lets hope he does not end like him. But I hopingly agree, in the end the German French leader team will be back in harmony. There is no alternative - and that's good.
I am afraid the Germans will stick to the napolonic law and the Brits have to look further for another competitve edge to gain the role they so intensively accuse the Germans of striving for i.e dominant influence in Europe and the world.

[Marina]

As a woman I think we all are different, some enjoy a touchy communication and some don't. If an important figure in politics is not sensitive to that after a first encounter the person is just as ignorant as any other person you can come across in your ordinary life.

As a political human, I am sure that polititians have an image or a "mascara" which helps them not only hide but project power.

The british media would mock Tony Blair with the title "Call me Tony"

Each man or woman of state has their style. Some styles are pretty neutral and some feel extreme

Personally, I think Sarkozy's sucks!!! I'm glad I am not alone in this.

By the way, is not to do with being French -I am a latin-american not a French by the way- but with being "macho" But who said that people in power are evolved?

[Edward Johns]

This touching non -touching business is all about national stereotyping.
A fine example of a German going against the stereotypical image is Boris Becker the champion tennis player conceiving his illegitimate daughter in a restaurant broom cupboard. (The name of thr Restaurant being " NOBU ". perhaps he was only obeying orders )
Come on someone, let's have an example from the French model stereotype to equal that one !

[John Hornsby]

What is wrong with Sarkozy's name, Starling? It is a habitation name, since Sarköz is a small town in Northern Hungary. By the way, the Starling isn't my favourite bird: they bombard people from the treetops. You ought to change your pseudonym!

[Sandrine]

"As a woman I think we all are different, some enjoy a touchy communication and some don't."

I totally agree Marina, Sarko should know when to stop. Who is he to touch women like that ? I hate when guys start doing creepy things like that. I wouldn't stay here like a cow with this guys' hands around me. President or not !

Clearly Angela has no choice (diplomatically speaking) but she can't totally hide what she thinks about that. Poor woman !

At least Chirac's "baise-main" was less intrusive.

I too would like to see Sarko meet the Queen, Ros !! ;o)

Rocket, I totally agree... ! Except for the last part, I'm not sure only Frenchmen think like that nowadays.

[Christophe Egea]

Where did u get the info ?
I checked 'Le parisien' today and nothing about that!!!
Very Strange isn't it ?

Is that HOAX ?

From now I won't read the TIMES anymore....

Cordialement
[Dear Mr Egea. I suggest you read yesterday's Parisien, not today's. CB]

[Helen]

"Given the choice of having a dinner for two with any world leader, I would strike the tactile Sarkozy and smarmy Bush immediately off my list of preferences."

-Sarko would be at the TOP of mine! I think my litany of questions for him would go on forever, and I bet he'd be hilarious.

[hicham moha7]

Womanizer

Being a womanizer and politician goes perfectly hand in hand.in fact, by By insisting on Cuddling, hugging and kissing Merkel Sarko remove all doubts about who really is. he is a mere failure despite the aura that might surround him.

[Frank Schnittger]

“Frank - your BLEC sounds like that old Guardian parody of the afrikaner description of black africans as 'blecks'. No connection intended was there?”
- John Gregory Flinn

Yes - the allusion was intentional, as WASPS do have a tendency to look down on BLECS.

Azloon is right. Bush did rather try to overcome his WASPISH roots by overcompensating as a Tixas hell-raiser who was then saved by Jesus - also not a very WASPISH thing to do. It meant he could appeal to the east coast WASP, southern trailer trash, and bible belt saved votes all at the same time. Given that his father was an architypal WASP, it was a triumph of self-re-branding and not a bad election strategy!

[concedo nulli]

I am sorry to say why do you non-French readers of this blog bother to have negative opinions of Sarkozy. You are unable to get him right and will remain so Your cultural references are not relevant. Sarkozy happen to feel warmly towards women (I know as a former female supporter of Ségolène Royal) ; it seems he has a very nice cultural inheritance there. In order to make you understand he is probably as faithful to his wife as Tony to Cherie Blair.

[azloon]

[why do you non-French readers of this blog bother to have negative opinions of Sarkozy. You are unable to get him right and will remain so Your cultural references are not relevant] Concedo

i'm not french and i love the guy. and what's not to like?

he's 'over the top,' a bull in a china shop, 50 years old and going on 18, shoot now, ask questions later, never met a women he didn't want to sleep with. in short, a model for all of us to emulate.

france has been so insufferably boring and predictable for so long, they ought to think about making this guy president for life.

[mike caplanis]

i knew sarkozy as a child. his parents--low level hungarian diplomats who worked in administration --spent six years at the embassy in washington and the family lived in a neighborhood that was full of embassy families from all over the world. my grandmother lived next door and i remember him at the age of six or seven, always dressed up in american cowboy gear, looking not a little like steve martin in that one memorable scene from 'parenthood' where he entertains at his kid's birthday party. sarkozy was fat and clumsy and with the chaps and six guns on each hip, he easily lost his balance. a little (and slighly older) italian girl that he was smitten with (of all the kids in the neighborhood, i was the only american) used to push him down whenever she got the chance. he'd cry and come back for more. clearly, love of whatever attention a female was willing to offer him was evident at a very early age. it might explain his 'reach out reflex' whenever in the presence of a powerful woman. he's worried about losing his equilibrium. all in all, a beneficial reaction.

[mike caplanis]

by the way, clinton's pussy admiring pal wasn't hamilton jordan, it was vernon jordan.

hamilton jordan was jimmy carter's communications director and press secretary. he was known, however, as something of a 'hound' and played a round of golf or two himself, so to speak.

[azloon]

Mike Caplanis -- thx for picking up on my error. i remembered it was vernon, not hamilton, about three minutes after posting. glad to know we have proofreaders in our midst.

re your early knowledge of sarko

it's essential you stay on this blog so we can measure his future antics against your early observations.

it must have been not the least bit surprising for you when he leaped onto the photographers boat and personally confiscated a camera.

this guy is a real piece of work.

[Frank Schnittger]

How come Sarkozy couldn't speak english to the photographers if he had spent 6 years of his childhood in Washington?

[Zetscho]

Well, Merkel is a German woman and without trying to review old clichees, Germans often just don't appreciate physical contact that much. And our chancellor seems to be one of those uptight types.

Anyway, I just don't know who I hat more: Sarkozy who looks amd acts like a criminal to me, or Merkel who seems to be some kind of a political patsy.

Anyway, nice article, made me laugh!

[mike caplanis]

dunno frank, except that like more than few politicians, maybe he likes to hide behind ignorance when convenient. he was jabberin' a plenty at lake winnipesaukee this summer

[VisitorHK]

“…Merkel who seems to be some kind of political patsy” (Zetscho)

« For the second year in a row Angela Merkel, the first woman to become chancellor of Germany, ranks No. 1 on our list of the World’s 100 Most Powerful Women. She continued to impress the world with her cool leadership at two back-to-back summits, and stuck to her principles,…” (Forbes, 30.08.2007)

[Maynard]

A truly great man. At last the French will experience the joys that Americans -- the non-childish ones, at any rate -- knew during the Clinton years. And the French will of course handle it with both grace and zest.

[isobel]

Frank Schnittger asks "How come Sarkozy couldn't speak english to the photographers if he had spent 6 years of his childhood in Washington?"
Presumably he went to a French school and so didn't have much contact with English speakers; he was only 6 - and it's perfectly possible, even as an adult, to live in a foreign country without speaking the native language. He had the press following him and I would be very hesitant about speaking a foreign language ( for fear of sounding stupid)in front of them - wouldn't you?