# Conservative French President Sarkozy swinging to the left?!
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conservative-french-president-sarkozy-swinging-to-the-left/510252
**Category:** Great Debates
**Created:** [September 16, 2009, 12:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conservative-french-president-sarkozy-swinging-to-the-left/510252 "2009-09-16T00:02:43Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)
#### Post date: [September 16, 2009, 12:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conservative-french-president-sarkozy-swinging-to-the-left/510252/1 "2009-09-16T00:02:43Z")
I thought [Sarkozy](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarkozy) was suppose to be a right-winger. But, [according to John Nichols in _The Nation:_](http://www.thenation.com/blogs/thebeat/473146/sarkozy_wants_g_20_to_get_beyond_cult_of_the_market)
> [@](#):
>
> When the G-20 meets in Pittsburgh next week, French President Sarkozy will urge world leaders to make two moves – one immediate and one long-term – that have the potential to temper capitalism’s worst abuses and reassert human values at the national and international levels.
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> Sarkozy’s aides say he will walk out of the summit of presidents and prime ministers from the world’s most developed countries if the leaders fail to endorse a plan to curb bonuses for bankers.
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> That’s the immediate demand. And it is an important one, as it could put the G-20 in the unusual position of trying to tame – rather than cheer on – the banksters and corporate CEOS that have so unsettled the global economy.
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> But even more important will be the French president’s push to “revolutionize” international definitions of development, progress and achievement.
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> In recent decades, those measures have pretty much begun and ended with the bottom-line details of economic growth and wealth accumulation.
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> But Sarkozy says he wants to use the G-20 gathering as the launching point for a “fight” against what he describes as the “cult of figures” and the “cult of the market.”
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> “A great revolution is waiting for us. For years, people said that finance was a formidable creator of wealth, only to discover one day that it accumulated so many risks that the world almost plunged into chaos,” argues the French leader. “The crisis doesn’t only make us free to imagine other models, another future, another world. It obliges us to do so.”
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> Sarkozy’s “revolution” would still use measures of economic growth and contraction in the analysis of a nation’s success. But the definition would be expanded beyond traditional gross domestic product (GDP) models to include measures of well-being and what Sarkozy describes as “the politics of civilization.” These include environmental sustainability, the quality of public services and the amount of time citizens of a country have to meet family responsibilities – which the French leader values as “personal services provided within a family circle.”
Try to imagine Bush 2 or Bush 1 or Reagan or even Nixon talking like that! Are European RWs RWs **at all** by American standards?!
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### Author:  [@alphaboi867](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/alphaboi867)
#### Post date: [September 16, 2009, 1:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conservative-french-president-sarkozy-swinging-to-the-left/510252/2 "2009-09-16T01:28:11Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#):
>
> I thought [Sarkozy](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarkozy) was suppose to be a right-winger. But, [according to John Nichols in _The Nation:_](http://www.thenation.com/blogs/thebeat/473146/sarkozy_wants_g_20_to_get_beyond_cult_of_the_market)
>
> Try to imagine Bush 2 or Bush 1 or Reagan or even Nixon talking like that! Are European RWs RWs **at all** by American standards?!
No, they’re Democrats.
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### Author:  [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)
#### Post date: [September 16, 2009, 1:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conservative-french-president-sarkozy-swinging-to-the-left/510252/3 "2009-09-16T01:35:08Z")
> [@alphaboi867](#):
>
> No, they’re Democrats.
What I was going to say. What America calls liberal, they call right wing. What we call right wing they call lunatic fringe.
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### Author:  [@Starving\_Artist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Starving_Artist)
#### Post date: [September 16, 2009, 1:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conservative-french-president-sarkozy-swinging-to-the-left/510252/4 "2009-09-16T01:39:39Z")
Funny how that lunatic “fringe” tends to consist, philosophically, to approximately half the country’s population (and growing, if recent polls are to be believed).
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### Author:  [@njtt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/njtt)
#### Post date: [September 16, 2009, 1:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conservative-french-president-sarkozy-swinging-to-the-left/510252/5 "2009-09-16T01:51:41Z")
> [@Starving\_Artist](#):
>
> Funny how that lunatic “fringe” tends to consist, philosophically, to approximately half the country’s population (and growing, if recent polls are to be believed).
Funny? More like scary and depressing (if actually true).
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### Author:  [@Brown\_Eyed\_Girl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Brown_Eyed_Girl)
#### Post date: [September 16, 2009, 1:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conservative-french-president-sarkozy-swinging-to-the-left/510252/6 "2009-09-16T01:57:11Z")
> [@Starving\_Artist](#):
>
> Funny how that lunatic “fringe” tends to consist, philosophically, to approximately half the country’s population (and growing, if recent polls are to be believed).
Funny? It’s only funny when they talk about how brilliant Sarah Palin is, but for the most part it’s just depressing and sometimes scary, too.
ETA: Beaten.
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### Author:  [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)
#### Post date: [September 16, 2009, 2:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conservative-french-president-sarkozy-swinging-to-the-left/510252/7 "2009-09-16T02:01:31Z")
> [@Starving\_Artist](#):
>
> Funny how that lunatic “fringe” tends to consist, philosophically, to approximately half the country’s population (and growing, if recent polls are to be believed).
What polls? [This study](http://people-press.org/report/312/trends-in-political-values-and-core-attitudes-1987-2007) and [this one](http://people-press.org/report/312/trends-in-political-values-and-core-attitudes-1987-2007) say the opposite. And “approximately half”? I think you’ll find it’s approximately a third (and dropping).
Getting back to the OP: I wonder if Obama will feel obliged to react to this in any way? (Since he’s taken some heat over how much of his bailout money has gone for executive bonuses.)
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### Author:  [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)
#### Post date: [September 16, 2009, 3:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conservative-french-president-sarkozy-swinging-to-the-left/510252/8 "2009-09-16T03:00:03Z")
> [@Starving\_Artist](#):
>
> Funny how that lunatic “fringe” tends to consist, philosophically, to approximately half the country’s population (and growing, if recent polls are to be believed).
Not quite that many, fortunately. But your criticism of my characterization of those people would have more bite if I actually _ **liked** _ America and felt some obligation to talk about how great a place it is. Instead, it’s just an example of why I don’t.
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### Author:  [@dropzone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dropzone)
#### Post date: [September 16, 2009, 3:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conservative-french-president-sarkozy-swinging-to-the-left/510252/9 "2009-09-16T03:14:21Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#):
>
> Conservative French President Sarkozy swinging to the left?!
It’s to center its orientation, but with that hot a wife you gotta wonder why he has anything left.
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### Author:  [@Kobal2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kobal2)
#### Post date: [September 16, 2009, 6:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conservative-french-president-sarkozy-swinging-to-the-left/510252/10 "2009-09-16T06:13:57Z")
Heh. Pretty hypocritical words, from a guy who, a mere few months ago, was basing his entire political platform on the slogan “let’s work more to earn more !!”, and was busy abolishing every social program from the last 20 years. Measures of well being, my pale arse.
Oh, and **Der Trihs** , I don’t think you could call Sarkozy an American-style liberal. He’s for more police/more “toughness on crime”, more immigration control, against nationalized businesses, against welfare/unemployment benefits, against minimum wage, against reducing work hours, against “Islamisation” (whatever the fuck \*that \*means)… From where I stand, he’s a right winger all right, and pretty far right at that.
That is, when it’s what gets him elected. He doesn’t have convictions, but a desperate, almost pathological urge to have his name in history books, to stand out. Whatever he thinks will help there, he’ll say. Including the above.
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### Author:  [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)
#### Post date: [September 16, 2009, 7:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conservative-french-president-sarkozy-swinging-to-the-left/510252/11 "2009-09-16T07:13:29Z")
Sarcozy is not right wing. Le Pen is right wing, which is why he only won 18% of the vote in 2002.
In the US, someone like Le Pen would easily win a national election. His stance on the issues is not too radical by US standards:
Reinstatement of the death penalty
Anti-immigration stance
Anti-abortion
Resisting international organizations (the EU, UN, etc)
Xenophobia against muslims
Support of torture
The French have too much dignity to elect someone like that though. Good on them. In the US someone like Le Pen would be president of the senate, speaker, president or something else.
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### Author:  [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)
#### Post date: [September 16, 2009, 7:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conservative-french-president-sarkozy-swinging-to-the-left/510252/12 "2009-09-16T07:36:47Z")
> [@Kobal2](#):
>
> Oh, and **Der Trihs** , I don’t think you could call Sarkozy an American-style liberal.
I wouldn’t call the majority of Democrats liberals either.
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### Author:  [@Kobal2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kobal2)
#### Post date: [September 16, 2009, 7:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conservative-french-president-sarkozy-swinging-to-the-left/510252/13 "2009-09-16T07:41:05Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#):
>
> I wouldn’t call the majority of Democrats liberals either.
Excellent point 😛
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### Author:  [@Sri\_Theo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sri_Theo)
#### Post date: [September 16, 2009, 12:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conservative-french-president-sarkozy-swinging-to-the-left/510252/14 "2009-09-16T12:52:57Z")
Well when you consider the Conservative party leadership in the UK supports a Universal Healthcare model that would make most Democrats recoil in horror…
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### Author:  [@Mk\_VII](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mk_VII)
#### Post date: [September 16, 2009, 2:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conservative-french-president-sarkozy-swinging-to-the-left/510252/15 "2009-09-16T14:08:50Z")
Your ever-so-slightly-left-of-centre-with-a-teeny-little-social-conscience Democratic Party isn’t nearly left-wing enough for us.
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### Author:  [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)
#### Post date: [September 16, 2009, 2:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conservative-french-president-sarkozy-swinging-to-the-left/510252/16 "2009-09-16T14:22:56Z")
> [@Wesley\_Clark](#):
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> The French have too much dignity to elect someone like that though.
“Dignity”?! From people who eat snails, build public toilets without seats, and invented the blowjob?!
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### Author:  [@Miltonyz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miltonyz)
#### Post date: [September 16, 2009, 3:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conservative-french-president-sarkozy-swinging-to-the-left/510252/17 "2009-09-16T15:46:50Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#):
>
> “Dignity”?! … invented the blowjob?!
I take back anything bad I have ever said about the French.
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### Author:  [@Mk\_VII](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mk_VII)
#### Post date: [September 16, 2009, 5:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conservative-french-president-sarkozy-swinging-to-the-left/510252/18 "2009-09-16T17:38:20Z")
If they truly invented the BJ I’d say humanity owes them a considerable debt.
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### Author:  [@wmfellows](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wmfellows)
#### Post date: [September 16, 2009, 6:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conservative-french-president-sarkozy-swinging-to-the-left/510252/19 "2009-09-16T18:13:02Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#):
>
> I thought [Sarkozy](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarkozy) was suppose to be a right-winger. But, [according to John Nichols in _The Nation:_](http://www.thenation.com/blogs/thebeat/473146/sarkozy_wants_g_20_to_get_beyond_cult_of_the_market)
>
> Try to imagine Bush 2 or Bush 1 or Reagan or even Nixon talking like that! Are European RWs RWs **at all** by American standards?!
You’re mistaking American anti-governmental sentiment for a universal (or even coherent) definition of “right wing.”
The Right in France has always been Statist, and highly un-liberal. Indeed much of the Right tradition in the non-Anglo Saxon world is very Statist and un-liberal. The Americans are rather the outlier in the unique identification of Right as Anti State as such.
Sarkozy is really just returning to the traditional French centre Right tradition of Statist desire to control economic activity.
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### Author:  [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)
#### Post date: [September 16, 2009, 6:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conservative-french-president-sarkozy-swinging-to-the-left/510252/20 "2009-09-16T18:23:33Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#):
>
> “Dignity”?! From people who eat snails, build public toilets without seats, and invented the blowjob?!
You forgot the body odor.
And yes.
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