Sarkozy: Obama is "unoriginal, unsubstantial and overrated." Times UK

[Soul Crusher]

French President Nicolas Sarkozy portrays Obama as weak and overrated...

Posted by Zone Daiatlas on April 15, 2009 at 5:22pm in Black, White & Red Eyed: In The Headlines
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World Agenda: Nicolas Sarkozy puts Barack Obama in the doghouse


Source by TimesOnline.co.uk - Click Here

France has been cooing along with everyone else over the arrival of Bo Obama at the White House, but the master of America's new First Dog is no longer in good odour with President Sarkozy.

Mr Sarkozy is pouring cold water on President Obama's efforts to recast American leadership on the world stage, depicting them as unoriginal, unsubstantial and overrated. Behind leaks and briefings from the Elysée Palace lies Mr Sarkozy's irritation at the rock-star welcome that Europe gave Mr Obama on his Europan tour earlier this month.

The American President's call "to free the world of the menace of a nuclear nightmare" was hot air, Mr Sarkozy's diplomatic staff told him in a report. "It was rhetoric – not a speech on American security policy but an export model aimed at improving the image of the United States," they said. Most of Mr Obama's proposals had already been made by the Bush administration and Washington was dragging its feet on disarmament and treaties against nuclear proliferation, the leaked report said.

Personal pique and French politics are also behind the souring of Mr Sarkozy's self-promoted honeymoon with the United States. On the personal side, the French President is needled by the adulation for an unproven US leader whose stardom has eclipsed what he sees as his established record as a world troubleshooter. "The President is annoyed by what he sees as the naivety and the herd mentality of the media," said a journalist who is privy to Elysée thinking.

Mr Sarkozy has put out a version of the proceedings at the London G20 economic summit which casts him as hero, in the classic French role of intransigent defender of principle in the face of the American steamroller. This is to counter last week's reports of Mr Obama saving the day by persuading President Hu of China to accept Mr Sarkozy's demands for naming tax havens.

According to the leaks, Mr Sarkozy shamed Mr Obama into intervening: "You were elected to build a new world. Tax havens are the embodiment of the old world," he is quoted as saying. He also reprimanded Mr Obama for setting US goals for climate change that were inferior to Europe's, according to his staff.

Again, according to the Sarkozy version, at the Nato summit in Strasbourg, Mr Obama was meekly yielding to Turkey's refusal to endorse Anders Fogh Rasmussen as the alliance's new Secretary-General. It took pressure from Mr Sarkozy and Chancellor Merkel of Germany to stiffen him up and change his mind, say the French.

Mr Obama's favour for Ankara has irked but also helped Mr Sarkozy as his Union for a Popular Movement campaigns for European Parliament elections in June. Mr Sarkozy slapped down the US President on French TV after he publicly called for Turkish entry to the European Union.

Permanent refusal of Turkish membership is one of Mr Sarkozy's policy planks and one of his most popular with voters. Mr Obama's venture into EU affairs has enabled Mr Sarkozy to make political capital. He has shown that France can still stand up to the United States despite rejoining the Nato command last week.

It sounded like old Franco-American business as usual this morning when Bruno Le Maire, Mr Sarkozy's Europe Minister, accused Washington of backing the northern and eastern EU members by wanting to turn the union into a mere free-trade zone. France and Germany are sticking to their vision of the "political" Europe that others do not want, he said.

Behind the policy argument, it is easy to detect disappointment over Mr Obama's failure to respond to the Sarkozy charm offensive that began when he befriended the junior senator on a visit to Washington in 2006. Mr Obama showered compliments on France's "hyper-president" in Strasbourg, but the one that has stuck was double-edged: "He is courageous on so many fronts, it's sometimes hard to keep up with him."

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Is Sarkozy part of the VRWC now too?

[The True Adonis]

Sarkozy under fire for 'criticisms' of world leaders



PARIS (AFP) — French President Nicolas Sarkozy came under attack Friday despite denying he said US President Barack Obama was not "up to standard" and that Spain's prime minister was not very bright.
"Dim, callow, irrelevant -- Sarko's verdict on fellow leaders" said Britain's The Guardian, while The Times called him a "bitchy little princess" and Spain's ABC said he "confirmed his superiority complex has no limits."


The media buzz across the continent was sparked by a French press report that Sarkozy let rip at fellow world leaders during a lunch on Wednesday with parliament members to discuss the global financial crisis.


The right-wing president, who has a reputation for blunt talking, reportedly suggested that the new US president was lacking in hands-on experience of government and not yet up to speed.
"Obama has a subtle mind, very clever and very charismatic," Sarkozy was quoted as saying by a parliamentarian in Liberation daily. "But he was elected two months ago and had never run a ministry."
"And he is not always up to standard on decision-making and efficiency," he reportedly said.

On Spain's Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, Sarkozy was quoted as saying: "Perhaps he's not very clever but I know people who were very clever and who did not make the second round of the presidential election."


German Chancellor Angela Merkel was also allegedly targeted, with the French president reportedly saying she merely followed his lead in her response to the global crisis.
"Once she realised the state of her banks and her car industry, she had no choice but to come round to my position," he was quoted as saying.


But Sarkozy did have praise for one EU colleague, noting admiringly that Italy's Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi had been re-elected three times.
"What is important in democracy is to be re-elected," he allegedly said.
Sarkozy's office went into damage control mode late Thursday, saying "the Elysee denies the remarks reported by Liberation," and several parliamentarians present at the lunch said they were taken out of context.


Centrist senator Jean Arthuis told AFP that the comments were playful and that "I did not sense in Sarkozy the slightest critical element towards Obama or Zapatero."
But that failed to stem the flow of Internet and press comment on the latest alleged example of tactlessness by a leader nicknamed the "hyperpresident" by friends and foes alike.


The Spanish government has not officially responded, but the Spanish media reacted with incredulity to the alleged gaffe.
La Vanguardia daily's headline read "Sarkozy humiliates Zapatero."
"It does not seem like the best way to prepare a state visit," it noted drily, referring to Sarkozy's planned trip to France's southern neighbour later this month.


The Times of London said in an opinion piece that "Sarkozy is annoyed by the adulation for an unproven US leader whose stardom has eclipsed his own record as a world troubleshooter."
The same paper's diplomatic editor wrote in a separate article that "the arrival of a new -- taller, more handsome and popular -- president on the scene (has turned) him into (a) kind of bitchy little princess."

[240 is Back]

"According to the leaks"

I see.  There is no quote, then?  Just anonymous leaks from a French newspaper?

Ah, so when the French question 911 they're insane, but when they bash obama, it's legit.  Okay.

[SAMSON123]

I agree without hesitation that Obama is OVERRATED, WEAK, IMPOTENT puppet carrying on the Bush administration mindset and ideals.

[Soul Crusher]

PER ABC NEWS TODAY:

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Sources Say Sarkozy Finds Obama's Iran Policy ‘Arrogant,’ ‘Utterly Immature’
October 28, 2008 11:39 AM

The respected Israeli newspaper Ha'artez reports that according to a "senior Israeli government source, the reports reaching Israel indicate that Sarkozy views the Democratic candidate's stance on Iran as 'utterly immature' and comprised of 'formulations empty of all content.'"

Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., met with Sarkozy in July and they are said to have discussed Iran at length.

French authorities are said to be concerned that the international community doesn't take the Iranian threat seriously enough. French intelligence has concluded that Iran has already obtained up to 40% of the enriched uranium it needs for a bomb, the newspaper reports, and will have obtained the rest next summer.

"According to the reports reaching Israel, Sarkozy told Obama at that meeting that if the new American president elected in November changed his country's policy toward Iran, that would be 'very problematic,'" Ha'aretz reports. "Until now, the five permanent members of the UN Security Council plus Germany have tried to maintain a united front on Iran. But according to the senior Israeli source, Sarkozy fears that Obama might 'arrogantly' ignore the other members of this front and open a direct dialogue with Iran without preconditions."

The Obama campaign did not respond to a request for comment.

-- jpt

UPDATE: The Obama campaign passes along this comment from a spokesman for the French government: "The remarks attributed by the newspaper Haaretz to the President of the French Republic concerning Senator Obama's positions on Iran are groundless. To the contrary, the in-depth discussions between the President of the Republic and Senator Obama on Iran during their meeting in Paris in July demonstrated a broad convergence of views on this issue. President Sarkozy and Senator Obama agree to oppose Iran's development of a military nuclear capability."

October 28, 2008 | Permalink | User Comments (143)

[IFBBwannaB]

"According to the leaks"

I see.  There is no quote, then?  Just anonymous leaks from a French newspaper?

Ah, so when the French question 911 they're insane, but when they bash obama, it's legit.  Okay.

And when you bash Newton?