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| -Lurid Crime Tales- |
| France Debases Itself Yet Again (Obama eats meal, restarauteur sees God) |
| 2009-06-07 |
| The lame walk, the blind see, the homeless have Mcmansions..... Observe the excruciatingly purple prose of the AP as they report this miraculous ascension of national spirit: People gawked and cameras clicked as the Obamas cut a wide figure through the French capital even while confined to a presidential motorcade. It was more personal for the few kept not so distant -- the restaurant owner who "saw God," the chauffeur reveling in a "magnificent mission." President Barack Obama, wife Michelle and their two daughters touched lives in simple ways during a private stay in the French capital that closed out a six-day presidential tour rich in history, symbolism and giant messages to the world. Even a Sunday visit to the gilded Elysee presidential palace was casual and intimate. I don't know about that, but media sycophancy has reached new heights... The luncheon hosted by President Nicolas Sarkozy and his wife, Carla, for Michelle and the two Obama daughters looked like an advance fete for Sasha's 8th birthday this Wednesday. The Obama trio, lingering a bit in the City of Light after the president's departure, then went shopping at the high-end Left Bank store for children, "Bonpoint." Media scrutiny of the family was intense. The French are confirmed fans of the Obamas, whose politics and elegant style conform to their ideal vision of the United States. The couple makes frequent appearances on the covers of French magazines. Michelle Obama, whose wardrobe choices are analyzed, gets an A-plus for sartorial glamor, natural poise and sheer intelligence. But the common touch the first American couple represents, so antithetical to the traditional pomp and circumstance of French heads of state, sets them apart. When dining out Saturday night at a no-star bistro, La Fontaine de Mars, the presidential party was served water, Coke and table wine to accompany foie gras, lamb and steak with shallots, and paid for meals "like any client," said owner Jacques Boudon. "It's just what they wanted." "And I think they were very happy since they stayed three-quarters of an hour after dining," he said by telephone. Boudon was over the moon. The table had been reserved 10 days earlier but he only knew his guests were the Obamas that morning. "I saw God before me," he said, "because I saw this smile that a million people have seen around the world. I saw her (Michelle) radiant. ... It's idiotic, but it's like that." It was no surprise that the streets of Paris were lined with well-wishers. When the Obamas dined out, neighbors in nearby apartments hung from windows hoping for a glimpse. Some real fans hung their building with a handmade sign reading "We love you Obama." Even the conservative Sarkozy appreciates Obama's personal style and, multiplying direct contact with citizens, is desanctifying the office. Sarkozy had worked to lure Obama to France, trying to get him here in early April between a G20 summit in London and a NATO summit in Germany and Strasbourg, in eastern France. Obama said it was a squeeze and suggested the D-Day commemoration at Normandy, a presidential official has said. On the family's Paris agenda were Notre Dame Cathedral on Saturday evening. There, Obama lit a candle and listened to a children's choir. On Sunday morning, it was the Pompidou Center, the modern art mecca in central Paris, where two exhibitions are currently featured, the works of American sculptor Alexander Calder and Vassily Kandinsky, the Russian-born painter who helped pioneer abstract art. The family spent some 90 minutes inside the museum, distinguished by its exposed colored piping, and at one point the president was seen waving from a top-floor glassed-in walkway that provides a sweeping view of the city. But it was the few brief minutes that Obama spent with 61-year-old Gerard Daldoss and other drivers in the presidential motorcade that mattered. Before climbing into his limousine in the Pompidou Center's underground parking garage, Obama shook the men's hands, then posed for a group photo. "It's fantastic. What a beautiful souvenir!" exclaimed a beaming Daldoss. He said he has worked in motorcades for Presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush without ever getting such hands-on gratitude. "The others were nice but not more than that," Daldoss said. "I retire in a few months. This is a magnificent mission." The tourism followed a somber remembrance Saturday on the 65th anniversary of D-Day in Normandy with Sarkozy and elderly veterans, preceded by a visit to Buchenwald concentration camp in Germany and an address in Cairo to the world's Muslims, a bold effort to heal enmity toward the United States borne by large swaths of the Islamic world. At his own behest, Obama had flown into Paris on Friday night without a formal airport welcome from Sarkozy, while Michelle and the kids were visiting the Eiffel Tower. Some French pundits wonder whether Sarkozy's admiration for Obama is reciprocal. Their meetings have so far been official -- unlike the picnic-style lunch Sarkozy shared with the Bush family at their Kennebunkport, Maine, compound shortly after taking office. However, a visible sign of Obama's French connection may just be his own family's decision to linger in the land of France after his departure -- and have an informal Sarkozy moment with the kids. |
| Posted by:Atomic Conspiracy |
| #33 Btw "God" was ripped off. 300 euros for LUNCH in a bistro (60 euros per person including 2 kids)? Please |
| Posted by: European Conservative 2009-06-07 23:43 |
| #32 I pity the reporter's poor kneepads. |
| Posted by: CrazyFool 2009-06-07 23:31 |
| #31 @trailing wife Meet a German who isn't that impressed about Kennedy either. But Jackie certainly had style. She wouldn't have mopped the White House floor with Michelle's dresses. |
| Posted by: European Conservative 2009-06-07 23:18 |
| #30 My wife says that she wouldn't "hang dead over a fence" with most of her dresses. I quite agree with your wife, European Conservative. But you see, if President Barack Hussein Obama, as he now styles himself, is John F. Kennedy reborn, then Michelle Obama must be the beautiful, charming, trend setting Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy (later Onassis). Reality has no impact on such minds when there is a myth to redefine the images transmitted from the space before their eyes. |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2009-06-07 23:04 |
| #29 Damn, did the writer have a cigarette after he/she/it finished writing this story? |
| Posted by: Cornsilk Blondie 2009-06-07 22:48 |
| #28 I think she is just a nasty bitter woman that has hacked and slashed her way to the top and found it to be empty space. |
| Posted by: 49 Pan 2009-06-07 22:25 |
| #27 Perhaps because she's so composed of hate and can't justify her past or present circumstances? |
| Posted by: Frank G 2009-06-07 22:01 |
| #26 I can't figure Mrs. Obama out - she always looks so angry and miserable in her pictures, and you have to figure the media is showing the GOOD ones. Why is she angry now? Because of all that racial discrimination she suffers? As First Lady? |
| Posted by: Glenmore 2009-06-07 21:47 |
| #25 I can't understand the outright worship of this empty man. Aunt Myrtle says He is the anti-Christ. I'm starting to think the ol' gal may be on to something. Did you notice the plague that broke out after He went to Mexico? |
| Posted by: SteveS 2009-06-07 21:40 |
| #24 Lone Ranger, it would indeed be interesting with the Secret Service's Gatling gun-equipped SUVs accompanying the One. |
| Posted by: Rambler in Virginia 2009-06-07 21:33 |
| #23 Well, after Obambi is done turning water into wine, let's see him go out and walk around the Zones Urbaines Sensibles of Paris - I guess we'll see what kind of success he cn achieve in getting the "lion to lie down with the lamb." My guess - not so much. |
| Posted by: Lone Ranger 2009-06-07 20:43 |
| #22 Aside from one German, Karl M, our prophet just isn't fond of Ice People. |
| Posted by: ed 2009-06-07 20:22 |
| #21 Merkel refused to give him the Brandenburg Gate in 2008 while he was using Germany for his campaign. I guess he thought payback was a bitch. But the lady wasn't that impressed. |
| Posted by: European Conservative 2009-06-07 20:14 |
| #20 Rift With Germany Is Next on Diplomatic Agenda On a more basic level, there is a sense that the Obama administration is ignoring the needs and counsel of longtime allies. Divided Germany was once at the center not only of the cold war, but of American foreign policy as well, which is no longer the case. Yet the United States can ill afford to alienate Europe’s largest economy and its most important intermediary in the strained relationship with Russia. “They’re not angry, they’re not anti-Obama or anti-American,” said John C. Kornblum, a former United States ambassador to Germany and now a business adviser in Berlin. “But they’re confused by the wave of criticism which has been sent at them by the administration and people close to the administration. “It’s not that they don’t like him,” he said. “They just feel like things aren’t working, like the levers of government are not being engaged to make issues run smoothly.” Now there's some delicious irony. |
| Posted by: ed 2009-06-07 20:11 |
| #19 I think someone just has to ask? WHY, why do people think that Michelle dresses well? My wife says that she wouldn't "hang dead over a fence" with most of her dresses |
| Posted by: European Conservative 2009-06-07 20:10 |
| #18 Despite the press's slobbering, all is not well in the land of Lafayette. Barack and Michelle Obama decline dinner with the Sarkozys The Obamas turn up in Paris this evening, but have declined a dinner invitation from the couple next door: the Sarkozys. President Obama’s reluctance to spend more than minimum time with the French leader on his visit for the D-Day anniversary has come as an embarrassment to the Elysée Palace. America’s First Family will not be dining with President Sarkozy and his wife, Carla Bruni, even though they are staying at the residence of the US Ambassador, yards from the Elysée apartments where the Sarkozys spend their weekends. Mr Sarkozy’s dream date (haha!) would be dinner somewhere spectacular |
| Posted by: ed 2009-06-07 20:01 |
| #17 Every time I read these stories I think of OUR FRIENDS THE PIGS FROM URANUS. Desanex the poem is a nice touch here's an extra $5. |
| Posted by: Don Vito Anginegum8261 2009-06-07 19:38 |
| #16 "Coco must be rolling in her grave." Heck, she's revolving in it like a Black & Decker drill, at so many RPMs, you could hook up a generator and provide electricity to a large percentage of the City of Light on the output. |
| Posted by: Sgt. Mom 2009-06-07 19:27 |
| #15 The Obama adulation in the German media is fading every so slightly. |
| Posted by: European Conservative 2009-06-07 19:18 |
| #14 Good one, Frank. ;-p |
| Posted by: Barbara Skolaut 2009-06-07 19:13 |
| #13 Everytime I see such stories I am irresistibly reminded of this: Here lies a fallen god His fall was not a small one, We did but build his pedestal A narrow and a tall one” --Tleilaxu epigram Frank Herbert |
| Posted by: Cromert 2009-06-07 18:54 |
| #12 I'm kinda proud of that one |
| Posted by: Frank G 2009-06-07 18:39 |
| #11 my comment at AOSHQ: #44 I heard Chris Matthews offered to be the President's Taster, and was disappointed when he found out it was for the food Posted by: Frank G at June 07, 2009 11:28 AM (Aaspy) |
| Posted by: Frank G 2009-06-07 18:38 |
| #10 BTW the Fontaine de Mars isn't exactly your run of the mill bistro where you rub shoulders with workers. It's in the posh 7th district and rated one of the best of its kind. Also don't tell PETA about the foie gras (torturing of geese) www.fontainedemars.com |
| Posted by: European Conservative 2009-06-07 18:37 |
| #9 "Michelle Obama, whose wardrobe choices are analyzed, gets an A-plus for sartorial glamor, natural poise and sheer intelligence" Coco must be rolling in her grave |
| Posted by: European Conservative 2009-06-07 18:34 |
| #8 The ludicrously overblown tone of this article reminds me of a classic story from the heyday of print journalism, the 1920s. An eager young reporter was sent to western Pennsylvania to cover a massive and damaging flood. His first report started with the words, "God sat on a hill and laughed as the town of (whatever) died." His hard-boiled editor wired back, "Forget flood, interview God, get pictures." |
| Posted by: Atomic Conspiracy 2009-06-07 18:30 |
| #7 On the other hand Obama walking alone unrecognized in a Parisian banlieue might not work out that well |
| Posted by: European Conservative 2009-06-07 18:26 |
| #6 So will it be grape coolaid or green? This is sickening... |
| Posted by: 49 Pan 2009-06-07 18:24 |
| #5 I can't understand the outright worship of this empty man. There is nothing behind his words. He turns pretty phrases and gives pretty speaches that are vapid, self-serving, and show a painful lack of historical knowledge. |
| Posted by: Deacon Blues 2009-06-07 18:09 |
| #4 Clinton had Monica and Obama has the entire main stream media. |
| Posted by: DMFD 2009-06-07 18:04 |
| #3 The tone here would do justice to a North Korean account of one of the Dear Leader's outings. As a media historian I can think of no precedent for this level of sycophancy in the western free press, at least not since the beginning of the twentieth century. You have to go back to controlled press coverage of Mao and Stalin to find anything remotely similar. |
| Posted by: Atomic Conspiracy 2009-06-07 18:03 |
| #2 It was no surprise that the streets of Paris were lined with well-wishers. Old Vichy Paris meet the new improved Vichy Paris here. |
| Posted by: Besoeker 2009-06-07 17:50 |
| #1 Tingle-leg Matthews is a pinstripe Republican compared to the sycophants at the AP. |
| Posted by: Atomic Conspiracy 2009-06-07 17:50 |