Courtesy of Mish.
Arrogance cost former French president Nicolas Sarkozy the election in 2012.
Judging from statements he made today, he’s just as arrogant, if not more so today. He even brags of a bigger Facebook audience than Francois Hollande and his UMP party opponents, ignoring the fact that 60% of the electorate does not want him to run again.
Self-Appointed Savior Has “No Choice”
The Financial Times reports Sarkozy Pledges to Win Voters Back from French Far-Right.
In a television interview, the former centre-right president who failed to get re-elected in 2012, said: “I am going to reconquer those French people,” referring to the voters who in May helped the FN become the country’s most successful party in EU elections.
Mr Sarkozy, who on Friday confirmed his long-awaited return to politics less than three years after vowing to never again return to public life, said that his reappearance was due to necessity.
“I had no choice,” he said.
Less Energy, More Wisdom, More Facebook Hits
The Guardian reports Nicolas Sarkozy Sets Out Comeback Plans for France’s UMP party on TV
The former French president Nicolas Sarkozy was given a prime-time television news slot to explain his plans after announcing his return to frontline politics. Sarkozy set out his platform for the race to head the opposition UMP party, which will hold a hotly contested leadership vote in November.
For Sarkozy: The Return Part II, he was given 45 minutes to reintroduce himself to the French public.
If viewers had expected a changed, wiser and less confrontational Sarko, they were to be disappointed. Asking the presenter – twice – if he imagined that the former French leader had “just two brain cells”, Sarkozy launched into a vigorous defence of his five years in power and a vehement attack on the state of France and the current Socialist government.
Saying he had “perhaps less energy, but more wisdom”, Sarkozy explained that he felt duty-bound to return not through personal ambition, but because of the “lack of hope, the anger and the absence of vision” that François Hollande’s government had imposed on his compatriots.
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