Sarkozy and Royal gaffes abroad
Today, Nicolas Sarkozy was in London, meeting with Prime Minister Blair to discuss bilateral and international relations. Beyond Jacques Chirac being annoyed by this, and forbidding other Ministers (and especially the Defense one, Michèle Alliot-Marie), to be part of this trip, Sarkozy showed that he actually can also make gaffes abroad. In front of 10 Downing Street, as a tribute to the British Prime Minister’s action, he said that “Socialists from Europe can be proud of what one of us did..” He corrected himself: ”Sorry, I meant one of them…” Two possible reasons for the gaffe – either Sarkozy never identified Blair as a socialist (and to be fair, he would not be the only one), or he himself discovered in London he actually was one.
Some weeks ago, Royal had her own interesting comments about how justice in China was actually working “faster” than in France. Everybody still tries to figure out what that was supposed to mean. Then came the tricky line about Quebec.
At the end of the day, people rarely vote according to the positions candidates take on foreign affairs, but…