(with a grateful hat tip to French Election 2007, a wonderful American site devoted to following the French presidential election, a source quickly becoming one of my favorite places to visit during my morning coffee, and one which I unhesitantly recommend)
Ségolène in Royal pickle over Corsica
A French comedian masquerading as Quebec’s prime minister has added to Ségolène Royal’s growing reputation for gaffes by extracting a politically incorrect remark from the French presidential candidate in a hoax telephone conversation.
Gérald Dahan, who has trapped several French celebrities into telephonic indiscretions, called Ms Royal this week pretending to be Jean Charest, prime minister of Quebec’s premier. Mr Dahan deceived several of Ms Royal’s staff before speaking to the candidate, saying he wanted to discuss some controversial remarks she had made this week about Quebec.
Employing a fake Quebecois accent, Mr Dahan said that Ms Royal’s expression of sympathy for the sovereignty of the Québécois people would be comparable to him coming to France and supporting the idea of Corsican independence.
Laughing, Ms Royal replied: “The French would not be against this by the way. Don’t repeat that. It will create another incident in France. It’s a secret.”
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Now, merely reading the translation may not convey the seriousness of the gaffe; listening to her in french, however, let's one recognize her utter tactlessness, her complete lack of anything resembling self-discipline or basic common sense.
Here is a french video clip featuring a phone interview with the quebecois comedian about his exploit, along with the very Sego sound clip on Corsican separatism that has caused all the uproar.
Joker to the end, Dahan pretends as if he has a second interview going on at the same time, so for most of this clip, the crosstalk makes the comedian admittedly hard to understand. The main reason I am including this clip for our english speaking audience, is to let you see the face of the two journalists as they listen to Segolene Royal's outrageously impolitic remark. Royal's sound clip begins at 2:11 of this video; you can tell from the reactions of the two hosts that they are flummoxed by the sheer inapropriateness of Royal's comments. "Mais cet enorme!" is the main host's initial reaction: "This is enormous!" he says, incredulous.
Once the interview with Dahan is over, the depths of the scandal are probed in the final seconds of the video, as the two hosts mention that for the prankster to have reached Sego herself, as he did, it meant he would have succeeded in fooling no less than ten levels of security checks with his impersonation!
3 comments:
@ charles
I'm glad you caught this "event". I was going to post it, but I got involved in a few other howlers she has generated over the past couple of days.
She has her lawyer going after bloggers who discuss her love life; she had Georges Freche removed from the Socialist Party for racist comments; during an interview she didn't know how many nuclear submarines France has. BUT they ADORE her in Martinique. There she can do no wrong, because she is in favor of a France "métissée".
There are hints at many websites that she won't get through the campaign. At this stage it's wishful thinking.
Thanks Tiberge,
As we've discussed before, most of these actions bring about new scandals, to my mind much worse than the original: and that is, her reaction to them, her party's reaction to them, and most damning of all, her followers' reaction to them.
Talk about "wishful thinking": the dreamers pretending that this avalanche of incompetency is not a cause for concern, **that** is the scariest part of any of these gaffes. Must a socialist live in such an illusory world, that no hint of reality must ever be acknowledged, lest the whole edifice come crashing down?
This practical joker could pass himself off as the leader of, from Segolene's point of view, a nation; what else could people get away with, if they but had the devilish ingenuity to try? Doesn't that worry the socialist rank and file?
She needs to attract potential votes away from the "centrist" candidates and parties, if she is to find an electoral majority; are all these pratfalls going to result in making the socialist party more, or less, convincing as an alternative?
France's left are engaged in willful suspension of any intellectual analysis, for continuing to believe the illusion that Segolene Royal remains the credible alternative they need her to be, in order to sway sufficient new voters to their side for her to win. Talk about "wishful thinking"!
I'm all for acting on faith, but to me "wishful thinking" involves dis-illusioning oneself, so that a clear measurement can be taken in order to perceive a way to persevere through to victory. Pretending that problems don't exist is hardly acting on faith; the missing nuance is to recognize you don't yet know how you may win, **despite** the recognized problems surrounding you, and in that humble confession can come the mix of courage and awareness that so often tips the scales towards success.
The socialist dreamers have none of this; just the dream...
@ charles
Actually, they may be more on to her than we think. An article at Le Conservateur provides a link to a web page where party militants outline ways to counteract her errors. They apparently present themselves as "commentators" at forums and message boards, especially those of the MSM, and armed with pre-planned arguments, they undertake to explain away her goofs and to explain rationally why she said what she said. I don't have the link right now, but I'll pass it on to you ASAP.
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