Macho against Big Mother
Column: "Bikini Royal" and "Circus Sarkozy": The media are playing a new role in the French presidential election campaign.
Column Bikini Royal and the Sarkozy circus: the media play a new role in the French presidential election campaign When her children were born, socialist Ségolène Royal had herself photographed in childbirth for Paris Match. Last August, she showed that she still cuts a fine figure: photos appeared in the French tabloids showing Ségolène Royal in a blue bikini. Never before had a French politician been seen like this. Her comrades and opponents were fuming, and no one believed her assurances that the candid pictures had been taken by a paparazzo in an ambush. Sitting next to her in the boat was the party's Secretary General, François Hollande - her partner and the father of her children - and in response to Ségolène's breasts, the Minister of the Interior, Nicolas Sarkozy, flexed his muscles. The rival was photographed jogging topless on the beach - with sunglasses and an MP3 player. The bodyguards who accompanied him were all dressed in T-shirts. He showed off his taut stomach and published a book: a declaration of love full of kitsch to his wife Cecilia, who had returned home in time for the election campaign. A year ago, Sarkozy had banned a biography of his wife and had 20,000 printed copies destroyed. The editor-in-chief of Paris Match, who had put Cecilia on the front page with a lover, was dismissed - and Peter Rothenbühler's Le Matin was slapped with a lawsuit in Thonon.
Sarkozy is friends with all the important publishers and TV bosses. He was even able to prevent the renowned journalist Edwy Plenel from becoming head of the struggling Libération, where a Rothschild is now the major shareholder - with the concept of creating an "anti-Sarkozy newspaper".
He seems to stage his terrorist investigations exclusively according to the television broadcasting schedule, whose journalists outnumber the police officers on the ground. He is filmed at his election rallies by a private production company - whose sequences are also used by state television. Italy, Berlusconi? No, France with an interior minister who thinks he's Napoleon and wants to dominate the media. He stirs up fears and presents himself as the last resort to ward off danger.
Even more dangerous for Sarkozy than the Royal is Sarkozy himself. The announcement of his candidacy turned into an embarrassing flop. He had negotiated with the publishers of the regional press, six journalists were summoned to the interview, 61 newspapers were supposed to print it. But many refused, including Ouest France, which has a circulation of several hundred thousand. The newspapers that took part felt instrumentalized - and the others excluded. One of them leaked the interview to Libération - which had already posted it online the day before.
Ségolène's comrades and opponents mocked who would look after the children. But she survived three TV debates relatively unscathed. And several attacks on the internet. A scene from an interview with the long-dead sociologist Pierre Bourdieu was clicked on almost as often as Zidane's headbutt. She was not a leftist at all, but a conservative moralist, explained the sociologist of the class struggle. She joined the socialists because she recognized the better career opportunities here - especially for women. Friend films along: An appearance by Ségolène filmed on her cell phone at a non-public meeting was leaked online.
It was all to no avail. She knocked out the men of her party. And when it comes to dealing with the media, she is in no way inferior to Sarkozy. She has banned television from showing her eating. She opposes critical journalists almost as authoritatively as Sarkozy. She demanded a counterstatement "with a large photo that attracts the attention of readers". One media critic found that her TV appearances were staged like a "pagan cult": "Nobody shines the light as brightly as Ségolène."
She knows what the voters now also know: Programs are not implemented, promises are not kept - renouncing them does not have to be a disadvantage. The dream pairing of the dream couples turns the French election campaign into a power drama with great entertainment value: the nervous macho who can't keep himself in check versus the "big mother" without a concept who sells herself as a sedative.
Jürg Altwegg is the cultural correspondent for the Frankfurter Allgemeine in Geneva and an author.
Sarkozy is friends with all the important publishers and TV bosses. He was even able to prevent the renowned journalist Edwy Plenel from becoming head of the struggling Libération, where a Rothschild is now the major shareholder - with the concept of creating an "anti-Sarkozy newspaper".
He seems to stage his terrorist investigations exclusively according to the television broadcasting schedule, whose journalists outnumber the police officers on the ground. He is filmed at his election rallies by a private production company - whose sequences are also used by state television. Italy, Berlusconi? No, France with an interior minister who thinks he's Napoleon and wants to dominate the media. He stirs up fears and presents himself as the last resort to ward off danger.
Even more dangerous for Sarkozy than the Royal is Sarkozy himself. The announcement of his candidacy turned into an embarrassing flop. He had negotiated with the publishers of the regional press, six journalists were summoned to the interview, 61 newspapers were supposed to print it. But many refused, including Ouest France, which has a circulation of several hundred thousand. The newspapers that took part felt instrumentalized - and the others excluded. One of them leaked the interview to Libération - which had already posted it online the day before.
Ségolène's comrades and opponents mocked who would look after the children. But she survived three TV debates relatively unscathed. And several attacks on the internet. A scene from an interview with the long-dead sociologist Pierre Bourdieu was clicked on almost as often as Zidane's headbutt. She was not a leftist at all, but a conservative moralist, explained the sociologist of the class struggle. She joined the socialists because she recognized the better career opportunities here - especially for women. Friend films along: An appearance by Ségolène filmed on her cell phone at a non-public meeting was leaked online.
It was all to no avail. She knocked out the men of her party. And when it comes to dealing with the media, she is in no way inferior to Sarkozy. She has banned television from showing her eating. She opposes critical journalists almost as authoritatively as Sarkozy. She demanded a counterstatement "with a large photo that attracts the attention of readers". One media critic found that her TV appearances were staged like a "pagan cult": "Nobody shines the light as brightly as Ségolène."
She knows what the voters now also know: Programs are not implemented, promises are not kept - renouncing them does not have to be a disadvantage. The dream pairing of the dream couples turns the French election campaign into a power drama with great entertainment value: the nervous macho who can't keep himself in check versus the "big mother" without a concept who sells herself as a sedative.
Jürg Altwegg is the cultural correspondent for the Frankfurter Allgemeine in Geneva and an author.
