Word: chirac
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...Call it Chirac's Revenge. Less than two years after he left office with nearly record low approval ratings, former French President Jacques Chirac finds himself atop polls again as the nation's most popular politician. Better still, Chirac can now boast about getting plaudits from President Barack Obama, whose recent private letter to Chirac - parts of which were published in the French press - has been widely interpreted in France as recognition for the former French leader's stance on the Iraq...
...renewed approbation must seem refreshing to the 77-year-old ex-president, who has spent the past 23 months watching his successor and long-time conservative foe Nicolas Sarkozy market himself as the anti-Chirac. In the latest IPSOS/ParisMatch poll of national politicians, Chirac finished first with a 74% support rating, while recession-hit Sarkozy came in 29th with just 47%. Other recent surveys show 60% of French people condemn the government's handling of the economy. (See pictures of Bastille Day celebrations...
...would be unwise to put much stock in the shifts in polls less than two years into a five-year, reform-focused term - especially when you add in a nightmarish global recession few people expected. Still, Chirac must secretly be enjoying the moment. After his own 12 year presidency limped to an end with approval ratings at times dipping below the 20% mark, Chirac was left to watch his one-time protégé-turned-rival take over the Elysée and thrill a mesmerized French public. Where Chirac's leadership was criticized as plodding, unfocused, and ready...
...Klarsfeld notes, then-President Jacques Chirac gave a historical speech that sought to atone for the nation's dark past. Chirac broke with the traditional French depiction of wartime events by accepting, in the name of France, responsibility for the July 15-16, 1942 arrests of 13,000 Jews by French police. Known as the "Vel d'Hiv roundup" - after the name of the winter cycling stadium in Paris the deportees were held in - the infamous case was cited by Chirac as an example of active French participation in Jewish persecution. Chirac called on his French countrymen to accept responsibility...
...Yesterday's ruling goes further. "While [Chirac's] speech was so important to France and her Jews by finally stating an historic truth, the ruling by the Conseil d'Etat is also crucial, because it now sets that down in stone in legal terms," Klarsfeld explains...