How appropriate was Laurent Delahousse's July 14 Islam question to François Hollande

July 14, aka Bastille Day, came and went. France's celebratory show of military might made its collective way along "la plus belle avenue du monde", every major flippin' TV channel covered the it - live, and what ho!

The French president François Hollande (once again) broke an election promise (don't gasp in surprise).

Remember how during the presidential election campaign Hollande had said that, if elected, he wouldn't follow the example of his predecessors by conducting interviews at the Elysée palace?

Well....he had changed his mind - obviously.

François Hollande (screenshot from Huffington Post video on DailyMotion)

Weekend anchors Claire Chazal (TF1) and Laurent Delahousse (France 2) were the lucky couple invited along to pose questions on:

**shale gas (there won't be any exploration during his presidency apparently),

**taxes (he'll decide next year whether there need to be increases but wants to keep them to a minimum),

**the economy ("It's recovering!" Please don't splutter and snort in contempt as you read that...Hollande actually said it),

**a possible Sarkozy return (Hollande is "cool" about it - that's paraphrasing what he said),

**the Greens (the political party - not the type you might not want to eat) and their place in government, pensions, the Bernard Tapie affair (here's a challenge...try to explain what that's all about Twitter style) and all the usual subjects you might expect to be of interest to viewers.

It was a veritable flood of questions and follow-ups from both Delahousse and Chazal as the two battled for Hollande's attention during 35 minutes and Hollande, the poor guy, resembled a spectator at a tennis match with his head swinging from side to side, seemingly unsure as to whom he should direct his replies.

Chazal et Delahousse font" tourner la tête" de... par LeHuffPost

And then, just as it was coming towards the end, Delahousse slipped in a question that has angered some.

Hollande had just finished explaining how dangerous and ill thought-out he believed the policies of the far-right Front National's leader Marine Le Pen to be when Delahousse had his "inspirational" moment described by political journalist Bruno Roger-Petit in the Nouvel Observateur as being without any real substance and pandering to an agenda set by the Front National.

http://leplus.nouvelobs.com/contribution/907416-quand-delahousse-interroge-hollande-sur-islam-et-democratie-une-question-pro-fn.html

"During your recent visit to Tunisia, you said something very important in that 'France knows that Islam and democracy are compatible," began Delahousse.

"That was obviously a message aimed at Tunisians. But I wanted to ask you a question. In France there are five to six million Moslems and a third of them say they're practising. If one day, an Islamist party, a fundamentalist one, were created in France, what would be your reaction?"



Hollande's answer was a simple one, reiterating what he had said in his speech in Tunisia that "no religion was inconsistent with democracy" and that France "remained a secular state".

But Delahousse's question received a furious response from Socialist parliamentarian Pouria Amirshahi.

"This is an issue worthy of the propaganda of the far right," he said.

"It was pitiful especially as a question for a July 14 interview and just feeds into irrational fears," he continued.

"At best it was ridiculous and at worst it was one more example of those who try to have us believe France is being 'invaded'."

While Amirshahi's reaction might appear virulent, he surely has a point.

Look at the words use by Chazal as she welcomed viewers and outlined to Hollande what subjects would be covered right before the interview began.

"We will ask you questions on issues that of course concern the French: unemployment, growth, the economic crisis ... "

And Roger-Petit pointed out a certain inconsistency in Delahousse's "science fiction" question.

"How can one of the leading and most acclaimed French journalists put such a question to the president," he wrote.

http://leplus.nouvelobs.com/contribution/907416-quand-delahousse-interroge-hollande-sur-islam-et-democratie-une-question-pro-fn.html

"How can he ask him something that is a matter of 'science fiction' (abour the speculative creation of a fundamentalist Islamist political party in France) at the expense of "reality" (the creation of a political extremist Catholic party for the next European elections)?

Rachida Dati's "dildo" code of practice

Trust Rachida Dati.

The former French justice minister and now European parliamentarian has once again proven herself to be adept at unintentional sexual innuendo.

Rachida Dati (screenshot of interview clip on LCI)

Few will forget her "fellatio - inflation" slip of the tongue during a televised interview last September when talking about foreign investment funds.


The clip soon became an Internet hit and even Dati managed to see the funny side, admitting at the time that she had been talking too quickly.

Now though she has given television viewers and Internauts alike another reason to smile by inadvertently slipping in the word "dildo" during an interview.

It came over a week ago on April 1 (how appropriate you might be thinking) as Dati was a guest on Christophe Barbier's programme on the all-news channel LCI.

Up for discussion were laicity and Islam, with Dati in full flow as Barbier asked her about France's "code de la laïcité" or "code of secularism" and whether she thought it was useful.

Dati replied that it laid down a "code of practice" and started giving examples of other fields in which similar "sets of written rules explaining how people should behave" also worked.

Except she used the word "code" a little too often and at one point substituted "gode" or "dildo" before instantly correcting herself and continuing.

The slip-up would have probably have remained unnoticed had it not been for sharp-eared Nicolas Domenach, a journalist on Canal +, who happily ran a copy of the clip on Thursday.

You can hear Dati's '"dildo" reference at 14 seconds in a clip which surely - thanks largely to Domenech - has all the right ingredients to go viral.

Rachida Dati sur LCI Vidéo OZAP sélectionnée dans TV/Séries

Of course if Dati, who is undoubtedly a very bright and articulate woman, would just ease down on the speed at which she speaks, these sorts of mistakes might not be made.

But there again, what would the world be like without the occasional misplaced "fellatio" or "dildo"?

Claude Guéant - "a minister whispering into the ear of France's far-right Front National"

Not a day seems to go by without the recently-appointed interior minister Claude Guéant making a remark which many are interpreting as an attempt to reach out to potential voters of the far-right Front National (FN).

"He's a minister whispering into the ear of the Front National," is how one prominent Socialist party politician, Jean-Marc Ayrault, described Guéant's latest comments about the need to prevent anyone using the country's services from wearing religious symbols.

Yes Guéant is at it again.

Claude Guéant (screenshot from i>Télé interview)

In the space of a week he has made remarks that have angered the opposition Socialist party - and many others - worried some within his own party, confused and surprised those who've worked close to him over the years and provided a platform for the FN to expound its policies.

After "the French not feeling at home in France" and praising Sarkozy for "leading the crusade in Libya" comes the latest in what some see as a direct appeal to those tempted to vote for the FN.

This time it was the suggestion that religious symbols should be banned in all public services - not only for those working in them, but also those using them.

"Obviously anyone working in a public service shouldn't wear a religious symbols or show any religious preference," he said in an interview on the news and current affairs channel i>Télé on Thursday.

"Nor should those using them," he added.

Guéant tried to cover himself somewhat by saying later that he had mainly been talking about hospitals and in particular cases in which women didn't want to be seen by male doctors.

But as had happened on the previous day with his "crusade" comment, the reactions came thick and fast and once again Guéant was flavour of the day in terms of news reporting.

Most telling of all the reactions though is from someone who knows Guéant well, and indeed worked alongside him for eight years.

Interviewed on Friday morning's news magazine La Matinale on Canal +, Abderahmane Dahmane, president of the democrates musulmans de france and until recently a special advisor to the French president Nicolas Sarkozy in charge of diversity, said he was as confused as anyone by Guéant's remarks.

"I have the impression that the sky is falling in on them," he said in reference to Guéant and Sarkozy, both of whom he said he still considered friends.

"In eight years of working together I never heard a word uttered by Claude Guéant that could annoy anyone. He was always the go-between, the moderator," he continued.

"But now, I don't understand why he's saying what he is. What purpose does it serve?"

Indeed.

And where is Sarkozy in all of this?

All right so he's currently playing "King of the World" as leader of the G20, G8 and the "crusade" against Libya.

But he's also a man used to meddling in all aspects of domestic affairs as he sees fit and reining in ministers whenever they're deemed to be overstepping the mark.

Sarkozy has been strangely quiet.

Perhaps part of the answer for Guéant's apparent change in behaviour and Sarkozy's silence comes in those cantonal elections on Sunday.

Oh yes and there's that debate on laicity set by the governing centre-right Union pour un Mouvement Populaire (Union for a Popular Movement, UMP) for April 5, which the leader of the party Jean-François Copé is organising to "discuss religious practice in France - including Islam - and its compatibility with the country's secular laws."

But there is of course also Sarkozy's poor showing in the opinion polls, the rise of in popularity of the FN leader Marine Le Pen and the fear that some UMP supporters will be attracted to her and her party's policies when it comes to next year's presidential elections.

Recent polls suggest that Sarkozy might not even make it past the first round of those elections.

Has he "unleashed" Guéant on France in an attempt to win over that far-right vote?

Sure looks that way - whatever anyone else is saying - or not saying.