Let's get political

It's Friday and I feel like putting aside the political correctness by talking about.... politics.
Here are a few highlights of political views that were of interest:

Bernard Chazelle on tonykaron.com about Nicolas Sarkozy:
"Soccer star Lilian Thuram might well be right that “Sarkozy stirs up people’s latent racism,” but as to being a racist himself the evidence is thin. Sarko actually never used the word “scum.” An exasperated resident of the projects asked him when he would rid them of the racaille (wrongly translated as scum; it means rabble) and he repeated her plea in the affirmative. [...]
However, Sarko’s open admiration for the rancid views of my former Ecole Polytechnique colleague, Alain Finkielkraut, makes one wonder. One of the “new philosophers,” he is the French Niall Ferguson, who goes whining to Haaretz that “In France… we no longer teach that the colonial project sought… to bring civilization to the savages.” "

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Georgie Anne Geyer in the Dallas News on Bush behaving like an NBA star:
"But by all reports,President Bush is more convinced than ever of his righteousness. Friends of his from Texas were shocked recently to find him nearly wild-eyed, thumping himself on the chest three times while he repeated "I am the president!" He also made it clear he was setting Iraq up so his successor could not get out of "our country's destiny."

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In French, roundup of Malagasy bloggers' opinions on the new immigration laws in France:
"(Nivo):
Concernant l’immigration choisie, il est clair que je désapprouve ce qu’il propose, non pas en tant qu’étrangère vivant en France, mais en tant que personne respectueuse des dignités humaines et du libre arbitre et du choix concernant la direction que chacun veut donner à son existence
Et puis, comment réellement apprécier la “qualité”, l”amour”, l’”engagement” d’un individu envers un pays étranger ? Je ne pense pas qu’il y ait de critères assez objectifs pour nous permettre d’être juges…"

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The government in Madagascar might be turning a new leaf. Barijoana and other weigh in:
"Après Christian Chadefaux, 40 ans à Madagascar, voilà que Sylvain Urfer se voit refuser un titre de séjour après avoir passé 33 ans à Madagascar. Du grand n’importe quoi, en tout cas symptomatique du fait que l’on sort de la dictature molle pour passer à quelque chose de plus marqué. De Sarkozy et de Ravalomanana, théruféraires et opposants ont dit qu’ils partageaient le fait d’être de la même génération, leur américanophilie, leur culture du résultat, leur fascination pour l’argent…"

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Jodi Kantor (NYT) on Barack Obama. Basketball as a social equalizer:

"Though some of these men could afford to build courts at their own homes, they pride themselves on the democratic nature of basketball, on showing up at South Side parks and playing with whoever is around. At the University of Chicago court where he and Mr. Obama used to play, “You might have someone from the street and a potential Nobel Prize winner on the same team,” Mr. Duncan said. “It’s a great equalizer.”"

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