BERLIN: You don't get much of an argument in Germany's halls of power against the proposition that Nicolas Sarkozy is Europe's most interesting politician. What you get is a kind of leery smile. And, with it, a story about a getting-to-know-you meeting between Angela Merkel and the relatively new French president. Back then, she told Sarkozy: "I learned from Helmut Kohl you have to work things out over time. About staying the course. You're the other way round. We are completely different people. Knowing this, we can work together." Months later, here's a practical measure of how they have not: Merkel and Sarkozy were scheduled to meet in London on Jan. 29 at the invitation of Gordon Brown to discuss the impact of America's subprime crisis on Europe. At Germany's insistence, Romano Prodi of Italy was added last week to the original threesome. Why? Because Prodi's presence assures Germany - Prodi doesn't like Sarkozy's challenges to the independence of the European Central Bank, and Sarkozy doesn't like him - that Merkel won't have to stand alone if the French talk up an outcome she insists hasn't taken place.
BERLIN: You don't get much of an argument in Germany's halls of power against the proposition that Nicolas Sarkozy is Europe's most interesting politician.
What you get is a kind of leery smile.
And, with it, a story about a getting-to-know-you meeting between Angela Merkel and the relatively new French president. Back then, she told Sarkozy: "I learned from Helmut Kohl you have to work things out over time. About staying the course. You're the other way round. We are completely different people. Knowing this, we can work together."
Months later, here's a practical measure of how they have not: Merkel and Sarkozy were scheduled to meet in London on Jan. 29 at the invitation of Gordon Brown to discuss the impact of America's subprime crisis on Europe. At Germany's insistence, Romano Prodi of Italy was added last week to the original threesome.
Why? Because Prodi's presence assures Germany - Prodi doesn't like Sarkozy's challenges to the independence of the European Central Bank, and Sarkozy doesn't like him - that Merkel won't have to stand alone if the French talk up an outcome she insists hasn't taken place.
Merkel won't have to stand alone if the French talk up an outcome she insists hasn't taken place.
why "the French"? It's just Sarkozy. They can't yet come aroud to saying that he is a compulsive limelight grabber and liar... but they're getting closer. In the long run, we're all dead. John Maynard Keynes
