You take a literal view to dismiss what are very real problems

• there are alwmost never hardball questions to politicians, on 14 July or otherwise. But that 14 July interview is symbolic of the sycophantic nature of the top political journalists;

• the Legion d'Honneur, similarly, is a symptom of political journalists being institutionalised and being fully integrated in the system. Look at who the top names are - they've been around for as long as Chirac, Sarkozy or Royal - or longer. The head of Europe 1 is Elkabbach. His sidekick 25 years ago, Jean-Marie Cavada (until recently, the head of Radio-France, and previously of France Television), is now a MEP for Bayrou's UDF. PPDA is the Establishment's Establishment. Duhamel, who's paying today for having admitted his preference for Bayrou, has been around for more than 20 years. Catherine Nay, Michele Cotta, Anne Sinclair, etc..; have been around for ages. They go on holiday with politicians, sleep with them, are godparents to one another's kids and live the exact same lives in the same circles. And the same goes with the owners of the media, the Bouygues, Lagardère or Dassault families.

• the "tu" is part of that as well - it reflects that these people know each other too well (and I saw that the two times I was in the Europe 1 studio last month: all of these people are very obviously intimate and friendly with one another, even when in opposite political sides.

• as to the intimate relationships, it's a LOT more widespread than you pretend. It's pervasise, and most of the insiders know about it, and they protect one another.

And you can call me populist or extreme-lefty all you want, it's your credibility that's at stake when you say that, not mine.

In the long run, we're all dead. John Maynard Keynes