The Culture Minister Nonce & Sarkozy's government

international | arts and media | opinion/analysis Thursday October 08, 2009 20:12 by gossip monger - (iosaf)

notes on a scandalous life overlooked so long - just like Polanski's case.

European politics are no doubt scintilating for the average Irish citizen now Lisbon2 is behind us & our continuing place at the heart of Europe is assured. We expect the Dáil expense scandal which hints at as much outragous sociopathic graft & cheek as our rivals in the British parliament will keep us in the top rankings. We can read about Berlusconi unknowingly frolicking with prostitutes and cocaine traffickers and think it slightly pathetic that he imagined his pretty guests were up & gaggin for it. Now new scandal at the heart of Europe which alas, is in the process of being hijacked by the far right! Sarkozy's minister of Culture, Frédéric Mitterrand, who though son of the socialist president chose a rightwing career path, is at the heart of the EU. In the lead-up to a new set of agreements between France and Thailand to stem sex tourism, passages from the minister's 2005 biography describing the thrill of sex with young Thai boys are raising interest of both prurient and legitimate nature.

a poisonous chalice of attitudes and presumptions laced with just too easy to formulate moral outrage............hmmmm............take note & don't let the far right do this.

First some background for those Irish readers who think Sarkozy's court is just about the ex-supermodel & hetrosexuality on stilts

It may not be the first time that Sarkozy's regime has attracted such interest. His former minister of Justice (& ex girlfriend) Rachida Dati generated pages and at least one lawsuit for two reasons which like this latest news - ask us to meditate on the fine line between public interest and private lives.

Dati's never chose to name the father of her pregnancy amidst speculation that the daddy was indeed the former prime minister of Spain, Jose Aznar. As I reported on this website at the time, the Spaniard was a prime suspect and had been introduced to Dati by Sarkozy at an Elysee dinner shortly after Caral Bruni had arrived on the scene. Aznar might have chosen to sue the Moroccan magazine that broke the news whilst ignoring the French media which repeated and arguably diffused it wider, but the paternity of Dati's child though tantilisingly opening up tales of European and Billionaire daliances and the inner social mechanisms of the European ruling class, was not to prove the reason she left the cabinet. There was and is reason to think the father might have been one of the players in France's current"Clearstream trillion dollar scandal" just as some have even suggested Sarkozy himself. As I noted before, we will need to wait till that little baby grows up and decide is it short and domineering with a moustache or short and domineering without a moustache. Dati's image had been sullied in a progressive accumalative way for some time. There had been the photoshop editing of her image which saw a ring worth €15000 (£13000) appear in press one day and get airbrushed out the next.

c/f
* "Aznar denies getting French Justice minister pregnant (it was ETA)"
http://www.indymedia.ie/article/88950
* "mystery of minister's ring" http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/mystery-....html
* photos of "the disappearing ring of Dati" before manipulation & afterwards :
http://www.museumofhoaxes.com/hoax/photo_database/image...ring/


Now we come to look at the current scandal - of the sex trade, sex slaves, Thai youth & how the Le Pen's far right have jumped into the politically correct vacuum of liberal moral laissez faire tolerance.

Le Pen and the French far right have jumped on the extracts from a 2005 autobiography which only now are been recirculated. Conveniently forgetting or sidestepping the documentated links between the sex trade and human trafficking with the global far-right. Nor without getting investigative even touching the hypocrisy inherent in their "personal & private" argument to avoid discussnig the homosexuality of their European heroes.

I cite the notable case of Jörg Haider the leader of the Austrian far right and template for third position contemporary parliamentary neo-nazism. After he died in car crash and had his funeral mass said by RC Cardinal and televised with state honours on Austrian networks, it emerged that not only had he enjoyed a long term sexual relationship with the man chosen by the Haider's far right party to replace him. But he had argued with that lover & party colleague, Stefan Petzner on the last night of his life and gone off sulking to a hardcore gay sauna club in the company of male escorts before crasing his car.

Somehow, the revelations of Frederic Mitterrand are though "grist for the mill" & in the eyes of the far right a matter of state . http://www.lefigaro.fr/flash-actu/2009/10/08/01011-2009...n.php

His book «La Mauvaise vie» was published in 2005. It certainly didn't sell or will sell as many copies as Bertie Aherns or Sarah Palins offerings. Perhaps because he wrote it himself. Any ghost writer good at their job would never have allowed frank disclosure of how Mitterrand had found the sight of the slave trade and so many young boys being available to be arousing followed by admittals that he had enjoyed carnal relationships with young male sex workers.

So why if the book didn't raise eyebrows in 2005 is it all so shocking now?

The French on the right and far right will attempt to pitch it as a moral and fibrous response to the French state's plans to agree an accord and new partnership with the Thai state to stem sex tourism, (quite probably like a carbon tax but on condoms and lubricants) & attempt to position its policies at the heart of European wide legislation on paedophilia. We're talking about potentially tough measures for the beasts which not only include the now commonplace registers and movement restriction orders but would widen voluntary chemical castration (available in some states such as the Spanish one to offenders) to a mandatory sentance.

That's heavy stuff and needs to be treated upon by society as a whole. It's such heavy material that we really ought not leave it to the politicians alone. I remind Irish readers of the June 2005 article I entitled "The Sunday Papers Brainy Edition", http://www.indymedia.ie/article/76446 which marked the widest cross society role ever in legislation in Ireland. New laws which were rushed through without thought for procedure or expenses or dail recesses in reaction to the mess left by the former minister of Justice, Big Swinging Mickey Mc Dowell's law reform project which had left a huge loop hole in the unlawful carnal knowledge and child rape and molestation laws. The emergency session of the Oireachtas and urgent assent of the President to pass without quibble these laws :-
http://www.oireachtas.ie/viewdoc.asp?DocID=5771
http://www.oireachtas.ie/viewdoc.asp?DocID=5772

But the far-right aren't really bashing nonces

Of course they're not. The real reason that this story is front page in France & generating inches in English press and comment throughout Europe, is that the French minister of Culture played a big part in organising the defense petition for Roman Polanski and got really vocal criticising the US Justice department's extradition order.

That is of course another story and one which finds its roots and polticial advantage far away from either Thailand or the French art ministry scene, in the heartlands of the US Republican party and Dixie as its movers and shakers vie and play each other to rebuild their organisation, choose a presidential leader and consolidate their power bases. It's a case of them holding what Obama doesn't touch. Be it honduras, SouthCom or arty farties.

But that is another story................

French links :

Extract from the book
http://www.liberation.fr/livres/0101595944-que-dit-la-m...e-vie

http://www.liberation.fr/politiques/0101595696-mitterra...exuel
http://www.lefigaro.fr/flash-actu/2009/10/08/01011-2009...n.php
http://droite.blogs.liberation.fr/alain_auffray/2009/10....html

English coverage http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/8298051.stm