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Something really scary in France right now is that you can see really clearly how most mainstream media are used for propaganda. Since a few days, there is an

Something really scary in France right now is that you can see really clearly how most mainstream media are used for propaganda. Since a few days, there is an abundance of cover and articles in most major newspaper here with propaganda and repeated lies supporting him. It's hard to imagine but non stop. You have everyday interviews of his family saying that it is an injustice, that he did nothing, that the judgement was rigged, that he was a great men that served France and so should not be treated like everyone else. Article about how sad the poor family is. Number of articles repeating friends of him verbatim s that the judgement was fake. Almost none speaking about the facts, the grounds for his sentence, the big number of other trials against him that are running. And also the other definitive convictions he got. Like for attempting to bribe a head prosecutor to get insider info about his case. Using a prepaid line opened with a fake name... But what you see in the end is that 90% of medias in France belongs to a few wealthy families that are friends with him.

oulipo2 1y ago
Exactly. Meanwhile 75% of French people agree that he should go to jail. This is nuts
- wiz21c 1y ago
  And then France will get Bardella... It's very very close now. And thanks to Trump we are now arming Europe. It doesn't go in the right direction.
  - croisillon 1y ago
    that's the problem with first-pass-the-vote: 75% against him and scattered over 10 candidates, 25% for him will help him reach the second round
TacticalCoder 1y ago
That's not the issue. The issue is that there are hundreds, if not thousands, of french politicians who should be in jail. I don't disagree with him going to jail: but it's one heck of a corrupt country where they all have their hands in the cookie jar. Most french politicians who served at the EU, for example, have friends and family as "employees" on their payroll (well, on the EU citizens' payroll). Same at non-EU level: it's called "emplois fictifs" in french ("fictional jobs"). Soooo many stories about politicians at so many local, regional, national and supra-national levels engaging in "emplois fictifs". So many mayors in France have dirty money on their hands. Where for example they block construction permits then, once joyfully greased with cash, allow the construction permits. But Sarkozy was right-wing and the EU, and France in particular, is ultra left-wing. So it's good to put a right-wing president in jail. Once again: I've got nothing against him going to jail. But we're talking about a country were judges are openly leftists. They're not impartial. It's all rotten and disgusting. And why do you think all the leftist french mainstream media root for right-wing Sarkozy? Because these media are at the hand of corrupt politicians who think a politician going to jail is a dangerous precedent. They're nearly all corrupt, so they're shitting their pants to see that even a president is sent to jail. But yup: one politician in jail. Great. Only 9999 more to go. And corrupt judges.
- ithkuil 1y ago
  You have to start from somewhere
- phtrivier 1y ago
  > And why do you think all the leftist french mainstream media root for right-wing Sarkozy? Which are the "leftist french mainstream media" rooting for Sarkozy ? The "leftist french mainstream media" I can think of would be Libération, Le Monde, Le Nouvel Obs, France Inter... Do you have a link to articles where any of those are "defending" Sarkozy, cause quite frankly I missed it.
- akudha 1y ago
  corrupt politicians who think a politician going to jail is a dangerous precedent There is a reason why administrations don't go after obvious, in-your-face crimes committed by previous administrations/politicians. They all hate each other, but they are also terrified that if they prosecute previous administrations (for legitimate crimes), they'll be the target when someone else is in power (even if they themselves didn't commit any crimes). I suppose it might be easier to prevent misbehavior by highest officials of the land by having stricter scrutiny, laws etc than prosecuting them after the fact, but who watches the watchdogs? Who watches the judiciary? As an ordinary citizen, it is exhausting to just even follow the news. And if it is this bad in democracies, imagine how it is like in countries like Russia.
  - Nextgrid 1y ago
    > even if they themselves didn't commit any crimes Does that still even exist? The problem I see in politics is that everyone has their hand in the cookie jar to some degree. You don't get into politics unless you already have your hand in there, or are given the option to prove yourself where moving up the ranks involves helping someone getting their hand in there, with the unspoken assumption that they'll return the favor. And of course once you're in and have your hand in there, why rock the boat and waste all that effort?
    - akudha 1y ago
someuser2345 1y ago
> Using a prepaid line opened with a fake name... Sorry, why is this such a big deal?
- ben_w 1y ago
  Committing a crime is bad, trying to cover up that you're committing a crime makes it obvious (as a generalisation) you knew you shouldn't have been doing the crime.
Aurornis 1y ago
> Since a few days, there is an abundance of cover and articles in most major newspaper here with propaganda and repeated lies supporting him. How much of this is driven by contrarian and counter-cyclical reporting? I’m not familiar with French media, but I see the same pattern in every country where I’ve kept up with the news: Media starts being favorable to a topic when it’s up and coming, switching to being highly critical when that topic becomes mainstream, then reverts again to exploring the positives when the topic falls out of favor. You see it even with people like Elizabeth Holmes. News stories about her fraud were everywhere until she had to go to jail, but now the news has swung to humanizing her, claiming her sentencing was excessive, focusing on the angle of a mother separated from her children, and confusingly ignoring her fraud at all. It’s all designed to be counter-narrative and rise waves of controversy. The more controversial, the more shares and views.
- dijit 1y ago
  I have a much less charitable view than you about Elizabeth Holmes. The fact that a new publicist was hired by her before all the sympathetic press started coming out is enough for me to believe that there's a link there and not a natural news swing cycle. https://www.theverge.com/news/611549/elizabeth-holmes-people-jailhouse-interview https://www.theverge.com/news/611549/elizabeth-holmes-people...
  - orionsbelt 1y ago
    I don’t have a strong enough view here to have an opinion, but I think someone as rich as her always had a publicist, so to play devils advocate, it may be true that the press only played ball with the publicist after she was convicted.
    - mattnewton 1y ago
      Elizabeth Holmes had some very big fish as investors she ended up defrauding, so it’s possible the devil’s best advocates were busy advocating she go to jail before her sentence.
    - 1y ago
schmidtleonard 1y ago
What's crazy to me is seeing this happen at an individual level. In 2022, my conservative family members were reluctantly but firmly on board with the idea that Trump did the crimes: lied to the tax man, stole the classified documents, leaned on the Georgia secretary of state to "find me 11780 votes," and on Jan 6 set up fake electors and asked Pence to overturn the election. In each case, they gave a good fight, but as those who are familiar with these cases know, the evidence is overwhelming, almost comically so at points (the fake elector certifications are so poorly put together that they are tough not to laugh at, the recording of trump bragging about the classified documents and establishing intent belongs in a law school documentary). By 2024 they were 100% in lock-step with the party line that all cases were fake news lawfare (but wouldn't engage with detailed argument, of course) and in 2025 they are gaslighting me about ever having had those arguments at all. The only thing keeping me sane is the correspondence that I kept proving that our conversations weren't a product of my own fevered imagination.
- adriand 1y ago
  Man, that's a scary story. The Georgia thing especially is so easy to understand: just listen to the tape!
  - schmidtleonard 1y ago
    That, and Mike Pence went on Fox News and said: > President Trump demanded that I use my authority as vice president presiding over the count of the Electoral College to essentially overturn the election by returning or literally rejecting votes.
  - bnjms 1y ago
    I’m going to go find these recordings now. But do you, or anyone else, have a preferred location for this type of data? For example reddit is consistently an echo chamber in the reverse direction. Another example is any clips selected by cable news are doubted by republicans for intentional malicious framing. Which is fair enough since I’ve seen plenty of intentionally obtuse takes of things said which are already unacceptable.
- 1y ago
phtrivier 1y ago
I would disagree on the "most mainstream media". Clearly, all the right-wing papers that have traditionnaly supported him (Le Figaro, Match) and all the hard-right-wing papers (owned by Bolloré, Arnault, etc..) that have _personnal_ ties to him are playing their "opinion" part. I don't think public media is defending him at all. Left or Center-left papers are not (obviously.) The tie breaker would be: "what is TF1 20h saying" (this is, no matter what new media says, still the one thing that most people watch and treat as "the news") - and I don't think they have been "blatantly" defending him.
- Foobar8568 1y ago
  You forgot Bouygues (TF1) who was one of the witness at his wedding and godfather of one of his son.
  - eastbound 1y ago
    Yes, TF1 is our right-wing news channel (non-populist), France 2 is our left-wing channel. So TF1 would widely support him.
jmkni 1y ago
Isn't that the case in pretty much every Country to a certain extent though?
- morkalork 1y ago
  Certainly in the anglosphere
Brendinooo 1y ago
I think that, at least from my American perspective, there are two uncomfortable truths about national political figures: 1. They are the voice of a group of millions of people, and therefore a perception will exist that an attack on the politician is an attack on those people as well 2. Sure seems like a lot of them are compromised in some way, so any time one is targeted it will always seem selective in the moment I don't know how much that intersects with what you're observing, and I don't really have easy answers.
- candiddevmike 1y ago
  Parasocial relationships via social media strikes again! You no longer need to start a cult, just get big enough on social media and have an army of "followers" (both in the literal and proverbial sense) that you can control and weaponize.
fred_is_fred 1y ago
This is exactly the same in the US. Perhaps all countries at this point.
scotty79 1y ago
Probably russian money is involved in this campaign of discord.
- handelaar 1y ago
  (Fellow readers: this is not kneejerk Russia-bashing but a reference to the recorded fact that Sarkozy has received at least hundreds of thousands of euro from Russian government-linked entities, apparently in exchange for favours.) For example: https://www.mediapart.fr/en/journal/international/110123/nicolas-sarkozy-his-praise-putin-and-trail-kremlin-money https://www.mediapart.fr/en/journal/international/110123/nic... https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/jan/15/france-investigates-sarkozy-over-contract-with-russian-insurer https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/jan/15/france-investi...
  - aerostable_slug 1y ago
    That doesn't mean their intelligence services aren't also stoking various fires, some calling for more inquiries. Discord is to their benefit. A politician who is no longer able to exert influence going to prison isn't a big loss to them, in fact it's arguably a good outcome. They get to have had favors while Sarkozy was in office and an angry France now that's he's out.
MangoToupe 1y ago
> is that you can see really clearly how most mainstream media are used for propaganda. Was there ever a time or place where this was not true?
- glenstein 1y ago
  To greater or lesser degrees, and in different ways. Which is important because otherwise you can end up "agreeing" to the reality of the phenomenon even if you have an entirely different thing in mind. I might be thinking of, say, Hungary or Poland weaponizing the press and using it to destroy their own democratic institutions. Someone else might think it means saying global warming is real. In Hungary and Poland, they are specific, time-bound events with important institutional implications and unique factual circumstances. "It's always been that way" is risky because it can be used to airbrush away specific moral urgency with vagueness and false equivalences, and even functions to apologize for active advancements of authoritarianism as they are happening in real time.
epolanski 1y ago
I think propaganda is only obvious when it involves topics you follow or now intimately.
- pessimizer 1y ago
  This is untrue. What makes it seem true is that there are extremely bad or nonsensical arguments that some people will accept (often without examination) when they support their own predetermined (often by lifestyle) side, but they will be far more critical of any argument that supports the other side. They spot the bad arguments on the other side and call them out, but ignore the good ones because they cause stress. The best way to notice this in yourself (I think) is if there are arguments for the other side of an issue that you simply avoid discussion of altogether. When they are brought up, you attack the source, personally attack the person repeating them, or refuse the discussion on some other terms. This is reflexively doing propaganda, on a small scale, but as a reaction to being cornered. If you find yourself in this situation, resorting to repeating slogans you've heard rather than treating the argument exactly as you would treat an argument in an uncontroversial context, it's better to shut up, listen, and reflect. The only moral position is to be a collection of any valid argument you can find, always trying to clarify their degree of soundness. Whenever you deviate from that, you're defying reason, and weakening civil society (which relies on secular protocols.) If you consume propaganda with that mindset, you notice because it has very little useful content at all. It's astounding how long media can go on about a subject without saying anything, or making any coherent claim, and scary when you see people who seem to get something out of that avalanche and they can't quite explain how they got there. It's how Saddam did 9/11.
  - epolanski 1y ago
    I don't get the whole point of your post. What I meant is that general media (either social or legacy) has often strong biases and narratives and at certain times it gets too much to the point of propaganda. But, if you're not very intimate in some topic, or have not been part of the events it's not that obvious. Few examples. 1. Almost a million people protested the war in Gaza few weeks ago here in Italy, in many cities, but if you turned on the tv (any channel really) or read the news this was skipped and instead the entirety of the focus was on few limited clashes with the entire narrative being built about how if you protest for Gaza you're automatically violent and antisemitic. Nonsense. 1.5 At an anti-Covid protest in Piazza San Giovanni, a place that comfortably holds half a million people, the place was ultra full, as packed as during concerts...But ask the police and the official numbers were below 10k. Ridiculous, it was at least 15 times as much. I wasn't part of the protests but lived nearby so I had a full account. 2. Around 15 years ago our main airline (Alitalia) was in terrible shape and Air France-KLM wanted to buy it out, pay the debts and retain most of the workforce. Non stop bombarding on every outlet about how we could not sell our main company, and that taxpayers would foot the bill. The bombarding went on with plenty of interviews of how Alitalia staff was in favor of this operation, but I had several friends working for the company and actually the opposite was true: most of them supported the merger rather than the bailout, but the propaganda did its best to silence these voices. Again, how would you know about those things if you were not intimately knowledgeable about the topics? I really don't have time to get knowledgeable and fact check or be part of every world, national and local event. Thus I'm not equipped with distinguishing a genuine fact based narrative from a biased one.
add-sub-mul-div 1y ago
If you think that's scary, imagine a country where the corrupt ex-president doesn't even go to jail at all.
- FridayoLeary 1y ago
  Imagine a country where every level of the judiciary and law enforcement is used to persecute a president, with cases so weak that they fall apart on their own, or are so obviously politicised it turns everyone against said systems, even if there is substance to the claims. But he still wins the popular vote, because he is so good and everyone else is so bad.
  - stickfigure 1y ago
    Imagine a felon, convicted by a jury, claiming "the case was so weak it fell apart on its own".
    - nullc 1y ago
      A felon convicted of essentially same 'crime' his opponent in the prior election committed but was given a settlement and a fine instead. Hilary Clinton funded the creation of the Steele dossier-- which was later shown to be generally false and unsupported-- but paid for it through one of her law firms and misclassified it as legal expenses in an effort to conceal its origins. Trump was criminally charged with falsification of business records because he paid Stormy Daniels hush money (to get her to deny her earlier claim that they had an affair) via his lawyer, and classified it as legal expenses. A visible hush money payment would have made it ineffective, just at the Steele dossier being known to be a campaigned paid hit piece would have made it ineffective. There are plenty of things to ding Trump on, but I think if you're trying to persuade someone that the legal system wasn't weaponized unfairly against him this is a particularly poor example. Even an argument that the facts make him worse here (e.g. maybe you say concealing an accusation of an affair says more about his integrity than paying for a false report says about hers)-- wouldn't change that this is just not a good example. Particularly because there was nothing unlawful about the hush money payment itself-- the crime was an obscure accounting violation resulting from it... and in any other circumstance nothing would happen at all or at most, as seen with Clinton, a nominal fine would result. Sure, it's true that random details (like what state the acts in) will often decide if an act is technically illegal or not, but that's hardly an argument for the fairness of the justice system or that it was fairly applied to him. I don't even hope to convince you of this-- but only to convince you that your example is unlikely to convince others, and is easily exploited to wrongfully convince people opposite your intentions.
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h1fra 1y ago
As always, france is always just 5-10 years behind US craziness.
- baby 1y ago
  I think we won't get there because we are willing to put corrupted politicians in prison. The day Trump goes to prison I will change my mind on US politics.
- FridayoLeary 1y ago
  US is 5-10 years ahead of Europe. MAGA is coming to France and the UK unless things change. In the UK the Conservatives and Starmer have seen to it. There are literally 2 things people in the UK want to see and both parties are stubbornly ignoring it, while failing to enact any policies that can actually help people. Meanwhile Starmer is becoming more authoritarian by the day. Trump didn't happen in a vacuum, ignore your electorate for too long and eventually they will respond. The incredible successes of Trumps second term so far will encourage and empower populists everywhere.
  - DFHippie 1y ago
    > The incredible successes of Trumps second term so far will encourage and empower populists everywhere. Successes? He's succeeded at consolidating power because his own party and his partisans on the Supreme Court allow it. Also, destroying stuff is easy. What are these successes of which you speak?
    - deleted 1y ago
      [deleted]
    - ben_w 1y ago
      I'm not sure how much populists differ from authoritarians, but for the latter "consolidating power" is the definition of success, all else is unimportant.
  - selimthegrim 1y ago
lunias 1y ago
I don't think this problem is exclusive to France. I'm more interested in how the consumption and consideration of mainstream media is trending given its rampant bias. Clearly they think they can get away with it, I wonder if people are letting them.
- tinfoilhatter 1y ago
  It's definitely not a problem exclusive to France: https://swprs.org/the-american-empire-and-its-media/ https://swprs.org/the-american-empire-and-its-media/ Edit: Not sure why I'm getting downvoted for providing a link to a website and infographic shining light on the lack of independence in US media. That's HN for you.
- bamboozled 1y ago
  I cannot believe anyone actually watches “main stream media” at all?
  - sandspar 1y ago
    >Does anyone watch mainstream media? Many people over 60 (i.e. the people who vote) watch nothing but.
almosthere 1y ago
Try being conservative in the United States. You have no idea.
duxup 1y ago
And yet he's in jail right? Not sure how much an impact what you describe is having. I see non optional and IMO skewed reporting all the time, I'm not sure it is all directed by someone.
lenkite 1y ago
Basically Libya would still have been an intact nation with college tuition and free health care if Gadaffi hadn't been so extraordinarily stupid to give money to Sarkozy - who later had him murdered and his nation destroyed via NATO to cover this fact up.
- GeoAtreides 1y ago
  Basically this article would still be expanded if Gadaffi was not deposed: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_rights_violations_during_the_Gaddafi_regime https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_rights_violations_during...
  - lenkite 1y ago
    Frankly, that record looks far cleaner than most US Presidents.
    - GeoAtreides 1y ago
      That's a complete non-sequitur. Btw, I've seen chinese tankies and I've seen russian tankies. First time I see a gadaffian tankie.
      - lenkite 1y ago
        Maybe speak to some ex-Libyans then ? The security and economic stability compared to continuous civil war and chaos - which caused far more atrocities and deaths tends to change one's opinion on NATO sponsored regime change very fast. Millions of your so-called "gadaffi tankies" out there - just not much in the Western world. But keep thumping yourself on the chest. What do all the deaths and suffering matter ? The bad guy has been beheaded after all and the War stockholders got richer! Mission Accomplished!
        GeoAtreides 1y ago
        I was born and raised in one of the most authoritarian regimes in Europe. I know what totalitarian regimes do, and I experienced the crushing poverty that followed the demise of such a regime. The crimes of the Gaddafi regime are one thing, the ensuing chaos is another. We celebrate the end of a brutal regime and we despair at the death and destruction that followed.
mattnewton 1y ago
Always has been, for those willing to pay for smart and unscrupulous people to manipulate the news. People must know this is what is happening but they are still seduced by the media. The brilliant Chicago press conference musical number comes to mind: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SBM82Ju2kJU https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SBM82Ju2kJU and the source material there was essentially the same techniques working to making murderers sympathetic, in 1924. At least in France he’ll serve a sentence- in the US we might have elected him again and let him make the charges go away.
tekbruh9000 1y ago
Something really scary is people believing what's printed or filed in court as fact without bearing witness. Faith based society is not just the domain of the religious. 1984 been the norm since well before Orwell wrote the book.
thatfrenchguy 1y ago
> But what you see in the end is that 90% of medias in France belongs to a few wealthy families that are friends with him. The only way the current wave of right-wing media ends if by finding a new way to fund media & making it impossible to concentrate in the ends of a few rich folks. And good luck with that, folks don't want to pay for media.
- FridayoLeary 1y ago
  Check out the BBC. I think it's part an unofficial mouthpiece of the foreign office and the most outstanding example in the world of how to push an agenda subtly through a combination of selective reporting, misrepresentation, false equivalances (an area where the BBC leads the world), combined with a very high quality editorial and reporting staff. But that recipe has an almost inherent left leaning stance. Oh also it's a punching bag for everyone and politicians love to bully it into submission, because it is subject to some level of state control. It's funded by forcing everyone to pay for a TV license.
  - malnourish 1y ago
    Interesting that you conclude with left leaning, when, as I understand it, the BBC is considered to lean right by many, too. I recall a number of journalists remanding BBC leadership over their alleged pro-Israel and right wing bias.
    - FridayoLeary 1y ago
      Is that satire? Like i said they're a punching bag for everyone.
  - pjc50 1y ago
    The BBC World Service is an official mouthpiece of the Foreign Office; it was (at least until recently) funded separately for that purpose, like Voice of America.
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Hilift 1y ago
> 90% of medias in France belongs to a few wealthy families that are friends with him. That isn't a problem if the electorate aren't easily influenced.
reliabilityguy 1y ago
What incentive does the French media (or any media for that matter) has to tell the truth? I do not want to be all about doom and gloom but I do not think that there is any media on this planet that delivers factual information without lying (either directly or by omission) to shape the opinion. And no, having a narrative is not lying as long as all the facts are presented, which allows the reader to make their own judgement whether they are buying into the narrative or not. Unfortunately, today journalists/editors believe that they have to report in a specific way as otherwise the “fight” would be lost.
lapadite2 1y ago
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ctrlp 1y ago
This is hopelessly naive. Heads of state should not be prosecuted in democracies. It sets a bad precedent and there is no easy way to apply the rule of law to the head of state. There are too many examples in history of abusive lawfare practices. Better not to nitpick about "crimes" in such cases and let the man disappear from the stage. Aggressive prosecutions only increase the likelihood he'll try to mount a political comeback.
- stenl 1y ago
  He was not head of state when the crime was committed and he is not head of state now.
  - ctrlp 1y ago
    That matters little. It's a category error. People say things like "no one is above the law" but that isn't true. Not because of corruption, but because of the nature of politics. Law is downstream from politics and therefore in a very real sense subservient to it. To apply the law to political figures can never be done in a clean or unambiguous way, since it will always support the suspicion of lawfare, which degrades confidence in the law for the rest of us. To preserve the law for the common stock, we can't use law against political figures without debasing the currency of law. It is also the case that trying to constrain political figures using the law is anti-democratic. If the will of the people can be overruled by the shrewd use of legal challenges then you have a juristocracy, not a democracy. The legal system can and will be abused when it is used politically. Not only is it a category error, it is undesireable. Let them fight it out in the special realm of politics and leave our legal systems alone so we can enjoy their benefits.
    - cjfd 1y ago
      This is not correct. Very many laws live much longer than the term of a politician. They are as much upstream to politics as downstream to it. A correct way of talking about this is as co-equal branches of government. Also 'politics' lumps together the executive and the legislative branch.
    - 1y ago
wubrr 1y ago
The fact that he is even going to jail, or that there was a trial at all, is amazing. In Canada, top-level corruption like this just gets covered up by RCMP (who are directly top-down controlled by PM) - many cases of this.
- brailsafe 1y ago
  One that I've noticed recently is that we had a housing "crisis" up until prices actually sort of started dropping, and now all the coverage is about the plight of condo developers. Thankfully we have the former mayor of the most expensive city in Canada as the housing minister, chosen over the MP for Beaches who actually seemed to give a damn.
  - wubrr 1y ago
    That's arguably negligence (though such blatant negligence is evidence of corruption), but there are corruption scandals involving straight up fraud and embezzlement of public funds by the top levels of government almost every year. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sustainable_Development_Technology_Canada https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sustainable_Development_Techno...
- karambahh 1y ago
  He has half a dozen court dates set for other stuff related to corruption/money/.... Assuming he's losing the appeal on this particular case, he will have been sentenced for scheming with a convicted murderer (Lockerbie amongst other things). If convicted, that person will be guilty of criminal actions together with a foreign dictator and his terrorist in chief. Not exactly stealing gums. The case is of particular seriousness and he's a convicted person, repeat offender. Would something as serious be put under the rug in other democracies? I'm not so sure. If Justin Trudeau is found accepting money from a bunch of Taliban involved in weapons trafficking, would the RCMP turn a blind eye? (Why do I say "if convicted"? He appealed, so he is innocent until proven guilty. Why is he in jail? In large parts because his political party lobbied for this type of sentences. Leopards did eat his face)
  - 1y ago
baby 1y ago
In the last years I've noticed a huge number of pro sarkozy videos with epic soundtracks and diverse appearances from the guy. He is clearly a good speaker, but also clearly incompetent and mostly a good actor. I also noticed how much they invited his son to talk about important topics when the guy is just... The son of sarkozy
- xorbax 1y ago
  Well is his kid a good speaker or a bore?
holoduke 1y ago
Most of western media is extremely biased and not different than Chinese media. Good luck finding a job as a journalist with controversial ideas. Only the selected minds are offered positions. Of course we in the west still have a choice to read from different sources, but 95% of the people are stuck with propaganda news outlets.
akkad33 1y ago
> Something really scary in France right now is I mean he's going to jail. If anything that's better than most countries. In India, a chief minister who instigated racial riots never even had to go to court for it and he even became the current de facto autocrate
VeejayRampay 1y ago
thanks for this post it should be repeated ad-nauseam that he is a crook, a shame for the country and its values and that the whole discourse about the injustice of the sentencing has heavy anti-liberal vibes
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cookiengineer 1y ago
The real question I have in my mind, observing this from Germany, is: How much dirt does Sarkozy have on these families that own the media/press? Was this a regime similar to Putin's role in the FSB when he collected all the dirt on oligarchs until everyone was controllable? The logical choice for a media agency would be to disassociate themselves from Sarkozy, not the other way round. There has to be something else at play here, and I'm assuming it's not financial control because Sarkozy's family should not have much influence left there, given that the Judicative rulings already are done.

oulipo2 1y ago

Exactly. Meanwhile 75% of French people agree that he should go to jail. This is nuts

wiz21c 1y ago
And then France will get Bardella... It's very very close now. And thanks to Trump we are now arming Europe. It doesn't go in the right direction.
- croisillon 1y ago
  that's the problem with first-pass-the-vote: 75% against him and scattered over 10 candidates, 25% for him will help him reach the second round

TacticalCoder 1y ago

That's not the issue. The issue is that there are hundreds, if not thousands, of french politicians who should be in jail. I don't disagree with him going to jail: but it's one heck of a corrupt country where they all have their hands in the cookie jar. Most french politicians who served at the EU, for example, have friends and family as "employees" on their payroll (well, on the EU citizens' payroll). Same at non-EU level: it's called "emplois fictifs" in french ("fictional jobs"). Soooo many stories about politicians at so many local, regional, national and supra-national levels engaging in "emplois fictifs". So many mayors in France have dirty money on their hands. Where for example they block construction permits then, once joyfully greased with cash, allow the construction permits. But Sarkozy was right-wing and the EU, and France in particular, is ultra left-wing. So it's good to put a right-wing president in jail. Once again: I've got nothing against him going to jail. But we're talking about a country were judges are openly leftists. They're not impartial. It's all rotten and disgusting. And why do you think all the leftist french mainstream media root for right-wing Sarkozy? Because these media are at the hand of corrupt politicians who think a politician going to jail is a dangerous precedent. They're nearly all corrupt, so they're shitting their pants to see that even a president is sent to jail. But yup: one politician in jail. Great. Only 9999 more to go. And corrupt judges.

ithkuil 1y ago
You have to start from somewhere
phtrivier 1y ago
> And why do you think all the leftist french mainstream media root for right-wing Sarkozy? Which are the "leftist french mainstream media" rooting for Sarkozy ? The "leftist french mainstream media" I can think of would be Libération, Le Monde, Le Nouvel Obs, France Inter... Do you have a link to articles where any of those are "defending" Sarkozy, cause quite frankly I missed it.
akudha 1y ago
corrupt politicians who think a politician going to jail is a dangerous precedent There is a reason why administrations don't go after obvious, in-your-face crimes committed by previous administrations/politicians. They all hate each other, but they are also terrified that if they prosecute previous administrations (for legitimate crimes), they'll be the target when someone else is in power (even if they themselves didn't commit any crimes). I suppose it might be easier to prevent misbehavior by highest officials of the land by having stricter scrutiny, laws etc than prosecuting them after the fact, but who watches the watchdogs? Who watches the judiciary? As an ordinary citizen, it is exhausting to just even follow the news. And if it is this bad in democracies, imagine how it is like in countries like Russia.
- Nextgrid 1y ago
  > even if they themselves didn't commit any crimes Does that still even exist? The problem I see in politics is that everyone has their hand in the cookie jar to some degree. You don't get into politics unless you already have your hand in there, or are given the option to prove yourself where moving up the ranks involves helping someone getting their hand in there, with the unspoken assumption that they'll return the favor. And of course once you're in and have your hand in there, why rock the boat and waste all that effort?
  - akudha 1y ago

someuser2345 1y ago

> Using a prepaid line opened with a fake name... Sorry, why is this such a big deal?

ben_w 1y ago
Committing a crime is bad, trying to cover up that you're committing a crime makes it obvious (as a generalisation) you knew you shouldn't have been doing the crime.

Aurornis 1y ago

> Since a few days, there is an abundance of cover and articles in most major newspaper here with propaganda and repeated lies supporting him. How much of this is driven by contrarian and counter-cyclical reporting? I’m not familiar with French media, but I see the same pattern in every country where I’ve kept up with the news: Media starts being favorable to a topic when it’s up and coming, switching to being highly critical when that topic becomes mainstream, then reverts again to exploring the positives when the topic falls out of favor. You see it even with people like Elizabeth Holmes. News stories about her fraud were everywhere until she had to go to jail, but now the news has swung to humanizing her, claiming her sentencing was excessive, focusing on the angle of a mother separated from her children, and confusingly ignoring her fraud at all. It’s all designed to be counter-narrative and rise waves of controversy. The more controversial, the more shares and views.

dijit 1y ago
I have a much less charitable view than you about Elizabeth Holmes. The fact that a new publicist was hired by her before all the sympathetic press started coming out is enough for me to believe that there's a link there and not a natural news swing cycle. https://www.theverge.com/news/611549/elizabeth-holmes-people-jailhouse-interview https://www.theverge.com/news/611549/elizabeth-holmes-people...
- orionsbelt 1y ago
  I don’t have a strong enough view here to have an opinion, but I think someone as rich as her always had a publicist, so to play devils advocate, it may be true that the press only played ball with the publicist after she was convicted.
  - mattnewton 1y ago
    Elizabeth Holmes had some very big fish as investors she ended up defrauding, so it’s possible the devil’s best advocates were busy advocating she go to jail before her sentence.
  - 1y ago

schmidtleonard 1y ago

What's crazy to me is seeing this happen at an individual level. In 2022, my conservative family members were reluctantly but firmly on board with the idea that Trump did the crimes: lied to the tax man, stole the classified documents, leaned on the Georgia secretary of state to "find me 11780 votes," and on Jan 6 set up fake electors and asked Pence to overturn the election. In each case, they gave a good fight, but as those who are familiar with these cases know, the evidence is overwhelming, almost comically so at points (the fake elector certifications are so poorly put together that they are tough not to laugh at, the recording of trump bragging about the classified documents and establishing intent belongs in a law school documentary). By 2024 they were 100% in lock-step with the party line that all cases were fake news lawfare (but wouldn't engage with detailed argument, of course) and in 2025 they are gaslighting me about ever having had those arguments at all. The only thing keeping me sane is the correspondence that I kept proving that our conversations weren't a product of my own fevered imagination.

adriand 1y ago
Man, that's a scary story. The Georgia thing especially is so easy to understand: just listen to the tape!
- schmidtleonard 1y ago
  That, and Mike Pence went on Fox News and said: > President Trump demanded that I use my authority as vice president presiding over the count of the Electoral College to essentially overturn the election by returning or literally rejecting votes.
- bnjms 1y ago
  I’m going to go find these recordings now. But do you, or anyone else, have a preferred location for this type of data? For example reddit is consistently an echo chamber in the reverse direction. Another example is any clips selected by cable news are doubted by republicans for intentional malicious framing. Which is fair enough since I’ve seen plenty of intentionally obtuse takes of things said which are already unacceptable.
1y ago

phtrivier 1y ago

I would disagree on the "most mainstream media". Clearly, all the right-wing papers that have traditionnaly supported him (Le Figaro, Match) and all the hard-right-wing papers (owned by Bolloré, Arnault, etc..) that have _personnal_ ties to him are playing their "opinion" part. I don't think public media is defending him at all. Left or Center-left papers are not (obviously.) The tie breaker would be: "what is TF1 20h saying" (this is, no matter what new media says, still the one thing that most people watch and treat as "the news") - and I don't think they have been "blatantly" defending him.

Foobar8568 1y ago
You forgot Bouygues (TF1) who was one of the witness at his wedding and godfather of one of his son.
- eastbound 1y ago
  Yes, TF1 is our right-wing news channel (non-populist), France 2 is our left-wing channel. So TF1 would widely support him.

jmkni 1y ago

Isn't that the case in pretty much every Country to a certain extent though?

morkalork 1y ago
Certainly in the anglosphere

Brendinooo 1y ago

I think that, at least from my American perspective, there are two uncomfortable truths about national political figures: 1. They are the voice of a group of millions of people, and therefore a perception will exist that an attack on the politician is an attack on those people as well 2. Sure seems like a lot of them are compromised in some way, so any time one is targeted it will always seem selective in the moment I don't know how much that intersects with what you're observing, and I don't really have easy answers.

candiddevmike 1y ago
Parasocial relationships via social media strikes again! You no longer need to start a cult, just get big enough on social media and have an army of "followers" (both in the literal and proverbial sense) that you can control and weaponize.

fred_is_fred 1y ago

This is exactly the same in the US. Perhaps all countries at this point.

scotty79 1y ago

Probably russian money is involved in this campaign of discord.

handelaar 1y ago
(Fellow readers: this is not kneejerk Russia-bashing but a reference to the recorded fact that Sarkozy has received at least hundreds of thousands of euro from Russian government-linked entities, apparently in exchange for favours.) For example: https://www.mediapart.fr/en/journal/international/110123/nicolas-sarkozy-his-praise-putin-and-trail-kremlin-money https://www.mediapart.fr/en/journal/international/110123/nic... https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/jan/15/france-investigates-sarkozy-over-contract-with-russian-insurer https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/jan/15/france-investi...
- aerostable_slug 1y ago
  That doesn't mean their intelligence services aren't also stoking various fires, some calling for more inquiries. Discord is to their benefit. A politician who is no longer able to exert influence going to prison isn't a big loss to them, in fact it's arguably a good outcome. They get to have had favors while Sarkozy was in office and an angry France now that's he's out.

MangoToupe 1y ago

> is that you can see really clearly how most mainstream media are used for propaganda. Was there ever a time or place where this was not true?

glenstein 1y ago
To greater or lesser degrees, and in different ways. Which is important because otherwise you can end up "agreeing" to the reality of the phenomenon even if you have an entirely different thing in mind. I might be thinking of, say, Hungary or Poland weaponizing the press and using it to destroy their own democratic institutions. Someone else might think it means saying global warming is real. In Hungary and Poland, they are specific, time-bound events with important institutional implications and unique factual circumstances. "It's always been that way" is risky because it can be used to airbrush away specific moral urgency with vagueness and false equivalences, and even functions to apologize for active advancements of authoritarianism as they are happening in real time.

epolanski 1y ago

I think propaganda is only obvious when it involves topics you follow or now intimately.

pessimizer 1y ago
This is untrue. What makes it seem true is that there are extremely bad or nonsensical arguments that some people will accept (often without examination) when they support their own predetermined (often by lifestyle) side, but they will be far more critical of any argument that supports the other side. They spot the bad arguments on the other side and call them out, but ignore the good ones because they cause stress. The best way to notice this in yourself (I think) is if there are arguments for the other side of an issue that you simply avoid discussion of altogether. When they are brought up, you attack the source, personally attack the person repeating them, or refuse the discussion on some other terms. This is reflexively doing propaganda, on a small scale, but as a reaction to being cornered. If you find yourself in this situation, resorting to repeating slogans you've heard rather than treating the argument exactly as you would treat an argument in an uncontroversial context, it's better to shut up, listen, and reflect. The only moral position is to be a collection of any valid argument you can find, always trying to clarify their degree of soundness. Whenever you deviate from that, you're defying reason, and weakening civil society (which relies on secular protocols.) If you consume propaganda with that mindset, you notice because it has very little useful content at all. It's astounding how long media can go on about a subject without saying anything, or making any coherent claim, and scary when you see people who seem to get something out of that avalanche and they can't quite explain how they got there. It's how Saddam did 9/11.
- epolanski 1y ago
  I don't get the whole point of your post. What I meant is that general media (either social or legacy) has often strong biases and narratives and at certain times it gets too much to the point of propaganda. But, if you're not very intimate in some topic, or have not been part of the events it's not that obvious. Few examples. 1. Almost a million people protested the war in Gaza few weeks ago here in Italy, in many cities, but if you turned on the tv (any channel really) or read the news this was skipped and instead the entirety of the focus was on few limited clashes with the entire narrative being built about how if you protest for Gaza you're automatically violent and antisemitic. Nonsense. 1.5 At an anti-Covid protest in Piazza San Giovanni, a place that comfortably holds half a million people, the place was ultra full, as packed as during concerts...But ask the police and the official numbers were below 10k. Ridiculous, it was at least 15 times as much. I wasn't part of the protests but lived nearby so I had a full account. 2. Around 15 years ago our main airline (Alitalia) was in terrible shape and Air France-KLM wanted to buy it out, pay the debts and retain most of the workforce. Non stop bombarding on every outlet about how we could not sell our main company, and that taxpayers would foot the bill. The bombarding went on with plenty of interviews of how Alitalia staff was in favor of this operation, but I had several friends working for the company and actually the opposite was true: most of them supported the merger rather than the bailout, but the propaganda did its best to silence these voices. Again, how would you know about those things if you were not intimately knowledgeable about the topics? I really don't have time to get knowledgeable and fact check or be part of every world, national and local event. Thus I'm not equipped with distinguishing a genuine fact based narrative from a biased one.

add-sub-mul-div 1y ago

If you think that's scary, imagine a country where the corrupt ex-president doesn't even go to jail at all.

FridayoLeary 1y ago
Imagine a country where every level of the judiciary and law enforcement is used to persecute a president, with cases so weak that they fall apart on their own, or are so obviously politicised it turns everyone against said systems, even if there is substance to the claims. But he still wins the popular vote, because he is so good and everyone else is so bad.
- stickfigure 1y ago
  Imagine a felon, convicted by a jury, claiming "the case was so weak it fell apart on its own".
  - nullc 1y ago
    A felon convicted of essentially same 'crime' his opponent in the prior election committed but was given a settlement and a fine instead. Hilary Clinton funded the creation of the Steele dossier-- which was later shown to be generally false and unsupported-- but paid for it through one of her law firms and misclassified it as legal expenses in an effort to conceal its origins. Trump was criminally charged with falsification of business records because he paid Stormy Daniels hush money (to get her to deny her earlier claim that they had an affair) via his lawyer, and classified it as legal expenses. A visible hush money payment would have made it ineffective, just at the Steele dossier being known to be a campaigned paid hit piece would have made it ineffective. There are plenty of things to ding Trump on, but I think if you're trying to persuade someone that the legal system wasn't weaponized unfairly against him this is a particularly poor example. Even an argument that the facts make him worse here (e.g. maybe you say concealing an accusation of an affair says more about his integrity than paying for a false report says about hers)-- wouldn't change that this is just not a good example. Particularly because there was nothing unlawful about the hush money payment itself-- the crime was an obscure accounting violation resulting from it... and in any other circumstance nothing would happen at all or at most, as seen with Clinton, a nominal fine would result. Sure, it's true that random details (like what state the acts in) will often decide if an act is technically illegal or not, but that's hardly an argument for the fairness of the justice system or that it was fairly applied to him. I don't even hope to convince you of this-- but only to convince you that your example is unlikely to convince others, and is easily exploited to wrongfully convince people opposite your intentions.

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h1fra 1y ago

As always, france is always just 5-10 years behind US craziness.

baby 1y ago
I think we won't get there because we are willing to put corrupted politicians in prison. The day Trump goes to prison I will change my mind on US politics.
FridayoLeary 1y ago
US is 5-10 years ahead of Europe. MAGA is coming to France and the UK unless things change. In the UK the Conservatives and Starmer have seen to it. There are literally 2 things people in the UK want to see and both parties are stubbornly ignoring it, while failing to enact any policies that can actually help people. Meanwhile Starmer is becoming more authoritarian by the day. Trump didn't happen in a vacuum, ignore your electorate for too long and eventually they will respond. The incredible successes of Trumps second term so far will encourage and empower populists everywhere.
- DFHippie 1y ago
  > The incredible successes of Trumps second term so far will encourage and empower populists everywhere. Successes? He's succeeded at consolidating power because his own party and his partisans on the Supreme Court allow it. Also, destroying stuff is easy. What are these successes of which you speak?
  - deleted 1y ago
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  - ben_w 1y ago
    I'm not sure how much populists differ from authoritarians, but for the latter "consolidating power" is the definition of success, all else is unimportant.
- selimthegrim 1y ago

lunias 1y ago

I don't think this problem is exclusive to France. I'm more interested in how the consumption and consideration of mainstream media is trending given its rampant bias. Clearly they think they can get away with it, I wonder if people are letting them.

tinfoilhatter 1y ago
It's definitely not a problem exclusive to France: https://swprs.org/the-american-empire-and-its-media/ https://swprs.org/the-american-empire-and-its-media/ Edit: Not sure why I'm getting downvoted for providing a link to a website and infographic shining light on the lack of independence in US media. That's HN for you.
bamboozled 1y ago
I cannot believe anyone actually watches “main stream media” at all?
- sandspar 1y ago
  >Does anyone watch mainstream media? Many people over 60 (i.e. the people who vote) watch nothing but.

almosthere 1y ago

Try being conservative in the United States. You have no idea.

duxup 1y ago

And yet he's in jail right? Not sure how much an impact what you describe is having. I see non optional and IMO skewed reporting all the time, I'm not sure it is all directed by someone.

lenkite 1y ago

Basically Libya would still have been an intact nation with college tuition and free health care if Gadaffi hadn't been so extraordinarily stupid to give money to Sarkozy - who later had him murdered and his nation destroyed via NATO to cover this fact up.

GeoAtreides 1y ago
Basically this article would still be expanded if Gadaffi was not deposed: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_rights_violations_during_the_Gaddafi_regime https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_rights_violations_during...
- lenkite 1y ago
  Frankly, that record looks far cleaner than most US Presidents.
  - GeoAtreides 1y ago
    That's a complete non-sequitur. Btw, I've seen chinese tankies and I've seen russian tankies. First time I see a gadaffian tankie.
    - lenkite 1y ago
      Maybe speak to some ex-Libyans then ? The security and economic stability compared to continuous civil war and chaos - which caused far more atrocities and deaths tends to change one's opinion on NATO sponsored regime change very fast. Millions of your so-called "gadaffi tankies" out there - just not much in the Western world. But keep thumping yourself on the chest. What do all the deaths and suffering matter ? The bad guy has been beheaded after all and the War stockholders got richer! Mission Accomplished!
      - GeoAtreides 1y ago
        I was born and raised in one of the most authoritarian regimes in Europe. I know what totalitarian regimes do, and I experienced the crushing poverty that followed the demise of such a regime. The crimes of the Gaddafi regime are one thing, the ensuing chaos is another. We celebrate the end of a brutal regime and we despair at the death and destruction that followed.

mattnewton 1y ago

Always has been, for those willing to pay for smart and unscrupulous people to manipulate the news. People must know this is what is happening but they are still seduced by the media. The brilliant Chicago press conference musical number comes to mind: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SBM82Ju2kJU https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SBM82Ju2kJU and the source material there was essentially the same techniques working to making murderers sympathetic, in 1924. At least in France he’ll serve a sentence- in the US we might have elected him again and let him make the charges go away.

tekbruh9000 1y ago

Something really scary is people believing what's printed or filed in court as fact without bearing witness. Faith based society is not just the domain of the religious. 1984 been the norm since well before Orwell wrote the book.

thatfrenchguy 1y ago

> But what you see in the end is that 90% of medias in France belongs to a few wealthy families that are friends with him. The only way the current wave of right-wing media ends if by finding a new way to fund media & making it impossible to concentrate in the ends of a few rich folks. And good luck with that, folks don't want to pay for media.

FridayoLeary 1y ago
Check out the BBC. I think it's part an unofficial mouthpiece of the foreign office and the most outstanding example in the world of how to push an agenda subtly through a combination of selective reporting, misrepresentation, false equivalances (an area where the BBC leads the world), combined with a very high quality editorial and reporting staff. But that recipe has an almost inherent left leaning stance. Oh also it's a punching bag for everyone and politicians love to bully it into submission, because it is subject to some level of state control. It's funded by forcing everyone to pay for a TV license.
- malnourish 1y ago
  Interesting that you conclude with left leaning, when, as I understand it, the BBC is considered to lean right by many, too. I recall a number of journalists remanding BBC leadership over their alleged pro-Israel and right wing bias.
  - FridayoLeary 1y ago
    Is that satire? Like i said they're a punching bag for everyone.
- pjc50 1y ago
  The BBC World Service is an official mouthpiece of the Foreign Office; it was (at least until recently) funded separately for that purpose, like Voice of America.

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Hilift 1y ago

> 90% of medias in France belongs to a few wealthy families that are friends with him. That isn't a problem if the electorate aren't easily influenced.

reliabilityguy 1y ago

What incentive does the French media (or any media for that matter) has to tell the truth? I do not want to be all about doom and gloom but I do not think that there is any media on this planet that delivers factual information without lying (either directly or by omission) to shape the opinion. And no, having a narrative is not lying as long as all the facts are presented, which allows the reader to make their own judgement whether they are buying into the narrative or not. Unfortunately, today journalists/editors believe that they have to report in a specific way as otherwise the “fight” would be lost.

lapadite2 1y ago

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ctrlp 1y ago

This is hopelessly naive. Heads of state should not be prosecuted in democracies. It sets a bad precedent and there is no easy way to apply the rule of law to the head of state. There are too many examples in history of abusive lawfare practices. Better not to nitpick about "crimes" in such cases and let the man disappear from the stage. Aggressive prosecutions only increase the likelihood he'll try to mount a political comeback.

stenl 1y ago
He was not head of state when the crime was committed and he is not head of state now.
- ctrlp 1y ago
  That matters little. It's a category error. People say things like "no one is above the law" but that isn't true. Not because of corruption, but because of the nature of politics. Law is downstream from politics and therefore in a very real sense subservient to it. To apply the law to political figures can never be done in a clean or unambiguous way, since it will always support the suspicion of lawfare, which degrades confidence in the law for the rest of us. To preserve the law for the common stock, we can't use law against political figures without debasing the currency of law. It is also the case that trying to constrain political figures using the law is anti-democratic. If the will of the people can be overruled by the shrewd use of legal challenges then you have a juristocracy, not a democracy. The legal system can and will be abused when it is used politically. Not only is it a category error, it is undesireable. Let them fight it out in the special realm of politics and leave our legal systems alone so we can enjoy their benefits.
  - cjfd 1y ago
    This is not correct. Very many laws live much longer than the term of a politician. They are as much upstream to politics as downstream to it. A correct way of talking about this is as co-equal branches of government. Also 'politics' lumps together the executive and the legislative branch.
  - 1y ago

wubrr 1y ago

The fact that he is even going to jail, or that there was a trial at all, is amazing. In Canada, top-level corruption like this just gets covered up by RCMP (who are directly top-down controlled by PM) - many cases of this.

brailsafe 1y ago
One that I've noticed recently is that we had a housing "crisis" up until prices actually sort of started dropping, and now all the coverage is about the plight of condo developers. Thankfully we have the former mayor of the most expensive city in Canada as the housing minister, chosen over the MP for Beaches who actually seemed to give a damn.
- wubrr 1y ago
  That's arguably negligence (though such blatant negligence is evidence of corruption), but there are corruption scandals involving straight up fraud and embezzlement of public funds by the top levels of government almost every year. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sustainable_Development_Technology_Canada https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sustainable_Development_Techno...
karambahh 1y ago
He has half a dozen court dates set for other stuff related to corruption/money/.... Assuming he's losing the appeal on this particular case, he will have been sentenced for scheming with a convicted murderer (Lockerbie amongst other things). If convicted, that person will be guilty of criminal actions together with a foreign dictator and his terrorist in chief. Not exactly stealing gums. The case is of particular seriousness and he's a convicted person, repeat offender. Would something as serious be put under the rug in other democracies? I'm not so sure. If Justin Trudeau is found accepting money from a bunch of Taliban involved in weapons trafficking, would the RCMP turn a blind eye? (Why do I say "if convicted"? He appealed, so he is innocent until proven guilty. Why is he in jail? In large parts because his political party lobbied for this type of sentences. Leopards did eat his face)
- 1y ago

baby 1y ago

In the last years I've noticed a huge number of pro sarkozy videos with epic soundtracks and diverse appearances from the guy. He is clearly a good speaker, but also clearly incompetent and mostly a good actor. I also noticed how much they invited his son to talk about important topics when the guy is just... The son of sarkozy

xorbax 1y ago
Well is his kid a good speaker or a bore?

holoduke 1y ago

Most of western media is extremely biased and not different than Chinese media. Good luck finding a job as a journalist with controversial ideas. Only the selected minds are offered positions. Of course we in the west still have a choice to read from different sources, but 95% of the people are stuck with propaganda news outlets.

akkad33 1y ago

> Something really scary in France right now is I mean he's going to jail. If anything that's better than most countries. In India, a chief minister who instigated racial riots never even had to go to court for it and he even became the current de facto autocrate

VeejayRampay 1y ago

thanks for this post it should be repeated ad-nauseam that he is a crook, a shame for the country and its values and that the whole discourse about the injustice of the sentencing has heavy anti-liberal vibes

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cookiengineer 1y ago

The real question I have in my mind, observing this from Germany, is: How much dirt does Sarkozy have on these families that own the media/press? Was this a regime similar to Putin's role in the FSB when he collected all the dirt on oligarchs until everyone was controllable? The logical choice for a media agency would be to disassociate themselves from Sarkozy, not the other way round. There has to be something else at play here, and I'm assuming it's not financial control because Sarkozy's family should not have much influence left there, given that the Judicative rulings already are done.