A few days ago [5]it was that other great egaliatarian president, Barack Obama, who urged Americans to tear free from the shackles of cynicism and to unleash some more of that hopium that got Obama elected in the first place. Now it is the turn of that other just as impressive socialist, France's own Francois Hollande, who just like Obama has seen his popularity rating crumble to unprecedented levels, come up with his own prescription for how to fix the troubles that ail France. In short: "less lamenting and disparaging, more confidence."
From Reuters [6]:
In the television interview to mark Bastille Day, when a crowd stormed a Paris prison on July 14, 1789, at the outset of the French Revolution, Hollande said his compatriots were more inclined than some others to put their country down.
"We are very proud but, at the same time, I would say there is a sort of sickness, which is not serious but which can be contagious, whereby we are always lamenting and disparaging," he said.
"Speak well of your country because, when I'm abroad, people do speak well of France, of what it's doing in the international arena, in the diplomatic sphere, on defense, the operations we have carried out for peace, but also innovation, companies."
The president also cited entrepreneurs, major companies with significant exports, the tourist industry and agriculture.
"We have to fight but, most importantly, we have to have confidence in ourselves," he said.
Bottom line: watch your president and government lie every day while pandering and preaching, working solely on behalf of the rich, while you rot away in your part-time jobs or worse, unemployed, surviving day to day on the measly pittance the government hands you to make you a docile little handout addicted serf, and at the end of the day, whatever you do, don't become a jaded, cynical lamenter and disparager, but have "hope and confidence." Truly the road to socialist utopia is paved with best intentions.
