Très discret depuis sa défaite au second tour des dernières élections présidentielles, Nicolas Sarkozy fait son retour médiatique ce matin dans des propos cités par Valeurs actuelles qui font le buzz.

La première intervention de Nicolas Sarkozy dans le débat public depuis sa sortie sur la Syrie en août dernier, fait beaucoup parler.

Selon des propos cités par l’hebdomadaire de droite Valeurs actuelles, l’ancien chef de l’état ne souhaiterait pas revenir en politique mais pourrait être « obligé d’y aller » pour « la France », en raison de l’état du pays. « Il y aura malheureusement un moment où la question ne sera plus : ‘avez-vous envie ?’ mais ‘aurez-vous le choix ?’ (…) Dans ce cas, je ne pourrai pas continuer à me dire : je suis heureux, j’emmène ma fille à l’école, et je fais des conférences partout dans le monde. Dans ce cas, effectivement, je serai obligé d’y aller. Pas par envie. Par devoir. Uniquement parce qu’il s’agit de la France », aurait déclaré le prédécesseur de François Hollande. Des propos à nuancer toutefois car Nicolas Sarkozy estime parallèlement qu’il « pas envie d’avoir à faire au monde politique qui (lui) procure un ennui mortel ».
« Et puis, regardez comment j’ai été traité, ajoute-t-il. Lorsqu’on m’a convoqué pour treize heures d’interrogatoires, à propos de l’affaire Bettencourt (…) Sans compter la manière dont ils ont traité ma femme. Interdite de chanter pendant cinq ans », assure-t-il.

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Battu par 1 131 067 voix lors de la dernière élection présidentielle, Nicolas Sarkozy, 58 ans, ne se dit pas animé par un sentiment de revanche. «Quelle revanche ce serait ? Pour reprendre la France dans l’état où les socialistes la laisseront. Tu crois que je ne sais pas que je vais mourir ? Donc franchement est-ce que j’ai envie de revenir ? Non”.

La compagnie Alnoor Holding basée au Qatar a annoncé mardi que le budget pour un film en sept volets sur la vie du prophète de l’islam Mahomet s’élevait désormais à un milliard de dollars, contre 1,5 million de dollars annoncé en 2009.

Au Qatar, on a les poches pleines de (pétro)dollars, et on ne s’intéresse pas qu’au football. Le cinéma aussi. Témoin l’annonce par la compagnie Alnoor Holding, qui annonce que le budget pour un film en sept volets sur la vie du prophète de l’islam Mahomet s’élève désormais à un milliard de dollars, contre 1,5 million de dollars annoncé en 2009; Vu la différence des budgets, on peine à croire que la première était sérieuse.

 

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Le personnage de Mahomet n’apparaîtra cependant pas dans le film, en respect pour les traditions islamiques qui interdisent la représentation des prophètes. Historiquement, il faut le dire, il n’en a pas toujours été ainsi, puisque de nombreuses oeuvres depuis le XIIIe siècle mettaient en scène Mahomet. Cette production comprendra “sept volets au lieu des trois précédemment annoncés avec un budget total d’un milliard de dollars (755 millions d’euros)“, a déclaré le président d’Alnoor, Ahmed Al-Hachémi, dans un communiqué reçu par l’AFP.

 

Alnoor avait annoncé en 2009 qu’elle réunissait des fonds pour une épopée produite par Barrie Osborne, un producteur d’Hollywood connu notamment pour Le Seigneur des anneaux et Matrix. L’influent théologien qatari d’origine égyptienne cheikh Youssef al-Qaradaoui, dont les émissions sur la chaîne de télévision qatarie Al-Jazeera sont très suivies dans le monde musulman, sera consultant technique du projet. Alnoor a indiqué que le film serait en anglais et traduit dans d’autres langues, “pour corriger la mauvaise image que les sociétés occidentales ont de l’islam”. Une référence implicite au brûlot L’innocence des musulmans, qui dépeignait Mahomet comme un voyou aux pratiques déviantes, qui a provoqué des réactions parfois meurtrières dans les pays musulmans.

 

Reste qu’un bon film a déjà été réalisé sur le sujet, en 1976 : Le Message, avec Anthony Quinn et Irène Papas, sur une musique de Maurice Jarre. Le coffret DVD du film propose d’ailleurs deux montages : la version internationale, de 2h51; et une version arabe, d’une durée de 3h18.

 

OP

Leur petite North ne fera pas la couverture des magazines (pour l’instant). Kim Kardashian et Kanye West viennent de refuser un gros deal de 3 millions de dollars avec un tabloïd australien pour la publication de quelques photos privées. Depuis la naissance de leur premier enfant, les Kimye s’essayent à la vie tranquille et commencent à y prendre goût.

C’est une tradition à Hollywood pour les stars qui viennent d’avoir un enfant. En couverture d’un grand hebdomadaire, les couples heureux ne boudent pas leur bonheur et dévoilent les premières photos de leur progéniture moyennant une grande quantité de billets verts. Et si Angelina Jolie et Brad Pitt ou Jennifer Lopez et Marc Anthony s’étaient déjà pris au jeu, Kim Kardashian et Kanye West, eux, n’ont pas l’intention de faire la une de sitôt. Parents d’une petite North West depuis quelques semaines, les amoureux gardent leur vie privée pour eux (pour une fois).

Ainsi, ils viennent de refuser la proposition intéressante d’un magazine australien pour dévoiler au monde le joli minois de leur fille. Le contrat prévoyait une coquette somme de 3 millions de dollars. Une bouchée de pain, quand on sait ce que dépensent les Kimye pour leur nouveau-né. Mais le nerf de la guerre n’est pas l’argent pour ces deux-là. Depuis l’annonce de sa grossesse, Kim se débrouille pour ne plus être au coeur des polémiques. Alors qu’elle est fraîchement divorcée de Kris Humphries, son nouveau chéri le rappeur Kanye West veille à lui refaire une réputation. Devenue mère de famille à 32 ans, Kim a décidé (de gré ou de force) de lever le pied côté ragots. De fait, son bébé ne sera pas la star de son reality show. Avec son Incroyable famille, le message est clair. « North n’est pas l’enfant de l’Amérique » et grandira sans flashes.

Une discipline de vie qui rappelle étrangement celui d’une autre fillette de star, la petite Blue Ivy Carter. Premier miracle du couple Jay-Z/Beyoncé, cette dernière a grandi un an durant dans les bras de maman sans montrer le bout de son nez. Ce n’est qu’au terme de sa première année que sa superstar de mère a décidé de la montrer. Documentaire oblige, la chanteuse de Crazy in Love avait partagé un moment de tendresse avec ses fans, en début d’année, face aux caméras expertes de la chaîne HBO.

Pour le début de leur vie de famille, Kanye West et Kim Kardashian auraient décidé de s’inspirer du couple modèle. Ainsi, le rappeur ne quitte plus la maison et ne parle plus que de sa princesse. Même chose du côté de la bimbo. Depuis sa sortie de l’hôpital, elle coule des jours paisibles auprès de sa mère et de ses soeurs. La maternité l’aurait-elle changée pour de bon? Avant d’en être sûr, mieux vaut attendre que People magazine fasse monter les enchères pour obtenir le portrait de famille tant attendu.

Remise du prix de la fondation Danielle Mitterrand, mise en lumière de la situation des femmes violées en RDC, focus sur l’association ELA : la compagne de François Hollande s’engage sur divers fronts humanitaires.

Elle le confie parfois, sa fonction de première dame l’a ouverte aux autres. Valérie Trierweiler a donc décidé de se concentrer sur des missions humanitaires. « Si je peux être utile, c’est volontiers », répète-t-elle souvent. Elle s’est ainsi récemment engagée pour l’association ELA, qui se bat pour aider les enfants atteints de leucodystrophie. Le 21 novembre, le professeur Denis Mukwege, lauréat du prix de la fondation Chirac pour la prévention des conflits, la remerciait chaleureusement sur la scène de l’amphithéâtre du musée du Quai Branly pour avoir mis en lumière la situation des victimes de viols en RDC. « Madame, vous êtes venue partager votre repas avec ces femmes. Vous êtes la meilleure ambassadrice des femmes de l’Est du Congo. » N’avait-elle pas évoqué devant l’ONU, à New-York, les sévices subis par ces dernières quelques semaines auparavant ? « Lorsque l’on est journaliste, on s’intéresse aux autres, mais on n’aide pas les autres. Peut-être qu’un jour je travaillerai dans l’humanitaire », confiait-elle, fin octobre, en marge d’un déplacement à Angers dans l’école de son enfance. La première dame doit remettre le Prix de la fondation Danielle Mitterrand, France libertés, au lauréat 2013, cet après-midi à la Comédie des Champs-Elysées. Alors que les commentateurs s’interrogent sur le cap emprunté par le président de la République, sa compagne semble, elle, avoir trouvé sa voie.

When Ann Mettler started work as a top policy adviser to the European Commission president, one of the first things she said to colleagues had echoes of Ronald Reagan’s famous words to Mikhail Gorbachev: “Tear down these walls.”

Mettler was referring to the office layout on the 12th floor of the Berlaymont, where she took over as head of the Commission’s in-house think tank, the European Political Strategy Centre, last December. She might have been talking about the way that thinking is done in the EU’s executive body.

“Everyone sat in their own offices with the doors closed,” Mettler said in an interview. “That’s not how you work a think tank. A lot of think-tanking is tearing down intellectual walls and opening minds to new ideas.”

Her staff now sits in a communal office space.

Rearranging the desks was not the only way Mettler hoped to shake up the Commission. The new Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker gave her a broad mandate. As one top official put it, “Juncker deliberately picked Ann to upset the ecosystem.”

Ecosystem disruption is not the normal way of doing things in the European Commission, an institution known for the glacial pace of its bureaucracy and an aversion to political provocation. This appointment was a statement of intent from Juncker, who was not only bringing the in-house think tank back to prominence after years of neglect but doing so with an outspoken outsider at the helm.

The Commission, so the thinking went, would have a powerful, German-speaking trio at the top: Juncker, his chief of staff Martin Selmayr, and Mettler.

A year later, things haven’t worked out as expected for this Commission or Juncker’s hand-picked disruptor. The agenda that Juncker ran on for his job last year — cut regulatory red tape, boost transparency, and spur growth and competitiveness — has been overshadowed, if not outright sidelined, by the Greek and migration crises. And the woman so closely identified with that agenda, someone who spent a decade pushing to change Brussels, is finding out first-hand how hard it is to do that.

The questions on many peoples’ lips are: What exactly do Ann Mettler and her team do, and does anyone care?

Insider’s outsider

The statuesque blonde is one of a select group of five directors-general, out of 37 in all, who report directly to Juncker. In person, Mettler retains the aura of a newcomer to the Commission who came over from the Lisbon Council, a think tank she co-founded in 2003 with her husband Paul Hofheinz, a Texas-born journalist.

At the Lisbon Council, Mettler gained a reputation for needling the Commission. She regularly knocked on Selmayr’s door — he was then working for combative former commissioner Viviane Reding — to criticize the institution for being outdated and old-fashioned, according to a Commission source.

Mettler, who is 44, was born in Malmö to a Swedish mother and a German father. She speaks English with a slight American twang, an echo of her time at the University of New Mexico, where she got a master’s degree in Latin American studies. She worked for a few years on Capitol Hill in Washington, before moving back to Europe — first to Bonn and then to the World Economic Forum in Geneva where she was the director for Europe.

After three years at the WEF, Mettler came to Brussels to start the Lisbon Council.

Her proposal for a reorganized Commission caught Juncker’s eye, according to an aide.

In her final report for the think tank last year, Mettler proposed an organizational structure similar to the one Juncker put in place when he took office: with powerful vice presidents overseeing the work of “ordinary” commissioners.

Aides say that Mettler ticked several boxes of what Juncker wanted in a top policy adviser. She is a committed European who speaks five languages. Her appointment helped Juncker meet his promise to put more women in senior roles. She is also not afraid of being confrontational.

“[Juncker] said, ‘You’re telling me things that I don’t like to hear, which is good,’” said a Commission source, adding that Juncker urged Mettler to present “disruptive ideas.”

Who’s afraid of Ann Mettler?

The Commission’s in-house think tank dates back to the late 1980s, when Jacques Delors was president. According to an aide, Juncker sought Delors’ advice before appointing Mettler.

The Bureau of European Policy Advisors, as it was known until Juncker came along, was supposed to cultivate and push ideas. But by the end of the previous president José Manuel Barroso’s second term, BEPA had little influence, with a staff that was overwhelmingly Portuguese, the same nationality as Barroso. One senior official described it as “chaotic and amateurish.”

“The old BEPA was unofficially the old bureau of ‘Pals of Barroso’,” a Commission source said.

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Juncker’s decision to revamp the think tank generated a lot of excitement in the Commission. According to one official familiar with the process, there were thousands of applications for positions in it.

Among those shortlisted for the top job were Andrew Duff, former MEP and president of the Union of European Federalists; and two former commissioners: Meglena Kuneva and László Andor.

By taking the unusual step of going outside national government or EU institutions, Juncker turned heads inside the Commission, many with resentment and apprehension over the arrival of an outspoken and independent woman with some bold ideas.

In her first months, Mettler focused on reorganizing her new shop. At Juncker’s insistence, Mettler asked every member of her staff to reapply for their job. Only BEPA deputy head Maria Benitez Salas survived the purge, because Mettler saw her as useful in navigating the Commission’s complex administration.

Among the new hires were a chief economist at credit ratings agency Moody’s, an economic advisor to the president of Ireland, and analysts from other think tanks. She also took on senior Commission staffers leaving other departments: Robert Madelin, Claus Sorensen and Karl Falkenberg, all big names in the Commission, now work as EPSC policy advisers.

Policy impacts

After all the fanfare and extensive house cleaning, Mettler was expected to have a heavy hand in shaping Commission policy. She has, however, faced barriers to success. Some of these are seen as of her own making, especially a pledge to stay in the post only for the duration of the Juncker Commission.

“She’s like a Washington player in that she has to be hyperactive because she’s giving herself limited time, but she might find that it’s quite difficult,” one senior official said.

There are also grumblings among the old Commission guard about the difficulty of getting meetings with the EPSC boss, while some say that her preference for outsiders like her for top staff jobs isn’t the best way to quickly put her stamp on the place.

“You can’t expect to exercise influence when you bring in all new people,” an EU official said. “You have to work with and against the grain. She should have gone on a shopping expedition to get the best and brightest already in the Commission as well as some new blood.”

Besides her deputy Salas, a BEPA layover, Mettler’s managed to poach some talent from within the Berlaymont like Georg Riekeles, a member of former Commissioner Michel Barnier’s cabinet and Vincent Stuer, a speechwriter for Barroso.

“I’ve seen her play across the political spectrum from the outside — but can you continue to do that when you’re from the outside?” asked Nick Davis, a former colleague at the World Economic Forum.

The most visible aspect of her work is the EPSC’s policy briefs, which this Commission has made public for the first time. Juncker gives Mettler a different theme to work on every two to three weeks. Her team has produced five papers on issues such as legal migration, eurozone reform, tax policy coordination and most recently a reassessment of the Europe 2020 strategy for achieving “smart, sustainable and inclusive” economic growth.

None of the policy prescriptions offered by the EPSC have been embraced visibly by the Juncker Commission. Officials say some of the think tank’s thinking made it into a report published in June by the so-called “five presidents” — Juncker, Donald Tusk, Martin Schulz, Jeroen Dijsselbloem and Mario Draghi — on strengthening the EU’s economic union.

As with any advisor to a senior politician, Mettler’s work is hidden from most eyes. The Commission doesn’t promote EPSC publications beyond posting them on a website and emailing them internally. One aide in the finance department admitted that Mettler’s economic and monetary union paper, sent out in June, was still sitting in his inbox, unread.

The EPSC will launch its Twitter account in the next few weeks, which will lead a few more eyeballs to the papers.

Other technocrats say it’s not realistic to expect Mettler to have much of an effect when most decisions are taken in national capitals. “No one listens to a think tank in the Commission,” said an economic analyst at the Commission who was not authorized to speak to the media and asked for anonymity. “There’s too much red tape. The member states dictate everything, it’s too political.”

Since think-tanking is not policy making, it’s difficult to judge impact. Mettler said she was proud to see members of the Bundestag and German press reference her “Defence Strategic Note” — proof that her papers were getting noticed in the capitals.

Mettler admitted that she doesn’t expect her papers to cause a revolution. She wasn’t able to point to any policy impact, and said that isn’t her goal or measure of success. In the interview, she said that she aimed for realistic proposals that will lead to the evolution of policy. Her goal has been to inspire a staid institution of technocrats to be more forward looking.

“I don’t think you can expect EPSC to write a paper that will become legislation,” she said. “I think much of the impact will be seen over time. I think what we bring to the table is also a new way of working, a new way of bringing people together. It’s not just written outputs, it’s how you do things.”

Others say the EPSC offers a window into Juncker’s world. If Mettler is writing it, they say, Juncker must be thinking it. And to her defenders, if he’s not acting on it, the fault lies with him, not her.

Dieselgate committee fails launch test

Center-right group says it won’t put pressure on Europe’s car industry.

Fighting between political parties over the running of the parliamentary committee set up to look into the European Commission’s role in the Volkswagen emissions scandal threatens to turn it into a lame duck before it even holds its first meeting.

A high-ranking MEP from the European Parliament’s largest political group, the center-right European People’s Party (EPP), has said his members will not allow the committee of inquiry to put Europe’s car industry under pressure.

“As politicians in the European Union, it would be stupid to attack our most successful technology — that is, diesel technology,” the MEP said, adding he did not want the committee to become a “Dieselgate” inquiry.

“We should not do the job of other [MEPs], who have other interests — [they want] to damage this technology,” the EPP MEP said.

The comments have raised the prospect that the 12-month super-inquiry, announced last month, will be toothless, in spite of having powers that go far beyond those of standard parliamentary committees.

They also suggest that the EPP, which had voted against setting up the committee, will now order its MEPs to pull their punches in order to give the car industry an easy ride through the committee.

The European Parliament tasked the 45-member committee of inquiry with investigating European carmakers’ breaches of EU rules on emissions, as well as possible failures on the part of EU member countries and the European Commission to enforce EU standards.

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The committee, known by the acronym EMIS, had been scheduled to hold its first meeting earlier this month, but after several delays it now appears to have been postponed until the morning of March 2.

All the parliamentary parties have been able to agree on so far is who should chair the first meeting, French center-right MEP Françoise Grossetête, who will then oversee the appointment of the committee’s key positions.

The committee was established after the discovery that Volkswagen had used software to cheat on carbon emission tests. It is the first committee of inquiry since 2006.

Unlike so-called “special committees,” such as the TAXE committee looking into the “Luxleaks” affair, committees of inquiry have strong powers similar to a national court.

The EPP’s comments have angered members of the Socialists and Democrats (S&D), Parliament’s second largest political group, which is currently fighting the EPP tooth and nail for the committee’s three key positions — a clash which has delayed the committee’s first meeting.

Insiders say the EPP is claiming both the position of committee chair and at least one of the two key rapporteur positions which are on offer — something the S&D is fighting. The front-runners for the top job are Kathleen Van Brempt, for the S&D, and Krišjānis Kariņš, for the EPP.

“The EPP claims that there are rules, that they are entitled to claim the chair — but there are no such rules,” said Ismail Ertug, a German MEP who is coordinating the S&D’s work on the committee.

“If you take the TAXE committee into account, the chair there was given to the EPP,” Ertug said. “It is hard to understand why any new committee should be automatically handed over to the largest parliamentary group as well.”

Negotiations between the two groups will continue until next week, sources say.

Tajani’s shadow

The EPP’s determination to ensure that the committee steer clear of the broader “Dieselgate” scandal has led those working on the case within the S&D to question whether the center-right wants to shield one of its own MEPs, Antonio Tajani.

Tajani, who was European commissioner for industry between 2009 and 2014, oversaw the Commission’s interactions with the car industry, before rejoining Parliament ahead of the 2014 European elections.

“That’s absurd — I don’t need protection from anything or anyone,” Tajani told POLITICO. “If anything, I am the one who could attack.”

Tajani, who is a vice president of Parliament, said that he has been able to prove that he responded responsibly to early signs of trouble and was, at the time, open with MEPs about what was going on. “If I am called to testify [before the committee] I will have no problem,” he said.

Tajani, who is not a member of the committee of inquiry, is widely viewed as a possible successor to Martin Schulz as president of the European Parliament, and is a leading EPP figure.

Meanwhile, the S&D says it has no intention of using the committee as a stick with which to beat the European car industry or undermine diesel technology. “For us, it is not a committee to use against any specific manufacturer, but to investigate whether the rules were enforced properly,” said Ertug.

“The EPP is right when it says that the legal system is already investigating what happened,” Ertug said. “What we need to do is find out whether there was a failure on the governance side.”

Commission’s 2016 strategy: Stay the course

Timmermans unveils the institutions priorities for the next year.

STRASBOURG — More of the same. That was the message from the European Commission on Tuesday as it made public its priorities for the year ahead.

Frans Timmermans, the powerful first vice president, unveiled the Commission’s 2016 work program titled “No time for business as usual,” even though it focuses on many of the same topics as a year ago.

The contrast with last year was stark. Back then, in a show of strength for the 2015 plan, the entire college of commissioners decamped to Strasbourg to hear Timmermans and Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker announce a slimmed-down legislative proposal to a roomful of MEPs. This time, Timmermans stood alone and fewer than 30 MEPs — out of 751 — showed up.

Where 2015 was a statement of intent from Juncker, who was determined to show his Commission would be leaner and meaner than his predecessor, with a slimmed-down program and a host of proposals thrown on the scrapheap, 2016 was low-key.

“One year ago this Commission made a new start, committing to focus on the big things where citizens expect the EU to make a difference,” Timmermans said. “Today we are taking the next steps to deliver on these political priorities.”

Those priorities are: tackling the migration crisis; jobs, growth and investment, with a special focus on small business; the energy union and environmental sustainability; employment and social affairs and a fair taxation system.

There will be 23 legislative initiatives in total, most of them falling within the five major subject areas. On migration, the Commission’s plans include a European coast guard system and a new approach to the Dublin III regulation, under which asylum must be claimed in the member country through which a migrant entered the EU.

Other new ideas include the promotion of a better work-life balance — perhaps to appease those disappointed at the dropping in April of a planned shake-up of maternity leave rules — new rules on corporate taxation, and a proposal on labor mobility.

“Free movement should never be considered as social dumping,” Timmermans said.

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The 2015 work program was a shock for many MEPs, who objected to a “kill list” of 80 items. MEPs were particularly incensed by the decision to withdraw proposals on waste and air quality. Later, the reduction in proposals led some MEPs to claim that they were bored.

That is unlikely to be the case this year, with just 20 pending plans to be dropped or rethought, and 40 will face the REFIT test — Commission-speak for re-evaluating plans to see if they are still relevant.

“The Commission decided to take us seriously. It is ready to work,” said Philippe Lamberts, co-leader of the Green group. “But so far only the American Chamber of Commerce and business are applauding Timmerman’s proposals. It says something.”

Documentary filmmaker and left-wing activist Michael Moore claimed without evidence that President Donald Trump is lying about his health, suggesting that the president’s recent visit to Walter Reed hospital wasn’t for a routine check-up as stated by White House officials.

Michael Moore made his claims shortly before President Trump appeared at a cabinet meeting Tuesday at the White House, where the commander in chief called members of the press “sick” and “dangerous” for implying that he had suffered a heart attack.

White House Press Secretary Stephanie Grisham said in a statement Sunday that President Trump took advantage of a free weekend to begin portions of his routine annual physical exam at Walter Reed.

Grisham also appeared on Fox News over the weekend and told Judge Jeanine Pirro that President Trump’s visit to Walter Reed was “routine” and that the president was “doing just fine.”

The Bowling for Columbine director expressed his incredulity early Tuesday morning, saying on Twitter that no one in the White House press corps had seen President Trump since Saturday when the commander in chief made an unannounced visit to the Washington, D.C. hospital.

Moore also accused the White House of lying about President Trump’s health.

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At Tuesday’s cabinet meeting, President Trump said he went to Walter Reed for a “very routine physical” and visited a few members of the military who were being treated there.

President Trump then blasted the mainstream news media, including CNN, for speculating if he had experienced massive chest pains.

“We don’t have freedom of the press in this country, we have the opposite, we have a very corrupt media and I hope they can get their act straightened out because it’s very, very bad and very dangerous to this country,” Trump said.

President Trump’s military physician issued a statement Monday denying the rumors being spread by some news outlets.

“Despite some of the speculation, the President has not had any chest pain, nor was he evaluated or treated for any urgent or acute issues,” Physician to the President Navy Cdr. Sean Conley wrote in a letter.

Moore has used his Twitter account to repeatedly lash out at President Trump and his supporters. He has also become a quasi-regular pundit on left-wing cable news channels.

Last month, the Oscar-winning filmmaker appeared on MSNBC where he claimed that white working class Americans voted for President Trump because they are afraid of losing power due to the country’s changing demographics.

With reporting by Charlie Spiering.

Follow David Ng on Twitter @HeyItsDavidNg. Have a tip? Contact me at [email protected]

Europe takes on Wall Street

The Capital Markets Union is the EU’s most ambitious financial initiative since the launch of the euro in 1999.

The European Commission on Wednesday unveiled what is arguably its most ambitious financial project since the birth of the euro: a plan to create a single capital market across 28 states to boost growth and challenge the U.S. as a center for investment.

The proposal to create a Capital Markets Union by 2019 aims to give European companies access to funding from sources other than their own national banks or money markets — making them more like their American competitors who draw on vast equity and bond markets for capital.

The global financial crisis and its repercussions in the EU have made financial institutions more cautious about lending, stifling economic growth. The Capital Markets Union — the flagship financial project of Jean-Claude Juncker’s Commission — is designed to make Europe more resilient to financial shocks and bank failures. It follows months of consultations with the financial industry.

The Capital Markets Union will be “a central part of the Commission’s overall effort to encourage jobs and growth,” said the EU financial services chief Jonathan Hill, presenting the plan in Brussels at midday Wednesday.

At the moment, although the European economy is roughly the same size as America’s, U.S. capital markets dwarf their EU peers. The U.S. venture capital market is five times larger than Europe’s and U.S. equity markets are approximately twice the size of their EU peers in terms of capitalization.

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“We have 28 member states and legislations — and few more languages, if you want to compare us with the American situation — but it doesn’t mean that you cannot create a European market for venture capital financing,” the Commission vice-president in charge of jobs and growth, Jyrki Katainen, told POLITICO in a joint interview with Hill following the launch Wednesday.

“If you create a harmonized market someone will start using it, and the others will get jealous and start to follow, and it will change the culture,” said the Finn.

Hill, a former leader of the House of Lords for Britain’s ruling Conservatives, called for the U.K. to take an active role in shaping EU regulation around “financial services, which is such a strong part of the British economy and its biggest export.”

The City — London’s financial center — is shaping up as critical voice in support of staying “In” the EU ahead of the referendum on British membership in the bloc that Prime Minister David Cameron has promised to hold by 2017.

Freeing up trillions

Unifying its capital markets is the next step in integrating the EU’s economies at a time when disintegration seems to have the upper hand — visible, as in recent days, in the sharp differences between Western and Central Europe over how to deal with the refugee crisis, in Catalonia’s bid for independence from Spain and in the Brexit debate.

The complex and highly technical plan, prepared largely behind-the-scenes by one of the lowest-profile commissioners in Brussels, could be the most sweeping change to the way Europeans do business since the introduction of the euro in 1999.

The hope is to free up funds for investment in companies and infrastructure. The Commission estimates, for example, that of the more than €9 trillion that insurance companies have invested in Europe, less than 0.25 percent is currently placed in infrastructure projects such as telecoms networks or roads.

The goal is to make cross-border investment and services like life insurance and retirement savings easier and cheaper, to provide  incentives to venture capital funds, and to review financial regulation to ensure investment is not unfairly burdened.

“When a lot of this system was put in place … the thing at the forefront of people’s minds was the financial crisis,” Hill told POLITICO. “Now I think the thing at the forefront of people’s minds, certainly at the forefront of mine, is how to we create jobs and growth because 23 million people are out of work. A low-growth environment is not just a threat to financial stability, it’s a broader threat.”

Some elements of the plan, such as new collateral requirements for insurers to invest in infrastructure, could be in place as soon as the end of this year if there are no objections from national leaders or the European Parliament.

Other proposals, like harmonizing European insolvency rules in to reduce anxiety levels for cross-border investors, will take years.

“Anonymous investors”

“Building a capital markets union will require a sustained effort year in, year out,” Hill said. “But we are starting fast to build momentum … to work through the biggest barriers one by one.”

“It’s exactly this type of policy action that we need in Europe,” said Wim Mijs, the chief executive of the European Banking Federation. “I hope the Commission can maintain its resolve to make it work so that these plans can deliver a single European capital market without obstacles…. At our end, banks are ready to play their part.”

More skeptical observers such as some financial watchdogs and center-left politicians worry that regulations introduced after the global financial crisis to rein in banks could now be rolled back. They also say there is too much emphasis in the plan on promoting riskier investments such as venture capital.

“The German craftsman, the Spanish agricultural company or the Greek tourism firm need well-capitalized local banks that will provide long-term financing by their side — something an anonymous, financial quarter-oriented investor cannot provide,” said Gerhard Schick, financial expert for the Greens in the German parliament.

Other groups have raised concerns that the Capital Markets Union’s embrace of securitization — the bundling and onward sale of illiquid assets, such as mortgages — will benefit the big banks, which use this process to free up capital on their balance sheets.

A statement signed by more than 20 civil society organizations, including the non-profit group Finance Watch and the World Future Council in Germany, portrayed the plan as counterproductive in terms of financial stability.

“The CMU revives pre-crisis trends without adequately integrating the lessons from the crisis,” they said.

En novembre, Elisabeth Bost, ancienne compagne de Jean-Luc Delarue, tentait d’empêcher la sortie de l’autobiographie de Jean-Luc Delarue. En vain. Un mois plus tard, la journaliste persiste et assigne l’éditeur en justice pour qu’il cesse la diffusion de ces Carnets Secrets.

On pensait qu’Elisabeth Bost avait jeté l’éponge et abandonné toute idée d’empêcher la parution de Carnets Secrets, l’autobiographie de Jean-Luc Delarue, l’animateur disparu en août dernier. En novembre dernier, la chroniqueuse du Grand 8 de Laurence Ferrari n’avait pas réussi à interdire la sortie du livre, finalement paru le 7 décembre. En cette fin décembre, Elisabeth Bost, que l’on découvre sur notre photo au bras de Jean-Luc Delarue lors de la garden party de l’Elysée du 14 juillet 2008, lance une nouvelle contre-attaque.

Selon l’AFP, la jeune femme et Jean, le fils qu’elle a eu avec Jean-Luc Delarue, assignent les éditions de l’Archipel pour stopper la diffusion de l’ouvrage. Dans le texte, Me Isabelle Wekstein, l’avocate des plaignants, affirme qu’ «aucune autorisation n’a jamais été sollicitée auprès de Jean Delarue, unique descendant» et «unique titulaire du droit moral de divulgation des œuvres posthumes» de son père. Selon elle, Carnets Secrets «porte gravement atteinte à l’intimité de sa vie privée et à celle de son fils et qu’il contient également de graves propos diffamatoires à son égard». Son avocate ajoute que les «révélations privées et mensongères aggravent la douleur morale de Jean Delarue-Bost, âgé de 6 ans qui vient de perdre son père et celle d’Elisabeth Bost (…) dont la vie privée se voit dénigrée et donnée en pâture dans les médias».

Lors de la première demande, en novembre, les avocats de l’éditeur avait refusé de stopper la parution au motif que «le droit de divulgation (avait) bien été exercé par Jean-Luc Delarue de son vivant».

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En plus de l’arrêt de la diffusion, Elisabeth Bost demande la destruction des exemplaires en stock, sous peine de 1000 euros par jour de retard, 50 000 euros en réparation de l’atteinte à sa vie privée, 50 000 euros au même titre pour Jean Delarue et 80 000 euros de dommages et intérêts pour diffamation. 180 000 euros et un nouveau coup de projecteur sur un livre dont elle aimerait tant que personne ne parle…