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The Next Jackie O?
France's President Nicolas Sarkozy is reportedly set to wed his girlfriend Carla Bruni: According to some reports in the French press, they married at a "secret ceremony" in the Elysée Palace a week ago.
Much of the press, both in France and overseas, has criticised the President for his very public affair, while commentators have scorned Mme Bruni's colourful past and the President's apparent haste to marry her.
Here at EURSOC, however, we're going to stick our necks out and say that perhaps Sarko has made a wise choice: Ladies and gentlemen, we give you Carla Bruni, the World's Leading First Lady.
Let's take those criticisms one by one. First, the claims that Sarko and Bruni are ill-matched. He's an arriviste politico, a tough operator with a workaholic streak. He has a boyish enthusiasm and a very Mediterranean love of status symbols.
She's quite the opposite: Moneyed, aristocratic, laid-back, slightly louche and exudes a glamourous sophistication Sarkozy lacks. She likes to pose as a member of the intellectual, artistic left: He's an anti-elitist right-winger. However, sometimes men are attracted to women who represent something they don't have. Sometimes powerful men find matches in women who can bring them that elusive characteristic, class. As one English commentator said last week, Sarkozy is always two inches short of cool: That doesn't mean he can't marry it.
Besides, one important characteristic they do share is intelligence, though Bruni's cosmopolitan artiness is of a different class from Sarko's wily politicking.
What about their haste to marry? Much has been made of the damage Cécilia Sarkozy caused her husband when she left him for another man in 2005. Sarkozy won her back (briefly), but reportedly felt that his standing had been damaged in some respect. When she demanded a divorce, he felt that his machismo had to be repaired. How better to do this than by appearing with one of the world's most beautiful women on his arm? Judging from EURSOC's post bag, our American readers pick this up better than Europeans: There's an expectation that an Alpha Male should be linked with an Alpha Female to prove his status. They don't call him Sarkozy the American for nothing!
Moreover, there was the question of the President's love life. Sarkozy, at 52, is still a young man in political terms. He has the energy of a much younger man, as Tony Blair helpfully pointed out at a UMP rally at the weekend. He was sure to have a long string of girlfriends, perhaps not all of them "slappers" as Cécilia would have it.
Observers may judge that his haste to marry Bruni is unseemly: But is this worse than a constant stream of women arriving at the Elysée in darkened limousines? Or the President on the pull in Paris nightclubs? Or having his younger aides roaming the bars procuring suitable girls for him? Chirac's, or Mitterand's, or Giscard's mistresses weren't the kiss-and-tell type: Things have changed.
Or would the French prefer their President to live like a monk?
Sarkozy is taking a gamble, for sure. Things could go wrong with the free-spirited Carla, and the French might not regain their admiration for him following his recent slump in the polls. But just think if things work out in his favour. Imagine Mme Bruni-Sarkozy arriving with her husband in Washington, in London, at a G8 Summit. Only Jackie Kennedy and Princess Diana could compare for glamour. Newspapers would send fashion journalists to fawn over Bruni's choice of costume, the French designers she favoured would win thousands of orders, and the French themselves would find themselves possessed of a First Lady who captured the world's attention.
It's possible she could deliver the feel-good-factor that France has been lacking on the international stage. And how she would stand out among the other Presidential spouses at meetings of global leaders!
Most commentators choose to ignore the fact that despite her rock-star days, Bruni has breeding. She's multilingual and she knows how to handle the media. She and Sarkozy would make a welcome respite from the tacky celebrity couples we've been burdened with in recent years.
Yes, she's had an interesting history that future Presidential biographers are going to have a hell of a job unpicking (though one suspects it'll make a great read). But, at 40, she surely sees herself as ready for a change. A public role, some Diana-style international charity ambassador for example. Why shouldn't she be given the chance? People change; men and women deserve the benefit of the doubt when they open the second, or even third or fourth act in their lives. This is France: We don't expect the consorts of our leaders to be virginal, just as we don't expect our Presidents to live like monks.
There's enough doom and gloom on the horizon: EURSOC wishes them the best, and we bet that 12 months from now, the rest of the press will be agreeing with us.
