FRANCE:Sarkophants in the media have even gone as far as airbrushing the president's fat rolls, writes Lara Marlowein Paris
It's hard to keep a level head when you're surrounded by sycophants. Or perhaps we should say Sarkophants. Fawning politicians and journalists could yet be the downfall of French president Nicolas Sarkozy, who yesterday celebrated his first 100 days in office.
France's three leading news magazines and two national newspapers put Sarkozy on their front pages yesterday. This banana republic-style barrage has, alas, become de rigueur since Sarkozy's election.
L'Expressmagazine's cover story on "Why He Fascinates" reveals a jewel of Sarkophancy.
In a photograph published by Paris Matchon August 8th, the French president wears only swimming trunks, sunglasses and an expensive watch as he rows a canoe with his son Louis.
In the original photograph, a "love handle" sags displeasingly over the waistband of the presidential swimming togs. But in the same photograph, as published by Paris Match, the little roll of fat disappeared.
In its own defence, Paris Matchsaid that "the position on the boat exaggerated this protuberance", and claimed that the effect of its "correction" was amplified by the printing process.
The Élysée didn't need to ask for the picture to be Photoshopped. Arnaud Lagardère, the billionaire owner of Paris Match, calls Sarkozy his brother. The magazine's previous editor was sacked for publishing a photograph of Cécilia Sarkozy, now France's first lady, with her then lover in New York.
The jury is still out on Sarkozy's policies. Sluggish economic growth and a ballooning trade deficit cast a shadow over his 100 days. But he remains a genius at public relations. Sarkozy is, quite literally, everywhere. Earlier this summer, a cartoon showed Sarkozy's spokesman announcing that, "due to a scheduling problem, the president will not compete in the Tour de France".
During his family's two-week retreat in a €22,000-a-week villa in New Hampshire, Sarkozy issued 16 communiques and spoke to French journalists at least six times.
Yet Sarkozy's omnipresence seems to reassure the French. As the philosopher Marcel Gauchet told L'Express: "We're playing for high stakes, since we bet everything on Sarkozy . . . Whatever you may think of Nicolas Sarkozy, you want it to work."
It would have been unthinkable for any past French president to board a photographers' boat (as happened in New Hampshire) and briefly seize one of their cameras. No other French president would have attended the funeral of a Breton fisherman killed in a collision with a cargo ship, as Sarkozy did on Wednesday, or would have repeatedly telephoned Anote Tong, the president of the Kiribati islands where the guilty ship is registered, in the hopes of having its captain tried in France.
The French public love it, though Sarkozy's popularity rating slid from 65 per cent to 61 per cent this month. As new presidents go, he is still second only to Charles de Gaulle, who scored 67 per cent in the summer of 1958.
Yasmina Reza's book, Dawn, Evening or Night, which goes on sale today, has been hailed as the literary event of the year. It is - surprise - a 192-page portrait of Sarkozy. Reza's works have been translated into 35 languages and she holds the Laurence Olivier prize, a US Tony award and the Die Weltprize.
When she asked Sarkozy if she could follow him around from June 2006 until June 2007, he said: "Even if you tear me apart, you will make me greater."
Reza has a lot in common with Sarkozy. Both have one Hungarian parent, and both grew up in a Jewish milieu in the affluent suburb of Neuilly. They share indomitable will and determination to leave their mark. Yet she manages to avoid the trap of Sarkophancy.
The portrait that emerges is Sarkozy as France knows him: boyish, cynical, attracted by all that glitters, vain and without a trace of self-doubt.
One day, he grabs a newspaper from Reza. Its front page carries articles about Iran and his campaign, and an advertisement in the lower right-hand corner. The presidential candidate stares at the page and comments: "What a beautiful Rolex."
It's a telling moment in a country where the bling-bling right has deposed the caviar left. Non-Sarkophant media have identified eight wristwatches worn by the presidential couple, and estimate the value of the various Rolexes, Breitlings, Chanels etc at up to €180,000.
Le Mondethis week caricatured Cécilia Sarkozy as Marie-Antoinette, clutching a Prada handbag.
The couple's US holiday was, it turns out, paid for by the Crombacks and Agostinellis. Cécilia Sarkozy's best friends are Agnès Cromback, president of Tiffany France, and Mathilde Agostinelli, head of public relations for Prada France.
Reza suggested to Sarkozy that, if he lost such worldly connections and was condemned to live in the northern French industrial backwater of Maubeuge, he would despair and throw himself in the river.
"Non," Sarkozy replied. "In two years, I'd be the king of Maubeuge!"