Its effects on European economies were underestimated, according to two of the organization’s economists.

Albertini, Domique. “Oups, le FMI s’est trompé sur l’austérité.” Libération. January 09, 2013.

Most economists now admit that austerity policies are bad for growth and employment. But those measures are even worse than previously thought, as two of them have discovered, and not a minor pair either: Olivier Blanchard, a French chief economist at the IMF and Daniel Leigh, an economist with the same organization. They find that using a bad calculation coefficient led to an underestimate of the negative effects of austerity in Europe. 

May (with Belga”). “La Page Facebook « Failed: Leuven » fait polémique”. Le Soir. January 8, 2013. 

The “Failed: Leuven” Facebook page contained photos of drunk students. A page that constitutes “a violation of privacy” according to Louvain Police. 

Failed : Leuven” compiled a series of photos of drunk students. And this Facebook page “constitutes a violation of legislation on the protection of privacy and image rights,” according to Louvain’s local police. The page has since been removed from the social network. This is the second case of violated privacy involving Facebook pages in Belgium after the page “Antwerpse Hoere” (“Whores of Antwerp”), whose author was identified this Tuesday.

“Whoever wants to publish a photo of someone, even if their face is unrecognizable, must first request express permission from the person concerned,” states police spokesperson Stéphanie Gille.

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Véronique Lamquin. “Confédéralisme: nouveau synonyme de séparatisme”. Le Soir. January 7, 2013. 

When you get down to it, Rudy Demotte is right: confederalism is an “idiot trap.”  Or, in more restrained French: a lure, a sham, a fraud.

Confederalism gives birth to confederations. Which are, in international law, unions of independent states. To this day, there is not a single “Confederal State” in existence anywhere in the world: Switzerland usurped its titular confederation beginning in 1848 and turned into a federal state. If the N-VA intends to make Belgium move toward confederalism, that will necessarily mean the country first breaking up into independent Regions. Which could then create a Belgian confederation through free association. Highly improbable: how to imagine that an independent Flanders’ first move would be to form a free union with partners it had just separated from?

Didier Jacob. “La Confession secrète de Duras”. Le Nouvel Observateur. January 4, 2013. 

A journalist at La Stampa, Leopoldina Pallota della Torre met Marguerite Duras in 1987. She had to negotiate at length, she says, to convince the novelist, busy writing the screenplay for The Lover, to receive her in her apartment on la rue Saint-Benoît.  The journalist remembers first seeing her from behind, tiny, very tiny, seated as always in her dusty room, cluttered with papers and stuff, elbows on her desk.

The interview, broken up by phone calls during which Marguerite held Leopoldina’s hand to stop her from noting what she was saying, would last three hours. It would be the first in a series, where Marguerite would indulge in making confessions before bringing the conversation to a brutal halt. As if he had been waiting for the signal, Yann Andréa, her companion, would arrive from another room, proposing, as usual to accompany her outside, and gently helped her into her strawberry-colored coat.

These interviews, which appeared at that time in Italy, were never reedited, and remained curiously overlooked by French publishers. But Marguerite opens up with a sort of peaceful abandon, as if she had sensed that her words would never fall on French ears.

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Caviglioli, David. L’Enfer de Dantec. Le Nouvel Observateur. December 9, 2012. 

Last May, rumor had it that Maurice G. Dantec was making a comeback. As his new editor, David Kersan, explained, the man who glued France to its seat with Roots of Evil, French sci-fi’s ex-prodigal son was returning to the heart of his work: cyberpunk. He was putting characters back in the saddle from Babylon Babies, his biggest success released 13 years ago: Hugo Cornelius Toorop, the muscular mercenary who reads medieval theology, or the Zorn sisters, genetically modified twins. His fans believed it: Satellite Sisters would be a return to form.

This was forgetting his legendary self-destructive imagination. August 10, several days before the book’s release, the prophet with the black glasses requested an injunction to block sales of the book. Then he filed a series of complaints in civil and criminal court, notably against Kersan and his brand-new publishing house, Editions Ring, for “exploitation of weakness”. He wanted his contract cancelled.

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Mounier, Frédéric. Pour Benoît XVI, « Dieu n’est ni dans le vacarme, ni dans les faux remèdes ou l’égoïsme ». La Croix. December 9, 2012.

 As he does every year, Benedict XVI headed to the Piazza di Spagna on Saturday, December 8, in the middle of Rome for the feast of the Immaculate Conception. 

As he does every year, Benedict XVI went to the base of the column erected on the Piazza di Spagna in honor of the Immaculate Conception.

The pope gave particular assurance that we cannot recognize the voice of God in “commotion and agitation” and that “only the love” of God could save man from the “fall”. Warning against “false remedies” like drugs, Benedict XVI also invited men “to learn to say ‘no’ to the voice of egoism and to say ‘yes’ to the voice of authentic love.” In the presence of several hundred faithful, Benedict XVI began with a meditation on the gospel of the Annunciation.

The pope declared that such an event “If it took place in our time, would leave no traces in the papers and magazines since it’s a mystery that unfolds in silence.”

Baygert, Nicolas. “Miss France: princesse républicaine ou conte de fée low-cost?”. Le Nouvel Observateur. December 7, 2012. 

MISS FRANCE. The Miss France Election comes to TFI on December 8. But what to make of the annual parade, the temporary queen getting an on-air crown? Misogynist brofest halfway between an agricultural expo and old-fashioned reality TV, or national heritage worth preserving?

Completely Serious

Owned by Endemol and la Société Miss France, the Miss France competition has been turned upside a few times these past few years. Let’s remember how, faced with the risk of unworthy cage-raised Endemolized Miss Frances, Geneviève de Fontenay, who was eventually ousted, tried to impose her own organic label: “Miss Nationale”: 100% homegrown and free-range. But the lady-with-the-hat’s initiative would prove no match for a dynastic coup by Sylvie Tellier, herself the 73rd Miss France.

François Hollande,  David Delos, Roselyne Febvre, Jean-Karim Fall. “Interview du Président de la République par France 24, TV5MONDE et RFI.” l’Élysée. Oct. 11, 2012.  

Roselyne Febvre: Mister President, for a long time you have been hesitant to go to Kinshasa, to the Francophonie Summit, but Tuesday, you declared that the situation in that country is totally unacceptable when it comes to rights, democracy and recognition of the opposition—in short, a country beyond the pale. 

So we’d like to ask you why you’re going to Kinshasa and whether you’ve received guarantees since then? 

François Hollande: First of all, I’m going to Kinshasa because it’s Africa and because I want to tell Africans who speak French that we appreciate them a lot. French is an African language. Today, most French-speakers are African; I want to express my gratitude to them. And I’m going to Kinshasa because the RDC is a big country; it’s a country whose borders are threatened. I am also going as president of the Republic to say what I have already announced at the UN’s General Assembly: I don’t accept the outside attacks that are threatening this great country’s borders. Later, I’m going to Kinshasa—before that I’ll be in Dakar in Senegal, to give a speech on civil rights, transparency, and respect. There were elections last year in the Democratic Republic of Congo. And they weren’t considered completely satisfying. But progress is being made: that’s my focus. There’s now a commission on elections, and a human rights commission. So, each time I travel around, I want the brand to be there; there should be progress when it comes to democracy whenever France is around. 

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Anonymous. “La France est un coffre-fort.” Le Canard enchaîné, July 18, 2012. 

It obviously won’t last, since nothing ever does with the financial markets, but it’s now come to this in France: France “in default,” like Fillon was saying five years ago, France saddled by the 600 billion in debt added during Sarkozy’s five-year term, France, which only gets two out of three A’s from Standard and Poors is, well, well, well, reassuring the markets. And reassuring them to the point that they’re fighting to lend us their pretty pennies. Even better: they’re paying to hand it over to us. 

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Pierre Barbancey and Jean-Louis Triaud. “Une intervention militaire au Mali serait une catastrophe.”  L’Humanité, July 12, 2012. 

Jean-Louis Triaud is a historian specializing in sub-Saharan African Islam. He’s professor emeritus at the University of Provence. As he sees it, using armed force in Mali against the Islamist militias would mean opening a wound in West Africa. 

How could Tuareg groups join forces with jihadist groups? 

Jean-Louis Triaud. Ansar Dine’s leader, Iyad Ag Ghali, has spent time in Saudi Arabia. That’s probably a telling connection, there. Also, he has been one of the Tuareg movement’s main leaders for about ten years. Then he became the quasi-official point-of-contact with the Malian government. He’s a major player who wanted to take back control. To do that, he created his own organization, which he conceived under the influence of the Islamic models he has encountered. Meanwhile, al Qaeda for the Islamic Maghreb (AQMI) is very present in southern Algeria, so it isn’t far away. All of them support each other’s independence and are in cahoots with each other, too. For religious reasons, of course. On top of that, there’s been all the trans-Saharan trafficking for years, and they’re all trying to get their share of it. Religion is a refrain that’s well-suited for anti-Western rhetoric, which definitely reflects some people’s reaction to the gap between the West and Africa, for example.