Acting like a 2008 Napolean

The President of France--I don't even know his name--some days ago
said if Beijing would not talk to Dalai Lama, France would boycott the
Beijing Olympic. This is strange in view of the fact that the
President of an enlightened Western democracy would promote theocratic
authoritarianism instead of democracy to China.

This career-oriented politician spoke as if he were the 2008 Napolean
of France, and as if his counterparts such as Bush and the British
Prime Minister had been less daring than he was.  What he did not
realize, or perhaps had realized but pretended not to be aware of, is
the fact that France, together with its language and economy, have
been on a long term decline for years.  The only thing that could
effectively arrest this decline is a colossal market demand from
foreigners such as the Chinese.  The gigantic demand from the Chinese
for the French education, its language, its Air Bus and other
industries and so on has tangibly arrested this decline; under normal
cir***stances the French industries would have collapsed onto the
ground in the face of global competition, particularly that presented
by the Anglo-Saxons and the Japanese.  France could not afford this
loss in playing a political game against China.  Its ideology of
democracy and freedom, like its wine and beautiful leggies, is fine
but for only those who could afford it.

In view of the French need to break out of the Anglo encirclement and
to give the French culture a chance to reassert itself, it pays for
the frog-eating French to be a bit humbler. The luxury of acting
Napolean to China is affordable on stage only.