[house of scandal] l'affaire de l'appartement gaymard

You’ve no doubt already seen the article by Gene Weingarten here, concerning the tete-a-tete between the French Agriculture Minister and himself. Well, by chance I stumbled on a tawdry scandal attached to the former and thought it best to publish it, you know. My little contribution to gutter journalism.

Now, before you take a quick glance, see that it’s written in French and look away mumbling and grumbling, stop a moment. You did four years of French at school , didn’t you? Anyway, written French is far easier than spoken and words like ‘l'affaire’, ‘58 894 euros’, ‘remboursement’ and ‘accepte son chèque’ are good indicators of a juicy tale. And it’s only one paragraph [well – two actually]. So read on, Francophiles :

Un article de Wikipédia, l'encyclopédie libre.

L'affaire de l'appartement Gaymard concerne le ministre de l'économie français Hervé Gaymard et de sa femme Clara, depuis l'annonce par le Canard enchaîné le 15 février 2005, que le couple était logé, avec ses huit enfants, dans un luxueux duplex de 600 m² payé 14 400 euros par mois par l'État. Elle aboutira à la démission de Hervé Gaymard de son poste de Ministre de l'Économie, des Finances et de l'Industrie le 25 février 2005.

En septembre 2005, il a reversé à l'État français une somme de 58 894 euros en remboursement des frais engagés pour cet appartement comprenant notamment les deux mois de loyers payés (14 400 euros mensuels), le montant des travaux effectués (31 800 euros) et les frais d'aménagement. Le 19 septembre 2005, le quotidien Libération a pris acte de ce remboursement en signalant qu'"hormis sa promesse, rien ne l'obligeait à rembourser. La location avait été avalisée par le directeur de cabinet de Jean-Pierre Raffarin et, du point de vue du droit, on peut même se demander à quel titre le Trésor public accepte son chèque" .

[happy monandæg] day of the moon

Despite disagreements, despite the workload we have on our hands this week, despite the previous posts so far, on which one kind soul commented: 'Bit heavy for Monday morning isn't it?', despite any negative vibes, it's going to be a wonderful day and a good lunch. Go to it rightly and may scallops rock yer tadger.

[britain] flat rate tax and cbi

I’m buying into an issue here which others with more claim to expertise have already dealt with. As your average Joe Bloggs, I asked a question on one site: how could a CBI be afforded and flat rate tax also? I suppose I was looking at our own 13% flat rate tax over here.

Here are some summaries of the issue for the benefit of those rare souls, such as me, who may not yet be au fait with the whole biz:

Radical UK Financial Reform. DK . Freebornjohn. Mr E. S&M reported over a year ago. Citizen's Basic Income. Tim Worstall.

Well, someone has costed it and a powerful lot of work it is. The bottom line is a 20% flat tax. Now I’d like to see how this and DK’s proposals can be combined. Stay tuned.

[litvinenko] the vexed issue of whom your sources are

I greatly appreciate comments of any hue on this issue because through thrashing it out, it might be possible to arrive at the truth and by so doing, we might have done a good turn.

Gracchi said: I heard a Radio 4 Start the Week in April where Anna Neistat of Human Rights Watch argued that the Russians had effectively, through their brutality, turned a nationalist into an Islamist movement.

Notsaussure said: Isn't this conflating two separate questions? Whatever one thinks about Russia vs Chechnya, one can still hold views on the propriety of bumping off people who hold the wrong views, and particularly on the propriety of bumping them off in London … I tend to ask who benefits most and who has the opportunity; there's one well-known chap who clearly had the opportunity and whose name springs immediately to mind.

You can read their full comments in the comments section of the last post.

I replied: No doubt at all the Russians were more than heavy handed. The Russians aren't noted for their delicacy. Who was more heavy handed here – the oranges or the greens in Ireland? The Boers or the British? The Canaanites or the Israelis? A better question – who was in the right? These issues go too far back to draw a conclusion about that. And it’s hardly bumping someone off for ‘wrong views’ as you’ll see further down.

What is at issue here is that the British backed the wrong horse in Chechnya, a terrorist training ground. Sympathies were naturally directed towards the Chechnyans because of anti-soviet sentiment, because the FCO and BBC are very pro-arab, as are elements of the Royal Family and therefore the only story coming out was of Russian barbarity and Chechnyen innocence and national self-determination. The only media which was telling the other side was in the Russian language which Brits don’t read. But it was equally well documented and attributed and no – it was not state controlled – this was still in the heady days of almost complete press freedom 1991 - 2001.

I read two articles yesterday very pro Anna P which showed she was admitted to the company of the warlords, treated as a friend and given safe passage and yet the articles constantly referred to her as a fighter for justice, brave woman and so on. The Russians say she was consorting with known mass-murderers but worse – abetting them. You say, ‘What rubbish’ but on what do you base this ‘what rubbish’? I even provided links in the last post which show beyond doubt that Alex V’s and Anna P’s friends were criminals and in two cases, known committers of atrocities. Here and here are two of them.

In Alex V’s case, there is now evidence he’d even gone over to the Muslims and the source was radio Echo Moskva. Predictably, the western press immediately assassinated this radio station by saying it was Gasprom funded. This is gross injustice to a fine station and which my very libertarian Russian friends listen to avidly as the voice of freedom. The presenters’ tone is always critical and the articles in no way support the Putin line. That’s why EM is listened to. Why is it not shut down then?

Yes, exactly. Why is it not shut down then? And why does Putin hold citizen conferences where unvetted questions are asked online? Certainly not for foreign publicity because the west doesn’t know of them. And why does every Ministry have a ‘priyomni’ time where the Minister is in attendance to answer citizen’s questions and I’ve seen him doing it? And why is Putin popular?

The thing is, the British blogger is playing with a stacked deck which has been kindly provided by the MSM, which is controlled. And equally the Russian is playing with the same. And neither appear to want to hear both sides of the issue even when they can get hold of it. Of course I may be wrong in this.

[accident prone] or just plain unlucky

Are you accident prone? Are you unlucky?

Britain's unluckiest man has suffered his 17th accident, falling down a manhole. John Lyne's misfortunes have included lightning strikes, a rock fall, near drowning and car crashes. Mr Lyne, 54, of Stainforth, will be out of action for eight months after his latest mishap.

Maybe you’re the type who’s just in the wrong place at the wrong time. Maybe you just have bad luck. For example, you book a table at the local pub for 16 people from your office for lunch but when you get there, they have you in the V.I.P. room and are expecting the cash to flow whereas all you were hoping for was for them to put some tables together for a few drinks and nibbles.

BBC Health has an explanation but would that explanation cover this? And of course, everyone remembers Final Destination.

[worst movie ever] 2nd nomination – tom and viv

Appearances can be deceptive

Tim Almond submits a second nomination and it is indeed a worthy contender: Tom and Viv, about TS Eliot and Vivienne Haigh-Wood. It appears to have all the necessary qualities.

First, imdb: In 1915, T.S. (Tom) Eliot and Vivienne Haigh-Wood elope, but her longstanding gynecological and emotional problems disrupt their planned honeymoon...

Tim adds: So, when I saw it on a friend's video rack, I asked if I could borrow it. "Take it" he said, "It's terrible. I never finished it". Thing is, nor could I. The whole film is just location after location with Miranda Richardson's character being completely mad and creating a scene, whilst T.S.Eliot stands there looking embarrassed, with lots of irritating characters hanging around looking on.

The Washington Post called it: a stolidly literate new film ...

So, it goes onto the list and the plan is to wait until we have, say, 20 nominations, then run a reader-poll to see which is the worst. Agreed?