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Like politicians the world over, Nicolas Sarkozy ran for office on a promise to restore popular faith in politics, end electoral cynicism and create an “irreproachable” government. Nearly half way into his term, and despite a relatively good recent record on the economy and labour relations, a series of scandals over sex and money are making a mockery of the French president’s promises. They leave a troubling impression of an arrogant government, out of touch with its deputies and contemptuous of the popular mood.
跟全世界的政治家们一样，尼古拉斯萨科奇执政期间承诺要在公众 心中重塑对政治的信心，终结选民们的愤世嫉俗，建立一个“无可挑剔”的政府。然而，任期过半，除了最近在经济问题上，劳动力关系上处理相对出色以外，一系 列的性丑闻和贿赂丑闻已经让萨科奇的承诺成为笑柄。丑闻众多，给政府形象带来麻烦，在人们看来，这是一届自以为是的政府，与议员没有沟通，对公众的情绪置 之不理。
For the traditional political right who form the backbone of Mr Sarkozy’s electorate, the most serious of the scandals has been the admission by Frédéric Mitterrand, the openly gay culture minister, that he paid “boys” for sex in brothels in Thailand and France. Opposition politicians—led by Marine Le Pen, vice-president of the far-right National Front—unearthed the comments in a book he wrote in 2005. In it, Mr Mitterrand, who is the nephew of a Socialist former president, fills pages with extraordinarily detailed description of his various encounters. At Thai sex shows, he writes: “The profusion of very attractive and immediately available boys puts me in a state of desire that I no longer need to restrain nor hide.”
传统政治右派是萨科奇当选总统的 中坚力量，对于这些人来说，这写丑闻中最为严重的一起，便是文化部长弗雷德里克-密特朗承认自己在泰国和法国的妓院招男妓。弗雷德里克-密特朗是一位公开 的同性恋者。由Marine Le Pen领导的在野党政治家，也是far-right National Front副主席，发现了弗雷德里克-密特朗 2005年在一本书里所写的评论。密特朗一位社会主义前总统的外甥，在这段评论中，他异常详细地描述了他的各种见闻。写到泰国色情秀时，他这样写到：“满 眼帅气的小伙子随时可得，这让我感觉自己不必再有任何控制和躲藏。”
His words took on new meaning after Mr Mitterrand, a well-known television producer who is treated as a national treasure, last month called “absolutely appalling” the arrest in Switzerland of Roman Polanski, a film-maker facing extradition to America, where he had pleaded guilty to a charge of unlawful sex with a 13-year-old girl in 1977. As quotes from the book were splashed all over the press, and opposition politicians demanded his resignation, Mr Mitterrand told French television that, yes, he paid for sex with “boys”. But, he added, they were not under-age and were consenting. He went on to condemn both sex tourism (which he admits to having practised) and paedophilia (which he denies).
上个月，他就1977年因与一名13岁女孩发生不正当关系被判有罪的Roman Polanski在瑞士被捕并面临被引渡回国一事发表言论，表示“非常震惊”。现在，他的一席话要被重新理解了。他所写的内容可见于各家媒体，因此在野党 政治家要求他辞职。密特朗接受法国电视台采访时说，他确实花钱同男孩儿发生性行为。但是，他补充道，那些男孩儿都不是未成年，而且都是自愿的。接着他对性 旅游和恋童癖都表示了谴责。前者他承认自己做过，后者他不承认。
Ministers have tried to dismiss the affair as a distraction, arguing that it concerns Mr Mitterrand’s private life and not his capacity to carry out his job promoting French culture. “I don’t see what the problem is,” declared Henri Guaino, one of President Sarkozy’s closest advisers. Yet the affair has shocked not only the right, drawn to Mr Sarkozy’s pre-election promise to restore morality to public life and “turn the page on May ‘68”, but also the left. “At a time when France is working with Thailand to combat the scourge of sex tourism,” declared Benoît Hamon, Socialist Party spokesman, “along comes a government minister explaining that he is himself a consumer of it.”
部长们试图把这件事情糊弄过去，他们 说，这是密特朗的私生活，与他担当宣传法国文化的能力无关。萨科奇的一位贴身顾问Henri Guaino说：“我不知道这有什么问题。”然而，这件事情不仅震惊了右派，也震惊了左派。萨科奇选举前曾承诺要在公众中重塑道德观念，让法国重现 1968年5月运动的光辉一页，正是这些承诺争取到了右派的支持。而社会党发言人Benoît Hamon说：“在法国与泰国联合打击性旅游的当口，一位政府部长却表示他自己就是性旅游的消费者。”
Were this the only saga, it might have blown over. But it was followed this week by news that the president’s son, Jean Sarkozy, an undergraduate law student, is a candidate to become chairman of the development corporation for La Défense, a high-rise financial centre to the west of Paris. On paper, the younger Mr Sarkozy has gone through all the hoops. He is an elected councillor in the department of Hauts-de-Seine, which includes La Défense, as well as head of the majority UMP party’s group there. The job of chairman is not a presidential nomination, and Sarkozy fils has to win a council vote, and then a board one. There could also be other candidates.
如果就只有这一件丑闻，那么可能很快就过去了。然而就在此之后，有传出一个 消息，总统的儿子让•萨科奇，一名法律系本科身，成为巴黎西边一座高楼层金融中心La Défense的发展集团主席候选人。报道称，小萨科奇已经通过了所有的环节。他已经被选为Hauts-de-Seine的市委员， La Défense就在该市。同时，他还是当地大部分UMP党组织的负责人。主席跟总统提名不一样，萨科奇的儿子必须赢得委员的投票，然后再赢得董事会的投 票。也可能还有其他候选人。
Yet even a generous interpretation of the facts cannot quite dispel the impression of nepotism. The department includes the swanky suburb of Neuilly which launched the president’s own career when in his twenties, and the council is full of his friends. The job of chairman is to oversee a management team’s efforts to rival the City of London. Jean Sarkozy is 23, and in his second year at university; the outgoing chairman, Patrick Devedjian, is a 65-year-old government minister.
但是，不管怎样放宽来解释这件事，还是免不了给人一种任人唯亲的感觉。这 个失的辖区包括Neuilly豪华的郊区，萨科奇20多岁的时候在这里开创了自己 的事业，而且整个议会全是他的朋友。主席的工作要监督一个管理团队，努力建成一个能与伦敦相提并论的城市。让•萨科奇23岁，大学二年级；而刚离任的主席 Patrick Devedjian是一位65岁的政府部长。
And as if all that were not enough, last month, Brice Hortefeux, the interior minister and long-time chum of Mr Sarkozy, was caught on video engaging in racist-sounding banter. He joked with a young Frenchman of North African origin, who had asked for a photo with him, “When there is one of them, it’s ok,” he said. “When there are lots of them, you get trouble.” Mr Hortefeux denied any racist intent, saying that he was talking about people from Auvergne, his home region. He kept his job.
如果这些丑闻还不够的话，这里还有。上个月，内务部长兼萨科奇多年老友Brice Hortefeux，被录像拍到开疑似宗族歧视的玩笑。一名法籍北美年轻人请求跟他合照，他开玩笑说：“如果只有一个得话，没什么问题，如果有一群的话， 那你就麻烦了。”Hortefeux 否认有宗族歧视的意图，他说他是在谈论他的家乡奥弗涅地区的人。因此他保住了职位。
Mr Sarkozy seems to consider such incidents as froth, diverting attention from the real business of growth and jobs. “We are all the son of somebody,” airily declared Isabelle Balkany, vice-president of the Hauts-de-Seine council and an old Sarkozy friend: “It shouldn’t be a handicap.”
萨科奇似乎把这些事情都看成小插曲，把精力都放在经济增长和就业这样正经事情上。Hauts-de-Seine市议会副主席，也是萨科奇的一位老朋友Isabelle Balkany对此觉得无所谓，他说：“每个人都有父亲，父亲的身份不应该被当成一种缺陷。”
But many of his own deputies do not seem so sure. They fret that tradition-minded voters are left perplexed, if not outraged, both by the goings-on and the high-handed way in which the government and its friends seems to brush them off. The critics point to a recent parliamentary by-election in a safe seat, which the UMP held by only the thinnest of threads. “Have we regressed in France to such a perverse court practice that nobody dares tell the monarch that he is wrong?” asked an editorial in Le Monde, a left-leaning newspaper.
但Isabelle Balkany的议员对此似乎没那么确信。他们担心政府这种不光彩的高压举动，对保守选民的莫不理睬，就算不会激怒这些选民，也会让他们感到疑惑。批评家 指出了最近在一个稳操胜券的选区进行的补选，在这次选举中，UMP只以微小的优势获胜。左倾报纸《世界新闻报》的一片社论评论道:“难道法国已经退回到君 主宫廷时期，荒谬到没有人敢告诉君主他做错了吗？”
Even those supporters ready to give Mr Sarkozy the benefit of the doubt on the scandals themselves worry about the damage they will do to his ability to make some of the hard choices that lie ahead. The French still consider their soaring government deficit as necessary to support spending on recovery. The budget deficit is expected to reach 8% of GDP in 2009. But questions about the need for deficit cutting, and ultimately of possible tax increases, lurk inevitably—if unvoiced—round the corner. At that point, President Sarkozy can ill afford the sort of cynical public opinion that, in 2007, he promised to turn around.
就连那些准备先姑且相信萨科奇对丑闻的表态的支持者 们，也担心这些丑闻造成的破坏会影响萨科奇对面前的难题作出艰难抉择的能力。2009年 财政赤字预计达到GDP的8%。而要求削减财政赤字的问题，以及最终可能出现的增税，即将来临，虽然悄无声息却是不可避免的。这点来看，萨科奇改善 2007年民意调查满意度低的状况的承诺无法实现，他将为此付出代价。 |
