Poor reaction to bad journalism

Sunday night, the French president went on the “60 minutes” news show, with Lesley Stahl, just long enough before he brutally put and end to the session and abruptly left the room, following a question on his private life. “An unpredictable and ill-tempered head of state” is probably the image that will remain with the American public. CBS’s “60 Minutes” newsmagazine was featuring a piece called “Sarko the American” in which Nicolas Sarkozy lost his cool, rolled up his eyes before he screamed at his press secretary and called him an “imbecile” among other expletives. Moments later, still under Stahl’s incredulous eyes, Sarkozy suddenly rips off his mike and leaves the room after one question too many about Cecilia, still his spouse when the piece was produced. It’s pretty obvious that Lesley Stahl was pushing the envelope in asking such a personal question at that moment, at any rate the botched interview showed the confluence of three factors: First, Sarkozy doesn't have a good grasp of the American culture to make jokes on the fly like he did and should have stuck to speaking French all along instead of showing off at times a marginal command of English. Second, his lack of self-control including the terrible manner in which he insulted his assistant is a telltale sign that the man is a "loose canon". Third, and finally, "60 Minutes" which used to be a good news show has fallen into the abyss of low-life “tabloid” gossip, which obviously is CBS’s problem, but seems the kind of media Sarkozy is ready to go after...