Saturday, June 6, 2015

Valéry Giscard d'Estaing interview by Charlie Rose

A couple of nights ago, the 89 years old Giscard d'Estaing, former French president from 1974 to 1981 was interviewed by Charlie Rose. With a pretty good command of English the politician shared his world views that were, for the most part, pretty good except for a few points that made my hair and that of Charlie Rose raise at times.

He said that Putin was a good man and that the Russian leader was well justified in reclaiming Crimea for his country's account. He said is wasn't afraid neither of the Chinese (that he says he knows very well), nor the French right-wing party, but thinks that the US-led globalization went too fast and is what caused the world's financial crisis in 2008 (he may be partially right on that last point).

Things that worry him the most are Islamist terrorism and the fact that Muslims will soon overtake Christians in sheer numbers. This said, he doesn't appear to be bothered by our messed up environment and the planet overpopulation. He doesn't like social networks and the fact they can empower ordinary people who aren't qualified to think for themselves. He prefers the old way: People looking up to their leaders for answers.

Given his advanced age, I'll give him a decent grade of 7 out of 10!

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