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<DIV>Two items that should really delight conservatives:</DIV>
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<DIV>From <EM>The Week</EM>:</DIV>
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id=ctl00_cphMainContent_lblTitle>France: Really Leaning Right? </SPAN><BR><!--dek data--><SPAN id=ctl00_cphMainContent_lblDek></SPAN><BR><!--week_date data--></FONT></STRONG><SPAN
id=ctl00_cphMainContent_lblWeekDate>5/11/2007</SPAN> <BR><BR><!--main_text data--><SPAN id=ctl00_cphMainContent_lblMainText>The
French have moved to the right—or so we hear. Their election this week of the
fiscal-reform candidate, Nicolas Sarkozy, over Socialist Ségolène Royal is being
portrayed as an embrace of conservatism and a rejection of the welfare state.
Sarkozy’s own rhetoric bolsters that view, as he colors his speeches with
toughly worded appeals to a “new work ethic” and “respect for authority.” He
even calls himself an Américain, a French term used these days almost as a
synonym for “fascist.” But France’s new president is no neocon. In fact, he’s
not a conservative in the American sense at all. He’s merely more conservative
than most previous French leaders. The political yardstick marked left, center,
and right covers a different section of the spectrum on either side of the
Atlantic. <BR><BR>In the Gallic context, a right-winger doesn’t resemble
anything close to a Ronald Reagan. He’s more like a Bill Clinton or a Tony
Blair—tempering a respect for market economics with a strong commitment to
social services. <STRONG><FONT color=#0000ff>Sarkozy’s version of tax reform,
for example, envisions a cut in the top income tax rate from 60 percent all the
way down to … 50 percent—still among the highest in Europe. And his plan to
reduce France’s bloated bureaucracy doesn’t call for a single job cut; he simply
proposes not replacing some of the civil servants who will retire in the next
few years. Add to that his pledges to ban “golden parachute” payouts to
corporate executives, make all national museums free, and legalize gay civil
unions, and Sarkozy starts to seem more left-wing than most
Democrats.</FONT></STRONG> In foreign politics, as in foreign policy,
perspective is everything. One country’s conservative is another country’s
liberal. <BR><BR>Susan Caskie<BR>Deputy editor/International</SPAN> </DIV>
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<DIV><BR>From <EM>The LA Times</EM>:</DIV>
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<DIV>According to a tally by Three University of Indiana scholars, Fox News host
Bill O'Reilly's daily commentaries contain an average of 8.88 instances of
name-calling per minute, or one insult every 6.8 seconds.</DIV>
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