One thinks that Jacques Chirac is very stupid and very nice. In fact, he is very intelligent and very unpleasant.*

Sarko,
Ministre d'Etat, ministre de l'Intérieur
et de l'Aménagement du Territoire,
et L'UMP présidentiable
PARIS November 6, 2006 (Reuters, infra)

While Jack pretends to weigh a third run, the Élysée chamberlain locks up the silver and hides away unsecured historical tchotchkes. Jack is a notorious appropriator of knick-knacks and souvenirs.

Pave has already posted severally on Jack's sputtering finish and his feeble legacy and nonaccomplishments, specifically his nonactions, his inactions, the buck-passing, the reverses, climbdowns, the flops, the failures (and here), the disasters (and here and here). And the mayoral scandals, the presidential scandals (and here), and Jack's arrangements for a jail-free retirement.

The French chattering class is not just now waking up to all this. It is catching up.

CRITICS PILE ON AS CHIRAC APPROACHES 'FIN DE REGNE'

PARIS, October 4, 2006 (AFP) - With the end of his monumental career probably only months away, French President Jacques Chirac has come under fire in a series of frank and often cruel assessments, accusing him of opportunism, ideological emptiness and even treachery.

... Out this week is "The Irresponsible" by Le Monde journalist Herve Gattegno, who plunges into the detail of the politico-financial scandals surrounding the president.

"Motivated by his survival instinct" and covered by his presidential immunity, Chirac "has used the presidency to preserve his person and his power", he writes.

Chirac is also treated mercilessly in 'After de Gaulle', a collection of confidential notes kept by Jean Mauriac, son of the writer François Mauriac. Several members of the Gaullist old guard describe a man who is indecisive, impressionable and full of grudges.

KNIVES OUT IN THE TWILIGHT OF CHIRAC'S REIGN

PARIS November 6, 2006 (Reuters) - Journalists are emptying their notebooks, enemies are putting the boot in and friends are keeping a low profile.

The cacophony of criticism invariably leads to one simple question - why didn't Chirac achieve more?

"Why has a political animal who is so gifted at reaching the peaks of power ... collected so many failures," a recent documentary on France 2 state television asked.

"That is the mystery of Chirac ...," it concluded.

... In the best-selling book, "The Tragedy of the President," author Franz-Olivier Giesbert argues that Chirac had an insatiable appetite for everything but tough, meaningful reform.

"He is an ogre. He gulps down everything with the same gluttony. Men, women, ideas, mileage, loves, defeats or cheap meals. Everything in life follows the same cycle: indigestion [sic], digestion, rejection. He retains nothing. Not even his friends."

In a private conversation with Giesbert shortly after winning his first term in office in 1995, Chirac said he had decided not to seek a second term when his mandate expired.

"It's a mistake. When you stay in power for too long in our democracies, one always ends up getting a huge kick up the backside, not to mention all the snubs you receive," he says.

Chirac of course did seek, and win, a second mandate. As he predicted, the kicks and snubs duly arrived.

Pave will soon have its own multi-part post on the endless decline of Jack.

* For the record, Pave finds Jack stupid and unpleasant.

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