The French media : in bed with power
►http://www.ft.com/cms/s/2/b5382b9e-6d66-11e1-b6ff-00144feab49a.html#axzz1pK5KMgcL
France’s media-political embrace climaxed under President Nicolas Sarkozy. He gave himself the right to appoint the directors of state TV and radio. His links with private media barons are almost hilarious, featuring the manifold entanglements of a Brazilian soap opera or Victorian novel. Bouygues is godfather to one of Sarkozy’s sons. Sarkozy has called Lagardère “more than a friend, a brother”. Vincent Bolloré, another billionaire in media, lent Sarkozy his yacht. Dassault, whose family is big in fighter planes, is a senator in Sarkozy’s party, though sadly no longer a mayor, having lost the post after a court found he had paid cash to voters.
On the “night of Fouquet’s” in 2007, many of these men gathered with Sarkozy to celebrate his election in that swish Champs-Elysées restaurant. To those living beyond the choicest arrondissements of Paris, all this looks a bit like Putin’s Russia. No wonder Hollande has built his campaign around distrust of wealth and capitalism.
No wonder also that, on the average day, less than 2 per cent of French people buy a national newspaper.
Le fort mérité déclin de la presse française