E-mail updates
Follow on Twitter
Subscribe to RSSFrench President Nicolas Sarkozy vowed during a TV debate on Tuesday to halve the number of immigrants and impose a minimum tax on profits of big listed companies as he sought to bolster support for his re-election bid in April.
Sarkozy, grilled by veteran Socialist Laurent Fabius and journalists for three hours on the primetime show, defended his record on tax reform, public finances, and unemployment - which rose on his watch as economic crisis battered the world.
The conservative leader, lagging behind Socialist challenger Francois Hollande in the polls, was also made to apologize for old gaffes and explain his personality traits in a lengthy section about awkward moments in his early presidency.
Sarkozy, said by critics to pander too much to the far right as he seeks to maximize support for the April 22 first round, said he would cut the number of immigrants to 100,000 a year from 180,000 and tighten up the rules on foreigners' access to French nationality and benefits.
The debate with Fabius - a former finance and prime minister who is destined for a top job if Hollande wins - comes as Sarkozy is struggling in opinion polls. Having gained a few points at the start of his campaign, Sarkozy slipped back last week as he suffered setbacks on the campaign trail.
Hollande, who launched his campaign months before Sarkozy, regained momentum by proposing a 75 percent tax rate on earnings above a million euros, a move 61 percent of French people would support, a poll by TNS Sofres and Mediaprism showed.
Quizzed about the economy, Sarkozy said that while Germany remained a model to be emulated, France had held up better than much of Europe in the crisis.
In a tense and barbed debate, Sarkozy accused his opponent of using artistic license when citing unemployment figures.
"If unemployment exploded in so many countries, was it my fault it rose in France or did something happen?" Sarkozy said. "If you didn't include temporary workers in jobless figures when you were finance minister, why would you do it now?"
In a long section about his personal style, Sarkozy said he regretted episodes such as feting his 2007 election victory in a swanky Paris nightspot. Asked about his personal failings, he listed them as being spontaneous, emotional and sentimental.
"When people freely insult me, I don't like it," he said, explaining why he had more than once snapped at members of the public. His biggest strength was his energy, he said.
It was Sarkozy's first political debate of the election campaign, following an able performance by Hollande at the end of January against Foreign Minister Alain Juppe.
Sarkozy, who is set to deliver his biggest campaign speech yet in the Paris suburbs on Sunday, said his first foreign trip if re-elected would be to visit his German counterpart in Berlin, after which he would go to the Middle East to discuss peace talk possibilities with Israeli and Palestinian officials.
More from msnbc.com and NBC News:
- Syrian military hospitals torturing patients?
- High stakes for China iPad dispute
- Obama accuses GOP critics of 'beating the drums of war' in Mideast
- McCain calls for US-led airstrikes on Assad forces
- 107 percent turnout? Another side to Russia's vote
Follow us on Twitter: @msnbc_world
Copyright 2013 Thomson Reuters. Click for restrictions.
Leave a Comment:
At last a world leader has it right! In Europe and here in America we have opened the gates to way, way too many immigrants who only wish to come here and eat at the table that has been provided by the hard working American and European forefathers. They are unwilling and too lazy to do the hard work that made America and Europe great, they only wish to feast on the efforts of others. And the worst of them, the muslims only wish to bomb and kill and subjugate others to thier twisted and hate filled culture and demand ever increasing benefits from the host country. Stop them all now!
@Jack, You are so right!
Lets see. First we open the doors to immigrants in order to create a larger tax base. Then we reduce the immigrants to burger flippers, floor cleaners, and tomato pickers or worse, no work, and would refuse social help when needed. I think all who would close the doors forget that their moms and pops came from over there. This idea of borders is to exclude one group and entitle another only to deny and enslave. Hey you know, we are in, lets close the doors so that the others won't get in. Exclusive, elitist. History will prove this model wrong.
The demographics and economics in a super small nutshell are this: post WWII North America boomed. Economically and with population. Our strength allowed help to Europe and Japan and later they also boomed. The new affluence allowed to the nouveau riche to have a requisite "one child", personal policy while accumuating wealth. Indeed the native northern Europe caucasians, the Japanese, and North American Caucasians are in demographic decline. But the Riche still want services. So they let great quantities of people in from the subtropical and tropical regions where population explosions are rampant. They move north just to fill the void so to speak. They do not assimilate to their new homes. Instead they want to have the old country in the new country only with nice cars, nice homes and medical care and air conditioning. By rejecting the values and history of their new countries, the values that built the wealth, they guarantee these northern countries will decline socially and economically and turn into their old southern countries. If the values they brought with them were capable of building wealth, then their old countries wouldn't be such miserable places and they wouldn't want to flee from them. But by bringing their politics, specially their religion based politics, their invalid ideas of contract law, and property rights etc, to the the new country, they doom the social order and economic prosperity of the host country. But they don't know that, so they continue on. Generally unskilled but hard working they take the labor intensive jobs the "one child" of the riche do not want to do. The native northeners who are not the nouveau riche resent the loss of opportunity for their kids as they see the apologetic nouveau riche give away jobs, civil rights and scholarships to the immigrants while denying such opportunities to the native born. So in Europe and the US we see some anti-immigrant activity. Not in Japan where they never allowed immigration in the first place.
I could not have said it better. People need to stay in their home country unless they are transferred. The people who do immigrate are ususally unschooled and have no money.
Hey Pete.... My grandparents came over legally.... We are not against letting people into this country... Just do it legally... I hope to hell you don't have to go through THE hell when your identity is stolen.. Maybe until that happens to you, you'll change your tune..
Or, Pete, they can stay in their own countries and try to make Them better, instead of crowding here (we're getting pretty full and we've allowed immigrants from every country now, quota complete).
France has a right to proceed with caution.. people forget that France has an obligation to its current population in regards to Safety, Health services, the economy etc.. not to mention, identity! - France should govern for France, not cater to outsiders.. or a minority but, its majority.. especially, if human rights are not being violated.. Its France!
Foreigners can also be viewed as an asset, the energy and hunger that drives those immigrants often benefit their adopted countries.. but, if France believes too many are turning to crime or crumbling the economy by taking and offering nothing.. they have a right, to say " heck no " maybe later, check back at a future date..
Well.....
drive down to ANY Welfare Office, and ANY major City in the United States, and we can see very clearly just how much immigrants have "Helped" themselves to.
As an American married to a Hispanic, I have ZERO prejudice against LEGAL IMMIGRATION. The process works. I do, however, place my vote with ANY candidate who will crack down on Illegal Immigration. How many Single Mothers of 4 could receive additional Job Training, financial, and Medical Support if we eliminated 1/4 of the help ILLEGAL IMMIGRANTS ARE HELPING THEMSELVES TO?
HE IS NOT "POLITICALLY CORRECT"
but 100% CORRECT......
let's get real, and realize that WAY TOO MANY Immigrants are simply non-contributors, going elsewhere to "suck on the teat" of another Government.
Not to try and say that I think illegals should be allowed to stay, but anybody who thinks that the farm workers, and day laborers don't contribute to society is sadly wrong. Those people, work harder in a day than most legal citizens work in a year. You can see it in their bodies. They just look worn down from the years of hard work. Simply put, some of the hardest working people in America are not here illegally.
Hello Washington... Come in Washington.... Is there anybody home? Is anyone listening?
Maybe we can stop the immigration for a while? Or at least not provide incentives and give aways paid for on the backs of all of us Legal Americans?
This is just a despairation tactic by President Sarkozy who isn't going to be reelected anyway. I believe his ancestry is Hungarian but his complaint is that France has too many immigrants? It's just like the Know Nothings in 19th century America he's trying to profit by appealing to prejudice.
Cecil...I think we would all suggest you enroll in an English class, followed by remedial work in logic, and with some extra-curricular work when time allows in history. France foolishly allowed way too many immigrants, and it's those of the muslim persuasion that are the damage to the long revered French culture and success.
We are not talking about ancestry, we are talking people coming and not being wanted due to the fact they take food and housing that should be for the french people only.
75 % tax rate? this man is nuts! i guess they need the money to support the immigrants-- pretty much like here in the u.s. i guess socialists are all the same..
Eisenhower era tax rate on the third million was 93%. It worked great at preventing the money from flowing to the top unearned. It also worked great at keeping the playing field level.
After all... this is the good old days that cons want to go back to; so why is a 93% rate on the third million of income a problem?
Because no government should deserve 93% of your earnings. What did the government do for 93 cents on the dollar? This holds especially true when you think about how roughly 50% of the population doesn't pay a dime in federal income tax. Why should some people pay 93% when about half pay nothing? BTW, I'm part of the nothing payers, but even I know it isn't right that somebody should pay 93%. Also, I'm sure back in the 93% days, there were ways upon ways to get around paying 93%. Only idiots would actually pay that amount.
Scalibrini.... go online and check out all the tax rates in France... just see what the rate is on just luxury tax alone..
Every non-muslim country needs to ship these nut cases/muslims/illegal immigration people back to their muslim countries..They have nothing in common with their host countries except to break the counties from the inside to destruction..They hate the infidels so why move there?? They have ulterior motives!!! This goes for the hispanics also,illegals,that is...Come in legally and be upright in your support of new country like the different nationalities in the past..
Sounds like there is a lot of hate on your side, intolerant girl.
Hey Tampon, doesn't sound like hate to me... She just hates people cheating they way into this country and sponging off the government... which is YOU the tax payer... oh, well if you do really pay taxes.
next year they will want 80%. But the poor will want to pay zero.
France will have the same trouble like us here in the US, with some immigrants. We have way too many Muslims in our country now and later we will pay the price. Sharia Law, is just one of those things they want to see here in the US. France has more guts than we do here, because they outlawed the covering of the faces for Muslim women.
Florida legislature is in session. a week ago a bill was brought up which would deny Florida family courts from considering any law which did not originate in Florida. A measure which appears to pre-empt someone from convincing a judge to make a decision on a case based on a law or religion originating from outside Florida. Bang, a crowd of Muslims showed up in front of the capitol and protested the racist nature of the anti-sharia bill being proffered. It appears as if the Legislator baited the Muslims and they took the bait. He did not name Sharia Law in his bill. No one else besides Muslims came to protest. THe protestors talked to the reporters on camera and said this was clearly an attempt to keep Sharia Law out. In other words, they WANT SHARIA LAW IN ! As far as being information for the public, this was a nice play by that Legislator. He allowed them to out themselves. Now the questions is: are the apologists among us going to deny the move to establish Sharia Law
If France follows its historical trends, it will elect a Socialist duffus instead of Sarkozy...and spend the remainder of that fellow's term wringing its hands and seeking a way to turn him out..
Sarkozy was a true "anomaly" for France...
Dont forget, a previous top contender was Strauss-Kahn, the African hotel maid rapist....
Sacre bleu!
And we had Predator Clinton.
It is amazing to me that people who are working three jobs to live in a 150k house are supporting these robber barons.
France is suffering from the independence of Algeria. Remember French Algiers? When they were granted independence, millions migrated to France. It was part of the deal. But if you went to an American school which has not taught history for the last 50 years then you may not know this.
Interesting point of view for Sarkozy, a man whose father was a Hungarian immigrant to France.
The US has very few Muslims - France has quite a few - partly because they colonized Algeria and in the ensuring years of violence and disorder got a lot of Muslim immigrants - now perhaps 10 percent of their population.
Most Americans have been proud of our openness to many cultures and religions and most of our ancestors were immigrants at some point in the past. Muslims are a tiny percentage of the US population and should be as welcome as any other religion - Mormons, Catholics, Jews, etc. They must, of course respect our laws on polygamy (Mormons, Muslims) and other laws protecting individual rights.
In general, America has benefited from immigration. They bring a lot of energy, the first generation is willing to do jobs other Americans don't want to do, and they are helping to keep our birthrate up - avoiding some of the problems of Europe, Japan etc. Most of the Muslims in America seem to be hard working, conservative people who follow their beliefs without trying to oppress or otherwise disfavor others.
France says it is illegal to wear a head scarf in public or in school and it recently expelled the gypsies from France. I don't think American would benefit from such intolerant policies.
America has lower costs than Europe - many services cost about half as much because we have so many immigrants willing to do the jobs in hotel cleaning, restaurant kitchens, slaughterhouses, agricultural harvesting, etc. They should be legal. Obama has been expelling a lot of the illegals that commit crimes - at a higher rate than his predecessors.
On balance the US has always benefited from immigration, even if there are some problems in the short term in integrating new people into our country. For many reasons, they should be legal and not illegal - to prevent exploitation, avoid forcing them into crime, avoid having people driving without licenses and insurance, etc. Most of the Muslims are legal residents.
Not taking the word "ILLEGAL" seriously does have consequences.
The U.S. also has far too many immigrants. Time to shut the door. Especially to the South, and to Muslims who do not wish to integrate into our society.
People all over the world are tired of illegal immigants being on tax subsidized programs like food stamps, Medicaid, housing vouchers, etc. It is time to end the gravy train.
What he meant to say was that they have too many MUSLIM immigrants. And we agree.
Well, the little banty rooster is finally right on something. Immigrants who do not assimilate, but try to force their 'traditional' ways on a different country (primarily because they feel safer somewhere besides their home country) are the real problem. If anyone wants to file the proper paperwork and go through all the steps to become a citizen and wants to assimilate (learn to speak the language, dress appropriately, get a job and adhere to all the laws), then that is acceptable. Trying to bring the Middle East, Mexico, China or another culture into a country that already has its own culture is not good.
France and England will be the two newest Muslim nations in a few decades.
looks like it !
If Sarkozy doesn't do something fast his country will be run by islam.
Sarkozy seems to forget he is descendant from Hungarian immigrants.
I Love Sarkozy. I hope he wins! Even 100,000 immigrants a year in a small country like France sounds like too much. Hell, it is too much for the US Every Year!