Sarkozy Walks Out Of 60 Minutes Interview: "If I Had Something To Say About [My Wife] I Would Not Do So Here"

Watch French President Sarkozy walk out of a 60 Minutes interview he called "stupid" and a "big mistake."

Read more about the interview below and on Huff Wires:

France's president abruptly ended a "60 Minutes" interview aimed at introducing him to U.S. audiences, dubbing it "stupid" and a "big mistake" and refusing to answer questions about his wife.

Before the CBS news show interview in Paris even began, Sarkozy called his press secretary "an imbecile" for arranging the session on a busy day.

Comments

[cmk1967]

Whoops

[AntiFascistMajority]

Sixty Minutes' Scott Pelley was rude in an interview with Mahmoud Admadinejad in Tehran September 20. You can find the transcript by scrolling down a little on the page at the link below:

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article18452.htm

At one point Ahmadinejad compares Pelley to a CIA investigator, which could be literally true. According to what former CIA Director William Colby once said, "The Central Intelligence Agency owns everyone of any significance in the major media."
.

[BufoAmericanus]

I think the guy acts like a spoiled eight year-old. He's a little brat.

[BufoAmericanus]

I can't believe that there are so many Americans who think that if Bush and Laura had a divorce, while Bush was in office, it would be none of their business... In fact, I don't believe it for a second.

Running for the head of a country... People might want to know more about you then you're comfortable sharing. But if you're only a dog-catcher, well then we'll have to check into your background, make sure you're alright, maybe give you a piss test...
But don't DARE ask the rich about their life. If they wanted low-lifes to know about their lives they'd hire people to put it on TV... Not just invite investigators into their homes.

[mae692]

this interview happened 2 weeks before the divorce was announced. and yeah, we'd be interested and demand answers, but it's still none of our business. and knowing republicans, they wouldn't hesitate to tell us to mind our own business.

[TLV]

George and Laura are divorced. I read it The Enquirer a couple of years ago.

[TLV]

No.

A spoiled brat says imbecilic things like, "We have tried to disarm Saddam and he refuses." That was a lie.

A spoiled brat says, "The insurgency is in its last throes." That too was a lie.

A spoiled brat says, "We do not torture." That is always a lie, no matter how many times it is said.

A spoiled brat says, "As the myor of New York City, I knew a lot about Al-Qaeda." That was a lie.

[BufoAmericanus]

A well spoiled brat does whatever s/he wants to.

If they want to take the ball and go home, because someone isn't playing fair... That's what they'll do.

[PuffAndStuff]

Sarkozy just HAD to be thinking.....

---------------------
{Oh, these stupid, annoying Americans and the American press. What the hell is their fascination with a politician's (domestic and evidentally also foreign) personal marital business and status?}
-----------------------

Like there was nothing more pressing to ask him in this interview. Good Grief. I can't say that I blamed him for leaving, actually it was a waste of his time. And Stahl just wouldn't let the matter rest. How tabloid. How absolutely ridiculous.

All one has to do is remember Monicagate. It proves not only a large portion of our public, but also our media is ridiculous AND an embarrasment.

[Sedaei]

I love this man for what he did. This is exactly what Bill Clinton should have done when they asked him about Monica Lewinsky or any other matter in their private lives. It's time someone tells these journalists what is or isn't their business.

[ceasenake]

Bill couldn't get away because he was under oath.

The whole matter came to light because he wasn't just playing hide the cigar with Monica - he had left a trail of abused female subordinates in his wake all the way back to Arkansas.

Sexual assault, sexual harrassment, rape and abuse of power are different than asking "Where is your wife, right now?"

[TLV]

Why don't members of the Bush administration ever take the oath? What are they hiding?

[ethnobotanist]

Good for him!!!

It looked kinda sick on Stahls' part - to persue his real personal info and feelings like that.

He had to maintain and protect his dignity, and I feel he did just that.

Leslie, stop that crap - it's beneath you!
Just to get a story, you chose to look bad, very bad.

[jdm58]

It's truly disappointing to see how far 60 Minutes has gone down the tubes. Used to be a reliable, class act. Now, it's no better than FOX. Guess I'll have to find something else to do Sunday evenings.

[HumeSkeptic]

It seems sarkozy is falling apart under pressure.

I read somewhere that his talks with Putin and Hu Jintao didn't go too well. He tried to change their minds about Iran and, basically, both told him to get lost.

On top of that, the divorce, of course.

[HumeSkeptic]

"Sarkozy, who had come to Moscow for two days as a doubter hoping to find something reasonable in Putin (even praising him as courageous, direct and determined), wound up being publicly contradicted as a know-nothing for his stance asserting that Iran is driving hard toward producing nukes.

This excruciating, face-to-face public episode during a news conference in the Kremlin's St. Catherine Hall left Sarkozy dangling in embarrassment, his good intentions trampled by his host." ...

Politicus: Sarkozy tries charm, but Putin isn't budging on Iran arms question
By John Vinocur Published: October 11, 2007

In Internationsl Herald Tribune

http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/10/11/news/politicus.php

[HumeSkeptic]

From The TimesOctober 11, 2007

Putin snubs Sarkozy over stance on Iran

Vladimir Putin yesterday brushed off efforts by Nicolas Sarkozy to persuade Russia to be more co-operative in its dealings with the world. He notably stuck to his refusal to put more pressure on Iran over its nuclear plans.

President Sarkozy, on a two-day “tough-love” mission to Moscow, was visibly embarrassed when his Russian counterpart failed to share in his upbeat account of the rapport that the pair had struck at a private dinner at Mr Putin’s home.

Talking in formal, deadpan tones in the white-and-blue splendour of the Catherine Hall, in the Kremlin, President Putin said nothing to substantiate the French President’s claim on Tuesday night of a Russian change of heart over Iran. “We do not have information that Iran is trying to create a nuclear weapon,” Mr Putin said. “We operate on the principle that Iran does not have those plans. But she shares in the concerns of our partners.”

Iran had already co-operated with the United Nations and Russia would continue to co-operate with the UN, Mr Putin said. The remarks amounted to a straight putdown for Mr Sarkozy, after he had indicated on Tuesday that the Russian leader was now amenable to joining the Franco-American push for more sanctions against Tehran. "

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/europe/article2631090.ece

[ModernHigh]

I have no real sympathy for Mr. Sarkozy because he seems to be walking lock step and in line with the thinking of the Bush administration; especially as it pertains to Iran. I hope this setback will bring him to his sences and he would not become another Bush's poodle as was Tony Blair.The nuclear problem with iran has less to do with nuclear proliferation and more about the Western countries ability to control the flow of oil.Oil is the name of the game.

[jasonball]

Wow! Check it out!

This ridiculous topic, actually more innane than the subject of his divorce, has more comments than any other topic on the mainpage of huffingtonpost!

Maybe it isn't the media turning a leader of a nation into "the divorce guy," maybe it's us.

Pathetic.

[hrhjuli]

While I am not fond of the neocon-lite French President, I applauld his dismissal of what passes as news, albeit in this case a television news magazine, in this country.

Viva La France!

[HDS321]

She asked a prying, personal question that didn't have anything to do with politics or policy in the manner of a typical brainless talking head. He did the right thing and left. What business is his relationsihhp with his wife of hers. The Clintons should have taken the same attitude. How about France's role in Europe, anything. But gossiping about his marital relationship. She's too clueless to know how much she humiliated herself, the fool.

[Gretchoid]

I applaud his discretion for not wanting to discuss his wife, the mother of his child and stepmother to his other(s), or the relationship. He's a bit impulsive, but isn't it refreshing and real!?! Leslie looked shocked but she knew she went too far with "the Brittany effect".

Now HE's someone I'd have a glass of Finger Lakes
cabernet with!!!

[FreedomCorpse]

I too am no fan Sarkozy (since when am I a fan of foreign country leaders, I'm not a fan of our own crop of cretins here) but I applaud his walking out. He wasn't rude, he knew immediately that that waste of a 'journalist' was going for the infotainment value ... no real meat of journalistic quality was to be discussed.

[kfdan]

Sarkozy's divorce is something he does not think is politically relevant and journalists have to understand when a person tells them it's none of their business, it's none of their business unless it's a matter of State!

[h20bird]

I'm sick of American journalists frothing over "personal interest stories" at the expense of true investigative reporting. He showed 60 Minutes for what it has become...nothing more than another sensationalist little newsmagazine. So sad.

[Maryse]

Like most of you on this post, I actually agree that divorce is a private matter and should stay so.

But we have to put back this first principal of privacy in the context of an electoral campaign and in the French political spectrum.

The journalists new since April 2007, several months before the presidential election, that M. Sarkozy and Mme Sarkozy were not just living together anymore.

It means that the new president has been elected on a lie and used his wife to be elected. So if you hide information in order to achieve something, you should also be able to take your responsibility and answer to question related to it. I’m quite convinced that regarding the part of the society which is voting for him, being divorced would have been a handicap for him. We know for fact that Sarkozy has been stopping the publication of a book written by his wife and has personally asked that a journalist gets fired because he had published photos of his wife with another man in New York. He used his position as a Home minister to do so.

This is not the first story we had in France about the personal life of a president. Mitterrand had a daughter nobody new about, except the journalists. Sarkozy political party, back then, was really critical of the secrecy which had been around the legitimate daughter. Seeing the criticism at the end of Mitterrand’s life, we have to wander if Sarkozy has learned about the lesson. He obviously hasn’t and uses all his power to silence the story. That’s an abuse of power and it is not good for the democracy.

[frenchstudent]

"It means that the new president has been elected on a lie and used his wife to be elected"

Nope. Sarkozy did not get elected because of his marital status. His main contender was not married, onpenly 'lived in sin", and got more votes than many married candidates. It is simply not an issue in France. However, both Sarkozy's divorce and Royal's breakup would have changed the subject of the campagn, and I am glad they all put it off till after the election.

As for Sarko's foermer criticism of Mitterand's secrecy, I believe it is exactlty as the interest of republicans for adultery or homosexuality : fake outrage faked for political motives. The difference? the french public doesn't bite.