Sarkozy Slams Obama: "I'm Going to Ask Him to Walk on the Channel...And He'll Do It"

Some of you may have missed this during all the tea party festivities. French President Nicolas Sarkozy told the press what he really thinks about Barack Obama. This happened yesterday:

Over three courses at the lunch, Mr. Sarkozy held forth on the shortcomings of others, according to the newspaper Libération and other French news outlets, based on the accounts of opposition legislators who attended.

In the world according to Sarko, President Obama is weak, inexperienced and badly briefed on climate change...

Mr. Obama, according to Mr. Sarkozy, “has a subtle mind, very intelligent and very charismatic. But he was elected two months ago and never ran a ministry in his life. He doesn’t have a position on a number of things.” Mr. Obama “is not always operating at a level of decision-making and efficiency,” according to the voluble Mr. Sarkozy, who has previously been quoted as insulting many other leaders.

Mr. Obama appeared unprepared on climate change when they met, according to Mr. Sarkozy, who told the legislators: “I told him, ‘I don’t think that you have quite understood what we are doing on carbon dioxide.’ ”

In the magazine L’Express, Mr. Sarkozy was quoted as joking about Mr. Obama’s sanctified image, and appeared to resent the uncritical welcome that the Obamas received in the European news media. Mr. Obama, pressured by Mr. Sarkozy, agreed to visit France again in June for the anniversary of the D-Day landings in Normandy.

“I am going to ask him to walk on the Channel, and he’ll do it,” Mr. Sarkozy reportedly said.

He gets it. He really gets it.