Paul from Paris

Cases of swine flu –known locally as grippe A– have appeared in Paris. As in New York, they’re centered on schools.

Last Friday, one elementary school student (in CM2, equivalent to fifth grade) at the Ecole de la place du Cardinal Amette fell ill with swine flu. On Sunday, six more swine flu cases were declared, at the same school. On Tuesday, 17 new cases were declared, including one at an adjacent elementary school, Ecole Dupleix.

Despite 24 cases declared in less than a week, the authorities have been reassuring and trying to minimize the situation. The school has been temporarily closed (the school year ends next week).

What strikes me the most is the insistence with which the authorities repeat that the class where the first student fell ill had just returned from a school trip in the United Kingdom; this foreign origin of the virus is emphasized at every occasion.

[ADDENDUM: As of 25 June, three additional swine flu cases were declared among students at an elementary school in Creteil, a Paris suburb. A middle school student from Châtillon (another Paris suburb) was hospitalized with swine flu shortly after his return from a class trip to Canada.]

Nicolas Sarkozy addressed a joint session of parliament at the Versailles palace yesterday. This was a first by a French president in over a century. Sarkozy seems to have taken a cue from American state of the union speeches (that American presidents are constitutionally required to make each year), but I found the ambiance more like a commencement (graduation) address at a university: an assembly excited but bored; a speaker grandiose and a touch pompous; a memorable decor and orchestration.

Sarkozy made five takeaway points:

1. 1. Change! It’s coming. Sarkozy’s bringing it. This point was borrowed, fully and unapologetically, from the Obama playbook.
   2. Crisis. It’s here. There’s an odd disconnect in France, with plenty of bad economic news, but people who seem at least to be putting on a bright face. Sarkozy demonstrated an awareness of the gravity of the situation.
   3. Big bond issuance. The times call for dramatic action. Sarkozy launched a major bond issuance, targeting French savers.
   4. No new taxes. Sarkozy didn’t ask the parliamentarians to read his lips, but he did swear off tax increases.
   5. No austerity. Spending will be commensurate with the challenges confronting France.

Sarkozy’s strongest words were reserved for another topic: should France outlaw the burka (the burka is a loose, full-body garment covering its wearer head to toe, worn by some Muslim women)? Sarkozy had strong words (my translation, emphasis in original text):

Sarkozy is not alone in his opposition to the burka. Fadela Amara, the current minister of housing, a progressive, a blogger, and the former head of activist organization Ni putes, ni soumises (“Neither whores nor doormats”), is “in favor of a full prohibition of the burka in our country.” André Gerin, a mayor and MP and communist party member, proposed a parliamentary commission to investigate the issue. His proposal has received parliamentary support across the political spectrum, including now from president Sarkozy.

Mainstream media, especially what the French call the “Anglo-Saxon” press, has misread into Sarkozy’s opposition to the burka an intolerance of religious freedom or a discomfort with Muslims. Neither of these arguments holds up. And the women’s-equality justification seems to go unreported outside of France. Far from seeking to divide, Sarkozy is actually using the burka as a foil to seek consensus. When he spoke of the burka, Sarkozy was trying to seek common ground, understood in four ways:

1. What we hold in common, part of national identity, common to all French people;
2. Something parliamentarians of all political stripes can agree on;
3. A preoccupation of the ordinary citizen or the common man, not just Parisians or government technocrats;
4. An everyday concern, something actually seen in the street, not an abstraction like the national debt.

Murder. A serious crime, anywhere. But this American who makes his home is Paris was puzzled by sentencing in two recent cases that drew lots of coverage in France.

In the United States, criminal law is generally a matter of state law, although there is federal criminal law as well. So there are many laws on homicide and sentences in the United States: 1 for each of the 50 states, plus 1 for federal law, making 51 laws in all. What they share are:

• A tiered system, with intentional homicides being punished more severely than others. This feature is widely known and often featured on television programs and in films.
• Long prison sentences. Life sentences are common. In California, for example, second-degree homicide is punishable for a term of 15 years to life, and first-degree homicide for a term of 25 years to life; recidivists are granted longer sentences. Throughout the United States, those convicted often receive consecutive sentences, where the term for multiple acts equals the sum of all the acts for which the defendant has been convicted.

Americans are accustomed to long prison terms.

Two cases decided last week brought into contrast these American expectations and European practice.

In the first case, a Geneva court found Cécile Brossard guilty of murdering her lover, Edouard Stern. Brossard had shot Stern four times in the head in the course of an argument.

The case was sensational because Stern was a wealthy financier and because the homicide occurred during a sex game, when Stern wore an elaborate latex costume.

The Swiss court sentenced Brossard to a prison term of 8 1/2 years. Brossard has already spent 4 years in pretrial detention and can be paroled next year.

In the second case, a French court found Véronique Courjault guilty of murdering three infant children.

The facts of the case are especially macabre. A few years ago, the Courjaults lived in Korea. Véronique's husband Jean-Louis discovered two babies in the family's freezer. Everyone was shocked and puzzled, and the Courjaults returned to France. Shock and puzzlement intensified when DNA tests indicated that the frozen babies were the Courjaults'. Veronique and Jean-Louis Courjault seem normal, and the couple has two sons who are now teenagers.

What had happened? Véronique Courjault reportedly suffered from pregnancy denial, a condition (that is not exceptionally rare, but known and studied) that leads an expecting woman to dissimulate a pregnancy, including from herself. In this case, Véronique Courjault had killed and frozen children she bore in 2002 and 2003. Subsequent investigations turned up another child, born in 1999, whom Courjault had incinerated and buried in the garden. (Jean-Louis Courjault maintained his ignorance of such things, and has not been charged with any crime.)

A French court found Véroniqiue Courjault guilty of murder and sentenced her to an eight-year prison term. She has already served three years in pretrial detention. She is eligible for parole in a year, which reportedly brought smiles to her family.

As an American observer, two aspects of these cases leave me perplexed: the comparative brevity of the overall sentence, and the long periods spent incarcerated before trial (or conviction).

The Société civile des producteurs de phonogrammes en France (SPPF) brought suit before the Paris tribunal de grande instance (superior court) against YouTube. SPPF seeks 10 million euros in damages. for alleged copyright infringement by YouTube.

SPPF is a collecting society. It has about 1,300 members, all French independents. In 2008, it collected € 14.53 million euros, up from € 12.67 million in 2007, a one-year increase of about 15%.

SPPF contends that more than 100 music videos by its members were available on YouTube in 2009, after having been removed from that site at SPF’s request in 2008. SPPF seems to have crafted its complaint to follow prior cases finding sites negligent for failing to remove content after request by a right-holder representative. I’m puzzled by the factual circumstances here, because YouTube has a system in place to avoid precisely this problem.

More generally, I’m puzzled because music videos are essentially promotional. Broadcasters pay royalties when they air videos, and there exists a limited consumer market for them. But they remain a promotional tool. Do SPPF members really not want promotion via YouTube and other sites?

La Californie, l’état le plus peuplé des Etats-Unis, se trouve particulièrement touchée par la crise :

• Son taux de chômage a atteint 11,0 % en avril ;
• Son déficit budgétaire atteint $ 21,3 milliards, ce qui a contraint le gouverneur Schwarzenegger à proposer au parlement à réduire de manière drastique presque tous les services publics ;
• Seul 79,7 % des élèves quittent l’enseignement secondaire avec un diplôme ; même si ce chiffre dépasse la moyenne nationale (médiocre, de 69,2 %), il cache d’importantes variations régionales et ethniques, et font craindre pour l’avenir des jeunes qui quittet l’école sans qualification, fâceau chômage et à un état sans ressources ;
• En mai 2009, 1 foyer sur 144 a vu sa résidence faire l’objet d’une saisie (pour crédit non-remboursé) ; une nouvelle loi en Californie incite les banques à renégocier avec le débiteur avant de réaliser une saisie ;
• Le prix de vente médiane d’une résidence en mai 2009 s’établit à $ 230 000, chiffre en baisse de 52 % par rapport à mai 2007 ($ 484 000).