BIDEN-MACRON: HUBRIS AND RETRIBUTION

The state dinner on June 8, hosted by Emmanuel Macron at the Élysée for President Biden, was magnificent! It was the climax of the D-Day celebrations and the American President’s state visit. Emmanuel and Joe were the kings of the world that night, their leadership shining brightly amid global turmoil...

A month later, hubris comes at a high cost. "When one rushes to their own ruin," said Aeschylus, "the gods lend a hand too." Macron, upset by the French voting results on June 9, decided to throw "a grenade between their legs" by announcing a surprise dissolution, threatening civil war if they dared to vote poorly again.

He got more than he bargained for. On July 7, the man who claimed seven years ago to transcend the old right-left divide, created a country more polarized than ever between two extremes, without a parliamentary majority or government, leading to probable paralysis and his forced resignation...

Across the Atlantic, Biden collapsed during the crucial June 27 debate against Trump. The carefully managed "cover-up" of his physical and cognitive decline was brutally exposed before CNN's cameras. Instead of a "Commander in Chief" ready to lead for the next four years, Americans saw a frail old man, often inaudible, lost, and searching for words...

With the Democratic Convention on August 19 approaching, his candidacy is in jeopardy. Major donors are pulling out. Panic ensues...

But Joe, like Emmanuel, resists. On ABC last week, he declared: "I revived NATO. No one thought I could expand it. I silenced Putin. No one thought it possible. I united 50 nations to help Ukraine... I am the most qualified to win this election. I’m staying and I will win." Adding, "Only the Good Lord could make me change my mind." More hubris.

Joe and Emmanuel meet this week in Washington for NATO’s 75th anniversary. But the atmosphere is different from the Élysée. With LFI and RN strong in the Assembly, Macron’s strict stance on Ukraine is compromised. Biden knows the truly awaited and feared guest by allied leaders is not him, but Trump.

Trump, whom Zelensky is publicly asking to clarify his future peace plan for Ukraine. Trump, who promises, according to his advisors, to revise the Alliance and withdraw most GIs from Europe once peace with Russia is achieved.

Sign of the times, while Paris and Washington focus on internal issues, Viktor Orban, the Hungarian, has taken advantage of his European Council presidency to meet Zelensky and Putin as a self-proclaimed peace mediator... Much to the dismay of the Commission, which clarified that Orban could not speak for Europeans in Moscow. Atmosphere...

Meanwhile, in Astana, leaders of twenty Global South countries, gathered within the SCO (Shanghai Cooperation Organization), behind Xi and Putin, watch with a glass of vodka in hand as their democratic opponents stumble: Sunak ousted in London, Scholz on the brink in Germany, and the end of reigns for Joe and Emmanuel. More hubris...

Pierre Lellouche
Column VA, 7/7/24