On Tough EU Trip, French Oddly Likeable

(NEWSER) - Europeans may have longer lives and longer vacations, but red-blooded Americans don't want their socialist ways on this side of the ocean, right wing media mouths are eager to remind everyone, MIchael Freedman writes in Newsweek. Underlying much of the opposition to health care reform is the fear that it's part of an anti-American conspiracy to transform the US into a "European social welfare state," according to Rush Limbaugh. More»

European leaders feel burned after visit by popular president

(NEWSER) - President Obama’s dizzying, 2-day jaunt through Europe left two people smarting in his dust: Nicolas Sarkozy and Angela Merkel. France’s president and Germany’s chancellor learned that Obama, not one to pal around with European leaders, keeps his distance. “Obama is not out to play buddy-buddy with Sarko or any other European leader,” Charles Bremner writes for the Times of London. More»

Washington, Paris on good terms, Sarkozy aide says

(NEWSER) - President Obama will travel to Normandy for the 65th anniversary of the D-Day invasion, the New York Daily News reports. An aide to Nicolas Sarkozy spilled the beans on Obama’s June 6 visit after a reporter claimed the relationship between the two presidents was distant. “Relations are excellent and very productive,” Claude Gueant said, noting that Sarkozy and Obama talked yesterday about the upcoming G-20 summit. More»

At odds with Germany over ECB, deflation, budget enforcement

(NEWSER) - French President Nicolas Sarkozy yesterday called for changing the eurozone treaty to make a tighter, stronger union, and demanded more budget discipline, increased help for foundering economies, and replacing countries' veto rights with qualified majorities, reports Reuters . He also called for the European Central Bank to be more interventionist and fight possible deflation. "Let us not hide it, Europe may be swept away by the crisis if it doesn't get a grip, if it doesn't change," he warned. "We don't have the right to let such a disaster happen." More»

Belgian division to be nationalized; Belgium, France offer guarantees

(NEWSER) - Leading Franco-Belgian bank Dexia has agreed to a government rescue plan—making it "the biggest euro zone bank failure in quite some time," one analyst tells the New York Times . The plan will nationalize Dexia's Belgian banking division in a $5.4 billion government buyout; meanwhile, Belgium, France, and Luxembourg are providing the bank with $121 billion in guarantees, Reuters reports. Belgium will cover 60.5% of the guarantees, with France providing 36.5% and Luxembourg the rest. More»