Our suddenly-popular president

For a current president, there's no better way of gaining popularity than to announce that you'll be abandoning the job. That leaves the way open to both friends and enemies to say publicly that you were a nice fellow.

I wonder what would happen if he were to suddenly say: "Now that I see that more people admire me, I think I should change my mind and envisage a second term." If ever François Hollande were to adopt this approach, I think he should be careful. I'm not very experienced in the domain of presidential counseling.

I'm pleased to see that Bernard Cazeneuve has accepted the nice task of guiding both the nation and her chief to the end of an era. He's a courageous gentleman. Above all, he has been a faultless head cop, and he'll surely go down in modern French history for that. As for the outgoing president, I'm not convinced that history will store away a good image of his passage.