Rigging French Elections: The “DEATH BY MEDIA” of Dominique Strauss Kahn

 

In 1999, Dominique Strauss Kahn was knocked out of the race for mayor of Paris by accusations of fraud

WSWS reports that France’s Minister of Finance Strauss-Kahn resigns.
(emphasis mine) [my comment]

France’s Minister of Finance Strauss-Kahn resigns
By Peter Schwarz
5 November 1999
The resignation of French Minister of Finance Dominique Strauss-Kahn plunged the Socialist Party-led government into the deepest crisis of its two-and-a-half-year existence.
Strauss-Kahn resigned his office in Prime Minister Lionel Jospin’s government on November 2, once it was clear he faced a formal investigation. He is suspected of receiving a fee of 603,000 francs (US$97,000) from France’s largest student insurance company, MNEF, for work he did not carry out.
These accusations are not new, but Strauss-Kahn has always maintained his innocence. …
Last week it was revealed that documents purporting to confirm this account had been falsified. Analysis in a police laboratory showed that the paper and typefaces used did not exist at the time when the documents were alleged to have been produced. They must have been created subsequently and given an earlier date.
…

The Independent reports that M Strauss-Kahn was not only tipped as a possible successor to Jospin.

Minister’s resignation tarnishes `clean’ Jospin
By CHARLES BREMNER
Wednesday November 03 1999
… M Strauss-Kahn was not only tipped as a possible successor to Jospin, but he was also the favoured candidate in the Socialist campaign to unseat Jean Tiberi, the Gaullist Mayor of Paris.
…

The Economist reports that DSK might have made a convincing, reassuring prime minister.

A sad adieu to Dominique Strauss-Kahn
Nov 4th 1999 | from the print edition
… Certainly, DSK might well have stood for mayor of Paris in 2001, perhaps prising the capital from right-wing control; and in 2002, when Mr Jospin seems set to stand against Mr Chirac for the presidency, DSK might have made a convincing, reassuring prime minister. …

The charges of corruption were baseless

The New York Times reports that Strauss-Kahn Sees Victory in Elf Case.

Strauss-Kahn Sees Victory in Elf Case
By Steven Levingston
Published: June 30, 2001
PARIS — Prospects may be improving for the political rehabilitation of Dominique Strauss-Kahn, the former French finance minister who resigned in 1999 under a cloud of corruption.
Mr. Strauss-Kahn, a rising star in the Socialist Party until scandal sidelined him, learned Thursday that a French prosecutor had dropped efforts to try him for allegedly granting a tax break to the fashion designer Karl Lagerfeld.
The former finance minister now expects to be cleared soon of any role in a broad scandal involving Elf Aquitaine, the former French state oil company that is now part of TotalFinaElf SA.
…
"All of the suspicions of corruption are falling," said a source close to Mr. Strauss-Kahn.
…
"I was accused from the beginning of having been paid for work that I did not do," he told RTL. "I was cleared of that. The court said: No, no, the work was done. There was no problem, simply the contract was not correctly dated."

In his defense, Mr. Strauss-Kahn said that the work under question was begun in 1994 but that the contract was not drawn up until 1995.

"So we wrote the date 1994," he said. "I think this is something that I should not have done. But honestly, it didn’t damage anyone because both parties were in agreement. I’m hopeful that the court will consider that this was not very serious."

April 28, 2011: DSK worried about becoming the victim of another political set-up

SMH reports about DSK’s April 28 interview.

Presidential run turns into a perp walk
Paola Totaro
May 18, 2011
It’s April 28, an icy Thursday afternoon, and Dominique Strauss-Kahn is ensconced at a restaurant table with a journalist from Liberation, the legendary Parisian newspaper founded by Jean-Paul Sartre.
The lunch date, in an eatery in the French capital’s second arrondissement, had been made in secret: the IMF chief and presidential hopeful had been in town all week from Washington and the chat was to be held ”en toute confidentialite”.
Cordial and smiling, DSK as he is known in France, nevertheless appeared cautious, suspicious even. As he extended his hand towards the journalist waiting for him, he asked if he was carrying a mobile telephone.
Strauss-Kahn explained that he carries two: one for IMF business, encrypted for security, and the other for personal business. The personal one, he said, had been left at reception as a precaution against the ”strong feeling” that he was under surveillance, fearful of dirty tricks by the French Interior Ministry.

Over the next couple of hours, the IMF chief – without confirming formally or on the record – made very clear to the left-leaning Liberation that he was on the path to formally declaring his candidacy for the French presidency. An informal pact with the Socialist Party’s leader, Martine Aubry, would see her withdraw her own foray for the top job and so would begin the long – ”too long” in his view – campaign to become President de la Republique Francais.

Then the bombshell, if only in hindsight.
Without prompting or questions from the reporter, DSK proceeded to outline the three obstacles he foresaw in his run for France’s top job: ”Le fric, les femmes et ma judeite.” (Money, women and my being a Jew.)
Strauss-Kahn, however, chose to begin his explanation with the woman problem: ”Yes, I love women … et alors? [So what?] Over many years people speak of photos of giant orgies … but I have yet to see them emerge. So, let’s see them. Bring it on!” he told Liberation.
Then he recalls a chance meeting with Nicolas Sarkozy, at a urinal during an international summit when he asked his political rival to stop the forays into his personal life. Continuing the story, he veers into the imaginary, portraying himself as a potential victim of a political set-up saying: ”A woman [who claims to be raped by him in a car park] and who has been promised €500,000 or €1 million to invent such a story.”
…
Three weeks after his extraordinary chat with a friendly French newspaper, the IMF chief is behind bars in New York’s notorious Rikers Island prison, and due to appear in court again on Friday.
His lawyers say he has a cast iron alibi – lunch with his daughter, a graduate student at Columbia University, in New York, on the very day of the alleged rape.
…

“DEATH BY MEDIA”

Daily Mail reports about France’s fury at ‘lynching’ of Strauss-Kahn after rape charge.

‘They want to make a Frenchman pay’: France’s fury at ‘lynching’ of Strauss-Kahn after rape charge
By Daily Mail Reporter
Last updated at 5:19 PM on 17th May 2011
…
Arrested on Saturday and charged with sexually assaulting a chambermaid at a luxury New York hotel, police made the 62-year-old walk in front of cameras on his way to a courthouse, and his appearance before a judge was televised.

Former Culture Minister Jack Lang described the treatment of the Socialist presidential frontrunner, whose political career is now in tatters, as a ‘lynching’ that had ‘provoked horror and aroused disgust’.


‘Public lynching’: Dominique Strauss-Kahn has been unfairly treated according to some of his countrymen
The U.S. justice system, he said, was ‘politicised’ and the judge appeared to have been determined to ‘make a Frenchman pay’ by denying the head of the International Monetary Fund bail even though his lawyer had offered to post a $1 million bond.
…
Former Justice Minister Elisabeth Guigou, who drafted that law, called the pre-trial publicity ‘absolutely sickening.’

‘The power of these images of a Dominique Straus

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