According to various press reports today Sarkozy is preparing to endorse Tony Blair as the first non-rotating President of Europe. Given that the wrangling for this and the position of Foreign Minister (a job we believe Sarko would like to go to Bernard Kouchner, currently France's Foreign Minister) will be taking place during the French Presidency in the second half of this year this would be a significant endorsement. As one of the articles puts it,

Former UK prime minister Tony Blair will attend a conference of French president Nicolas Sarkozy's centre-right party UMP on Saturday (12 January), in what is said to be his first intervention for a party other than his own.

The move is fuelling speculation that Mr Blair, who belongs to the UK’s center-left Labour party, is in the running for EU president – a new high-profile job that can be held for up to five years starting in 2009.

And it makes me feel all cold inside. The thought of Blair taking the European Union’s imperial purple (POTUSE – President of the United States of Europe) given the way in which he presented the Reform Treaty/Constitution as a fait accompli to Brown as his last significant act as Prime Minister is abhorrent.

 

See also:

Is Blair Betraying Britain?, 16 June 2007

Blair Pulls Out the Pin, 18 June 2007

Back in the EUSSR, 21 June 2007

Europe Has Given Up on the People, 27 June 2007