Spread the Turd

I have noticed that the legendary dogshit of the pavements of Paris has made a comeback of late; walking through the city has become as perilous as it was said to be before the city embarked on a clean-up drive ten years ago or so. There are turds almost everywhere again, in both the more and less salubrious parts of town, much of the shit smeared all over the pavement by someone that either could not remember Paris as it was or had allowed years of clean streets to make him complacent.

So who is to blame? Is this negligence part of an anti-Sarkozy protest on the part of Parisian dog-owners? Or is it an anti-Delanoë protest, ahead of the legislative elections and next year's municipals? Delanoë has led a strong, heavily-advertised municipal tidiness campaign over the past few years that specified particular fines for dog turds left lying around.

The best quote of the election campaign meanwhile has come from a Socialist Party campaigner in Paris, who said: 'Sarkozy said that he would only choose the best people for his cabinet; you'll notice he didn't select a single UMP deputy from Paris.' Deliciously bitchy. Things might be desperate for the PS but the wit is still there. They might even 'win' Paris.