President Nicolas Sarkozy of France at Columbia University World Leaders Forum

An address by Nicolas Sarkozy, President of the French Republic

Introduction by Lee C. Bollinger

On the first stop of his two-day trip to the U.S., French President Nicolas Sarkozy spoke at Columbia Universitys Low Library to a packed audience of students and faculty. The Columbia World Leaders Forum event was co-sponsored by the Universitys Maison Française and The Columbia-Paris Alliance Program.

(Full, unedited video of the event)

Date: March 29, 2010 from 10:00 AM to 11:00 AM
Location: Columbia University Morningside Campus Low Memorial Library, Rotunda

Co-sponsored by:

Maison Francaise
The Alliance Program

Category:

Education

Tags:

• education
• columbiauniversity
• worldleadersforum
• france
• sarkozy
• masionfrançaise
• Columbia University

[ibnjay7]

pretty sensible and rationale man.

[muhammadzahmad]

wow! it's great to have the president of France here..

[thegreeensky]

nice speech.. that was awesome!

[potpie921]

I wanna study there

[venusprojection]

@ksalaska Overall, you have named legit problems but have wrongly placed the blame the idea of free market capitalism and the principles laid out in the us constitution and bill of rights. This is what government does. They create problems and place the blame on whatever it is they want to see destroyed, posing as the saviors.

[venusprojection]

@ksalaska So, what you wrongly blame on The United States in general, is the really the fault of out of control big government. Libertarian Conservatives are in the process of taking the US back to it's constitutional roots and if we are successful then a lot of what you seem to hate (chronie-capitalism and m.i.c.) will be reigned in and or eliminated completely without the need for a world socialist government.

[venusprojection]

@ksalaska Wall Street is not the United States, first of all. Second of all, the military industrial complex is something that Americans are waking up to and can and should be stopped. However, what you fail to realize is that getting involved in foreign affairs (like in the example you gave, or the iraq war or afghanistan war) is due interventionist foreign policy. Interventionist foreign policy is in direct conflict with what the founders of the US had in mind and wrote/spoke about.

[ksalaska]

@venusprojection The United States, particularly Wall Street, and the corporations of the Military Industrial Complex influence a large part of the world. The US intelligence community has ultimate power. For example, look at Ecuador's recent coup attempt. Get real.

[venusprojection]

@ksalaska The United States is, like any other country ought to be, a sovereign nation. In the US, the government answers to we the people and we are free to live and govern in any which way we choose so long as we do not impede on the rights of each other. I know this must be a foreign concept to you, but we do NOT answer to any other international governing body, especially when that body holds beliefs and values vastly different from our own.

[venusprojection]

@ksalaska I disagree with your analysis and do not believe that America "makes the law" for the rest of the world, nor that we cause the majority of the world to suffer. I would like to know what exactly it is you're referring too instead of general accusations. What exactly does "the world needs to coorperate to survive" mean, as well? Socialist internationalists like Sarkozy are just control freaks who want to impose their will on the rest of the world.