Headlines: 2022, politics and optimism please!

Audio 05:08

French President Emmanuel Macron is speaking on national television a few hours before the entry into 2022, when France takes the rotating presidency of the European Union.

© Elysée

By: Sébastien Duhamel Follow

5 mins

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Starting with the president's traditional greetings, of course, on the evening of December 31. “

Resolutely optimistic

 ”

wishes, 

the

La Croix

website tells us

.

Caught up by the virus

,

Macron tries a positive attitude,

 " confirms

L'Humanité

. Emmanuel Macron recalled the importance of vaccination and barrier gestures against the virus but he wants to " 

keep hope for 2022",

we can read on the

World

website

. It will be " 

maybe the year of exit from the epidemic

 ", he declared.

Not yet a presidential candidate in April

 ", he also praised his record and clarified that he intends to " 

serve the country

 ", notes

Le Monde

.

A record defended in an " 

astonishing cavalcade of words"

, observes for its part

Le Parisien-Today in France

.

Wishes of a particular taste and therefore strongly political

,

in a speech of just over 13 minutes, the shortest in the history of his five-year term, 

" said the newspaper.

A strong speech in symbols

This is what

Le Parisien

also retains

 : “ 

A wide shot of the Élysée Palace as it concludes on the air from the Marseillaise, then a view of the Eiffel Tower in blue, in the colors of the 'European Union

 '.

The president

"will not intend to miss an important meeting in his eyes

 ", namely the rotating presidency of the European Union which begins on January 1, for six months.

One way to plant a banderilla in the garden of his two main adversaries Marine Le Pen and Eric Zemmour

, finally believes

Le Parisien

, Emmanuel Macron having hammered that 2022 must also be" 

the year of the European turn

 ".

The wishes of the opponents

Opponents who sent their wishes before the president. They were ahead of him, which is what most newspapers retain, like

Liberation

for example. And if the year 2021 has ended, the campaign for the presidential election, it really opens according to

Libé

 : “ 

Each contender for the Elysee has gone there from his message posted on social networks. A mixture of thoughts to the nursing staff, spikes addressed to the competitors and snippets of the program

 ”, sums up the daily.

The neo-Maurasian Eric Zemmour drew the first, at the end of the morning, he " 

said goodbye to Macron

 ", when his sister of the extreme, Marine Le Pen plays " 

credibility

 ", with " 

tricolor and bouquet of flowers for decor 

”. When the socialist Hidalgo, " 

tries to dissociate her two hats

 " of mayor of Paris and candidate, the representative of the Republicans, Valérie Pécresse, she wants to be " 

classic and serious 

", still analyzes

Libé

. The ecologist Yannick Jadot, finally, " 

plays the card of humor and originality by presenting his wishes for 2027

 ", and by displaying banners on which we could notably read " 

the Amish in power

 ”.

An entire program !

Economic changes and outlook

So much for politics but there is also daily life, and " 

what changes on January 1 for households

 ", as every year.

Le Monde

takes stock: " 

Extension of free contraception to all women under 26"

- we were under 19 until now - new pricing for emergencies, changes in minimum wage or taxes , among others ... But

Le Monde

, (which also prides itself on the front page of being the " 

leading national daily by its paid circulation

 " and which announces an increase in its prices in a few days), also gives us some perspectives for the global economy in 2022.

Or, rather, they are leaders who give us their perspectives. The journal gives the pen to Nobel Joseph Stiglitz and his fellow researchers Jeffrey Sachs and Anu Bradford. Joseph Stiglitz, first of all warns us against " 

two

distinct

risks 

": namely

"the global uncertainty created by the Republican Party

 " in the United States, in the event of victory in the House of Representatives in November, or even on " 

a decoupling between the Chinese and American economies

 ". Jeffrey Sachs, for his part, is worried about the persistent class warfare across the Atlantic, " 

four decades of war against the poor."

 Which have led the United States to "political paralysis, both inside and outside its borders".

And Anu Bradford is betting on an " 

endgame for the Big Tech

 " this year.

He notes that " 

from Brussels to Beijing, via Washington, the States are strengthening their antitrust arsenal to control the digital giants

 ".

The dice are cast, and happy new year!

End of party for homo festivus

 "

Homo festivus, quèsaco? Well, he is the festive man, quite simply, and he is in the process of disappearing according to

Le Monde,

which gives us a very interesting dossier. “ 

End of party

 ” with a “y”, as the Anglo-Saxons write, end of the party, in short, in French. In any case, end of the party in the nightclubs, which are again closed until the end of January due to the fifth wave of Covid obviously. However, already before the pandemic, " 

private parties and cocooning had sounded the festive withdrawal"

, explains

Le Monde

. With a very telling figure: in 1980, there were 4,000 nightclubs in France, there are only 1,500 left, " 

a fall of 70%

 ", we learn.

There are many reasons.

Boom of private parties therefore, but also of "intimate apprehensions", as for Lila, 17 years old.

“ 

I don't really want to meet 40-year-old men in a club who come to meet 16-year-old girls

 ,” she says.

Another reason put forward by

Le Monde

, the new modes of consumption like TikTok.

We now dance in our room or in our living room.

Anyway, the newspaper wonders: " 

What if we now live in a world where sweating together on the track is no longer essential?

 It's terrible, truly the end of an era.

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