What a Novel Idea

And surely one that the modern-day French themselves would have never thought of

France is the country that produced the Enlightenment, Descartes’s one-liner, “I think, therefore I am,” and the solemn pontifications of Jean-Paul Sartre and other celebrity philosophers.

But in the government of President Nicolas Sarkozy, thinking has lost its cachet.

In proposing a tax-cut law last week, Finance Minister Christine Lagarde bluntly advised the French people to abandon their “old national habit.”

“France is a country that thinks,” she told the National Assembly. “There is hardly an ideology that we haven’t turned into a theory. We have in our libraries enough to talk about for centuries to come. This is why I would like to tell you: Enough thinking, already. Roll up your sleeves.”

Citing Alexis de Tocqueville’s “Democracy in America,” she said the French should work harder, earn more and be rewarded with lower taxes if they get rich.

Ms. Lagarde knows well the Horatio Alger story of making money through hard work. She looked west to make her fortune, spending much of her career as a lawyer at the firm of Baker & McKenzie, based in the American city identified by its broad shoulders and work ethic: Chicago. She rose to become the first woman to head the firm’s executive committee and was named one of the world’s most powerful women by Forbes magazine.

So now, two years back in France, she is a natural to promote the program of Mr. Sarkozy, whose driving force is doing rather than musing, and whose mantra is “work more to earn more.”

“No, no, no madame. I weel seet on my great fat behind and burn cars vile askeeng for more. How dare you say zat I need to work to make money. I am an aktor. I need to hone my craft because no one ees hiring moi. And to do zat I need government monee, not more work.”

Don’t laugh, I recently had to explain to the wife that a person can get unemployment cash from the French government by saying they are an actor. Just because they can’t act doesn’t mean that their government won’t give them money. It isn’t like LA where every waiter is an out of work actor.

Which is also why I think that French waiters are so rude. They consider themselves professionals.