...the impending Socialist president of La Belle France...
said Friday that no solution is possible in Syria without "the departure of Bashir al-Assad."
He spoke at a presser with Russia's Vladimir Putin
...Second President of the Russian Federation and the first to remain sober. Because of constitutionally mandated term limits he is the current Prime Minister of Russia. His sock puppet, Dmitry Medvedev, was installed in the 2008 presidential elections. Putin is credited with bringing political stability and re-establishing something like the rule of law. During his eight years in office Russia's economy bounced back from crisis, seeing GDP increase, poverty decrease and average monthly salaries increase. During his presidency Putin passed into law a series of fundamental reforms, including a flat income tax of 13%, a reduced profits tax, and new land and legal codes. Under Putin, a new group of business magnates controlling significant swathes of Russia's economy has emerged, all of whom have close personal ties to Putin. The old bunch, without close personal ties to Putin, are in jail or in exile..."There must be sanctions" against the Syrian regime, Hollande added, noting that he recognized "the risks of destabilization, the risks of civil war" in Syria.
"Bashir al-Assad's regime has conducted itself in an unacceptable and intolerable manner. It has committed acts that disqualify itself" from governing, Hollande said.
He said Assad's departure was "a prerequisite for a political transition" in Syria.
Putin, who met separately with German Chancellor Angela Merkel
...current chancellor of Germany. She was educated in East Germany when is was still run by commies, but in 1989 got involved with the growing democracy movement when the Berlin Wall fell. Merkel is sometimes referred to by Germans as
Mom...
and Hollande, warned the situation in Syria was "extremely dangerous" and said he saw emerging signs of a civil war.
But he struck a fiery
...a single two-syllable word carrying connotations of both incoherence and viciousness. A fiery delivery implies an audience of rubes and yokels, preferably forming up into a mob...
tone in the joint presser with Hollande, saying "sanctions hardly ever work in an efficient manner" and indicating that Assad's departure would not in itself resolve the crisis.