Valery giscard d'estaing is not someone who normally inspires masses of sympathy. Indeed, the 76-year-old chairman of the European Union's constitutional convention is often portrayed as haughty, devious and elitist―everything, in short, the world is supposed to expect of a former president of France. Even so, the barrage of insults that has come Mr Giscard d'Es-taing's way since his appointment in December seems excessive. There were disobliging comments about his age: how could a man of the past be put in charge of Europe's future? Then there were suggestions that he was demanding grotesque amounts of money for putting himself at the EU'S disposal. Calumnies, apparently. He is not being paid a salary and is operating from a modest little office on the fifth floor of the Council of Ministers in Brussels: the Elysee Palace it ain't. His choice of decoration, however, does little to fend off the charge that he is yesterday's man. In pride of place is a framed photo from the 1970s of President Giscard d'Estaing with Helmut Schmidt, the then chancellor of Germany. "I still talk to him a lot," says Mr Giscard d'Estaing of his fellow old-timer. "He has many excellent ideas."
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