From Clearstream to Smudged Rivers.

While the Corbeau is still unknown, French PM de Vilepin is under increasing pressure today. Le Monde today published extracts from a leaked document the newspaper said proved Villepin knew more than he had acknowledged about the bogus document accusing political personalities in a bribe-ridden sale of French frigates to Taiwan in 1991 - inlcuding the name of his political rival Sarkozy. Sarkozy's entourage believe the bogus claims were leaked by the Villepin-Chirac camp.
So it's open warfare between the two camps. in the wake of the recent mass protests that forced him to withdraw a youth jobs contract, the French PM, backed by the president, has had his popularity ratings fall to just 20%.

"The latent rivalry between Dominique de Villepin and Nicolas Sarkozy has turned into open warfare," said the financial daily Les Echos, which said deputies from the ruling Union For a Popular Movement (UMP) are increasingly gloomy about their prospects in next year's elections. "The two men are avoiding direct attacks on each other, but the mutual suspicion is omnipresent, each posing as the victim of a manipulation rigged up by the other," it said.

There is obviously a lot of manpulation there. It seems that the more Villepin speaks, the worse it gets.