family values

Jan. 9, 2006—Should a motorcade be allocated to Carla Bruni, the girlfriend and possible fiancée of the French president? That is one of the protocol issues perplexing Indian officials as they prepare to welcome Nikolas Sarkozy for the nation’s Republic Day celebrations this month. NYT A7

--“I didn’t want to lie,” Mr. Sarkozy said of his romance with Ms. Bruni. “And I am breaking with a deplorable tradition in our political life—that of hypocrisy, that of lies.” NYT A7

--Already forced to drop his re-election bid over e-mail love notes sent from work to his executive secretary, [Republican] District Attorney Charles A. Rosenthal of Harris County faced new questions Tuesday with the disclosure of hundreds of other office e-mail messages containing racy jokes, racial slues and political campaign materials. ... Since Texas resumed executions in 1982, 102 of the 405 people put to death were convicted in Harris County ... One of the office messages showed Mr. Rosenthal trying to help his son, a lawyer, expunge old criminal offenses for a client. Others showed him gathering negative information against the Democrat planning to run against him, Clarence Bradford, a former Houston police chief, and against a Democratic state senator from Houston, John Whitmire, with whom he has clashed. ... About 130 of the messages were unsealed last week, showing Mr. Rosenthal, who is married to his second wife, in amorous exchanges with his secretary, Kerry Stevens, with whom he has acknowledged having an affair in the 1980s. ...Not all the political messages involved himself. On Aug. 14, Mr. Rosenthal forwarded to friends a message attacking the record of Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York, and calling her “a disaster for all Americans.” His name appeared on messages comparing her to Karl Marx. And one of the images turning up as an attachment was Mrs. Clinton as a nutcracker. Mr. Rosenthal also forwarded to a friend a mock study of flatulence and a series of jokes making fun of University of Texas football players after several were arrested on various felony charges. He also forwarded the image of a sign saying “girls and fish have a lot in common” with graphic sexual references. Other material that was in Mr. Rosenthal’s e-mail but did not contain his name was a photograph, titled “Fatal Overdose,” of a black man lying on a sidewalk amid watermelon peels and Kentucky Fried Chicken containers.Other videos showed men pulling down the tops of women in the street, exposing their breasts. And several videos showed hard-core pornography, although it was not clear how they came to be among Mr. Rosenthal’s e-mail turned over as part of the lawsuit. NYT12