Arnaud Montebourg, the French minister of industrial renewal, recently made a wonderful pronouncement in Brussels: “Nous sommes les idiots de village global.” This I found in Le Monde today, but I skipped the article altogether. The pronouncement itself delighted me. Ever since the global village has been put on the map by Marshall McLuhan, it has been waiting for an appropriate village idiot, a simpleton capable of occasional surprises and even wisdom. And Europe is surely turning into such a character in world affairs. The global village idiot is someone to be, no doubt. But who could better introduce such a character than the French minister of industrial renewal? Herman van Rompuy and Catherine Ashton, the president of the European Council and the high representative for foreign affairs and security policy of the European Union, are invited to give the new character proper flesh and blood. Congratulations all around!