It has emerged that Rachida Dati, France’s Justice Minister, is stepping down–reportedly at the behest of President Nicolas Sarkozy. It remains unclear exactly why. The official reason is that in June she will run for the Union for a Popular Movement Party (UMP) in the European elections and she can’t hold both positions at once.

The real reason, however, is almost certainly connected to her refusal to tell the public who her recently born child’s father is. Good for her, you might say. But the lower-brow elements of the French press have been ablaze with frenzied speculation. The current favorite pere possible is the president’s brother, Francois Sarkozy. Yet all sorts of names have been bandied about, including former Spanish Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar and even Sarko himself. (According to the authors of La Veritable Histoire de Carla et Nicolas, Sarkozy’s wife Carla Bruni turned to Dati as they toured the presidential bedroom in the Elysee Palace, pointed at the bed, and said: “You would have liked to occupy it, wouldn’t you?”)

It’s all fairly sordid stuff: not suitable at all for a conservative blog. Apologies. But a more appropriate point might be made about the Sarkozy administration, which is perhaps the weirdest government in the developed world. First there was Sarko’s very public and somewhat naff courtship of, and then marriage to, the former model Carla Bruni, and now this. There has often been a soap-operatic atmosphere in French politics: but with Sarkozy, it seems almost contrived. One wonders if Team Sarko is not trying to build some new brand of gossip politics, tailored for our salacious, celeb-mad times. Or maybe it’s just the French being the French.

Certainly, if Sarko is trying to be some sort of glossy-rag star, his efforts have not been well received in the polls. A brilliant article from last year by Ben Macintyre might explain why.