I perfectly understood President Obama's attitude throughout the

Host: The Parisian evening was draped in a thin mist, the city lights flickering like distant stars caught in the Seine’s reflection. A faint echo of traffic hummed through the narrow street, mingling with the scent of roasted chestnuts and wet stone. In a quiet corner café, the air trembled with the heat of conversation. Jack sat with his back to the window, his grey eyes sharp under the low amber light. Across from him, Jeeny cupped her hands around a steaming mug, her dark hair falling like a curtain, half hiding her eyes that shimmered with thought.

Host: The quote that stirred the silence had just been read from the newspaper between them.

Jeeny: “Francois Hollande said — ‘I perfectly understood President Obama's attitude throughout the French presidential campaign. He had no reason to distance himself from Nicolas Sarkozy. It's the basic solidarity that leaders who worked together owe to each other.’”

Host: Her voice lingered in the air, like the faint smoke curling from the candle between them.

Jack: “Solidarity,” he muttered, his lips tightening. “That’s just political courtesy dressed up as virtue. When you’ve shared power, you protect your own. It’s not about respect, it’s about strategy.”

Jeeny: “You always make it sound so cold, Jack. Maybe it was loyalty — not calculation. When people build something together, even if it’s just a political alliance, there’s an unspoken bond. A kind of moral echo.”

Host: The light from the window caught the edges of Jeeny’s face, making her look both fragile and resolute, like a statue carved from moonlight and memory.

Jack: “A moral echo, Jeeny? Tell me, when did politics ever care for morality? Hollande’s words are diplomatic smoke. Obama didn’t ‘owe’ Sarkozy anything beyond what realpolitik demanded. They had worked together, sure — on wars, on economics, on crises. But that’s not solidarity, that’s self-preservation.”

Jeeny: “And yet,” she said softly, “it’s precisely in power where solidarity should mean something. Leaders carry not just their nations, but their shared humanity. When Hollande says that, I think he means — even among rivals, there’s a code, a reminder that leadership should be bigger than competition.”

Host: A pause settled between them, heavy with the sound of a spoon clinking against porcelain. Outside, a busker’s violin began to weep through the fog, its melody thin and aching.

Jack: “You give too much credit to ideals. History proves otherwise. Look at Churchill and Roosevelt — allies in war, yes, but when the world rebuilt itself, their ‘solidarity’ crumbled under national interest. Every alliance ends when it stops being useful.”

Jeeny: “But that’s what makes Hollande’s remark interesting, Jack. He knew that too — yet he still acknowledged the human element. Maybe ‘solidarity’ isn’t about utility, it’s about recognition. The respect between those who’ve carried the burden of power together. Like soldiers who no longer share the same uniform but remember the same battlefield.”

Host: Jack’s brow furrowed, the shadows deepening around his eyes. He lifted his glass and took a slow sip, his voice low, almost gravelly.

Jack: “You romanticize it. There’s no virtue in mutual convenience. Obama didn’t want to offend Sarkozy, because France was a strategic ally. That’s not friendship. That’s pragmatism — the oldest, coldest currency in politics.”

Jeeny: “Maybe,” she whispered, “but even pragmatism wears a human face. You talk about leaders as if they’re machines, but they’re people, Jack. They laugh, they worry, they feel loyalty — sometimes misplaced, but real. Don’t you think there’s something noble in standing by someone simply because you shared a piece of history together?”

Host: The rain began to fall, a slow, steady rhythm tapping the glass. Jack’s gaze softened, his fingers tracing the rim of his glass absentmindedly.

Jack: “Noble? Maybe. But dangerous, too. Loyalty can blind. It can make leaders defend the indefensible. Look at Putin and Lukashenko — loyalty without morality becomes collusion.”

Jeeny: “You’re right,” she replied, her eyes meeting his. “But isolation without loyalty becomes betrayal. Even in politics, people need anchors, not just strategies. Hollande wasn’t praising Obama’s neutrality — he was admiring his human consistency. That even in a world of shifting power, he didn’t throw an old partner to the wolves.”

Host: The candle flame flickered, casting moving shadows across their faces — two worlds of thought, circling, colliding, searching for truth amid the dance of light and dark.

Jack: “So you think loyalty matters more than truth?”

Jeeny: “I think truth without loyalty becomes cruel. And loyalty without truth becomes corrupt. The challenge is to keep both alive.”

Host: Her words hung in the air like a slow echo, a note of melancholy that refused to fade. Jack leaned forward, elbows on the table, his voice lower now.

Jack: “You speak like someone who’s been betrayed.”

Jeeny: “Maybe,” she said, with a faint, sad smile. “Or maybe I’ve just seen what happens when people forget the meaning of solidarity. It’s not about defending someone — it’s about acknowledging their part in your story.”

Host: Outside, the rain grew heavier, turning the street into a sheet of mirrored gold. Cars passed, their headlights slicing the darkness like blades. Inside, the café felt smaller, tighter, as though the walls themselves leaned closer to listen.

Jack: “So, you’d defend your enemies too? Out of solidarity?”

Jeeny: “If they once stood with me when the world fell apart — yes, maybe I would. Because memory is its own kind of debt.”

Jack: “And what if that debt costs the truth?”

Jeeny: “Then I’d pay it, Jack. Because sometimes, loyalty redeems what truth alone can’t forgive.”

Host: Her voice trembled slightly, but her eyes didn’t falter. Jack stared at her, and something in his expression — a flicker, a hesitation — betrayed the armor he carried.

Jack: “You make it sound poetic. But in reality, loyalty is often just another form of fear — fear of being alone, fear of losing the comfort of shared illusion.”

Jeeny: “And you make fear sound shameful. Maybe fear is what makes loyalty real — the understanding that you could lose everything, and yet you still choose to stand by someone. Isn’t that what makes us human?”

Host: Silence fell — thick, profound, alive. The violin outside had stopped. Only the heartbeat of the rain remained.

Jack: “Maybe,” he said finally, his voice almost a whisper. “Maybe Hollande was right then. Maybe solidarity — even in politics — is a small rebellion against the cynicism that governs everything else.”

Jeeny: “Exactly,” she said, smiling faintly. “A quiet act of faith in a world that rewards betrayal.”

Host: The storm outside began to ease, the clouds slowly parting to reveal a faint moonlight spilling over the wet pavement. Jack looked out the window, then back at Jeeny.

Jack: “You know,” he murmured, “for someone who believes in ideals, you argue like a realist.”

Jeeny: “And for someone who trusts only logic,” she replied, “you listen like a poet.”

Host: The two sat in silence, the air between them now filled not with tension, but with quiet understanding. The rain had stopped; only the last drops slipped down the windowpane, catching the light like fleeting truths.

Host: Outside, Paris breathed again — its streets glistening, its voices soft. Inside, two souls — once divided by belief — shared a single, fragile realization: that solidarity, in any form, is not about politics or power, but about remembering that we are bound, however briefly, by the same storms we survive together.

Host: The camera pulls back — the café, the city, the soft light spilling into night. And in the stillness, the words of Hollande linger — a whisper of human truth beneath the noise of nations.