He's a Well Respected Follower of Fashion

I love a scandal; the bigger the better. This one involves a wealthy bureaucrat, an expensive hotel, forced sex, and hubris.

Dominique Strauss-Kahn is in heap big trouble. The wealthy head of the IMF, a well known womaniser is accused of attempted rape, false imprisonment and forcing "Axel Rose" on a poor unfortunate chamber maid. The America judge didn't trust him so even bail of $1 million dollars wasn't enough to prevent incarceration in one of New York's finest jails.

Even better he's French - oh how we love to see them on their uppers - so bloody arrogant. Who else, in last Saturday's Eurovision, would sing in their own language (besides us) and deliver their points in the same. Also his name is German sounding - great.

The French are pretty hacked off about the humiliating treatment meted out to one of France's elite by the NYPD: he didn't look such a senior and respected statesman handcuffed and dishevelled.

Already France's alarm and disbelief is seen in a bad light. It is said it shows the country's continuing dominance by the ancien regime, despite a revolution, and the deference for the privileged that still exists there. It is said that had Strauss - Kahn been arrested in his home country he wouldn't have been paraded before the world's press in handcuffs. You don't treat the upper crust of French society like that.

He has gone from hero to zero. Proving his innocence won't save him or his tilt at the French Presidency. Whispers about his amorous lifestyle are turning into something much nastier. He's got form it is being said and women are coming forward with claims of not only sexual predation on his part but also physical assault.

In the UK our scandals are much more suburban. Chris Huhne must be blessing old Dominique and his troubles at this time. Although being accused of getting someone else to cop your speeding conviction is pretty pedestrian.

Huhne's performance on the TV yesterday did his cause no good at all. He oozed an overbearing arrogance when interviewed: his peripatetic eyebrows roaming dangerously across his forehead. It crystallised the impression formed during the Liberal's leadership contest that this man is not to be trusted.

We are a vengeful people. We tolerate wealth and privilege, but at the first sign of weakness in the fortunate few we're onto them like a  pack of rabid dogs. Chris Huhne is dead meat.

Mind you none of this compares to the treatment meted out to Cheryl Cole for deserting our shores for the US.

She didn't have to be handcuffed to be humiliated, she just needed to be photographed looking like a juvenile version of Dolly Parton, bouffant hair and al'