Keep in mind that Sarkozy was the one who called the "immigrant youth" rioters scum, and has not backed down from that statement.
Now granted, Sarkozy isn't especially conservative by American standards, but I think that anyone our mainstream media criticizes, and the Arabs riot against is a big improvement over the previous president.
Just yesterday, the New York Times ran an op-ed piece calling for Sarkozy to abandon his divisive rhetoric, and to stop insulting the immigrants (and I'm not making this up!)