Freedom fry that. And look, no nationalization programs or bailouts. Who would have guessed that the nouveau-socialist Bush would finish his two terms looking more like a 1980s Francois Mitterand than Ronald Reagan?

French banks have lost about $28.5 billion so far this year in the global financial crisis, but they remain much healthier than banks in the United States, France’s finance minister said Monday.

Speaking on French radio station RMC, Christine Lagarde said French banks lost 1.5 billion euros ($2.14 billion) last week alone because of the bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers Holdings, but added “there’s nothing to worry about.”

“All the banks in the world are necessarily affected,” Lagarde said, adding “French banks are much more solid than American banks.”

Lagarde said the French banking system is “solid” because it is “much more diversified and much more balanced than the American system.”

Banks around the world have written off billions of euros in losses stemming from bad mortgage debt.