Can a president who's elected on a promise to be normal deal with Europe in the throes of a crisis of abnormality?

With France's Francois Hollande taking office, an all-star panel debates "Mr. Normal" and how the politics will reverberate across Europe in this excerpt from the past week's "Fareed Zakaria GPS." Watch the video above.

And is Germany taking too much of the anger? Here's what Josef Joffe, Die Zeit editor, had to say:

ZAKARIA: Josef Joffe, you know that much of the rhetoric and the anger is directed at Germany. The idea is the Germans are forcing all this austerity on Europe, European governments having forced to cut their budgets. It's causing misery, unemployment. It's even causing bigger budget deficits.

But you've sort of defended the German position, isn't it fair to say?

JOSEF JOFFE, EDITOR, DIE ZEIT: Well, I mean, Angela Merkel makes for a nice whipping boy for problems which are deeply rooted in the societies that we've just heard about [France, Greece, Spain]. ... FULL POST

All this on GPS Sunday at 10 a.m. and 1 p.m. ET.

On Fareed Zakaria GPS this week: The fallout from Francois Hollande’s win in France; Peter Mandelson, Josef Joffe, Elaine Sciolino and David Frum's feisty debate on Europe; how Israel has anointed a "King" and BlackRock Chairman & CEO Larry Fink's take on the global economy.

And: an exclusive interview with the World Bank's Robert Zoellick. In his first TV “exit interview,” the outgoing World Bank president weighs in on the rumors that Mitt Romney would offer him the Secretary of State job if Romney wins the presidency:

FAREED ZAKARIA: It's no secret, Bob, that many people think if Mitt Romney were elected president, he would turn to you, perhaps, to be Secretary of State, perhaps Secretary of Treasury. You're an unusual figure in that you could plausibly take both jobs or either job. You couldn't take both. Will you get more active in advising Gov. Romney once you leave this job?

ZOELLICK: Well, I think it's important not to be presumptuous. And so I appreciate you - the compliment that you posed, but in this job, I haven't been able to be engaged in politics. So that question will have to wait until I leave - on June 30th.

Watch more in the video above. FULL POST

Historian Robert Caro has spent almost 40 years studying and writing about President Lyndon B. Johnson. The result of that toil, in addition to two Pulitzer prizes, is about 3,388 pages so far on Johnson's life.

The fourth volume, "Passage of Power," has just published.

In the web exclusive video above, Caro talks about why Johnson could get things done in Washington and gives an example of what he calls Johnson's legislative genius in action.

On Sunday's GPS show interview, Caro said Johnson could offer today's politicians - and president - lessons on wielding power. Below is an excerpt of that interview. FULL POST

On "Fareed Zakaria GPS" this week: the global economy, China, the war on terror and a controversial defense of the 1%.

Fareed kicks things off with his Take: How Americans may have won the war on terror, but they don’t look like a people who have won a war.

The Financial Time's Martin Wolf and TIME’s Rana Foroohar help make sense of the U.S. jobs numbers, the recession in Europe and more about the global economy.

Then, exclusive to GPS, an unlikely defense of the 1%. Former Bain Capital Managing Director Ed Conard argues in a new book, “Unintended Consequences," that inequality is not necessarily bad. The rise of the 1% is good for the 99%, he argues.

Finally, the great historian Robert Caro on the years of President Lyndon Johnson, why he mattered and what we have to learn from him now.

All this on GPS Sunday at 10 a.m. and 1 p.m. Eastern. Excerpts below: FULL POST

More than 40 percent of the actions people perform every day - that you perform every day - are not actually decisions you make, but they are the product of habits. We like to think of habits as traits that can't be changed, but it turns out that habits are malleable and knowing how to change them has profound implications, not just at the personal level, but also for companies and governments.

I spoke with Charles Duhigg, author of The Power of Habit, a few days back. He is a reporter for the New York Times. Here's a transcript of our conversation: FULL POST

By Fareed Zakaria, CNN

When the movie Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan premiered in 2006, Kazakhstan's government banned the film and threatened to sue its star. Six years later, Kazakhstan's foreign minister is thanking Borat, crediting the film with a large tourism boost. He called it a 'great victory' as the number of applications for tourist visas to Kazakhstan has grown tenfold.

Travelers can't look to Borat as an accurate depiction of the country.  So how should they prepare for a trip?

Well, they could watch a 67-minute promotional film about the glorious country's history and recent achievements entitled In the Stirrups of Time. This one stars a different Brit, former British Prime Minister Tony Blair. The film features carefully selected clips from an interview with Blair who applauds the nation's diversity and progress.

It proudly celebrates Kazakhstan's recent accomplishments - political, educational, industrial, economic. Grab your passports, you are now an expert on Kazakhstan.

There were a few statistics that could not fit into the 67-minute video.

Kazakhstan ranks 172nd out of 196 countries in terms of press freedoms, 120 out of 183 in terms of corruption, 137 of 167 in The Economist's 2011 democracy index. Kazakhstan's president won the election with over 95% of the vote.

On second thought, maybe there is a Lonely Planet guide out there somewhere.

On Fareed Zakaria GPS this week, the U.S., China, Pakistan, Mexico and more.
Fareed kicks things off with his take: President Obama’s current campaign push is for the “Buffett Rule.” But instead, he should focus on Warren Buffett’s other mantra: “Invest in America”

The Bo Xilai scandal has gone from being an Agatha Christie story to a Chinese version of Watergate. The New Yorker’s Beijing correspondent Evan Osnos sits down with Fareed to explain the larger ramifications.

Then we get the real story on Pakistan’s "Memogate. " Exclusive to CNN, for the first time on TV since the scandal broke, Husain Haqqani explains why he lost his job as Pakistan’s Ambassador to the U.S.

What in the World explores a bizarre finding: Why net migration from Mexico to the U.S. has dropped to zero.

Then Fareed goes 1-on-1 with a man who served as National Security Advisor to two U.S. Presidents – Brent Scowcroft. They discuss Syria, the Middle East peace process, and more.

Finally, Charles Duhigg is on the show, with lessons from his great new book, The Power of Habit.

All this on GPS  Sunday at 10am and 1pm Eastern. Excerpts below:

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By Fareed Zakaria, CNN

A new danger for politicians, not only do they have to be careful of whom they consort with, what they say, and the promises they don't keep, they now need to look out for what they wear on their wrists.

Take a look at Nicolas Sarkozy at what should have been a standard political event shaking hands at a rope line. But it turned into a scandal thanks to this little move. You see, he has a watch in this photo, and in this one taken just after he has no watch. What happened? He took off his watch and he put it in his pocket. The French press speculated whether he was worried about somebody stealing it or whether he was worried that he would get flack for its reported $75,000 price tag. Well, he got flack all right. FULL POST

On Sunday, I interviewed the former Prime Minister and current Defense Minister of Israel, Ehud Barak. We spoke about Israel's "window of opportunity" to strike Iran and the future of the Palestinian Authority.

Here's a transcript of our discussion:

Fareed Zakaria: You have long argued that we need more pressure on Iran. President Obama announced recently that he believes that the supplies of oil in the world are sufficient to pursue an even more stringent set of sanctions against Iran.  These will be the tightest, harshest sanctions that have ever been put in place, I think, against any country.

Do you think that this will be enough to put the kind of pressure on Iran that you have wanted?  FULL POST

If you're looking for more from astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson, who was on GPS today, you can check out his Foreign Affairs article here (behind a pay wall) and/or order his book here.

Here's an excerpt of from his Foreign Affairs article:

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