So ... a businessman gets into a slightly robust exchange of opinions, and he is immediately threatened by a government official with regulatory harassment.
This is the point at which a competent U.S. government would fire off a letter of its own saying that discriminatory treatment of U.S. exports will not be tolerated, and that we will redouble our scrutiny of French practices in this area and retaliate against French exports to the U.S. if discriminatory treatment is found.
That is what a competent U.S. government would do if it is committed to increasing U.S. exports, which the Obama administration claims as a goal. Waiting.
Uh, the Obama Administration is too busy driving our manufacturers overseas to notice.