FRANCE - Some Famous Quotes

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[Xthe17th]

"France has neither winter nor summer nor morals. Apart from these drawbacks it is a fine country. France has usually been governed by prostitutes." --Mark Twain

"I would rather have a German division in front of me than a French one behind me." --General George S. Patton

"Going to war without France is like going deer hunting without your accordion." --Norman Schwartzkopf

"We can stand here like the French, or we can do something about it." --Marge Simpson

"As far as I'm concerned, war always means failure." --Jacques Chirac, President of France

"As far as France is concerned, you're right." --Rush Limbaugh

"The only time France wants us to go to war is when the German Army is sitting in Paris sipping coffee." --Regis Philbin

"The French are a smallish, monkey-looking bunch not dressed any better, on average, than the citizens of Baltimore. True, you can sit outside in Paris and drink little cups of coffee, but why this more stylish than sitting inside and drinking large glasses of whiskey I don't know." --P. J. O'Rourke

"You know, the French remind me a little bit of an aging actress of the 1940s who was still trying to dine out on her looks but doesn't have the face for it." --John McCain

"You know why the French don't want to bomb Saddam Hussein? Because he hates America, he loves mistresses and wears a beret. He is French, people." --Conan O'Brien

"I don't know why people are surprised that France won't help us get Saddam out of Iraq. After all, France wouldn't help us get the Germans out of France!" --Jay Leno

"The last time the French asked for 'more proof' it came marching into Paris under a German flag." --David Letterman

[Xthe17th]

You've probably already seen or heard some of these, but here they all are again in a single post. Feel free to add to the collection.

[JohnGalt]

Number of French Dead in World War II through June 1940: 120,000

Number of American dead in Korean and Vietnam Wars combined: 95,000

Rhetorical value of the fiction of French cowardice: priceless

Courtesy, The American Conservative.

[groanup]

bump

[martin_fierro]

"The French fight with their feet and f**k with their faces." -- Unknown

[Founding Father]

The most famous French quote, "I surrender."

[Chad Fairbanks]

"France is a dog-hole." - William Shakespeare, (All's Well That Ends Well, c.1603)

"The friendship of the French is like their wine, exquisite but of short duration." - German saying

"In Paris they simply stared when I spoke to them in French; I never did succeed in making those idiots understand their language." - Mark Twain

[IronJack]

"Going to war without France is like going deer hunting without your accordion." --Norman Schwartzkopf

I believe Donald Rumsfeld said this.

[BunnySlippers]

Thanks for the quotes. :)

[Straight Vermonter]

Let me first say that I am French. That is my ancestors hailed form France but came to the new world because life in France was so awful. They carved out a new life for themselves in wildernes of Quebec. Then when Quebec was invaded they were caught defending in the wrong direction (can you say Maginot line, boys and girls? I knew you could). Finally my ancestors were subjected to terrible deprivations and discrimination and decided to come to America.

So to my French cousins across the pond...thanks for nothing.

[Live free or die]

Rhetorical value of the fiction of French cowardice: priceless

Oh come now sir, I'm surprised at you! Let me provide you with a little contrast:

It's well documented that the French had the largest land army in Europe at the start of WWII and its equally well documented that the Poles didn't. Yet the Poland took longer for the Germans to conquer even with more troops to do it with. After the occupation Polish resistance to the German military took the form of the Polish Home Army and huge numbers of soldiers and airmen escaping to th Russians and British. The French "resistance" took the shape of a pathetically small number of fanatics terrorizing Vichy collaborators' women and children.

You bring up Vietnam...isn't the finest exploit of "French" military bravery exhibited by the French Foreign Legion? And even when that wasn't enough...did w not have to come and bail them out again?

Comparing the numbers of dead for us and them is infuriating and wrong. It proves nothing.

[cloud8]

France: A relatively small and eternally quarrelsome country in Western Europe, fountainhead of rationalist political manias, militarily impotent, historically inglorious during the past century, democratically bankrupt, Communist-infiltrated from top to bottom.
--William F. Buckley, Jr.

France is the only country where the money falls apart and you can't tear the toilet paper.
--Billy Wilder

What I gained by being in France was learning to be better satisfied with my own country.
--Samuel Johnson

I would have loved it--without the French.
--D. H. Lawrence

Everything is on such a clear financial basis in France. It is the simplest country to live in. No one makes things complicated by becoming your friend for any obscure reason. If you want people to like you, you have only to spend a little money.
--Ernest Hemingway

Frenchmen are like gunpowder, each by itself smutty and contemptible, but mass them together and they are terrible indeed!
--Samuel Taylor Coleridge

The French probably invented the very notion of discretion. It's not that they feel that what you don't know won't hurt you; they feel that what you don't know won't hurt them. To the French lying is simply talking.
--Fran Lebowitz

They aren't much at fighting wars anymore. Despite their reputation for fashion, their women have spindly legs. Their music is sappy. But they do know how to whip up a plate of grub.
--Mike Royko

Every Frenchman wants to enjoy one or more privileges; that's the way he shows his passion for equality.
--Charles de Gaulle

[Compiled by Jon Winokur ISDN 0-453-00565-9]

[raybbr]

Regarding the French: "Cheese eating surrender monkeys." Some show on the radio.

[harpseal]

A comment regarding French History the French Army at the start of World Wa II had more tanksthan the German army and more fighter planes than the Luftwaffe.

[Atticus]

"France would sell its own sister into prostitution."

-- One of my government professors, circa 1983

[Polybius]

Number of French Dead in World War II through June 1940: 120,000

Number of American dead in Korean and Vietnam Wars combined: 95,000

Rhetorical value of the fiction of French cowardice: priceless

Number of estimated Iraqi Dead in Gulf War One: 60,000 to 200,000

Number of estimated Iraqi Deserters in Gulf War One: 150,000

Rhetorical value of equating the numberof casualties with bravery: Zero

If death toll equated with bravery, zooplankton would qualify as the bravest organisms in the Animal Kingdom.

[Atticus]

So to my French cousins across the pond...thanks for nothing.

My ancesters (well, some of them) arrived in Canada from Montigny, France, in 1695. I concur with your sentiments.

[bobg]

FRANCE WAS SMART IN ONE AREA. OVER 70 PERCENT OF THEIR ELECTRICAL POWER IS GENERATED BY NUCLEAR, WHICH IS CLEAN AND SAFE (IS USING OTHER THAN SOVIET MKB TYPE TECHNOLOGY).
NO CO2 EMISSIIONS...LITTLE SOLID WASTER. IF KYOTO TREATY WERE IMPLEMENTED FOR SOME STUPID REASONS, FRANCE WOULD BE AHEAD OF THE ENERGY GAME.
OTHER THAN NUCLEAR POWER THEY STINK.

[Andyman]

Groundskeeper Willie on the Simpsons, actually.

[Live free or die]

the French Army at the start of World Wa II had more tanksthan the German army and more fighter planes than the Luftwaffe

And what did they do with them after France declared war on Germany while much of the German army was hundreds of miles away in Poland? Not a damn thing!

[Hillarys Gate Cult]

"I'm going to Iowa for an award. Then I'm appearing at Carnegie Hall, it's sold out. Then I'm sailing to France to be honored by the French government -- I'd give it all up for one erection.

- Groucho Marx