No merci in US for thankless French

Daily Mirror (U.K.) ^ | 04/28/03 | Tony Parsons

[Pokey78]

I DON'T think the British have it in them to truly hate the French.

Despite our jocular outpourings of hop-off-you-Frogs banter, despite being frequently messed around by their surly air traffic controllers, despite having often seen their bullying unions intimidate British lorry drivers and burn British products, and despite having fought numerous wars against them, I think the British quite like the French.

Maybe "like" is putting it too highly. But the British admire a certain je ne sais quoi about French life.

If a Brit is in any part of France from Paris to Provence, he or she is likely to think - ah, this is the way life should be lived.

It's not the food. It's not the sun sinking over the Med. It's not the more-wine-my-dear sophistication, or the Brigitte Bardot/Sacha Distel sexiness. It's not the art, the architecture or the sound of that beautiful language. It is all of these things.

But it is different for Americans.

America has always distrusted France. Americans have found the French arrogant - which is a lot like George Best disapproving of someone because of their drinking habits.

After the war with Iraq, that distrust has curdled into something much more vehement. In America today, there is a genuine hatred of France and the French, and it means that the Western alliance will never be the same again.

Americans feel that, only a generation ago, they set France free. This is true, of course - there are 75,000 American men and boys buried in European graves, and they are never given the respect they deserve. The French were also set free by the Russians destroying the German Sixth Army in the ruins of Stalingrad, and by the British, who faced down Nazism alone.

But the British and the Russians were fighting for their national survival. The liberation of France was a happy by-product of that battle. To Americans, who never had German bombs dropping on their cities, or German troops swaggering through their streets, the liberation of France looks more like a hugely costly act of charity. And are les bastards grateful? Non, monsieur.

"Why should we expect the French to help us get Saddam out of Iraq?" asked one American. "They didn't even help us to get Hitler out of France."

In America there is a massively popular website called Francestinks. com. As you would expect, it contains plenty of French jokes - "the only way the French were going in was if we told them we'd discovered truffles in Iraq" - but the overall tone is deadly serious.

AMERICANS died for a country that is ungrateful, decadent and yellow to the core.

"Going to war without the French is like going hunting without your accordion," says one commentator. "How many Frenchman does it take to defend Paris?" asks another. "Nobody knows - it's never been tried." Then there's the one about the ad for the French rifle - "never used, dropped only once."

The French joke industry only advertises how profound the anger is against the French in the USA. When George Bush says of Jacques Chirac, "I doubt he'll be coming to the ranch any time soon," he is basically stating that he hopes Chirac falls under a carriage on the Paris Metro.

It goes to show how the world has changed since 9/11, a day that resulted in Afghanistan having the crap bombed out of it. But it was our allies in Saudi Arabia who provided the suicide squad for September 11.

Just as France, by consistently blocking action against Saddam, unquestionably propped up one of the vilest regimes on the planet.

In the world today, it is not our enemies that we fear and loathe.

It is our friends.

[gcruse]

You know me, nopardons. I am not exactly a poster boy for conservative Americans. But Bush impresses the hell outta me. I disagree with the administration's treatment of the Tenth Amendment and a few of what I consider mistakes on their part,
but everytime I see Condi, Rummy, or X43 on TV, I think we couldn't be in better hands.

[Mr. Mojo]

Parsons isn't being honest about how the Brits feel about the Frogs.

You can say that again

[gcruse]

BTW, the unnamed American who made the comment out getting the Germans out of France was Jay Leno.

[Cultural Jihad]

The French have historically been moral-cowards for many decades. Known terrorists were granted safe passage through their country on the assumption that if they are kind to terrorists then they would bomb and gun and knife people in other countries, rather than in France. The French are the original George Soros Socialist-Libertarian Harm-Reduction advocates.

[gcruse]

if they are kind to terrorists then they would bomb and gun and knife people in other countries, rather than in France.

There is another thread from a Canadian paper praising Chretien
for denying anti-terrorist support to the US, in effect insulating
Canadians from being attacked.  The French teach each other.

[nopardons]

Yes, my dear, I do know you;though not in the Biblical sense. :-)

No person and most assuredly NO politicians, is perfect, nor will said elected official ( and I don't care who one names...dead or alive ! ) is going to do 100% of what anyone here, or anywhere else wants done. I've a list of " Now George, what the bloody H**l do you think you're doing/saying ? " sticking points myself.Still and all, I can't think of another person,alive, I'd rather have as president now and I think his " team " is fantastic !

The alternatives, make me physically ill. No one, not a single politicians, who ran in 2000, or is even thinkinking about running in 2004, could do .0000000001% as well as what we have right now. The pickers of nits, need to take off their blinkers and look at reality; for a change. :-)

[nopardons]

Righti-o ! :-)

[nopardons]

Nailed in one !

[Kevin Curry]

The French have historically been moral-cowards for many decades.

The French are reformed Libertarians. They still celebrate gross irresponsibility and moral cowardice but realize that these can only be sustained by a vast welfare state that sees no evil, hears no evil, speaks no evil, and resists no evil.

[Grampa Dave]

When I see an article like this one. I wonder how much the writer was paid by the French to write this trash?

Then, how much did the editor and publisher get paid by the French to allow this trash to be published as a so called news article?

We have several friends who are now Brit/Americans with a lot of family and friends living in the UK. Everyone of them has relayed how really poed their friends, relatives and others in the UK are re France. They have cancelled shopping trips, vacations and business trips to France. They are boycotting any France Product that has an alternative. So this bought and paid writer is just trying project his whoring instead of what is really happening.

[Hammerhead]

And American vandals are even better than the French vandals.

At least ours know how to spray paint a 'proper' swastika.