[ijcr]

To add to the tourist trade's woes, even the French are staying at home.

That says it all.

[Pharmboy]

As Austin Powers says: "Boo freakin' hoo."

[LibertyThug]

Instead of offering a tour including Britain, France and Italy, say, we are now replaced by Spain," said M Balderacchi.

Yes, easily replaced and easily forgotten...

[Paul Atreides]

"After the Iraq crisis, many American tour operators just airbrushed France out of their brochures. Instead of offering a tour including Britain, France and Italy, say, we are now replaced by Spain," said M Balderacchi.

I love it!

[FoxPro]

Time to visit Paris!

[yooper]

"The Americans were like flies round honey in the 1980s when there were 10 francs to the dollar," he said. "Give me two euros to the dollar and they'll be back, bin Laden or no bin Laden."

Dumbass. These idiots still don't get it.

[oceanview]

this is great news, someone email Oreilly.

[xp38]

Sars??!! Since when did France have any Sars cases? That is our excuse here in Toronto!

[xrp]

Woohoo! Kudos to Americans like me and others, who are choosing to spend their tourism dollars RIGHT HERE in the good old U S of A. #1, it helps our fellow American (thus the economy), #2, the USA looks a whole lot prettier than France anyway.

[tet68]

Woe is the po Francais!

Really, my heart goes out to them, really.

Imagine, Americans are subject to hijack and being flown into skyscrapers, and they wonder why tourism is down. tsk, tsk.

I was over the Franch a looooong time ago.

[Texas_Dawg]

lured by France's gastronomy

Looks like gastronomic bypass is even more popular in America than I'd thought.

[July 4th]

This is what the Parisians have always wanted - a Paris sans Americans. I thought they would have been a little happier.

[Interesting Times]

Evidently France isn't attracting enough former members of the Ba'ath Party to make up the difference.

Pity, that...

[nothingnew]

Tsk Tsk Tsk

FMCDH

[freedumb2003]

bookings from the United States in the past six months were 50 per cent down on last year

Good work, but people, we need to get that number UP. Bookings of 90% less than last year is the target number! But, we can certainly see and appreciate efforts so far. Now, let's see if we can acocmplish the same for Canada (except the good parts in the West).

[McGavin999]

"Convinced that the peace of the brave begins at the table, the French never really believed the Americans would fall out of love with them," it said.

HA! And they don't get away with pretending it's all Chirac's fault either. Add Villipan to the mix, and the arrogant, ignorant french themselves. We read the polls that were taken over there, we read the articles written about us and our president. This is not going to go away soon at all.

[F16Fighter]

[T]he French never really believed the Americans would fall out of love with them," it said.

Are these people dellusional??

Here they are thinking we're still ready to pucker up as half of us are fantasizing about dropping the Big One on top of the Eiffel Tower.

[DoughtyOne]

Travel agents say there is widespread evidence that the tourist industry is suffering as a result of President Jacques Chirac's vehement stand against the war in Iraq.  The strong euro has added to the crisis.

Do you think?  LOL, the French look for any excuse to blame but the real reason.  Tourism is all but destroyed, and it all has to do with that 10% slide in the dollar.  It couldn't have anything to do with Chirac's comments.

A brief tour of the centre of Paris yesterday confirmed his fears, with not a busload of camera-wielding Americans or Japanese to be seen. On a clear, sunny day, the bateaux mouches that ply the Seine were all but empty. Three or four heads stared balefully from an red open-top sightseeing bus. "Thanks very much, Tony Blair and friends," said the bus conductor.

"Where have all the Americans gone?" asked a gloomy waiter in a cafe next to Notre Dame. "Usually two waiters are hard pushed to cope during the summer months, but this year it's just me - not enough custom."

Dang, one almost feels sorry that the French have far fewer US citizens to insult this year.  "ALMOST"

Thanks Tony Blair and friends?  No, the thanks belongs much closer to home.  Thanks Jacques.  Your skills at diplomacy rank second to none, as the worst.

[gatorgriz]

One of my co-workers just returned from visiting her daughter in Italy, who's studying landscape architecture there this summer on an exchange program out of the University of Idaho.

Anyway, this was my co-worker's first trip to Europe, and she told me that her daughter and her had a GREAT time in Italy, Switzerland, and Germany, but then they made a BIG mistake and went to France... She said she would never go to France again... EVER... The people were extremely rude, the places were dirty to the point of being scummy, and it flat out wasn't a place she wished to visit again...

Oh, my co-worker is a big time liberal...

[RIGHT IN SEATTLE]

Screw France..........

I'm raising my own Escargot!

[Faraday]

Perhaps some Brits could go to Paris and explain Newton's Third Law. Anyway, French delusions of grandeur are entertaining the people of the world for the third consecutive century.