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Europe
I hope this isn’t a reflection of the entire country!
2004-02-12
Not an article. I visit The Independent’s forum to hone my debating skills and learn. (Boy you guys want to have some fun, you should check it out. MAJOR anti-americanism)
From a thread on banning the scarf, in response to a question if we’ve kissed and made up (between 2 other people):
No, i’m on a diet and in any case we call them fritte’s here......

In answer to your question, as far as the French are concerned there was never any animosity toward the U.K. or the U.S. Our elected government simply voiced its opposition to the incursion of Irak’s territory on the grounds of some spurious nonsense.

Suddenly, there were inflammatory articles in the press about how we had forgotten the aid that they had given us in the last war, which was very hurtful because one of the motivating forces against the French getting involved in France was, that as a country who had long suffered under occupation by foreign forces: we, above all recognise Fascism when we see it.

Then everybody stopped buying our wine and cheese etc. etc. blah blah blah; but the upshot of it all is, that our daily lives here are not influenced by the goings on across the Channel or the Atlantic. We love the British and the Americans.We won’t tell you to bugger off when you come on your hols. If the Americans can forgive the Japanese for Pearl harbour and we can forgive the Germans,surely we can be forgiven for not getting involved with a dirty and ignominious war.

Finally, Whatever the reasons Blair and Bush are giving to justify there stay in a country which manifestly does not want their presence or, whatever justifcation the G.I’s have for their failure to familiarise themselves with the language and customs of Irak: I suspect that the anti-French campaign was deliberately orchestrated to generate an anti-European feeling ,because the thought of a strong Europe scares the s**t out of the yanks.


I responded:

--Our elected government simply voiced its opposition to the incursion of Irak’s territory on the grounds of some spurious nonsense.--
Umm, Babavee, I’m assuming, since you’re here, you know about the internet and translation programs??

Also sites like this who do our work for us.

Some pretty vile "cartoons" our "ally" puts out via its mouthpieces considering it’s a heavy fine for making fun of the president of same country.

http://merdeinfrance.blogspot.com/

Oh, and here’s a hint, our response was not perpetrated by our government, it was perpetrated by yours.

--surely we can be forgiven for not getting involved with a dirty and ignominious war.--

Keep dreaming. You have failed to realize you have alienated a good portion of the Millenials. Future tourists.

So, to make up, maybe you could pay back what you still owe us for the Marshall Debt??? I don’t think you’ve made a payment since the 60s.
--

And the Pali/Israel threads, man.
Posted by:Anonymous2U

#8  Oh, Bob, I'm one of the 10% who DO have a passport. And I've used it. More than once. What you (and they) fail to realize is that we can now surf over there and throw articles into a translation program.

And the beauzeau's response was better, as of last week, he doesn't care because he retired from the human race.

And Bob, have you ever heard of the site "Merdeinfrance.blogspot.com?"

You'll be overwhelmed by the sympathy our "ally" shows us.

Some especially charming "cartoons" from LeMonde and the others, also. Just pouring out sympathy - well, oil anyway since it IS about oil, you know.
Posted by: Anonymous2U   2004-2-12 9:21:13 PM  

#7  The Marshall Debt issue reminds me....
To help eliminate our rather large debt from the war, could we not demand that the rest of the world pay us back what we have lent to them over the years to keep their counrties from disintegrating? I believe that we have lent the rest of the world a lot of money, and in places where we have not directly given money, we have not asked for payment of other things. So, why don't they just pay us back? I'm sure it would help us and would probably eventually even help those countries who pay us back.
Posted by: S   2004-2-12 6:11:26 PM  

#6  So, to make up, maybe you could pay back what you still owe us for the Marshall Debt??? I don’t think you’ve made a payment since the 60s.

Why haven't we held this over their heads? We can ram it down they're throats! Wait, maybe Bush will do that on the D-day ceromony?
Posted by: Charles   2004-2-12 4:58:07 PM  

#5  Well, if the French "know fascism when they see it", they sure weren't loathe to do business with it. Or, in the case of some officials, to take thinly-disguised oil bribes to keep it in power.

Many french people are anti-american and have been, with varying degrees of unbelievable condescension, for years. I found that out first hand while travelling ... on a US passport ... in Europe and also while doing business there.

Record's article is one point of view. It doesn't reflect the views of the Air War College faculty as a whole, by any means.

Oh, and Bob - do try to inform yourself a bit better. It really is the case that many Americans speak more than one language, travel and *still* don't agree with you.
Posted by: rkb   2004-2-12 2:20:05 PM  

#4  You guys are way off the mark. The French don't have anything against the Yanks; they live in a country that has 6m Arab immigrants for 65m population. The last thing they want is an all out Jihad at home, that’s understandable they tried that in the 90s with the Algerian terrorists before Al Qaeda was an issue. They are not happy because no WMD have been found and they said in the beginning let the inspectors do their job instead of attacking an Arab country that doesn't pose a threat, and starting a really dirty terrorist campaign. They are also very unhappy because America is 500 billion in debt mostly because of Iraq (I make the difference between the war on Terror and Iraq), the international banks won't lend America money anymore, so the dollar falls bringing the world economy with it. That might not be totally true but its all perception isn't it? They are sympathetic about US troops on the ground getting hammered because the troops are not trained to deal with this kind of war when its strategically unfocused by the policy makers (that’s taken from Bounding the Global War on Terrorism written by Jeffrey Record who is a professor in the Department of Strategy and International Security at the US Air Force’s Air War College in Montgomery, Alabama, it's a good read you can find it on the net). If more than 10% of the American population had passports and travelled around the world more you might learn a thing or two about how other peasants think, instead of believing everything you see on CNN. Oh by the way, "spurious" is in the dictionary it means fake, phoney, counterfeit, sham depending on how you use it, quite in context I thought...just depends where you get your facts. I'm no lefty believe me, but on this one you guys are way off the mark.
Posted by: Bob   2004-2-12 1:11:39 PM  

#3  Unfortunately for a large number of idiotarians in the world, the Internet has totally blasted away walls that used to separate us and allow those that hate us to hide behind their borders. Today, anything anyone says, anywhere in the world, can go from a local rant to worldwide common knowledge in a matter of hours. That certainly makes it far more difficult to lie about the role of government, whatever it might be, wherever it might play. And that's a good thing.
Posted by: Old Patriot   2004-2-12 11:40:07 AM  

#2  No boycott was orcestrated by anyone in the government. It was all done by the peasant American tourists and consumers. WE stopped buying French wines, and stopped visiting Paris. No force in the universe can stop us from not coming.
Posted by: Ben   2004-2-12 4:37:44 AM  

#1  Preety cool A2, I could almost taste the smoke and smell the boujalais.

"Then everybody stoped buying our wine and cheese..." thats hillarious.
Posted by: Lucky   2004-2-12 1:20:09 AM  

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