felix qui possit rerum cognoscere causas
|
April 09, 2003
How to hate the French
One of the tools of my trade is a Bloomberg terminal. Those who work outside of finance may know Bloomberg TV or radio, or the web site. A Bloomberg terminal provides a staggering amount of real-time data and information, and it's easy to just wonder around the system looking at yet more stuff. It's a bit like the Web, only much more expensive. Some of the material also appears on the web site, so I can link today to a column I came across. How to Hate the French: A User's Guide by Michael Lewis (of Liar's Poker fame) examines how best to stick it to the French. Berkeley, California, April 9 (Bloomberg) -- It's astonishing how much easier it has become in America in just the last few weeks to hate the French, even for those who shouldn't. (RTWT: Read The Whole Thing.) His main argument is that what the French are really after is not respect or admiration, but importance. They don't care what we think of them, as long as we think of them at all. Well, they certainly got our attention, which was the whole purpose of the pro-Saddam stance that France had taken. I don't think it's that simple as Lewis describes, but the yearning to be seen to be relevant is an important aspect of the French national psychopathology. Commercial interests and shady dealings with Saddam also played a role. The French have never come to terms with their declining influence and relevance. It should have been obvious after the second world war, which ended all pretense of France being a world power. The Vichy government also removed any claim to the moral high ground, although we did allow the myth of the Resistance to swamp the reality of the Collaboration after the war. Perhaps it was necessary, as a deluded non-communist France was preferable to a France under serious threat of a communist election victory. The French response to declining geopolitical relevance and the abdication of the moral high ground was brazen denial. By repeating to themselves that they were indeed important and morally superior they almost convinced themselves of it. The hypersensitivity where these issues are concerned shows that they never quite succeeded in vanquishing the cognitive dissonance this produced. It seems like Chirac and de Villepin did come to believe their own propaganda though, which led to their overplaying their hand dramatically. It would not have mattered too much, but it did give the downward spiral that France finds itself in another push. Although I don't entirely agree with him, I'll end by quoting Lewis again: Americans have long suspected that they don't actually like the French but it isn't until this war that those suspicions have been confirmed. Now they must learn how to express that dislike. Comments
Chirac really is no fluke. I can't remember when a French president acted in the interests of France instead of those of his cronies. I can't believe it that the French haven't caught on yet. Posted by: Ralf Goergens on April 10, 2003 09:02 PM When a French president acted in the interests of France? Charles de Gaulle. He retired in 1969. Posted by: JFM on April 13, 2003 12:46 PMI rather like the one from Gen. George Patton .... "I'd rather have two German Divisions at my front, than one French Division in my rear." and the one, recently, from Jonah Goldberg, said to have *really* 'got to' the French ....... " The French are just a bunch of Cheese eatin', surrender monkeys !" Very succinct. There is also a great body of thought, that Chirac and the pop-in-jay, de Villepin, have written checks with their Bulldog mouths, that their Poodle asses can't cash. Poor old Schroder and Putin have also "hitched their horses to the wrong wagon" and their peoples will suffer for that too. A shame. The French culture is not so much about what they they, but how they say it. Have you ever wondered why French teachers are incredibly anal-retentive about grammer? They see the brush strokes where we see the painting, and in effect, become lost in a sea them. Thus it is best to ignore their stroke and see the world for the painting it is.
We, French people, all love your vindicated inferiority complex which cause you to bark loads of abuse. We do appreciate your lessons in democracy as we look at Georgette Bushette, your well-elected "president", the sissiest wimp of the world who run away from a classroom (!) as she was told Ben Laden had blown two miserable symbols of vacuity. I feel sorry for the Unitedstatish, of course for those who were caught in the towers, but also for the sad overwhelming majority as they are driven to believe they live in a country that doesn't exist. Good luck. “From 1945 to the end of the century, the United States attempted to overthrow more than 40 foreign governments, and to crush more than 30 populist-nationalist movements struggling against intolerable regimes. Murder, Incorporated -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- While the lumbering giants of the American media make their clumsy bows of obeisance to the presidential paymaster filling their corporate goodie bags with tax cut candy and merger massage oil, a few snippets of unsalted truth about the real world continue to spill from the croker sacks of the lean and hungry provincial papers. Last week, it was the Savannah Morning News unearthing an attempted terrorist bombing by a U.S. soldier in the gaterous moral swamp of Jeb Bush's Florida. This week, it's the Ithaca Journal in upstate New York, bringing news of Big Brother Georgie's old-fashioned approach to warfare: Ordering soldiers to kill women and children. This revelation – entirely unremarked by the larded lords of the Fourth Estate – came in a homely profile of young Army Private Matt Guckenheimer, just returned to the bosom of his family after a tour of service in Afghanistan. While retailing some of his experiences during the much ballyhooed "Operation Anaconda," Guckenheimer artlessly spilled what was surely meant to be a secret order from his superiors. "We were told there were no friendly forces," Guckenheimer said. "If there was anybody there, they were the enemy. We were told specifically that if there were women and children to kill them." Let that sink in for a moment: American soldiers were told to kill women and children. "Specifically." To kill a child. To put a bullet in the brain of, let's say, a two-year old girl. To hold the barrel of a rifle to her tiny temple and pull the trigger. To watch as the tender plate of her skull, the delicate bones of her face, her large bright inquisitive eyes were all obliterated in a burst of red mist. "We were told specifically to kill them." "Women and children." "To kill them." So that's the kind of warfare being waged by those notorious two cowards, George W. Bush and Dick Cheney. When their own generation was on the firing line, in Vietnam, both men ardently supported the war – but disdained to fight in it. For his part, Cheney was too busy with his long bootlicking rise to power: "I had other priorities," he has loftily proclaimed. Meanwhile, Bush's daddy got his drink-addled little boy a cushy stateside berth in the Texas National Guard – but even then, Junior couldn't stick it. He bugged out for an entire year of his duty – desertion in wartime, a capital offense, if you're not rich and well-connected. Fortunately, his service records for that period were "scrubbed" by General Daniel James, former head of the Texas National Guard, who is now head of the entire nation's Air National Guard – courtesy of his appointment by a grateful George W. Bush. Now these two armchair warriors, Bush and Cheney, ensconced safely behind the greatest phalanx of personal protection ever seen in history, are sending out a new generation of young people to kill and die. Like their predecessors in the Vietnam War, they are twisting the faith and idealism of patriotic young soldiers and turning them into instruments of murder. And for what? Certainly not to "bring the perpetrators of September 11 to justice," the ostensible purpose of the war. Those perpetrators are still roaming free – and are even more dangerous than ever, according to Cheney himself. No, the main reason why Private Guckenheimer and his comrades are being ordered to murder women and children could be found last week in a headline buried in yet another obscure province of the American Empire – a brief business story from the BBC: "Afghan Pipeline Given Go-Ahead." And there is more of this to come; much, much more. For even as Private Guckenheimer was making his quiet revelations, the Commander-in-Chief was loudly proclaiming a brand-new military doctrine for the United States: Sneak attacks – like Pearl Harbor, like September 11. Speaking at West Point military academy, Bush first praised the soldiers in Afghanistan "who have fought on my orders." ("We were told specifically that if there were women and children to kill them.") He then announced that from henceforth, the United States will "impose preemptive, unilateral military force when and where it chooses," the Washington Post reports. For the first time in its history, America is now openly committed to offensive military aggression against any perceived threat designated by its leaders, the unelected White House occupant told the cadets. Bush said that "60 or more nations" presently lie under this dread edict – all potential targets of his "kill the women and children" orders. What's more, Bush said this new military bellicosity will be accompanied by aggressive diplomacy aimed at forcing other nations to adopt American values – that is, the Enron-style "crony capitalism" foisted on the United States by a corrupt elite and their political bagmen. Bush called this pustulant system – now suppurating before our eyes, as corporation after corporation, including Cheney's own Halliburton, are caught cooking their books – "the single surviving model of human progress." So there you have it. Just like bin Laden – another unelected leader who claims divine sanction for his actions – Bush will send his forces to strike without warning at anyone he believes is an enemy. Just like bin Laden, Bush considers innocent women and children to be legitimate targets of his holy wrath. Just like bin Laden, he seeks to impose his own limited, barbaric worldview on other nations, for his own power and profit. What quadrant of hell is hot enough for such men? Post Script Guckenheimer has since qualified his disturbing revelation. Perhaps shaken at seeing his words in cold print (or shaken by someone who saw his words in cold print), Guckenheimer wrote a letter to the Ithaca Journal modifying his remarks. He now says the soldiers were ordered to kill only those women and children who showed unspecified manifestations of "hostile intent." The orders did note that even "very young children" (of unspecified age) were being trained as soldiers by the heathen Mohammedans, and so could not be "just dismissed as noncombatants," said Guckenheimer. "But this does not mean we were ordered to kill noncombatants such as babies." Well, thank God for that. It is indeed a saving grace that U.S. ground forces were actually not ordered to kill babies. That would be a very serious breach of military protocol everyone knows the killing of babies and other innocent parties is reserved for the launchers of "smart bombs", "daisy cutters", B-52s, CIA drones and other purveyors of faceless, long-range death. Glad we could clear that up. Chris Floyd is a columnist for the Moscow Times. He can be contacted at cfloyd72@hotmail.com Back in the late 1970s, Steve Martin did a comedy routine in which he reminded the audience that we now live on a different planet. "Don't you remember?" he'd ask, describing some natural disaster in the recent past that had required the evacuation of all humanity to a more hospitable world. The punch line was something like, "And remember how the government decided it just wasn't going to tell any of the really stupid people.... " And he'd pause, and then say, "Uh oh." It's just a joke, of course. Even really stupid people, in this age of cable news and the Internet, can find the facts. Even really stupid people can discern truth from fiction, given all the tools at our disposal. Even really stupid people know what's what. I should warn really stupid people that I'm likely to offend them in the next few paragraphs. Read with caution. A question in a recent Knight Ridder poll prompted a remarkable response from Americans. It's the kind of response that provokes some to shake their heads or roll their eyes, and probably P.T. Barnum to spin in his grave, wishing he were alive today because he'd just be swimming in money. The question was this: How many of the 9/11 hijackers were from Iraq? Twenty-three percent of respondents said "some." Twenty-one percent said "most." Six percent said "one." So, what do we have for our contestants, Johnny? Uh oh. Well, to be fair, this could be considered a "push poll," a trick question with an apparent given fact as its premise. But let's not be fair. Three thousand Americans died on Sept. 11, 2001. We're told by the president that our country is engaged in a war on terrorism. We are massing American troops in the Middle East for an invasion of Iraq unless Saddam Hussein dies, leaves or proves a negative. It seems reasonable to wonder what percentage of Americans understand the relationship between Iraq and the perpetrators of 9/11, what with war and death and all that coming up. Seventeen. Thirty-three percent replied "I don't know," and 17 percent gave the correct answer, which, by the way, was "none." (I'm assuming this is news to 83 percent of you. Maybe I'm wrong). It's also worth pointing out that recent polls show that a solid majority of Americans (around 68 percent) believes that Iraq and al-Qaida have strong and continuing ties, despite virtually no evidence to support this. So, not only do a majority of Americans think Saddam and Osama are in cahoots, but a vast majority thinks that either there were Iraqis in the planes used on 9/11 or don't know that there weren't. Are we ready for a war or what? Polls are just snapshots, of course, a quick gauge of the nation's mood, but taken together they can present an interesting syllogism: If a majority of Americans favors U.S. action against Iraq, and a majority mistakenly believes Iraq is linked in some way to the 9/11 attacks, then... what planet is this again? Jay Leno has a recurring segment on his show where he goes out and asks people on the street questions about history or current events, and he gets some amazingly stupid answers. I've always wondered how long it takes him to find such ignorant people. Now I'm thinking, not long. Or is it just me? We were stunned and shocked at the terrorist attacks on New York and Washington, and for a few weeks we were inundated with facts. None of us expected a quiz; few of us remember any of the hijackers' names, and apparently a lot of us are unaware that most of them came from Saudi Arabia. But why do a majority of Americans sniff an imaginary (or at least unsubstantiated) trail between Baghdad and the twin towers? Are we seeking justification for sliding into a war no one contemplated 18 months ago? Are we just really stupid? Both. Neither. I don't know. Don't ask me any more questions, Mr. Pollster. "Facts are stubborn things," John Adams wrote. They can also be overwhelming, and accompanied by hard stuff like numbers and graphs. Maybe there are too many sources of information now. Maybe we're distracted by "Friends" and football. And maybe the question is moot, and war will happen or it won't and it doesn't matter what we think we know. Maybe the Bush administration will make the case, finally and concisely, about why we fight. In the meantime, though, I think it's important to be aware that while ignorance can make us laugh, there comes a time when it's just not funny anymore. Let's not forget what it was like 30 years ago, when we all had to pick up and move to a new planet. Uh oh. That just slipped out. Sorry. Posted by: Ugly Stinking Animals on May 19, 2003 09:27 AMThe French aposed the war they say they don't like war - I don't like things i;m no good at.The reason they hate us is that we stopped them reastablishing their "great" empire the good thing is they have to go through warterloo station when they get into Great Britain I dislike and often hate many of america's sentiments and it's low-life inhabitants more and more every week. If I hear that Fucking idiot w say nucular one more time– I'll burst a vein! We (not me) elected this nightmare on Pennsylvania Ave. God help this degenerate country. America deserves this. Stupid, mindless sheep, who place their glowing boob-tubes on pedestals and have the audacity to bad mouth any country. And now let's bash the French. Because some asswipe republican hate group says so. And Screw those fat- peddling McDonalds creeps! Freedom Fries my ass! WS Posted by: bsenge on August 18, 2003 03:38 PMHow dare you all use the name “America” or “American” when referring to the ugliest, most ignorant, stupid, stinking, uneducated sissies that live in that mean, miserable, pathetic third-world “country” called the USA (for Ultra Sissy Army - Untalented Sad Analphabets - Uncouth Sick Autistics - Ugly Stinking Animals - Useless Stupid Aunties...)? The revolting inhabitants of the USA do have a name. Just like Hispanophones call them “Estadounidenses” & the Francophones resort to “Etats-uniens” to name that crappy part of Humanity, please use “Unitedstatish”. It’s very simple. It works like English. The English - the Unitedstatish.
Post a comment
|