The American People recognize that the French see themselves as rivals to the United States in terms of prestige and power. This annoys the American People, who know full well that the French are a bunch of cheese eating surrender monkeys. It further annoys the American People when we can bail the French out of two World Wars at murderous cost, only to have them sneeringly refer to our policies as simplesme when we want to kill terrorists.
If John F'n Kerry spoke Spanish or Portuguese, the American People would have no problem with that.
The last paragraph of the article notes that we are "ambivalent" about the French. No, we aren't: we really don't like them at all, for reasons you outline in post #11.