Boy, do they hate Bush here

New York Daily News ^ | 11/08/04 | Richard Z. Chesnoff

[texson66]

It's not Bush they hate. It's the USA, plain and simple. They never got over their loss of importance in world affairs.

Ding!Ding! We have a winner!

[Old Grumpy]

We don't CARE what they think. When will they ever get that through their thick skulls?

[Publius6961]

We cannot simply dismiss the French nor ignore the concerns of people and governments around the world.

Yes we can. Germany is understandable, France is not. France has a really short memory.

Jean Francois Revel in his Anti-Americanism gives us a good explanation for world anti-Americanism, particularly the French variety. I have a slightly different take.

In 1969, on my first trip to France, I was impressed by two things: Pock marks on the concrete walls and abutments along the Seine, from street fighting during the "recent" war, and the level of Anti-American hostility; "Nixon go home" graffiti was everywhere.

The French Empire was in the final stages of disintegration, its world importance was approaching zero then. The had lost indochina and left the mess for the Americans to clean up. They were getting their butts kicked in Algeria and Lebanon, they had nothing to look forward to but more of the same worldwide.

But they solved the problem in their inimitable French way: they commited national suicide. The actually imported all the haters that were part of the world they were fighting. And continue to do so to this day.
Their sense of guilt and helplessness makes them an unreliable ally and their sense of lost "power" makes them arrogant to a fault. Keep your eye on this bunch.

When their mammary gets in the wringer and they ask for help next time, I would riot in the streets before I support the suggestion that we should help them and save their butts yet one more time! Short memory is a permanent affliction.

[Uncle Vlad]

Against our better judgment, we're protecting the French. The French need to get it through their heads that they do not vote, nor do they even influence, U.S. elections, are more than the children get tell the parents what time they want to go to bed every night. Does that sound arrogant? Perhaps it does, but boo hoo, welcome to reality.

[JasonC]

Yes we can dismiss the French. I am glad they are mad at our president. They are our enemies, and I want them to be mad, I want them as upset as possible. They are not allies we are having some trivial misunderstanding with, they are enemies.

[Publius6961]

BUMP

[Roccus]

It's been a long time since I read it but wasn't the "Ugly American," in the book of the same name, a good guy?

[Skooz]

This just makes the win so much sweeter.

Choke on it, euroweenies.

[Alas Babylon!]

But both Bush and Kerry understand that at this moment in history, we can neither walk away from Iraq nor from the war on terror.

Oh, not so fast! There WAS a key difference between the two. Kerry would have abandoned our war against Islamofascists faster than you can say "Peace Dividend" and "National Health Care".

That's why Bush won.