You might add to your list... IAMS.... This is a dog food entirely owned by the French. My yellow lab is now eating Fit & trim....and hopefully enjoying it more since it is made by Purina.
Posted on 03/17/2003 8:08:05 AM PST by Pokey78
I HOPE that the continent of Europe never again needs help from the United States of America.
I hope that there's never some murderous little tyrant - another Hitler, another Milosevic - that Europe needs help in taming.
I hope that there's never some economic catastrophe that requires American dollars to make it right, as they did at the end of the Second World War.
I hope that the euro experiment works. I hope that all those peace-loving souls in Belgium, Germany and France can somehow muster an army to protect themselves.
I hope that the continent I live on never again needs to go cap in hand to the Americans.
Because if that black day ever comes, I have the feeling that America might just tell Europe where to go.
On the eve of war, there is a tangible anger in America. But surprisingly little of it is directed against the Iraqis. It is the French who are detested.
"This is all about oil," the Brits hear all the time. And Americans think it is "all about oil" too. The $50billion worth of oil contracts that France has with Iraq. In American eyes, that is why the French are so keen to avoid war.
Anti-French feeling in the United Kingdom is never more than a passing fancy, a jokey bit of "hop-off-you-Frogs" banter.
Not in America.
THE cafeteria in the House of Representatives no longer serves French fries - chips to you and me, guvnor. Now they sell something called "freedom fries". That sounds nuts - and of course it is.
But when a furious Congresswoman presents a "bring home our dead" bill demanding that the 75,000 American men and boys who died in France during two world wars be dug up and brought home, you realise that this is more than "hop-off-you-Frogs" banter.
Congresswoman Ginny Brown-Waite says, "The remains of our brave servicemen should be buried in patriotic soil, not in a country that has turned its back on the US and on the memory of Americans who fought and died there."
That's the difference between the British and the Americans.
We do not feel that the British casualties in two world wars died to liberate the French. We believe that we were fighting for our nation's survival. Just like the Russians.
It is different for Americans.
Throughout the 20th century, through two world wars and one Cold War, America gave all the blood and money Europe needed to keep it free.
They feel that the current crisis has proved that Europeans are, when all is said and done, an ungrateful bunch of Euro bastards who do not give a flying baguette about the 75,000 American graves in Europe.
Anti-European feeling goes right across the board of public opinion, even among the millions of Americans who are passionately against attacking Iraq. America is united in feeling betrayed by Europe. America is finally starting to understand that - to Europe's eternal shame - there is an opinion that 9/11 was America's comeuppance.
Secretaries and waiters leaping from the top of the burning twin towers? The fault of American arrogance.
A terrified four-year-old girl cowering at the back of a hijacked plane? Blame it on America's support for Israel. A stewardess with her throat slit by a carpet cutter? One in the eye for American imperialism.
Those 3,000 dead, murdered on live television? Europe blames America.
When 9/11 happened, you might have expected to see Palestinians dancing in the street. But who would have expected the grim look of satisfaction on the faces of old Europe?
But the British are absolved of Europe's sins. Those who are against the war admire Britain because we had a peace march where one million people filled the streets.
Those for the war admire Britain because Tony Blair has been a true friend to America. And although the man on the M25 might make jibes about Blair being a "poodle", among American hawks our Prime Minister is seen as dangerously strong-willed.
THERE is a school of opinion in America that believes the war could have been over by last Christmas if Tony Blair had not been so keen on proceeding through the correct diplomatic channels. Nobody calls Tony Blair a poodle in the USA.
It has been good to be British in America these past few weeks
For America has been reminded that Britain is the best friend it has in the world, joined by blood, language, history, instinct and culture.
When will the British wake up from their pathetic little dreams of being Europeans and realise that we have been looking for our future in all the wrong places?
Who wants to be European today? Who wants to be an ungrateful, unprincipled, two-faced, pacifist, Euro-grasping, oil-hungry Lilliputian?
No matter what happens over the coming days and weeks, it is true what they say. The English Channel is far wider than the Atlantic.
_______________
WEST SIDE GORY
THE traveller to America can never quite decide if America is the friendliest place in the world or the most heartless.
Individually, Americans are kind, generous, supportive. They want you to succeed. Unlike back in Britain, where people want you to fall flat on your face.
The British convention of scratching cars out of pure spite does not exist in America. They might steal your car. Or they might ram it and rob you at gunpoint. But nobody is going to scratch it out of petty jealousy.
America is a strange cocktail of affability and brutality. You walk into a Banana Republic store and people are so keen to make you happy that you feel you could say, "Any chance of a blow job?" and nobody would bat an eyelid.
But then you pick up a paper and realise that this is still a very young, very violent country. A woman was sacked from her job delivering pizza after attending to a man who was lying in the street with a gunshot wound.
"She was away from her job for no good reason," said her manager.
But I bet that when that manager gave her the boot, he ordered her to have a really great day.
_________________
A TICKET TO HEAVEN
WHAT I will miss most about the States is the service culture. If you are a paying customer, then people genuinely want you to be happy.
There's none of that snotty "Can-I-help-yew?" service you get in the UK, where some lazy fat cow polishing her nails acts all surprised if you actually walk into her shop.
What I will miss least are the endless security checks at the airports. As absolutely everyone in America knows, it is people on one-way tickets who are invariably picked out by airport security.
And if you are travelling from city to city, as I have been, then all your tickets are one way. American airport security assumes that any terrorist on a suicide mission will only have a one-way ticket. Why shell out for a return ticket when soon you will be in Paradise, surrounded by 99 virgins?
Everyone in America knows about getting pulled over when you are on a one-way ticket.
I hope nobody ever tells the terrorists so they can outwit the system by purchasing a return ticket.
Because then we will really be in trouble.
You might add to your list... IAMS.... This is a dog food entirely owned by the French. My yellow lab is now eating Fit & trim....and hopefully enjoying it more since it is made by Purina.
That was one of the greatest gestures of friendship I've ever witnessed. What a moment it was! And the British government hasn't let up one bit since.
' And like you, my tears were flowing that day.
Actually...here is the real story...
The US military finally hunts down and kills Osama Bin Laden. Osama is lifted to the pearly gates.
There, he is greeted by George Washington. "How dare you attack the nation I helped conceive!" yells Washington, slapping Osama in the face. Patrick Henry comes up from behind. "You wanted to end the Americans' liberty, so they gave you death!" Henry punches Osama on the nose.
James Madison comes up next, and says "This is why I allowed the Federal government to provide for the common defense!" He drops a large weight on Osama's knee.
Osama is subject to similar beatings from John Randolph of Roanoke, James Monroe, and 65 other American patriots.
As he writhes on the ground, Thomas Jefferson picks him up to hurl him back toward the gate where he is to be judged. As Osama awaits his journey to his final very hot destination, he screams "this is not what I was promised!"
An angel replies "I told you if you died attacking America there would be 72 Virginians waiting for you in Heaven. What the heck did you think I said?"
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.