The French surrendering.......to reason?

[_JS]

It really depends. The French have a lot of investments in the United States and have made a great deal of money off of our market (even despite O'Reilley's idiotic boycott of their wine ). Yet, most of that lies outside of US Government control and more within cyclical economics.

The European Union is extremely important to France and despite a great deal of talk about short work weeks, the French workers are more productive than their British counterparts who work much longer hours.

The French Government is a very complex system and not at all similar to the American Government. The Prime Minister is of great importance and the French people are as well. They generally do not tolerate acts that are rammed through with little respect for constitutional law. This was a primary reason for the earlier riots. We generally thumb our nose at any riots, but for the French it is a time-honored tradition to bring out the barricades and show disfavor with the Government.

I'd take the talk of "rolling back everything from May 1968" with a grain of salt. No French President wants to be the cause of another Republic

[Michael Tee]

<<Just a guess though, since the only thing you have as supposed "evidence" is a Salon piece, debunked by report after report, committee after committee, and conclusion after conclusion, demonstrating nothing "stolen" in EITHER 2000 or 2004>>

Hey, thanks, I didn't even know about the Salon report.  The evidence that the election was stolen in 2000 was put together in a very compellinga and basically unanswerable case by three investigative reporters for Vanity Fair.  Lanya was actually able to track the article down on the net and posted either the article or a link to it here in this NG.

You could have saved yourself a lot of typing effort by leaving out "report after report, committee after committee and conclusion after conclusion" and just used the generic term "whitewash."  We all would have known what you meant.

[Michael Tee]

<<Interesting how you all have turned the entire French election into a pro-US or anti-US matter.>>

"you all" my ass.  I pointed out in post #5 in this thread that the French election wasn't a referendum on Franco-American relations.

[sirs]

Interesting how you all have turned the entire French election into a pro-US or anti-US matter.
I'm sure it had little to do with internal French politics and was all about the United States <sarcasm>

Funny, I coulda swore I made it perfectly clear, when Tee had broached this subject, that the French elections did not include either the U.S. or the war in Iraq as its predominant reasons for Sarkozy's win.  I do believe I've been referencing how the election of Sarkozy simply demonstrates how the U.S isn't this big blackhole of an albatross in Europe, and how given the choice between a conservative leader or a socialist leader to run their country, they chose conservative.

So, why this effort to highlight that and twist it into a claim of making the Sarkozy win based on some pro-U.S. movement, is beyond me    

[sirs]

<<Just a guess though, since the only thing you have as supposed "evidence" is a Salon piece, debunked by report after report, committee after committee, and conclusion after conclusion, demonstrating nothing "stolen" in EITHER 2000 or 2004>>

Hey, thanks, I didn't even know about the Salon report. 

I was wrong  *gasp*   It was in fact your Vanity Fair article.  Bad recollection on my part.  Don't ever say I don't recognize when I've been in error

You could have saved yourself a lot of typing effort by leaving out "report after report, committee after committee and conclusion after conclusion" and just used the generic term "whitewash." 

Translated; Don't confuse me with the facts, when my mind is already made up.  Funny how 1 article in 1 magazing is the gospel truth, according to Tee, but multiple official and unofficial reports and conclusions contrary to Tee's predisposed made up mind is deemed a "whitewash"    Gotta love it   

[sirs]

[Michael Tee]

<<Funny how 1 article in 1 magazing is the gospel truth, according to Tee, but multiple official and unofficial reports and conclusions contrary to Tee's predisposed made up mind is deemed a "whitewash"    Gotta love it >>

Yeah, why can't the government just limit themselves to one whitewash when they're gonna cover something up?  Isn't the whitewash overkill kinda wasteful? 
 
Newsflash, sirs:  the government works overtime to protect itself and one hand washes the other.  That's what a free press, independent of the government, is supposed to do.  It's a sad commentary on the state of journalism today when Vanity Fair digs out a story that the MSM has no interest in whatsoever.  Hmmm, wonder if corporate ownership of the MSM by giant conglomerates allied on many levels with big business and big defence contractors and dependent on government licensing of the broadcast media would have anything to do widdat?  Nah . . .

[sirs]

<<Funny how 1 article in 1 magazing is the gospel truth, according to Tee, but multiple official and unofficial reports and conclusions contrary to Tee's predisposed made up mind is deemed a "whitewash"    Gotta love it >>

Yeah, why can't the government just limit themselves to one whitewash when they're gonna cover something up?  Isn't the whitewash overkill kinda wasteful? 

Goodness Tee, it apparently wasn't just a bipartisan government whitewash, where Democrats apparently joined in to make sure Bush stole the election from messers Gore & Kerry, those dastardly news media outlets are all in cahoots as well, to make sure Bush got elected, when many of them underwent their own independent recounts and research.  How impressive that out of all the conclusions made, by both official and unoffical committees & sources, your little 'ol Vanity Fair article, the one that mirrors what you have concluded is what happened, is the only one that seemed to get it right.  Imagine that       

[Amianthus]

It's a sad commentary on the state of journalism today when Vanity Fair digs out a story that the MSM has no interest in whatsoever.

It's a sad commentary on Vanity Fair, when they write an article that is thoroughly debunked by other MSM outlets.

Hmmm, wonder if corporate ownership of the MSM by giant conglomerates allied on many levels with big business and big defence contractors and dependent on government licensing of the broadcast media would have anything to do widdat?  Nah . . .

Vanity Fair is owned by a pretty big corporation itself. It's not like it's published in some guy's backroom.

[Xavier_Onassis]

This crap about Sarkozy being elected because he favors the US is crap. The French, 85% of whom voted, compared with the puny 50 odd percent of Americans, most likely voted for Sarkozy because they were annoyed by a small number of unemployed Algerian punks incinerating their Peugeots and Citroens, and perhaps want France to be more assertive in the EC.

US foreign policy has very little support in France. Perhaps only a fraction of those who voted for LePen. And pretty much all ogf them think Juniorbush is a warmongering  moron oilman, because that is what he is.

[sirs]

This crap about Sarkozy being elected because he favors the US is crap.

Yo Xo.....would you care to show us anyone who claimed, or even implied, that it was because Sarcozy was more friendly to the U.S. than Royal was, as the primary reason he won the election.  Inquiring minds, would like to know. 

It appears to me that the "crap" is the continuing efforts to minimize his victory by complaining about an issue that was never made an issue

[sirs]

We gonna get any examples, Xo?  Or are you pleading the 5th?

[Michael Tee]

<<Vanity Fair is owned by a pretty big corporation itself. It's not like it's published in some guy's backroom.>>

Ridiculous.  Vanity Fair is owned by Conde Nast, a company that's in the business of publishing magazines.  And I think they just established a web presence very recently by buying Lycos.   Network TV is owned by multimedia conglomerates any one of which could buy and sell Conde Nast in the blink of an eye.

Besides which, if there's a niche market for leftist screwballs or anarchist crazies, the giant corporations aren't averse to cashing in on it.  They can run a subsidiary organization that caters to the niche, earns a healthy profit and still swamp its message with the sheer volume of crap that gets poured out by the MSM every hour on the hour.  Vanity Fair, regardless of who owns it is just pissing in the ocean.

American ruling class circles figured out a long time ago that it's better NOT to monopolize the news 100% - - they can always afford to have a few marginalized "left wing" publications to point to as examples of a free press, while the lion's share of the consumers is subjected to an unremitting blizzard of right-wing garbage . 

[Michael Tee]

<<Funny how 1 article in 1 magazing is the gospel truth, according to Tee, but multiple official and unofficial reports and conclusions contrary to Tee's predisposed made up mind is deemed a "whitewash" >>

Yes, a lot of things are funny, aren't they?

Funny how Democrats and Republicans all voted together to give Bush the power to invade Iraq.

Funny how the people never got a chance to vote between a Democratic "pull 'em out next Wednesday afternoon" candidate and a Republican "onward to victory" candidate but were offered only a choice between a Republican war candidate and a Democratic "me too" candidate.  (some choice!)

Funny how even after an electoral reversal of fortunes, the Democratic legislature continues the Republican war even though it's within their power to pull the plug on the financing of it.

But the funniest thing of all is how, when the warmongering politicians of both parties investigate themselves and decide in " multiple official and unofficial reports and conclusions" that everything that happened was strictly kosher from every angle, there are people who actually believe that the participation of Democrats in the process is a guarantee of impartiality and bona fides.

NEWSFLASH, sirs:  The system is fixed.  It ain't what it seems.  The "opposition" isn't really an opposition.  Get it?  They take turns fucking you ["you" being the people of the U.S.A., not sirs personally] and you think it's true love.

[sirs]

NEWSFLASH, sirs:  The system is fixed.  It ain't what it seems.  The "opposition" isn't really an opposition.  Get it?  They take turns fucking you ["you" being the people of the U.S.A., not sirs personally] and you think it's true love.

Yea, Bush & Reid are regular golfing buds, while Cheney & Pelosi are hunting buddies.  Yea, right Tee.  Can I have some of that stuff, you're smoking?             Oh, BTW, weak deflection effort I might add