[Rhodes22-list] Andy Rooney on France

[brad haslett]

Just in case you missed Andy on Sunday night. 
Subject: Andy Rooney on France, sorry Francophiles 


"You can't beat the French when it comes to food,
fashion, wine or perfume, but they lost their license
to have an opinion on world affairs years ago. 
They may even be selling stuff to Iraq and don't want
to hurt business. The French are simply not reliable
partners in a world where the good people in it ought
to be working together. Americans may come off as
international jerks sometimes but we're usually trying
to do the right thing. The French lost WW II 
to the Germans in about 20 minutes. Along with the
British, we got into the war and had about 150,000
guys killed getting their country back for them. We 
fought all across France, and the Germans finally
surrendered in a French schoolhouse. You'd think that
school building in Reims would be a great tourist
attraction, but it isn't. The French seem embarrassed
by it. They don't want to call attention to the fact
that we freed them from German occupation. I heard
Steven Spielberg say the French wouldn't' even let him
film the D-Day scenes in "Saving Private Ryan" on the
Normandy beaches. They want people to forget the price
we paid getting their country back for them. Americans
have a right to protest going to war with Iraq. The
French do not. They owe us the independence they
flaunt in our face at the U.N. I went into Paris with
American troops the day we liberated it, Aug. 25,
1944. It was one of the great days in the history of
the world. French women showered American soldiers 
with kisses, at the very least. The next day, the
pompous Charles de Gaulle marched down the mile long
Champs Elysee to the Place de la Concorde as if 
he had liberated France himself. I was there, squeezed
in among a hundred tanks we'd given the Free French
Army that we brought in with us. When we go to Paris
every couple of years now, I rent a car. I drive
around the Place de la Concorde, and when some French
driver blows his horn for me to get out of his 
way, I just smile and say to myself, "Go ahead,
Pierre. Be my guest. I know something about this very
place you'll never know." The French, a third-rate 
power with a third-rate track record since the end of
WWI, have not earned their right to oppose President
Bush's plans to attack Iraq.


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