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Breaking the News to See What's Inside! |
| Volume 4 Issue 1 | SPLENDIDE MENDAX | February 2006 |
| CURRENT ISSUE | ARCHIVES | ADVERTISING | SUBSCRIPTIONS | WHO DO WE THINK WE ARE? |
BUY THIS ISSUE Flying the Red, White & Blue National/World News: Minimum Wage Bill Benefits CEOs Liberalism is Dead Six Months After Katrina Alaska State News: Lonely Democrat Looking for Love Brake-in at FCC AWAL-Mart Employee Addvice & Entertainment: Un Soupçon - The Soup's On Learning French Dr. Geyges Advises: Dr. G's Guide for the Perplexed Employee Not Grateful for Firing |
Flying the Red, White and Blue  When rendez-vous means both “meeting” and “surrender!” The US and France have been at odds for over 200 years. Arguments between the two countries can be as acrimonious as those between siblings, whose differences are highlighted by their vast similarities. The younger, bigger, and some would argue less erudite nation has often looked askance, at times with envy, at its older brother. Growing up, the countries differed, as brothers do. In the late 18th Century both went through their liberating revolutions, but while the US was symbolized by buttoned-up men in breeches and wigs signing documents in a parlor, the French emblem of the revolution was a well-endowed topless woman brazenly leading revolutionaries over the battleground, red-white-blue flag held high. That liberation should include the sexes, and sex, was anathema to the founding fathers, whose tolerance only extended as far as baring arms. The siblings continued growing, and in the 19th Century, France evolved into a rabid colonial power murdering tens of thousands in Africa under the flag of civilization and enlightenment, while the US, drawing on its spiritual, religious heritage rabidly razed the North American continent of its natives in the name of the Almighty. In the 20th Century while the corpulent US beat the fruits of wealth down from all continents with its Big Stick, France retired from active colonial life, grew a pencil moustache and derived its pleasure from committee life—obstructing NATO, pontificating in the EU, and seizing every acronymical committee opportunity to be as snippy, coy, or bullying as it fancied. But to focus on the differences between the two—their historical variations, language, gastronomy, sexuality—is to focus on the harelip that distinguishes the brothers. For both countries followed their revolutions with empires, reigns of terror (France in the 18th, the US in the 21st Centuries), and colonial devastation; both established powerful presidencies in republics wherein political antagonists, all representing the “landed gentry” (a cornerstone of both democracies despite continual terminological revision) vie for their turn in power; and both fell under the spell of the sirens of corporate interests. The new millennium did not change anything in the sibling relationship. It began with a tiff about Iraq. The younger, by now massive, brother wanted to take it for his own. When France saw this would jeopardize its own plans for getting oil from the country, it objected. Recriminations flew between presidents: “Yeah, well your name rhymes with Iraq!” “Oh yeah, well I don't have to prove myself to daddy!” “Oh yeah? Well you eat snails!” “But at least I don't think I talk to God!” “ Well, I do! And he told me that's his Promised Land over there and we need to free it.” “Oh please!! Now you're going to start asking me to tell you about the rabbis again!” (A reference to the innumerable times the US asked France: “Tell me about the rabbi(t)s; tell me about the rabbi(t)s.”) So the brothers didn't talk for a while. But family blood grows thicker as it spills that of otherss, and so France and the US quickly reconciled, flew into Haiti and joined convicted human rights violators to blast their way up and down the streets of Cite Soleil until democracy ran red. On the diplomatic scene, too, there is clearly a détente between siblings. President Bush had been making playful ouvertures for quite some time, joshing Chirac with fraternal bravado: “Either you're with us or you're with the terrorists” or “Make no mistake about it, we are winning, and we will win”. It was the same spirit of sarcastic fun that saw France donate the Statue of Liberty to the US 120 years ago. And, finally joining the fun, Chirac recently stopped sulking and came out stating he would nuke any country involved in terrorism. The temporary rift between the two countries has thus been bridged. They are together again, and from the 9th Ward in New Orleans' to the Parisian “banlieu,” people know that all is back to normal. All is well. Cheers, Che |