France Frags Freedom Frequently

The BBQ Pit
21

[QUOTE=Beagle]
China executes around 10,000 people every year. Why “around”? Their justice system is a no-justice system.

Where is that European “morality” vis-a-vis the death penalty? French morality is measured in Euros, obviously.n

[QUOTE]
Wait a minute! France has no death penalty. It is the USA who is in the same boat as China when it comes to the death penalty!

I am not going to defend the current situation with regards to Human Rights in China as they have a long way to go before they even come close to approaching European levels but I note that they are moving in the right direction and I have great hopes. I have travelled to China many times and was there just recently for a couple of months and it is a great country and things are improving dramatically. The opposite can be said of the USA where respect for Human Rights and due process by the government has deteriorated recently. The USA has lost all authority to lecture other countries on the topics of Human Rights, international law, etc.

Now that the Soviet Union is gone I also believe that a strong military China would serve as a counterbalance to the hegemony of the USA and that would be a good thing and, at this rate, we can see it in 20 - 35 years. I have great hopes for the future of China. I believe engaging them is the best thing to do for France, the USA and everybody else.

22

There are some really serious flaws with the Chinese justice system. I’m not going into it, but the system is weighted to produce executions and false convictions.

I believe that free trade with China is a good thing, and I think that it is a good thing because, aside from the economic aspect, it has helped the Chinese see democracy and has instilled some desire for it. I consider it long term foreign policy to change the government system of China by inches. However, the US has never let its desire to be friends with China overshadow the plain fact that we have different and opposed strategic interests. We both know it and agree to be moderately friendly while pisyhing in different international directions. We have, essentially, agreed to disagree, and have made such measures as seem neccessary to avoid getting into a costly and pointless open war.

This French action, however, is a blatant slap in the face for one of the world’s democratic governments. Sure, they have their problems, but they can work to overcome them. China would like nothing more than to march in and stomp on them all. The FRrench are simply being selfish bastards again. No surprise there. I don’t think they are selling themselves for money. They are selling themselves and their morality for a chance to think themselves important.

I actually made my own post on this and then realized there already was one. C’est la vie. :smiley:

23

Agreed; but actively aiding them in trying to intimidate Taiwan is a bit more than “engaging.”

Which is exactly why France is doing this. They are seeking to be allied with such a “counterbalance” because they believe it is in their long-term self-interest, which is their right.

But it is yet another indication of two things that should be obvious, but which some continue to deny:

  1. France’s foreign policy – like everyone else’s – is not primarily designed to advance democracy or human rights or anything but the interests of France.

  2. France does not feel that a close alliance with the US is in her long-term self-interest. Thus, they cannot any longer be meaningfully called US allies.

Doesn’t mean they are enemies, but it does make absurd the idea that the US needs to listen to them and accept their guidance because they are our freinds and really have our best interests at heart.

24

Jumping morons on a website, Saddam was a WORLD LEADER! Fucking everyone met with the sumbitch.

France initiated the Rwandan genocide also?

Haiti, Vietnam, Algeria, WWI, WWII, Communism, Iraq, Hezbollah, Hamas, China, and now Rwanda, etc.

French policy is sociopathic.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/3515512.stm

I know reality is not going to dent anyone’s tinfoil hat (US always bad) mindset.
BUT, there is this thing called the Kitty Hawk that is going to be shadowing this whole affair. I know that military brinksmanship is not a specialty around here, so let me explain.

France is teaming up with an aggressor nation (China) to intimidate a democratically elected government. We have an obligation to protect Taiwan from aggression. Those waters are one of the most tense and dangerous places in the world.

But, rather than use logic (which never works) – what would everyone say if the US decided to influence the, say, Spanish elections in the same fashion while also supporting Eta? That is how the Taiwanese feel right now.

Honestly, I agree that France should pursue military opposition to the US. That will get rid of one of the Axis of Weasels.

Again, no factual refutations? Wow, this place gets weaker and weaker. Ad hominem ripping me personally, America, or conservatives (which I’m not) is all I seem to get. The pursuit of ignorance goes full speed ahead…

25

Well, I agree with furt and note that it’s becoming a trend. No legitimate comparison of this exercise between France/China has been made with respect to US/China though I’m still willing to hear one. France is the poster-girl for realpolitik–[seinfeld] not that there’s anything wrong with that [/seinfeld]. The important thing to glean from this is that the France and US are not allies. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: France and the US will be at war with each other within the next 50 years.

26

That would be going much too far. However, I think there is a grain of truth to the assertion that France has been a basket case of incompetant selfish intent and sucking up to tyrannical regimes in the last century. I’m talking more about their actions in the Cold War and after, rather than the Vichy government.

I pary that is not th case. I suspect France would never go to war with the US. They’d rather get someone else to do it for them.

I don’t think they’d shed any tears if someone did nuke us.

27

As in bang-bang shooting war? I can’t imagine that France would be so stupid as to pick a fight like that. Some minor kerfuffle on the high seas, maybe.

I can very easily imagine a cold war, though, with France using multinational agencies to try to hamstring US policy (more than they already are, that is) or funding some rebellion somewhere that would inconvienience the US. Even then, though, they’d probably need to officially deny what they are doing the whole time for the game to work. The best card they have is the willingness of so many in the US to think the best of them, and shooting at US troops would squander that. Especially, if, as smiling bandit says, they can get someone else to do it for them.

Chinese-built Mirages firing exocets at US ships defending Taiwan while the EU stays neutral? Yes, I can easily imagine that … and a lot sooner than 50 years, unfortunately.

28

We may be fighting ignorance around here but we sure aren’t doing much about hysteria.

War, by proxy or otherwise, between the United States and the Republic of France? Over what great issue? The dastardly French dealing with China, The Yellow Peril? The undoing of the Louisiana Purchase? While we are at it, how about the international struggle for the untold industrial resources of Quebec—Operation Quebecois Freedom we can call it. The world is a better place without all those French speakers running Quebec, we can say. War! War! Turn lose the dogs of war! The security of the nation hangs in the balance! No time to wait! We must act now!

Some people deal with hyperventilation by breathing into a bag; others just pull a future international conflict out of their ear based on what seems to be nothing more than a personal antagonism toward those snotty Frogs. Some days you would think we were English.

29

Good lord, the premise of this thread is at least as thunderingly stupid, if not more so, than the one in which the OP claims that the Guantanamo prison facility is the next thing to a holiday camp.

Concerning just a few of the gross inanities uttered by the OP:

A pair of French ships are teaming up to conduct joint (and apparently one-day)exercises with a handful of Chinese ships. Big fucking deal. Show me this flotillla loosing missiles over Taiwan or escorting landing craft towards its coast and I might be a bit more alarmed.

Really, you advocate immediate all-out war, with all its attendant loss of life and destruction, with a founding member of the European Union and current member of a military alliance with the US? Over two ships participating in a one-day exercise with a thrid country that has full dicplomatic relations with the US?

Actually, several posters have pointed out the fact that the US is not significantly less cordial with China than France is. Also, wasn’t it the US, that great ally and defender of Taiwan, that refused to sell F-16s to them, forcing the country to develop an indigenous fighter?

As you have failed to make your case that France is assisting China specifically in aggression against Taiwan, nor that France is somehow working with China against the US, I find you to be the one who is fact-deprived.

And if you didn’t want ad hominems, you shouldn’t have posted this drivel in the Pit. At least, please note, I for one have managed to restrain myself from calling you a blithering idiot. So far.

As for KidCharlemagne’s comment:

Balls. Show me France withdrawing from both NATO and the EU, as well as embarking on a massive arms buildup, and maybe I’ll consider that theory.

30

Can we force them to take back Quebec? I’m just thinking out loud, looking for the upside…

31

Oh jeez, my tongue was lightly probing my cheek when I said that we’d be
at war with France within 50 years. I didn’t think anyone would bite. It was just wild speculation [sub]cough, wishful thinking, cough[/sub].

32

Trust yer ol’ Uncle e. on this one, Kid. Indulging in irony when surrouned by the humorless is a very, very dangerous sport.
(Normally wouldn’t bother, but your cognomen suggests a Steely Dan devotee, such as these are worth preserving…)

33

Yeah. I mean, the images of Chirac and Jospin high-fiving each other and raising a glass of champagne upon hearing about the collapse of the Twin Towers was indicative enough.

Shit, did someone poison the well or something? What the fuck is wrong with y’all?

34

[QUOTE=sailor]

Improving from an appallingly low base is pretty easy. In some countries, eliminating death by stoning would a dramatic improvement but that won’t give them the moral high ground. For the record, Taiwan’s human rights record is light years ahead of China’s.

How many logical can you find in this statement? What you overlook is that the executive branch of the federal governement is not the USA. The United States has a complex political and legal structure. Many of the things you decry are currently being hashed out in the courts and in the politcal arena, and that’s as should be. By contrast, China has neither a legal system nor a political system worth the name. Whenever the Chinese leadership gets a wild hair, there are no checks and balances. On balance, I think the USA has plenty of “authority” to lecture China, not that lecturing will do any good, of course.

Be careful what you wish for, you might just get it. The biggest check on imperial ambition is democracy. The biggest impetus is a perceived threat. China is not a cuddly-wuddly puppy. They have a proud imperial tradition and an openly imperial bent that continues today. China is currenlty hell-bent on building a strong world-class military and a blue water navy. They’re not doing this to defend themselves against Japan.

Engagement is fine, but France is going a bit beyond that. The U.S. wants links with China’s military because such links can increase day-to-day cooperation and help avoid crisis. Even at the height of the cold war, for example, the U.S. Navy had a solid professional relationship with the Soviet Navy and everyone understood the rules of the game, as it were. The Chinese, by contrast, are cowboys and currently lack the Soviet’s professionalism.

France wants to play its own “China card.” The French are playing this game because they do not foresee any way that French interests will come into conflict with Chinese ones. But it is scurrilous to even tacitly encourage Chinese designs on Taiwan. Make no mistake. The French are engaging in realpolitik, pure and simple. Despite their protestations, they have not got the “moral high ground” and never have had.

Well, France withdrew from NATO as a practical matter in 1967. The EU was always France’s Big Idea for competing with the U.S. The recent “ungratefullness” of the incoming batch of EU members has given France serious doubts about the wisdom of enlargement. Unlike, say, Germany, France will fully participate in the EU only so long as EU policy serves French national interests. It is quite possible that French enthusiasm for the EU project will wane dramatically over the next decade.

35

And should that happen, I’ll give it due consideration. For now, however, there’s plenty of other things to worry my allegedly humorless little mind about.

36

The fact that the hypocrite Frogs have been loudly proclaiming their virtue and the inevitable triumph of their post-modernist socialist superstate over the evil American infidel pigsdogs! Death to the French! :wink:

Actually, I despise them for their moral cowardice (along with several people on this board) hypocritical blatant self-interest which they hide by saying they are really our friends and only want the best for us, and their decision to suck up to the worst of the world’s tyrannical regimes out of some mindless desire to be a “top nation” again. France died the moment German tanks rolled across their border in WWII. I don’t know why, but in my opinions from that day on, they’ve been nothing but a disaster for the rest of the world.

It doesn’t help that they were the loudest voices telling me that 3,000 people dying in the WTC destruction were really my fault and we all deserve it. Because after al, Americans are just mongrel trash right? We’re the ones who fled their lovely little states and kingdoms. Some of us aren’t even white people! :eek:

If they were honest, rather than being slimy vipers about it, I would respect them like I do the Russians and Chinese. I don’t neccessarily like the latter two governments, but they are usually honest and forthright about their intentions. I don’t agree with them, but we can sit down, talk it over, and come to a conclusion - or just ignore each other.

Yeah, I hate France. DeGaul was the worst thing that ever happened to that nation.

37

…sounds like the current administration (and past administrations).
The rest of your post is more of the same crap - they hate us because some of us aren’t even white? They were the loudest voices saying that the US deserved the WTC attacks and feel that Americans are just mongrel trash?

This is racist and offensive.Have you ever been to France or met a French person?

38

No, that is NOT the way it should be. The way it should be is that those things did not happen. The system is supposed to serve the people, not the other way around. A system which allows Human Rights abuses is wrong. Wrong, Wrong. I do not care how simple or complex it is, if it allows Human Rights abuses, it is wrong. The guy who has been jailed for years without any process does not care about the complexity of the system. nor do I. I measure a system by its results and the result of the US system right now is appalling.

I disagree. The USA has put the security of the state before human rights and it cannot lecture China when it does the same thing. The USA has no authority to decide for China when the interests of the State come before Human Rights. If the USA gets to decide that the interests of the State come before the interests of Ahmed then China gets to decide its own cases and the USA has nothing to say. A country which places an absolute value for Human Rights over state interests can lecture others to do the same. A state which decides when Human Rights are important and when they are not cannot lecture another state when it does the same thing.

Is that so? So why is the USA feeling so imperial these days in Iraq?

I am not saying I would like to have China, or any other country, much stronger than others. I am saying the opposite, that I would like that no country be much stronger than others so that they cannot go attacking others without fear of reprisal. I am saying I would like to see some strong military power balance the military power of the USA and it seems China will be the one to do it in the coming decades. I bet the USA would not have attacked and invaded Iraq had China been as militarily powerful as the Soviet Union was 25 years ago.

I believe the “cowboy” adjective these days fits the USA and its policies much better than China’s.

I have not seen any protestations by the French that they have the moral high ground. It is the OP who says the opposite. I am saying the USA does not have any moral high ground to lecture the French. . . or even China. But certainly not France.

39

Two words that half the people here should learn:

Tu Quoque

Claiming that the USA is bad does nothing to make France less… French.

40

Um, no. Everything is relative and it depends what you compare it with. I have a friend who, when asked “How is your wife?” likes to answer “Compared to what?”. Suppose I have a piece of shit poked on the end of a stick, well, compared to that she comes out pretty well.

When Beagle talks about France’s “moral turpitude” I am assuming he means compared to other countries in general and to the USA in particular because without any reference the post is meaningless. What is the standard of reference for judgment here?

Will Beagle ever start a similar thread about the USA? No need to tune in next week to find out the answer. Hell will freeze over before that happens.