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October 27, 2003
French Terrorists
Looks like the SMH has found a winning formula. Write a story about terrorists (that gets 50% of the readers) but make the terrorist French (the other 50%).
Screenshot from the on-line edition (links to main page of the paper):
Posted by Ozguru at October 27, 2003 07:10 AM
Comments
Does this mean that you lot down under have also taken up the Angloshpere sport of French bashing? I'd noticed the we Americans had joined the Brits in that sport but hadn't seen too much coming from OZ. (Tim Blair excepted.)
Posted by: Kathy K at October 27, 2003 07:10 AM
I think we have been "French bashing" for quite a while. The key triggers that come to mind are the Rainbow Warrior affair (the french not-very-secret service sunk a private vessel in New Zealand) and Mururoa Atoll (which according to the newspapers is "in our backyard").
What was interesting is that in a previous life (late 1980's) I worked for a defence contractor and I remember some discussions with the spooks about information sharing. We used to talk to the Poms (UK),
Yanks (US),
Kiwis (NZ) but never the frogs (France). No idea what triggered that but France was as out-of-bounds as Syria or the Soviet Union.
Don't forget one of my brother-in-law's favourite jokes (he is English).
Posted by: ozguru at October 27, 2003 07:10 AM
