[A-List] The President goes to school

[Michael Keaney]

"Appeasement," of course, is the Ultimate Evil, the Great French Sin.
Hence: "Fifth lesson: We are fighting an enemy that cannot be appeased;
were that 
possible, the French would already have done it--a Roberts quip that
elicited a loud chuckle from the president."

****

The last episode of the first season of Jim's favourite entertainment,
"The Unit", features the boys going out to the former Yugoslavia as part
of a UN detachment led by a prominent French general. Their mission: to
secure the capture of an indicted Serb war criminal for transportation
to The Hague and trial a la Milosevic. Just when they are surrounding
the hideout the UN troops open fire with the French general's approval
but to the dismay of the professionals of the unit. During the exchange
of fire the target's wife is killed, and the target mistakenly blames
David Palmer, oops, I meant Dennis Haysbert's character, who has been
trying to call cease fire all along. When the media show up the French
general orders cease fire and spins a tale for the reporters whilst
allowing the target a chance to escape. The next day, "The Unit"
organise their own interception of the escaping target, only to be
prevented from taking custody of the target by the French general, who
turns up just as they capture the Serb. Later back home it emerges that
the French general was killed by the escaping prisoner. And at the
private party organised to honour the colonel's new wife (this is the
same colonel who has been stepping out with the wife of one of "The
Unit") three of the boys perform a party piece lampooning the French and
present a tapestry of the French general's family crest to the colonel's
wife as a potential cooking apron.

Somehow I don't see Sarkozy taking a lot of this, however US-friendly he
might have positioned himself as.

Roberts is the latest in a line of anglophile ideologues like Robert
Conquest and Winston Churchill who have promoted "Echelon". The terrible
Jacob Weisberg did a fairly good demolition job a while back:

http://lists.econ.utah.edu/pipermail/a-list/2007-March/065753.html


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