Well, extravagantly researched posts don't draw much comment, so let's throw out some red meat:

French troops will replace US marines at this year's national day parade in Spain on October 12, Defence Minister Jose Bono said on Tuesday.

According to Bono, the invitation to the French marks 60 years since the liberation of Paris from Nazi occupation and pays "homage to the Spaniards" who were also involved in that momentous event at the end of World War II.

French General Leclerc's forces which entered Paris on the evening of August 24, 1944, contained some Republican veterans from the Spanish Civil War.

What with all the French and Spaniards handily liberating Europe, one needs to ask why the United States showed up at all?

Bono told reporters the decision to invite the French in no way constituted a change to relations founded on "friendship and respect" which Spain enjoyed with the United States.

Well, it is Spain's business where it parks its lips. And what it's about while down there.

The new Spanish leadership has revealed once and for all their true colors. Exemplary people like Aznar are like a needle in a haystack. But time to move on. France, Germany and Spain are now declared enemies of the U.S.. The sooner our government realizes this and stop trying to make nice with them, the less vulnerable we can be to their backstabbing ways.

Anti-Americanism is the principal reason for the change in the Spanish government. France is a friend of anti-American terrorists and will remain so for the foreseeable future. We must start convincing our fellow citizens to stop travelling to that France so that dollars won't help fuel pro-terrorist policies of their government.

More stories of America's oldest enemy.

http://www.nationalreview.com/comment/miller_molesky200410060852.asp

"French and Russians 'took cash from Iraq'"

http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,1321479,00.html

Now we know why the frogs kept saying "eets all about zee oooooiiiiiiiilllll!" Because for France, it was.

Now we know why France delayed the end to the "oil for food" program, even after Saddam was gone. Of course, many of us ignorant Americans were saying this months ago, but it appears now that even the Europeans are hearing this bit of news so carefully suppressed.

Just out of curiousity, I went to Le Monde for the story. I was "shocked... shocked!" to see that it was not there.

brb: there's almost nothing about the ISG report right now on the website of Le Monde -nice from you to note only the accusations on France and Russia, it seems there are other interesting pieces of information in this report- but Le Monde is an evening newspaper. So don't expect anything on the website until this afternoon.

on the Oil-for-Food scandal (free archive articles):
http://www.lemonde.fr/web/recherche_breve/1,13-0,37-848088,0.html

http://www.lemonde.fr/web/recherche_breve/1,13-0,37-845475,0.html

http://www.lemonde.fr/web/recherche_breve/1,13-0,37-850717,0.html

i agree with you to say that it was much discussed in our press, at least it was less covered than it should have been.

hum!
i meant: that it wasn't much discussed!

A little OT, but sometimes back i wrote in the comments that i was waiting for Bill GERTZ book "treachery";

Well, i got it 2 days ago and i can say that it's very short on specific and new charges against france arms dealing with saddam.
It's just a recap of all the bits and pieces that internet news junkies already know.

Maybe useful for others; But i think it describes very well, the anti-french feeling that hovers in DOD , and apparently, will stay for many years.

I'm so sorry, i really am. This socialist are doing stupid stuff everyday.
The last speech of Zapatero in New York was just...it's hard to explain the hooror and shame i felt.
"The most effective measure against terror is sexual parity" ( i swear)
"Peace need something much more heroic, pretty and honest than war" ( after saying this he pass his join to the Jamaican president and they begun to sing the best of Cat Stevens.
"To end with this situation we must declare and alliance of civilizations" C'mon president, we are not in the seventys ,ok? it's very embarassing to me.

Here it goes an article about Ossama Bin Zapatero i found in EURSOC, enjoy it...
The Loony Latin Left

It is unfortunate that just as Europe is preparing to bid good riddance to the EU’s whacky Italian president, Romano Prodi, Spain had to dump their new socialist Prime Minister, Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero on us.

And what is Senor Zapatero up to these days. Well, as George Bush was speaking to the UN General Assembly, the BBC reports that Zapatero was lurking on the “fringes of the UN meeting in New York.” (And a damn good place for him too.) Anyhow, while George Bush talked about serious matters, Zapatero, in typical European leftist fashion, was calling for “an alliance of civilizations,” under the direction of the UN, with a mandate to combat terrorism through political and cultural dialogue.

Unfortunately for Zapatero, or perhaps fortunately depending on your perspective, it seems the esteemed Spanish PM has never visited the UN before. If he had, he may have learned that there is already a UN bureaucracy set up to improve understanding among the world’s nations through cultural relations. It’s called UNESCO, and it was one of the most corrupt and inefficient of the many corrupt and inefficient UN bodies until the US and Britain finally left the organization to protest said rot. But when has corruption and ineptitude ever put a damper on the grand ambitions of a Eurupean lefty?

But this is not all. Oh no. Zapatero wants to “deepen political, cultural and education relations between those who represent the so-called Western world and, in this historic moment, the area of Arab and Muslim countries.”

This is a bit confusing. First, why is the Western world “so-called” while the Arab and Muslim countries get to be an “area?” Has the West become so amorphous, so disjointed, that it is now so-called, while the Arab and Muslim area is so easily identifiable? Perhaps Senor Zapatero is suggesting that some of the members of this so-called West – the US for example, or Britain – don’t fit into the “New West.” Maybe the West Zapatero hopes to head this great alliance of civilizations consists rather of the harbingers of humanity, like Chirac’s France and Schroeder’s Germany.

Then again, maybe Zapatero isn’t thinking about the US at all, because he also stated that he’d like to “position his country as a bridge between Europe and north Africa,” according to the BBC. Well, Spain certainly is a bridge, one where numerous African immigrants come into Europe illegally. Just go to the Spanish Canary Islands and ask what the natives think about Moroccan immigrants. You’ll get an earful.

What Zapatero really seems to be saying, all dressed up in the guise of humanitarian moralism, is that his country, along with much of the rest of Europe, is really terrified of the growing number of radical Muslims coming to their shores. Just recently, the grandfather of Middle East studies, Bernard Lewis, told a German magazine that he expects Europe to be predominantly Muslim by the end of the century. The reason being that Europe’s birthrates are falling, its traditional Christian roots are all but gone and it’s throwing itself into a fog of humanitarian rhetoric, somehow hoping that if they just repeat the fallacy enough that Islamic terrorism is all the fault of poverty in the Middle East and Israeli bullying, the radical Muslims won’t slaughter the Europeans in their beds. Good luck Jose.

To sum up his little fringe havering, Zapatero made the comment that it takes more determination and heroism to create peace than make war. This was obviously a defense of his policy to withdraw Spanish troops from Iraq after his election win. Well, you’ve certainly got to admire the man’s ability to delude himself, and to believe that cowardice, appeasement and hypocritical calls for dialogue are signs of courage. It appears Europe has found Prodi’s true ideological successor. Thanks for the freak show Spain

Worked like a charm, Damian. You even brought Victor out of the woodwork! ;)

The reason that French involvement is so interesting is that France worked so hard on Saddam's behalf. France even opposed ending the program after Saddam was removed. Why was that? Because suddenly a whole lot of vouchers would have become worthless? If Americans were involved, they apparently had no govt support.

Woodwork? I was pressing olives!!!

Victor, nice to hear from you!

Are you still in US?

No, but guess what, I'm coming back on Christmas!!!
I'm going to quit my job in spain to try to get a job in Manhattan. In case i don't succeed i'll call my buddy Aznar in Georgetown, he'll know what to do.

Welcome Victor.

The American actually never showed up.The Russian won WW2 and the rest was made up in Hollywood.