freedom fries?

So, let me get this straight - instead of "French fries," they're "Freedom Fries" now because those dastardly French have the temerity to disagree with Dubya's cowboy brinksmanship disguised as foreign policy?

Freedom fries? Freedom toast?
Freedom fries? Freedom toast?
FREEDOM FRIES? FREEDOM frelling TOAST?

In case no one else in this country stops snoring and bothers to say it, let me jump around and yell a bit in the hopes that someone will hear it:

Members of the House of Representatives: You are all wankers. As you have proven yourselves useless, please shoot yourselves for the good of your country.

Before I go any further, let's put the blame where blame is due: Representative Walter Jones, North Carolina, who originally circulated letter suggesting this change, and Representative Bob Ney of Ohio, who spearheaded the effort to have this name change made in the House cafeteria.

In the end, they answer to their own constituents, but I should think a flurry of emailed and written rebukes might work nicely. Need some help? Here are some helpful ways to get started:

Walter Jones' contact information:

Snailmail:
Rep. Walter Jones
United States House of Representatives
422 Cannon House Office Building
Washington, DC 20515

DC Phone: (202) 225-3415
DC Fax: (202) 225-3286

N.C. Phone: (252) 931-1003
1-800-351-1697 toll-free (for NC residents only)
N.C. Fax: (252) 931-1002

Bob Ney's contact information:

Snailmail:
Rep. Bob Ney
2438 Rayburn HOB
Washington, D.C. 20515

DC Phone: (202) 225-6265

I can't wrap my brain around just how incredibly stupid, pigheaded, and insulting this move is. This is supposed to be "symbolic" of our support of our troops. Symbolic? Oh, it most definitely is - symbolic of how immediately snotty our president and our elected officials become when the rest of the world doesn't want to play by American rules.

Gee, Bush wants a war. Wants to finish what his daddy started, I suppose. Congratulations - looks like he's going to get a rollicking good war - at the expense of American lives, any semblance of international agreement (much less cooperation), and any remaining slivers of goodwill left in the international community.

So, our president is going to aim, full speed ahead, at Iraq, while making conspicuous tests of a 21,000-pound bomb to make his point, which currently appears to be "Do what I say or we'll smack you around with this."

Where is Congress? This should be their moment to shine, to question the president's actions, to serve as a dissenting (or at least questioning) voice on what appears to be the eve of a war. Instead, they urge us to support our troops, beating the drums of patriotism with freedom fries and freedom toast.

Shame.

Better to be silent than to offer misbegotten 'support' in this political-stunt guise.

Mark my words carefully, reader. Do not construe my distrust of my president and his actions as a lack of support for the troops of this country. Nor should you construe my words to imply that I believe Saddam Hussein is a great, misunderstood leader; I believe him to be a dictator and a butcher.

But as the tone of a word is as important as its literal meaning, so are intentions and insinuations that accompany an action as important as the action itself. The French - and the rest of the world - will not remember this symbolic legislative action as being supportive of American military; they will see it for what it rightly is: an insult and a barely-veiled threat.

I love my country, but the people who govern it scare the crap out of me.

all tags: 
politics
stupidity
rants

Comments

On , sarae said...
And what about freedom kissing? Can't wait for that to catch on..

On , canspice said...
Actually, they're showing their support of France by making this change. After all, they're showing that the word "french" is synonymous with the word "freedom". To be French is to be free!

On , rogueGeer said...
this is double plus super good. that od think way is so minus bad. how can anyone new-think themselves to double plus happiness and bliss and oneness with big brother if they have all the old-think ways of speaking still clogging their vision... I plus pity the unbelievers, who have yet to embrace the Truth. cannot they see that this is so True, so right, so, harmonious and in every way like big brother? I TRULY BELIEVE THERE ARE FOUR FINGERS!!!

On , Erica said...
You put it so much more eloquently then I - I actually saw a blurb about this awhile ago and the only comment I can make is "WTF?" followed by some sort of expletive.

On , andy said...
I see....FOUR lights! Seriously though, we should rename French dressing to "caloric sludge" and French poodles to...well.....that's enough of an insult to the French. Why aren't we going after the Russians and Germans as well? They don't support us in this venture. How about we invade France? Pax Americana for all! French fries don't even come from France.....

On , Tialessa said...
"I love my country, but the people who govern it scare the crap out of me." What she said. I did not vote in the last presidential election because I did not believe in either candidate. Where's the Bartlett for President campaign? What's scary is that Dubya will probably get a second term out of this conflict. Yesterday's AJC mentioned that orders for Camembert & French wines have substantially dropped. If you want to protest - do it there - with your pocketbook, now with renaming food! Here's a quote from the MSNBC article about this yesterday "The French Embassy in Washington had no immediate comment, except to say that french fries actually come from Belgium." I do believe that war is WRONG. I actually wanted (years ago) a team to assassinate/eliminate Hussein - so it's not that I'm a peacemonger. I really want the US to stop being a bully. Why does the US have to be "right" all the time? Hell, I'm just starting to rant now. Going away to cool off & work at my job.

On , gfmorris said...
Shoot, I even think Bush is generally doing the right thing, and I find this more than a tad ludicrous. The French are a bunch of babies, and changing the name of a food won't change that. This has the teeny bit of historical precedent in Americans calling frankfurters "hot dogs", but all that proved is that we'll shovel the same crap down out gullets no matter what we call it. [On a side note, Amy ... expect the CD fairy to make a lunchtime delivery.]

On , Noah said...
You know what? Let them have their silly and pointless "freedom fries." I'd much, MUCH rather see them frittering away their time and energy on crap like that instead of, say, repealing freedom of speech and protection from illegal search & seizure, dismantling every last bit of separation between church and state that they can, taking away what little privacy we have left, wanting to open up the Alaskan wildlife refuge to oil drilling and the Sequoias to logging... so I say if this "freedom fries" stuff gets their rocks off enough to keep their hands off slightly more important things for a little while longer, then I say more power to them. You let me keep silly, inconsequential things like the environment, the bill of rights and world peace, and I'll gladly eat your damned "freedom fries." (sorry - by now I really should know better than to reply to stuff like this before I've had my morning caffeine.)

On , Tracy said...
Actually, the Congressmen are not the ones that came up with this idea - their constituents did. A restaurant local to the area one of them represents re-named French fries on their menu to freedom fries. The Congressmen were echoing the words/sentiments of their constituents...which by translation means they were doing what they were elected to do. Apparently, not everyone believes the President's policy is "cowboy brinksmanship".

On , canspice said...
Not everyone thinks the Earth is round either.

On , jowilson said...
Ha, I liked James Lileks response: "We have French doors in this house. We do not have Freedom doors. I do not put Freedom's Mustard on my hot dogs. I do not want my legislators to rewrite the scripts of "Family Affair" so Sebastian Cabot's butler character is named "Mr. Freedom." What am I supposed to call my niece - someone who has dual American-Freedom citizenship? You like the sound of that distinction? Holy temporarily satisfying empty symbolic gesture, Batman!" *lol* American-Freedom citizens! I also liked this phone conversation from Defective Yeti: Him: What about "French Toast." Me: Now it's "Liberty Toast". Him: Gotcha. Are any other country names off-limits now? What about "Iraq"? Can we still say "Iraq"? Me: No, now you have to substitute patriotic words for "Iraq". Like, when you're playing pool and you're between games, you can't say "I rack?" You have to say "Justice?" Him: Right, right. And when frat boys are checking out girls, now they say "Holy shit, bro: she has democracy that won't quit!"

On , domesticat said...
Tracy - So let me get this straight. If a couple of your constituents (out of hundreds of thousands, or even millions) privately adopt measures that are intended as a direct insult to an ally, the best thing for a politician to do is to publicly perpetuate this insult? Our legislators should have better sense than to openly insult long-term allies. Our president seems determined to start a war, all alone, UN or ally support be damned. The absolute least our legislators could do is not stomp on what few shreds of international goodwill remain toward the United States. A stupid little publicity stunt like this ordinarily would not matter so much, but the timing is unconscionably bad, and does nothing but magnify the insult.

On , jeffie said...
Oh, and let us not forget that Neal Rowland (the owner of the restaurant in NC who apparently started all this), AKA "the constituent", said his intent was not to slight the French people, according to this CNN article. WHAT?!? The intent is not to slight the French people. We just picked "french fries" at random from our menu. Come on. If you're going to do something like this, at least have the guts to fess up to what you're really saying. As if that's not good enough, the article goes on to say that Rowland said that the switch from french fries to freedom fries came to mind after a conversation about World War I when anti-German sentiment prompted Americans to rename German foods like sauerkraut and hamburger to liberty cabbage and liberty steak. So...if he didn't mean to slight the French people, then which country exactly is he comparing to World War I Germany (AKA "the enemy")? This is not the constituent that I want our representatives to be echoing. This was a childish publicity stunt aimed at insulting an ally that refused to play ball. They called a PRESS CONFERENCE for this. This is not quiet support. It's silly and counterproductive.

On , eviloompa said...
Urgh...holding...back...must...not...get...up....on.....soapbox.....must....not....rant

On , eviloompa said...
Okay...I can no longer hold back. I got an email at work today that just cemented the fact that I need to post my opinion where intelligent people will read it and understand what I am saying...instead of having a bunch of dubyaites telling me that I am anti-american and should be tried as a commie sympathizer or something. The email i received was of pro war sentiment. It featured a letter that was written in September of 2002 in the Daily Mail in London. I am sure most of you have seen this article...backing the US in their actions against Osama and Al-Qaeda written by a staunchly anti-US and anti Tony Blair columnist. The point is this article referred to the tragedies of September 11th. This article never once mentioned Saddam...never once mentioned Iraq...never once mentioned anything even remotely akin to that. Yes...the "war" against Osama and the Al-Quaeda organization was met with worldwide understanding and backing. There was no outrage against it whatsoever. There are no questions about that at all. However...since the US Military is and remains to be unable to locate Osama there has to be a fall guy to explain the hundreds of millions of dollars that are being pumped into the military. There has to be an explanation for finishing the job what Bush Sr. wasn't able to do. Dubbya is just trying to finish daddie's crusade. Never mind the fact that the rest of the world sees this as a war of agression. The world community is viewing this the same way that they viewed the germans in WWII. This is a war of agression...nothing more...nothing less. Now before you go off pegging me as someone who should then go be a human shield...let me state a couple of facts. Do I believe that Saddam is a madman who is capable of anything? Damn skippy I do. Do I think that he is a threat and danger to the United States? Damn skippy I do. However...is there ANYTHING more dangerous in the Muslim community than a martyr? FUCK NO...there isn't. Give them a martyr and you will have Jihad unlike anything the world has ever seen. Religious zealots and terrorists will have a field day with this. Dubbya is scaring the crap out of me. We have always been the country that mediates aggression...we are now the country that launches aggression. WTF????? Excuse me...does anyone else see a problem here? Argh...and the worst part is the public is stupid enough to believe what the politico's and spin doctors are saying. Use your brains....think about it. Since when did 9/11 become Saddam? I think I need to go puke now.

On , gfmorris said...
All I'll say on Iraq are two things: 1. There's something to be said for preventative medicine. 2. I imagine that, in fifty years, historians will view 1991-2003 as a long war interrupted by a faux ceasefire and general diplomatic pissantery. Oh, and ... the concept of French fries is Belgian.

On , canspice said...
And the concept of French Toast is, depending on the story you read, either from Albany or Louisiana. In any case, it's got no grounding on French cuisine. My officemate had a good point. The French would retaliate but there aren't any foods named after America that they'd really care about. American cheese? Pfft, the French wouldn't eat it anyhow, they have standards.