Still looking for that obnoxious Frenchman

Maybe it’s because I live in Boston where we set pretty good standard for obnoxious but after my third trip to France I have yet to encounter this mythical creature. Lest you think this is because I can pass for a native the entirety of my French consists of, “Pardonez moi, je ne parlez pas Francais.”

I love France and the French. Yeah they’ve got an attitude problem – but I don’t think Americans get to cast that particular stone. Because of the current political debate I was keenly aware that pretty much every non-tourist I saw had full health coverage. No one worrying about what happens if you lose your job or have a “pre-existing condition.”

I’m waiting for some company to rule that being born is a pre-existing condition. I really have never understood this insurance exception as anything other than a way for the companies to make even more money. I have flat feet and so am not covered for a podiatrist (well, in the past anyway). But the insurance still has to cover it when my knees get messed up because of my feet. Feh.

Mrs. CollateralDamage assures me there are obnoxious French people. She says they were all at Paris Disney, either employed as staff or paying to go there as guests. My anti-Disney parks stand pays off yet again!

Went to Chartres. Sat in the cathedral for like three hours. It isn’t for God, it is God. My  mother tells me I followed in family footsteps by doing this. Her father, architect Barry Byrne, went to Europe once to meet with Gropius and the Bauhaus gang. He stopped at Chartes and spent two weeks there.

No picture does it justice. Just go.

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Irate French workers kidnapping bosses

In the past month there have been four separate incidents of workers taking their bosses hostage for up to 24 hours. Also, a billionaire boss was blocked in his taxi by employees for an hour on March 31. It even has its own word: Bossnapping – which sounds a lot more like what workers always assume the boss is doing.

Public opinion is pretty much split on this one. A poll released Tuesday had 50 percent against & 45 percent in favor. The other 5 percent were probably out buying cheese. As a result the government is dithering. (Actually this is SOP for the French government.)

French President Nicholas Sarkozy is trying to figure out whether he should enforce the law on this one. (Why do I think only the French and maybe the Italians would have to debate this?) In addition to the fact that M. Sarkozy is already deeply unpopular among the workers

The risk of sending in the riot police when the next hostage-taking occurs is that, far from discouraging such acts, it could cause them to proliferate. Turning a blind eye carries risks as well. All four plants where bossnappings have occurred are foreign-owned, and the head of the CGPME employers’ group, which represents small and medium businesses, said foreign investors could be put off France.

Really I just think he’s in a bit of a tizzy because Michelle O. has totally eclipsed his pinup model wife for coolest first lady on the planet.

French law would jail those who “incite thinness”

The French parliament’s lower house adopted a groundbreaking bill Tuesday that would make it illegal for anyone — including fashion magazines, advertisers and Web sites — to publicly incite extreme thinness. … It would give judges the power to imprison and fine offenders up to $47,000 if found guilty of “inciting others to deprive themselves of food” to an “excessive” degree, said [Valery Boyer, a Conservative!!! lawmaker and author of the law].

• Let’s just hope that it makes more sense in the original French. But somehow, I doubt it.
• Who gets to decide what’s excessive? Jenny Craig?
• Can you incite mental illness? The law seems to posit that ads can cause or trigger or exacerbate anorexia. Can they do the same with alcoholism or obsessive-compulsive disorder? Where’s the line here? Anorexia is a very real problem and this is a very real PR move that won’t actually help the issue. “Her bill has mainly brought focus to pro-anorexic Web sites that give advice on how to eat an apple a day — and nothing else.“
• It seems that in France Conservative = Democrat.