Reply #4: Like most generalisations, this is 99.999 per cent false

[Benbow]

and horribly misinformed. I am a Brit, everyone in my family speaks French (one of my brothers teaches French, and my father's accent was so good that he was often mistaken for a Frenchman), and we are all immensely francophile. In Britain, anyone who becomes successful financially buys a property in France: in the Dordogne (which is sort of England in France during the holiday months), or Provence.

Less well-off Brits already have a tradition of popping over to France just for the day, and coming back stocked up with wine and other good things from the French markets. We admire and imitate their haute couture and culture and the French style and quality of life. Our language is peppered with words borrowed from the French.

Have I made my point? I don't know where you get your disinformation from: perhaps all your Brit sources are football hooligan school drop-outs, or perhaps you read only Murdoch-owned newspapers? (Murdoch is an Australian media-baron.) And not once, not once has Prime Minister blamed the French for the Iraq war. (Whereas more than half the UK blames the Republican administration for the godless mess that is the Iraq war and aftermath.)