An Open Letter to France

On January 25, 2003, Jonah Goldberg, a syndicated columnist, insulted you, saying, “The French are liars.”

Then, he went on to make fun of your accent and your skill at cheese-making. He also derided your ambassador to the UN, Dominique de Villepin, and also your president, Jacques Chirac. He chided them for attempting to lift the genocidal sanctions imposed on Iraq. Goldberg insisted the sanctions haven’t really being working because of “French efforts to undermine them.” He said, too, you “shame” yourself, when you advocate containment against Iraq, just because it worked “in the Cold War.” He insisted that your cry for “peace” is motivated by a desire for “oil.”

These gross offenses to your people and to your nation, appeared in the pages of the “Washington Times” newspaper. To sum up Goldberg’s nasty diatribe, entitled, “France’s Latent Motivation,” it was a smear job on you for having the courage to say “no” to a U.S. led war on Iraq.

Goldberg’s article was a classic example, too, of pro-Zionist propaganda (a/k/a “ZionProp”). This is where a pundit covertly advances the Zionist cause on a controversial issue, without even mentioning Israel, or Zionism, or Ariel “The Butcher” Sharon by name. Goldberg is a master of this technique. Sometimes, he does it openly, like when he did a hatchet job on the Palestinian Chairman, Yasser Arafat (12/05/01). (I’m going to get to that rant in just a moment.) Goldberg knows the Zionist Cartel wants this war with Iraq. I suspect that is the real objective of his phony spiel of January 25th.

Just Imagine, now, if I had written: “The Israelis are liars.”

Well, before the ink was dry on the paper, the cadres from the U.S. Anti-Defamation League would be out in full force. Its “Media Assault Brigand” would be activated. Steam would be coming out of Abe Foxman’s ears, and he would be heating up the tar. Meanwhile, his crony, Mortimer B. Zuckerman, “Mr. Zionist, USA,” would be supplying the feathers. Then, yours truly would be targeted, and unceremoniously run out of town on a rail provided by Israel’s “Amen Chorus.” I’d also be tagged forever as “a raving Anti-Semite,” by one of its media lackeys.

Never mind, the U.S. Constitution or the Bill of Rights, They don’t apply when the Zionist boy-ohs get their collective yarmulkes up. I’d have breached a big taboo: Calling little Israel a bad, hurtful name. Hughes would have to go.

But, Hughes DIDN’T say, “The Israelis are liars.” Jonah Goldberg, however, DID say, “The French are liars.”

Will Goldberg have to go? Or, will the World Zionist Community issue an apology on its behalf to you because Goldberg insulted your national honor? If Arafat is responsible for all the Palestinians, then why shouldn’t the Zionist elite be responsible for the conduct of its sympathizers, like Goldberg? Will Goldberg also be made to apologize? Stay tuned.

It was you, France, who came to our aid during the darkest days of our Revolutionary War. It was your fleet that blockaded the Chesapeake Bay, under Admiral Francois de Grasse, and your gallant soldiers, too, that aided General George Washington’s victory over the British forces at Yorktown, in 1781. America’s true patriotic sons and daughters will always remember you, and also the magnificent contributions of Major General Marquis de Lafayette to our struggle. I suggest that Mr. Goldberg has excluded himself from this latter category, either because he is ignorant of American history or his myopic political agenda will not permit it.

This is the same Goldberg, who recently penned an even dumber piece that suggested the U.S. should “bomb Canada!” After a furious response from our Canadian neighbors to that nonsense, he said that he was only kidding. He also rarely has a good word to say about Islam, and when he’s asked to cite an authority for his dubious anti-Arab opinions, he invariably cites the inherently biased Muslim-basher, Daniel Pipes.

On the slanted Arafat piece, Goldberg unfairly ripped into the Chairman for not being a good “partner in peace,” and, for rejecting the Zionists’ so-called “Most Generous Peace Offer.” However, Dr. Jeff Halper, a brave Israeli, in “The Link,” (10/02 issue), rebutted that cock-and-bull story, by clearly demonstrating that the “offer” would have turned a “Palestinian state into a prison, where all the borders [would] be controlled by Israel, and three million Palestinians [would] be living under siege.”

Goldberg’s inflamatory opinions are his own and, mercifully, reflect the views of only a few mouthy pundits in this country.

France: in response to your courageous stand for peace on Iraq, please know that justice is on your side. I feel confident that most Americans will join with me in declaring: “Vive la France!”

WILLIAM HUGHES is the author of “Baltimore Iconoclast” (Writer’s Showcase). He can be reached at liamhughes@mindspring.com.

© WILLIAM HUGHES 2003