25% of americans...

[Huguenot]

...still believe that the sun goes around the earth.

Just to wind Sean M up of course... ;-)

Reminds of the fat sweating thirteen year old american prat who disturbed me by braying loudly in a Cape Town museum (just the other day). He opined loudly that amercians needed to teach the world a lesson because they were stoopid enough to describe fossils as a million years old when the world was only created 6,000 years ago. Probably by an american.

Does anyone else play that fun game where you ask someone from over the pond to name an american invention?

[Asset]

The poor thirteen year old can't help it. They teach them that stuff in the schools.

[SeanMacGabhann]

Wind me up? The very thought. . .

there is the old notion that anything. . No matter how unbelievable. . Can be explained with a 2 word suffix. "in america"

i am geek enough to have played online games against americans. It doesnt do much to instill hope for the future i can tell you. But this is a sub set. I stand by my old defence that most americans are sound as a pound

[mockney piers]

How can it go round the earth when the earth is flat? Duhhhh!

[argibargy]

French too..

http://youtube.com/watch?v=ZlcUqrGMoLA

[Huguenot]

That's extraordinary.

I did hear say, but can no longer trace the source, that 90% of americans with a school leaving age over 16 (16 that is) vote democrat.

This means that Republicans not only rule the planet, they also struggle to spell. I can imagine post-it notes littering their houses saying 'now breathe'

On the subject of baiting yanks, it was explained to me in SA that the government ministers celebrating lemons and stinging nettles as a cure for AIDS didn't believe it themselves, but needed to steer the public away from a clamour for highly priced foreign pharmaceuticals. The alternative consequences would be that their grandchildern's granchildren would still be begging at the knee for debt relief from deranged southern big-pharma neo cons who attached a return to slavery as a condition on a waiver.

The clear point is that at least 40m people would rather be dead than american.

A better way to bait a yank has yet to be found.

[Michael Palaeologus]

Ahh - Welcome back Huguenot!

I met a very nice American yesterday - he looked just like Prince William. He was well educated and world wise and profoundly disagreed with his President. It gave me some hope.

[Ant]

Nice to be reminded that 'the other kind of Yank' still exists. :)

[citizenED]

Two American tourists were standing in Trafalgar Square looking up at the sculpture "Alison Lapper, Pregnant" from their converation it was clear they thought they were looking at the Venus de Milo...

citizen

[Muttley]

As the last but one US election demonstrated, almost exactly 50% of Americans vote democrat. And I'm prepared to bet that almost all the (numerous) Americans who live in East Dulwich are Democrats Abroad.

I have often wondered why it is generally deemed to be perfectly acceptable (by others, not by me) to bait Americans but not, say, the Japanese. It can't be about wealth. Substitute Japanese/Jap for American/Yank in the various comments around this forum and most people would probably feel a bit uncomfortable.

[Huguenot]

Lol

Nope, quite happy baiting the Japanese, and don't even get me started on the French. ;-)

It's a playground thing. I'm not picking on the little guy, I'm picking on the bully.

[Michael Palaeologus]

Now, the French. The reason I object to the move of the Channel Terminal to St Pancras is not that it will not be local anymore - but the fact the the Frenchies first foot on our soil is at "Waterloo".

[*Bob*]

Muttley Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> Substitute Japanese/Jap for

> American/Yank in the various comments around this

> forum and most people would probably feel a bit

> uncomfortable.

I agree. But only because it wouldn't make any sense. Japanese baitery would call for a different set of references. But both are infinitely baitable. The Japanese get it less because they are quietly strange. Americans get it more because they are omnipresently irritating.

Broadly speaking, of course. But then that's what national stereotyping is all about.. Broad strokes.

[Rolo Tomasi]

.....are afraid of the of 75%.

Old Jokes Home!

[dulwichmum]

I never understand why Americans have such respect for the French. Their roads are the pits (drive over the border from Germany to France and you notice immediately) but their toilet paper is completely barbaric, no better than baking parchment - and even today, a proportion of their conveniences consist of a porcelain hole in the ground - a dreadful place France. They smoke in your face in their filthy restaurants, and the women in Paris all seem to drag small doglets along on strings through the streets - in an effort to trip you on your nose.

If you ask me the only good thing to come out of France is Petit Bateau underwear for the children, and of course Aubade underwear for the grown ups. Yes I love Chablis and Champagne, but give me a nice clean toilet and a roll of Andrex any day of the week.

At least the Americans have nice toilets.

[SimonM]

>I never understand why Americans have such respect for the French. Their roads are the pits (drive over the border from >Germany to France and you notice immediately) but their toilet paper is completely barbaric, no better than baking >parchment - and even today, a proportion of their conveniences consist of a porcelain hole in the ground - a dreadful >place France. They smoke in your face in their filthy restaurants, and the women in Paris all seem to drag small doglets >along on strings through the streets - in an effort to trip you on your nose.

I confess I am mystified by this cri de coeur :))! For one thing I don't think Americans respect the French at all - an awful lot of the former loathe them because they refused to be drawn into the Iraq war. Their roads are certainly better than UK roads - a lot less congested for one thing - and if you drive from Strasbourg into Germany the quality deteriorates immediately. The "hole in the ground" loos are surely now of almost mythological status - I cannot recall when I last saw one, although I believe there were some at Glastonbury? B) You may be right about the smokers but, as for small dogs, try the Lincoln Mall in Miami Beach sometimes: it is simply awash with the little blighters :))

[Ant]

I've seen my fair share of the hole-in-the-ground horros in France. They're still out there. This was deep in rural France, mind. I wouldn't expect to find them in the cities.

I like France, though, and am willing to forgive the odd procelain abberation.

[Asset]

I have to say - if you are going for a merd the hole in the ground toilettes are far superior for ease of delivery. Bring them here is what I say.

Anyone watch the Tour today?

[dulwichmum]

Oh Mr SimonM,

It is just the way American Vogue constantly refers to the French as effortlessly stylish, I think the ladies of London are far more stylish. We spent several holidays driving around Europe before we were married, and I always hated driving over the border from Germany to France. My husband loved the autobahn as there were no speed restrictions and he could appreciate the speeds that some cars are built to achieve (sigh).

I despise the French toilet tissue. That is surely their biggest offense. And in agreement with Ant, I witnessed some of those dreadful "hole-in-the-ground-horrors" just last summer.

[SimonM]

>>It is just the way American Vogue constantly refers to the French as effortlessly stylish,> I think the ladies of London are far more stylish.

...back to the window of Caffe Nero again are we? (sorry) :)). I am sure you are right as I know nothing at all about "style" in this context.

> We spent several holidays driving around Europe before we were married, and I always hated driving over the border from >Germany to France. My husband loved the autobahn as there were no speed restrictions and he could appreciate the speeds >that some cars are built to achieve (sigh).

Yes, say what you like about Hitler, but he knew how to build roads!>:D< But we are all environmentalists now...

[Domitianus]

My position on Americans is that I have rarely met an individual American who was not very amiable and often likeable - it's just when you put them together as a nation the sum is LESS than the whole of its parts. There seems to be a slight disconnecion from reality present in the American nation, almost as if the 'tracking' wasn't quite right. I am amazed at how this seems to exist as they are not exactly backward or isolated from the rest of the word. Their take on situations and the world they live in seems to possess a quality of confusion and unreality that sits strangely at odds with their technological and financial sophistication. Almost like watching a child whose physical development has outstripped its emotional and psychological maturity by many years.

[Huguenot]

Ha ha, spot on - can I quote you? ;-)

[Domitianus]

Please do.