I am Julien Massillon, the French Intern, and I approve Dino Rossi’s mistake.

For the first time in my whole life, I agreed with a Republican guy, and that had to be noticed. Usually, Republicans are just stupid: they wage war for nothing; they think they rule the world; they tell lies; they are way too much patriotic; they are so conservative that it seems they regret the old times of slavery, segregation, and painful secret hidden abortions; they believe in God in ways God himself may not approve; and they spend their time insulting French people, blind to the fact we are so much more superior in so many domains (education, health care, cuisine, fashion, arts, beauty, perfumes, architecture, etc). This is why I’m so confused to see that a Democrat candidate is against our French Airbus! What’s happening here? Democrats are our friends. I mean, they are American but we deal with it and accept them the way they are. Sen. Patty Murray is shaking our old habits for electoral purpose and you must not follow her path.

Dino Rossi may be the first one to embody change in the Republican Party and I’m glad he did. Even if he apologized for this, he was right: the illegal subsidies European governments gave to Airbus must not be taken into account by an American agency. You are the champions of liberalism and capitalism! If you prevent Airbus from competing with Boeing for these AirForce tanks because of unfair competition, you are no longer American. Why do you care about what’s happening abroad? These subsidies are no concern to you. Or now you also should start being worried about Chinese children making Nike running shoes and Indonesian families being deprived from home because of palm oil production for your processed foods.

Besides, it’s too late. You want to protect your jobs and get rid of this foreign threat? But YOU made globalization the way we know it today! Okay, we the French launched it, in a traditional and crafty manner with colonialism; but you made it an industry with McDonald’s and Coca-Cola spread all around the world. You can’t go back now. You must face the consequences of your imperialism. Did we ask you if you subsided Justin Bieber, Miley Cyrus and Zac Efron before sending them to pervert our youth and make it brainless?

You may ignore this, but for years, Southern developing countries have been fighting —and they still are— for the same sort of equal treatment you are struggling for in this case. European and American agriculture are privileged since farmers are granted to receive subsidies whatever the amount of crops they sell. In South America, that’s not possible. For instance, Brazil’s government cannot afford to give money to help farmers. And when Brazilian farmers are competing on the international market, European and American farmers always win because thanks to the subsidies they receive, they can offer lower prices. That’s a huge issue in the World Trade Organisation. Developing countries’ leaders have begged Europe and America to stop, or at least decrease the amount of the subsidies. But Western countries never agreed to do so, and the competition is still unfair. I don’t know if this proverb exists here, but you only harvest what you seeded.

You know what’s the most interesting part of this story? The media coverage. They all point out the number of American jobs at stake in this struggle. But I have not yet found any reporting the number of European jobs that could benefit of this contract. You’re not the only ones coping with crisis and unemployment.

32 replies on “Vive Airbus!”

  2. D’accord. Ou est le mouvement internationale des ouvriers au jourdhui?

    The Democratic Party should go over to France and look up everything the French Socialist Party ever stood for and adopt it as the platform. When we Americans have six weeks paid vacation, payments to parents, and joie de vivre, then we can criticize France.

  5. “But I have not yet found any reporting the number of European jobs that could benefit of this contract.”

    Given the choice between protecting your job and protecting my job, I’m going to come down on the side of my job.

  6. I am finally completely convinced (perhaps I’m a bit slower than the rest) that the French Intern is a fictional persona the slog staff use for giggles and fun and as an excuse to eat croissants.

  7. @3: yeah, that is my guess. Also, coincidence that he went to San Fran right during the time for whih super cheap tickets were available via Jetblue couple of months ago?

  8. Has anyone seen Mudede and this “intern” at the same place at the same time?

    I suspect, much like Fnarf and Will from Seattle, that we are seeing a case of multiple personalities here. Dueling sockpuppets. The left hand seems to know what the right hand is thinking.

    Also- what do airplanes have to do with croissants?

  9. yeah this meme is ridiculous and readers are tired of it.

    not cute, not funny, just trolling for comments.

    unless you’re assailing him, please don’t feed the troll.

  10. I keep saying it.

    The Tanker program is welfare for aerospace engineers.

    The Loser Airplane company is the one that gets it.

    Boeing is now the winner airplane company because the 787 blows the doors of the A-line from Airbus.

    Pierre will not have a sou for an Orangina once the composite fiber 787 takes to the skies.

    We’re even giving them a chance to catch up by dragging our feet with its release, so devastating to the Republic is our bird.

  15. I’ve been flying between Seattle and Europe frequently for the past 12 years. In Boeing planes, and in Airbus planes. The Boeing planes are far more rigid, meaning you feel every damn bump. Worse than that, the cabin air in Boeing planes is TERRIBLE. It’s like being locked in an airless latrine, dry, stale, smelly. No way can I possibly sleep, and there’s almost always a sore throat, or worse. The 787 Vaporliner had better address the air problem… the press releases make that claim, anyway.

  18. I’m surprised that the attack on the intern comes from such an arrogant place… Wait a minute…. Americans…. That’s not surprising at all, is it? You’d think this was a Republican message board by the moronicly patriotic comments.

    His message on food subsidies is more important that anything else in his piece. That has made the third world completely dependant on foriegn food, collapsed local farming, and forced citizens to sell their land to rich ousiders for terrible uses that undermine healthy development. The IMF and the world bank have supported this in conjunction with the rich countries, including France and the USA. It’s criminal.

    To bring the argument down to hating on French architecture and “us vs. them” hyperbole seems unhelpful. Then again, I feel pretty darn cheered to make fun of American idiots, as does the whole world and fellow citizens of the USA. We produce some of the most easiest folks to be horrorfied by and still have the rights to also laugh at.

  19. If I’m not mistaken, although Airbus SAS is headquartered in Toulouse, Airbus has more employees in Germany than in France, and is wholly owned by EADS, which is based in the Netherlands. So it’s not so much a “French” company.

  24. Guys, you need to take it easy on Julien.

    He’s come all the way from France to intern at the Stranger and learn how to act like a proper twat on the internet. Soon he will return to his homeland strengthened and emboldened by this new knowledge. With journalism degrees barely worth the paper they’re printed on these days, he’ll need every advantage to succeed in the challenging European economic landscape.

  25. @18, maybe you can write for him. you are far more to the point and willing to put up with paragraphs of platitudes to come up with an actual idea worth discussing. was this about subsidies?

  29. Interesting point (if not annoying writing style). Still doesn’t mean we should support Rossi, we should instead call Bullshit on all of the subsidizing we do as a country.

  31. Americans are the “champions of liberalism and capitalism,” you say?

    Liberalism took a pretty nasty beating during the last Bush administration, that the Tea Baggers are only too happy to continue. And Bush & Co. never saw a capitalistic enterprise that they couldn’t make that much better with subsidies and/or no-bid contracts for their friends (or the VP’s company).

    Maybe you can check to see how we feel about those issues if and when the Dems end up keeping their majority after this upcoming midterm election.

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