These are only two of the many recent articles where Senator John Kerry is accused of being too French and of his cousin trying to distance Kerry from his Gallic relations and tendencies, presumably for his benefit.
But the undercurrents of such accusations tend to suggest that rift between the U.S. and France, at least with the Bush administration in the White House, isn't showing any signs of mending.
On the other hand, as the article mentions, the editor of Le Monde approvingly told a New York audience that Kerry "looks French."
International Herald Tribune - Globalist: If Kerry 'looks French,' look for an ugly fight
Chicago Tribune - Sen. Kerry's French connection
Globalist: If Kerry 'looks French,' look for an ugly fight
Roger Cohen IHT
Saturday, April 3, 2004
PARIS It is not going to be a pretty American election. Already the Bush administration has embarked on a campaign to portray John Kerry as a flip-flopping, tax-raising, European-educated wimp. The presumptive Democratic candidate has responded by describing the president as a job-destroying, budget-busting, alliance-breaking unilateralist.
But perhaps the surest indication that the looming political season will be ugly has come from repeated Republican suggestions that Kerry “looks French.”
Not only that: the senator is said to betray a dubious fondness for things French, even the language. A recent comment from Commerce Secretary Don Evans that the Massachusetts Democrat is “of a different political stripe and looks French” was only the latest of several jibes, mainly from conservative talk-show hosts and columnists, that have included allusions to “Monsieur Kerry” and “Jean Chéri.”
For some months now, the Republican House majority leader, Tom DeLay, has been opening speeches to supporters with an occasional routine. He says hi, then adds: “Or, as John Kerry might say, 'Bonjour.'”
The remark “always brings the house down,” said DeLay's spokesman, Stuart Roy, who added that its purpose was to highlight “Mr. Kerry's lack of support for the war on terror and the way he seems to be in agreement with the arguments of the French.” What is going on here? Ever since the Iraq war divided the Atlantic Alliance and the French government emerged as its most vociferous opponent, France has become a dirty word in some Republican circles. The France-bashing has had its lighter side - French fries disappearing from menus - but it has been no laughing matter. The criticism has carried the serious suggestion that France is not to be trusted. So if Kerry “looks French," the inference is clear enough.
Impugning the patriotism of a Vietnam war hero may seem an outlandish political tactic. But the Republicans have focused on other aspects of Kerry's life. He attended a Swiss boarding school and speaks good French; his maternal grandparents had a house in a village in Brittany, Saint-Briac-sur-Mer, where he spent several vacations; he has a French first cousin, the ecologist politician Brice Lalonde. The Republican National Committee recently circulated this last fact. Asked why, Christine Iverson, a committee spokeswoman, said the French family was not a big issue because Kerry would “be judged on his support for tax increases, not on his fondness for brie and Evian.” As for Lalonde, now the mayor of Saint-Briac, he is reluctant to be drawn into his cousin's campaign.
Many others in France have been less reticent. The broad French hope that Kerry will replace Bush in the White House is no secret. The Democratic candidate has been getting very good press; Jean-Marie Colombani, the editor of Le Monde, recently told a New York audience that Kerry “even looks French.” This time, the tone was one of approval.
Nicole Bacharan, a political scientist, sees several reasons for the French embrace of Kerry. A conviction that Americans will not re-elect a president widely seen in France as arrogant, simplistic and dangerous. A belief that Kerry will embrace old allies like France. Neglect and incomprehension of the large swathe of American society that finds Bush attractive. A subliminal association of John Forbes Kerry with another JFK, one beloved in France.
“There is a nostalgia for the Kennedy years and a hatred of Mr. Bush that I have never known for another American president,” Bacharan said. “So the French have just blocked out the America of religious faith and straight talk that likes Bush.” Much, it seems, is being blocked out in the talk of Kerry's French side. It is true that some of his promised policies seem attractive to many Europeans. He favors diplomatic engagement - in the past with Vietnam, today with Iran. He has castigated the Bush administration for its “intoxication with the pre-eminence of American power.” He has said he understands the need to “cooperate and compromise with our allies and friends.” He has vowed “to replace unilateral action with collective security.”
But Kerry also voted in favor of the war in Iraq - a fact not much aired in France - and urged the new Spanish Prime Minister, José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, to refrain from withdrawing Spain's troops from Iraq.
The fact is that Kerry understands the reality of post-9/11 America, one often only dimly perceived in Europe. The attack, like Pearl Harbor, changed the country, pushed national security back to the center of the political agenda for the first time since the end of the cold war, and almost certainly made any candidate not strong on defense and tackling terrorism unelectable.
As a result, the differences on foreign policy between Bush and Kerry, while distinct, may be less radical than they appear. The president is not as isolated or as isolationist as he is sometimes portrayed, and Kerry is not as beholden to his multilateralist convictions as the French might wish. “Multilateralist when you can, unilateralist when you must” is how Richard Holbrooke, an adviser to Kerry, describes the candidate.
Still, in an election as tight as this one, the Republicans will do all they can to associate Kerry with what they see as the French penchant for conciliatory weakness and slow-moving international institutions.
The French theme in the campaign is likely to endure, much to the displeasure of Nathalie Loiseau, a French Embassy spokeswoman in Washington. “I regret that anyone would consider that portraying someone as French is negative,” she said. “This is a country of immigrants, after all.” Indeed: Kerry's paternal grandfather Frederick Kerry (born Fritz Kohn) arrived in America from Europe in 1905.
As for the Kerry campaign, it is adopting a certain hauteur in the French affair. “There are more important things to talk about, like affordable health care,” said Stephanie Cutter, a Kerry spokeswoman. “Mr. Kerry is an American citizen.”
Chicago Tribune
Sen. Kerry's French connection
Not wanting to hurt his election chances, relatives in Brittany downplay affiliations
By Jocelyn Gecker
Associated Press
Published April 5, 2004
ST.-BRIAC-SUR-MER, France -- John Kerry's relatives in France bristle at jabs from across the Atlantic that the presidential contender has a French connection.
They say Kerry has no link to France other than the home his grandparents bought here.
"John Kerry is incredibly American," says Brice Lalonde, Kerry's cousin and mayor of this seaside Brittany village. "He has absolutely nothing French about him."
For another cousin, Christopher Curtis: "This is an American story. John is an all-American guy with the benefit of having spent some time overseas."
With the race for the White House turning nasty--and France-U.S. ties not quite mended from the Iraq war--Kerry's Gallic clan, when questioned, talks up his American-ness. Some are keeping a low profile, saying too much talk about France could be political arsenic.
As Lalonde puts it: "I'm afraid to hurt him."
But that hasn't stopped the Frenchman from pasting Kerry bumper stickers on his car--hardly a common sight in this 16th Century village.
St. Briac, near the port city of St. Malo, is a place of rugged seascapes and narrow, cobbled lanes that inspired Renoir and other Impressionists. It was here that the senator from Massachusetts spent boyhood summers and has said he traced his first inspiration to become a politician.
But nowhere on Kerry's Web site does he mention his summers in France or the family estate, known as Les Essarts, a sprawling property on a bluff over the sea.
"Monsieur Bush is angry with France," says Ian Forbes, an 85-year-old Kerry uncle who lives at Les Essarts. "We don't want to accentuate the connection between Johnny and France."
Kerry's maternal grandparents, James Grant Forbes and Margaret Winthrop--a descendant of Massachusetts' first governor, John Winthrop--bought the estate in the 1920s. They had 11 children, including the mothers of Kerry, Lalonde and Curtis, a British-American who lives in Paris. The home served as a summer hub for their cosmopolitan clan.
In his youth, Kerry joined the family gatherings while his father, a U.S. diplomat, was posted in Europe. Young Kerry also attended a Swiss boarding school and brought a touch of America to this corner of northwestern France.
"He introduced us to games like capture the flag. We still play something called kick the can," said Lalonde, who at 58 is two years Kerry's junior.
Politics also run in the family here. Lalonde was environment minister under then-President Francois Mitterrand. Like his American cousin, Lalonde ran for president. But that was 1981 and he received less than 4 percent of the French vote.
Kerry's campaign and his days in France have been widely reported here. A recent story in Liberation newspaper was headlined, "John Kerry, too Frenchy for the Republicans." It catalogued insults by allies of President Bush and the tendency of House Majority Leader Tom DeLay to start speeches with: "Good afternoon, or as John Kerry might say, `Bonjour.'"
For Lalonde, Kerry's long, angular face "resembles Abraham Lincoln, without the beard."
The French media like to compare John Forbes Kerry, who speaks fluent French, to John F. Kennedy.
Posted by Andrew Becker at April 5, 2004 10:58 AM