They should invoke bioterror laws.

That stuff tastes like shiat.

God our country is farking stupid.

Tightening the bioterror laws to restrict french wine imports.

Dumbasses.

Who is that Fat Bastard?




/obscure?

whose the leader of the club thats made for you and me ?
ale xei
say l e
damn i miss that show

French producers target American consumers with new brands such as "Fat Bastard"

I commend the French on their clever little inside joke.

Just the other day I saw that and almost bought it. Fat Bastard? I gotta try this. Then I turned the bottle over , saw it was from France and put it back on the shelf. Ended up buying something called 47 pound rooster because it was from California.

/that's a big rooster
//joke away

French wine sucks. They can keep it. Blech!

California Wines > all

Suck it Frenchies!

kasarul

Spoken like a true oenophile! Everyone who knows wine knows that ONLY California produces the world's greatest wines!

/jackass

"Tres Bandidos"

French, hiding bigotry behind elitist posing and fancy accents for generations.

Fnord

I commend the French on their clever little inside joke.

True. Sad. But true.
/still chuckled

Wine sucks. Give me a good beer any day.

I'll see your Fat Bastard
and raise you an ODB

I guess we don't want it in our belly.

/cliche whore
//I feel dirty now

Shimmy Shimmy Ya Shimmy Yam Shimmy Yay!

/RIP Russell Jones

Can someone more informed that I am please explain to me why the US would need the permission of the French in order to use (within the US) winemaking practices that are banned elsewhere?

Let's race to see who posts Fat Bastard first!!11 LOLOMGBBQ~!

Oh. Too late. Dumbass.

Got to go with the Frnchie on this one, adulteration as a shortcut is usually not a good move

I could go for a glass of Fat Bastard right now to wash down these freedom fries

Mofo_Jones

Wine sucks. Give me a good beer any day.

By "good beer" do you mean Budweiser?

hmm... I feel like drinking now :)

right now the best wine is coming out of South America and Australia

Dinty Moore's Law



I'll match your ODB with Rat Bastard Rootbeer

great... French wine are terrorists now....

just as i thought the American government cannot be more stupid.... they proved me wrong once again...

here's an idea.. stop making sucky wine..

toraque:

The French are angry about us making low quality wine, by not using the traditional processes, and we threaten to ban their imports of wine with screw-top bottles?


I'm confused too. What I got after a couple reads:

The French got to start using American practices after 9/11.

Now the EU is thinking about making them illegal again.

The US is threatening to "tighten application of the Bioterrorism Act" (whatever that means) if they do or don't make American practices illegal???

Consumption of wine in France is dropping, but Americans have increased theirs from eight to 13 litres a head over the past 10 years,

Anyone got a figure on what the French consumption of wine per person is? I noticed they kinda left that off.

McMutt
Can someone more informed that I am please explain to me why the US would need the permission of the French in order to use (within the US) winemaking practices that are banned elsewhere?

There's an international accord to reduce the American ability to produce very cheap undrinkable processed filth/wines produced using efficient modern methods (which side of this fence you sit on tends to depend on whether you're European or American) in order to protect the historic wine growing regions.

The wine accord was put in place to protect the historic wine regions, which would otherwise have their market destroyed by cheap imports. It's mutually agreed protectionism, but the American producers are beginning to feel that their thrust into the European (French, particularly) market is being unfairly curtailed and that their quality is no longer inferior to that of European wine - this havingly been tacitly accepted when the previous accord was negotiated.

Screw France.
Their vines are old, dying, and infested with parasites. The soil in their vineyards is leeched and has to be supplemented with nutrients. They're just pissed because California wines kick their collective Gaellic butts.

Why yes, I'm from California, thank you for asking.

I saw a 2002 Merlot sell for $85 in a New York bistro. I can ride my bicycle to the winery itself and get it for $20.
Label hint: "Dam Fine Wine" (spelling is correct)

Nevermind, answered my own question:


"The French have been slowly falling out of love with wine for several decades. Per capita annual consumption has fallen from 100 litres in the 1960s to 58 litres in 2002. That is still more than other European countries. Italians on average drink 55 litres and the Spanish manage 36, while beer-drinking Germans consume 24 litres and the non-wine-growing British only 16 litres. (Financial Times)

If you don't want to try "Fat Bastard," which is a Cotes du Rhone type, then you might try a South African variant, made from similar grapes, called, "Goats do Roam."

Most French wine is swill. They do make some exceedingly good stuff, but it costs approximately as much as major surgery and isn't covered by any insurance program I know of.

It's NY, a pack of cigs costs you $10 there and you still can't smoke them anywhere

McMutt

Can someone more informed that I am please explain to me why the US would need the permission of the French in order to use (within the US) winemaking practices that are banned elsewhere?

They need permission to export wines to Europe if those wines have been made using banned practices. Even though those practices don't in any way make the wine unsafe to drink.

So a ban based on snobbery is countered with a ban that misuses the anti-terror laws.

The French and American people must be so proud of their governments tonight.

lizajane999
The French got to start using American practices after 9/11.

No, post 9/11, the US introduced the Bioterrorism Act which can be used to ban any food import. It is widely seen as an act of economic protectionism that has little or nothing to do with terrorism.

The American practices are limited by International Accord (of 1983, iirc). This is now up for renewal. The French would like the restrictions to remain. The US is threatening to use Bioterrorism Act to ban the import of French wine.

While I am not a wine connoisseur, I do like affordable good red wine. Lately I am finding that the French imports are pretty good...George Debeouf being one of the cheapest and best, depending on the year. Fat Bastard was also good for a while.

Also try Old Fart and Old Fart's wife. Can't remember if they are french. However, being married to an old fart, I must say those wines aren't too shabby.

/had too much Little Penguin

Bioterrorism law to fist-f**k French wine imports? Give me a break. That's a horrible misuse of a policy.

suddenly I find myself craving a nice, aromatic glass of......FREEDOM JUICE!

Man, I tried that "red bicycle" wine, because it has some decent rating and write-up... Not good!

f France. If they start making beer, then they'll have something. until then, zzzzzzz.

Mister_Grey-No-More

They're just pissed because California wines kick their collective Gaellic butts.

Not really true, especially at the top end. However, at the mass market level CA wine is better, and cheaper, than the equivalent French stuff. In an ideal world there'd be a balance that maintained the market for the premier French producers and allowed the mass market to operate freely. This isn't going to happen.

The French will tell you that there are Californian pickers suffering from pesticide related illness and that the French use far less pesticide. The Californians will tell you that the French flood their land with fertiliser, damaging water purity. To pretend that France or CA have a monopoly on production purity is laughable. Both are, however, moving towards organic production in some areas.

The tragedy of the current farce is that, if the US is succesful, CA's better wines will be pushed out by the vast revenues acheivable from mass produced rubbish and France's vineyards, producing everything from plonk to exquisite wines, will wither on the vine.

If the US isn't succesful, French wine producers will continue to disappear up their own arses, while the CA producers try to find cheaper ways to produce traditional wines, ending up producing the same rubbish that the mass market French producers do.

lose/lose

/no axe to grind, most English wine is strange and/or undrinkable (and I loathe the French)

Carlo Rossi Rhine

$10 for 4L. Tastes fine, although I'm sure some snob will piss and moan at me now because I don't drink something that tastes like moldy rotten fruit. Which is what wine is. I drink to get drunk, thank you, and I want it to taste as good coming up as it did going down.

As far as expensive spirits and liquors go, I'm far more inclined to pay forty dollars for a good bottle of single malt scotch than something a frog pissed in. Glenlivet, Glenfidditch, Dalmore, and the like.

derfarker
If they start making beer, then they'll have something.

Yes, there are no French beers whatsoever

Damn this thread ! I'm now going to have to open a bottle.

(Tokaji Mezes Maly '95, for anyone who cares)