No, I’m not talking about Pat Robertson’s surprising endorsement, although that’s an eye-popper too. I’m talking about what the President of France said in his address to a joint session of Congress earlier today.

You won’t find it in the headlines, so here it is:

Today the President of France called the United States “the greatest nation in the world.”

I hope you were sitting down for that. Yes, I said the President of France today called the United States “the greatest nation in the world.”

I can understand why the mainstream media is burying that lead. The MSM certainly doesn’t agree that we’re the greatest nation in the world and they must feel a certain betrayal when they hear a Frenchman say it.

But I think its stunning to hear those words, coming from any man who holds the office De Gaulle once held. It’s like an old long lost friend, with whom you haven’t spoken for years, suddenly calling out of the blue to renew your friendship.

Here’s the key quote, and don’t miss Sarkozy’s point. It reveals a man who understands the essence of conservative philosophy.

America did not tell the millions of men and women who came from every country in the world and who–with their hands, their intelligence and their heart–built the greatest nation in the world: “Come, and everything will be given to you.” She said: “Come, and the only limits to what you’ll be able to achieve will be your own courage and your own talent.” America embodies this extraordinary ability to grant each and every person a second chance.

Here, both the humblest and most illustrious citizens alike know that nothing is owed to them and that everything has to be earned. That’s what constitutes the moral value of America. America did not teach men the idea of freedom; she taught them how to practice it. And she fought for this freedom whenever she felt it to be threatened somewhere in the world. It was by watching America grow that men and women understood that freedom was possible.

What made America great was her ability to transform her own dream into hope for all mankind.

[emphasis added]

But I got teary-eyed reading these next words.

The men and women of my generation heard their parents talk about how in 1944, America returned to free Europe from the horrifying tyranny that threatened to enslave it.

Fathers took their sons to see the vast cemeteries where, under thousands of white crosses so far from home, thousands of young American soldiers lay who had fallen not to defend their own freedom but the freedom of all others, not to defend their own families, their own homeland, but to defend humanity as a whole.

Fathers took their sons to the beaches where the young men of America had so heroically landed. They read them the admirable letters of farewell that those 20-year-old soldiers had written to their families before the battle to tell them: “We don’t consider ourselves heroes. We want this war to be over. But however much dread we may feel, you can count on us.” Before they landed, Eisenhower told them: “The eyes of the world are upon you. The hopes and prayers of liberty-loving people everywhere march with you.”

And as they listened to their fathers, watched movies, read history books and the letters of soldiers who died on the beaches of Normandy and Provence, as they visited the cemeteries where the star-spangled banner flies, the children of my generation understood that these young Americans, 20 years old, were true heroes to whom they owed the fact that they were free people and not slaves. France will never forget the sacrifice of your children.

To those 20-year-old heroes who gave us everything, to the families of those who never returned, to the children who mourned fathers they barely got a chance to know, I want to express France’s eternal gratitude.

On behalf of my generation, which did not experience war but knows how much it owes to their courage and their sacrifice; on behalf of our children, who must never forget; to all the veterans who are here today and, notably the seven I had the honor to decorate yesterday evening, one of whom, Senator Inouye, belongs to your Congress, I want to express the deep, sincere gratitude of the French people. I want to tell you that whenever an American soldier falls somewhere in the world, I think of what the American army did for France. I think of them and I am sad, as one is sad to lose a member of one’s family.

That was a really nice thing to say, and he didn’t have to say it in the way he did. But I, as an American born in Europe, really appreciate Sarkozy’s words, which I believe are heartfelt.

The MSM doesn’t want you to know it, but not everybody hates America. And I think there’s reason to be hopeful as long as we have friends like Anders Fogh Rasmussen of Denmark, John Howard of Australia, Angela Merkel of Germany, and now Nicolas Sarkozy of France.

Read the whole speech here.

Here at Six Meat Buffet we’ve had a lot of fun hurling epithets at “The Filthy French,” but when the president of France turns out to be more patriotic than the spokesman for Budweiser, it’s time to recognize it and say Vive la France.

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