Predictions, and the French Speaking of predictions, last spring a bunch of us made some about how long the war would last. (Defining what that meant became part of the prediction.) The guesses ranged from "2 days if they surrender like the french" to "18 months". Too bad for the last guy we had no money on it, eh?

Reading that file in which I saved the predictions, I remember that there were a lot of anti-French jokes at the time, even among my group of people who thought all the "freedom fries" crap was, well, crap. I had a lot of discussions about it with a friend (American) who happened to be living in Paris at the time. I traced it back to at least the perception of them being pansies in WWII, and was surprised to see that was actually a primary reason for a lot of people at the time. Of all the things to hold against a country. It's a stupid prejudice and I hope that nobody reading me here buys into it. If you do, Molly Ivins has some good points.

UPDATE: for fun, here are the (anonymized outside lucien) predictions.
joker: 3 days 16 hours to get to baghdad, 2 days if they surrender like the french. 2-3 weeks including the surrounding baghdad part

westyp: 12 days

ponytail: 12 days if iraqis surrender like a wave of french people, 6 months if we have to urban-war in baghdad

Yours Truly: 22 days, abbreviated baghdad seige, mass surrender by rest of army (I thought I had won...)

cujo: until the chemical attacks start

vroomboy: 18 months

¶ 12:15 PM