How the French Feel
From Reuters:

PARIS (Reuters) - Nearly nine out of ten French people would back John Kerry if they could vote in the U.S. election, according to an opinion poll on Friday which showed deep distrust of President Bush since the Iraq war.

The poll, published after Kerry and Bush battled over Iraq in a television debate, came as no surprise in the country which led opposition to the U.S.-led war and whose people were dubbed "cheese-eating surrender monkeys" by American Republicans.

But it underlined concern abroad over U.S. policies and highlighted the gulf that has opened with France -- even if Kerry and his aides may not wish to be too closely associated with France in the run-up to next month's election.

Eighty-seven percent of French people would back Democrat Kerry and 13 percent would vote for Republican Bush, according to the poll conducted by the CSA research group and published by La Croix newspaper.

Fifty-seven percent thought U.S.-French relations would be better under Kerry and 36 percent thought ties would not change. Seven percent said relations would improve if Bush won a second term and 65 percent said they would stay the same.

"We are in a logic of 'Anything but Bush," Andre Kaspi, a professor in North American history at Paris's Sorbonne University, told La Croix.

"French people know little about John Kerry, but it doesn't matter. Whoever the candidate was against George Bush, he would get the same support here."...

Eighty percent of the 954 people surveyed on Sept. 22 and 23 wished the United States had less influence in global defense and military matters -- much more than the 57 percent in a poll conducted in October 2000, before Bush took office.

"There is no doubt that international support for United States has fallen a lot in the last four years. This is true in France in particular, but this is a global trend and is also very strong in the Arab world," Kaspi said.

At the height of the U.S.-French row over the Iraq war, some Americans called for boycotts of French products although the appeals had little impact on sales....