or perhaps we Americans just don't like being looked down upon by anyone
As far as my experience goes, latin countries are the ones that look down upon USA more. So blame them.

On the other hand, I don't believe people in USA are jealous of France, seriously, as far as my experience goes, both USA and France are the most vanidous countries in the modern world. In other words, it has too many people saying "France/USA is the best country in the world". Well, China probably has more for obvious reasons, but I think you get my point.

On the other hand, for some things that patriotism isn't so evil. Just for example, here there's the typical dialogue between two Spaniards, talking about how horrible the high speed train that has been build is (It came two years later and it's 30% slower than it should be):

- What do you think of the AVE? Aint it awful?

-Heh, why? This is Spain, we are supposed to do things wrong and late.

-AHhhahahah! Yeah!




:rolleyes2