Book excerpt: The 2004 US election provided French citizens and their media with a springboard for re-conceiving 'self' and 'other'. Given its prominent opposition to recent US foreign policy such as the invasion of Iraq, a volley of insults and caustic remarks reverberated between France and the US. French observers linked the Bush administration's policies to particular groups and regions within the US, to a democratic deficit, to a perceived threat of US collapse and to the need for a stronger Europe. By examining how the French media - newspapers, television, the internet and scholarly research - represented the election from a critical geopolitical perspective, this book provides the first major in-depth study of views of the US in contemporary foreign media.