Not to play the devil’s advocate, but it is their livelihood they are taking seriously, not their wine.

I went on a tour and winetasting there and they explained that American wines tended to be very consistent year-to-year compared with European wines. I only found California wines while I was in London but Virginia has a very nice growing climate as well, especially for Riesling grapes.

Also, try Charles Shaw Chardonnay (a California wine) if there’s a Trader Joe’s near you. It’s cheap and it’s really good.

America has its share of insane subsidies, sugar being perhaps the most obvious. This is also fitting, given our national affection for nutritionless calories. But we don’t threaten to blow up a Safeway that sells Orangina because it threatens Coke.

Maybe the French should consider just how few indiginities are actually foisted upon them. Perhaps the U.S. should announce that, as a gesture of humanitarian concern, it will donate 100 tons of Velveeta and 3000 cartons of Saltines to the unemployed North African inhabitants of various notorious French urban ghettos. And, of course, some Coke.

- Josh, more of a beer guy, personally

But the last time I was in Australia, there were some Aussie reds that changed my mind, they were that good. It’s almost like what Melissa Etheridge said about one how guy was so cool he almost turned her straight.

It was so good, I forgave Australia for allowing Foster’s to be made and exported. It was so good, I got over not being able to get baseball on the TV. It was so good, I almost sent the New South Wales police my CV.

I wish I could remember what it was, but it got a little drunk out that night.

Most South American wines I’ve had are great (mostly from Peru, but have had others as well).

I’ve had some great Australians as well.

And I agree that between $7 and $40 it’s all hit and miss, so you might as well go with the cheaper stuff you like versus assuming the mid range stuff must be better.

And as for protectionism, it merely hurts the lowest class most. Protectionism (of course) stunts trade, and it is global trade that has brought lowcost goods to the “masses”. Perhaps not true for wine if France if it subsidized (then of course paid via tax) but crushing trade is never good over all for those who have the least. Protectionism is for the elite to remain so.

French wine… well, the good stuff is generally good, but IMExperience, in the midrange you’re better off picking a californian. Re the low end, if it’s cheap and it’s french, stay away.

Much to everyone’s surprise, it has turned out that dairy farming, done intelligently, is extremely profitable. I’d have been a lot better off financially if I’d taken over my parents’ dairy farm than I am as a computer programmer. Whole provinces that had been producing sheep or beef or even wheat now have irrigation systems and small paddocks and milking sheds dotted all over them. Not only that, but hundreds of young NZ dairy farmers have not been able to find farms in NZ and have gone to Australia — mostly around Melbourne and Adelaide — and turned sheep and beef farms there into very profitable dairy farms.

On the other hand, NZ seems to be a good place to do software development as well. There are so many software and internet startups here in Wellington that some people are calling the place Silicon Welly. If you look at Paul Graham’s essay on what it would take to create a sucessful Silicon Valley elsewhere Wellington hit’s nearly every point. The biggest obstacle has been the lack of venture capital, but with the big deals for TradeMe (who beat eBay out of NZ) and a couple of others there are people around who are seeding a whole raft of next generation businesses.

Bruce,
That’s a story that should be more widely told. It is absolutely relevant because my understanding is that part of the reason us Brits can enjoy so much top-notch plonk from NZ is that your farmers had to move into high value products such as wine. Kiwi fruit I can take or leave frankly but a crisp NZ white is a true pleasure. But can you imagine the French farmers if they were told that agricultural subsidies were going to be phased out. They’d have Sarkozy’s head on a pike. His head if he was lucky.

Here’s a true story from Lancashire. It was on the local news. Dairy farming uses a lot of water. It’s a major expense so a lot of dairy farmers have their own source. On this particular farm they realised they could get more for bottling their spring water than selling the milk from the cows. There is something clearly dementedly wrong with the UK agriculture sector when something like this is the case. It’s almost as though Toyota discovered there was more profit in selling lumps of steel than Corollas or Intel decided to wholesale sand and copper… It’s nucking futz!