From yesterday’s Washington Post:

[Representative Tom] Lantos said he joked with Brown that he had the good fortune to be coming to power with new leaders in Europe — German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Nicolas Sarkozy — who are more congenial to Britain and the United States than their predecessors. “He burst out laughing, and he indicated, in an inimitable English way, that he agrees with me on his luck,” Lantos said.

Sarkozy apparently made the same mistake, declaring that Brown was “mon ami anglais”.

Maybe they’ll all figure it out eventually.