Mr Obama Comes To Lunch

[poliphilo]

I'll hand it to Cameron: he's very good at the PR. The barbecue in the garden of Number 10- with Obama dishing out burgers- was very, very feelgood. It reminded me of the love-in with Clegg in the same venue a year ago. Only then it was Cameron doing all the alpha-male patting and now it was Obama. At one point- after the photo-call on the doorstep of No 10-  Obama guided Cameron into his own house- as if he- Obama- were the host and not the other way round. I wonder whether this ritual of patronage and submission-  the top dog does the touching, the underdog allows himself to be touched- is something they perform consciously.

So now we have a new word for the Transatlantic relationship. It is no longer merely "special", it is "essential". I wonder whether this rebranding will catch on. 

Comments

[michaleen.livejournal.com]

Obama and his people are also really good at optics and I feel vaguely unclean using that word or even knowing how to use it in this context. The obsession with appearances, too often over substance, is one of the more salient reasons we can't have nice things.

But compare and contrast the spectacle at No 10 with the cheering, foot stomping, standing ovations and sloppy wet kisses Bibi Netanyahu got from Congress, the other day. Words fail.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

Obama has been moving from one photo-op to the next- first Ireland- and all that O'Bama nonsense, then the British Royals, then burger flipping with Cameron. He's building up a splendid portfolio of images to use in his re-election campaign.

[michaleen.livejournal.com]

Indeed. The O-Man's re-election campaign has been in full swing for a while, now. It was unofficially kicked-off when he released his long-form certificate of birth, thus eviscerating a peculiarly vicious and race-based smear campaign, followed immediately by his public humiliation of faux-billionaire, joke presidential candidate, and loud-mouthed moron Donald Trump, at the annual White House Corespondent's Dinner.