Obama embarrasses himself in U.K . with protocol blunders

President Obama offended Wales, Northern Ireland and Mr. Brown’s home country of Scotland by referring to the U.K as England. He did manage to find something he liked about the U.K. He said he like the Queen. Undoubtedly, this offended some republican-minded Scots. He made up for these blunders by giving the Queen a spare ipod. I hope he brought British Prime Minister Gordon Brown a DVD player that will work with the stack of DVD's he gave him during his recent visit to the U.S.A.

Obama Wades Into Murky Waters of Diplomatic Protocol

The goods news out of London is that Barack Obama has reaffirmed America’s “special relationship” with the U.K. The bad news is that the “affinity and kinship” that the U.S. president spoke of apparently only extends to England.
Obama and Brown meet outside of 10 Downing St. (Reuters)

Mr. Obama’s first major foreign trip has been seen as a test not just of his leadership skills, but of his ability to navigate the protocols of diplomacy. In the U.K., that means mentioning the famous special relationship between the countries, which has been important here ever since Winston Churchill first referenced it after World War II.

On Wednesday at a joint conference with Prime Minister Gordon Brown, Mr. Obama made a pass at acknowledging the special relationship. Unfortunately, he inadvertently broke a cardinal protocol by at one stage using England to denote U.K.

“We owe so much to England; that when you come here there’s that sense of familiarity, as well as difference, that makes it just a special place,” he said, leaving Wales, Northern Ireland and Mr. Brown’s home country of Scotland out in the cold.

But in a statement to make any republican-minded Scots wince, Mr. Obama conceded one thing he loved about the U.K. — the Queen. (excerpt) read more at wsj.com