Obama Fumbled Brown Visit Because He’s “Tired” And “Overwhelmed”

March 7, 2009 · Filed Under Barack Obama, Politics

Remember when close to half of the United States electorate said of Barack Obama, “he’s not ready” and “he’ll be in over his head” or “this is no time for on the job training” — guess what? We were right.

Americans and Brits have been trying to figure out why the president treated PM Gordon Brown like a relative he hates but is forced to visit with once a year, and now we know.

According to The Daily Telegraph in London, the reason for the ill-treatment of Brown was that the president was simply “overwhelmed.” White House sources are saying they fear Obama is not getting enough rest. Aww — the poor thing.

Sources close to the White House say Mr Obama and his staff have been "overwhelmed" by the economic meltdown and have voiced concerns that the new president is not getting enough rest.

Allies of Mr Obama say his weary appearance in the Oval Office with Mr Brown illustrates the strain he is now under, and the president’s surprise at the sheer volume of business that crosses his desk.

A well-connected Washington figure, who is close to members of Mr Obama’s inner circle, expressed concern that Mr Obama had failed so far to "even fake an interest in foreign policy".

It’s easy to criticize from the campaign trail and talk about how much better you could do it than president Bush, but I don’t remember Bush ever shirking his responsibilities because he was tired or overwhelmed. Mr. smart ass hope and change has discovered it’s not quite so easy to carry the fate of the free world on your back, especially when you’ve never even run a small company or had any executive experience at all.

You’d think with all the Ivy League education between the president and his wife they would no better than to give the PM of Great Britain a box of DVDs he could get off Amazon.com. DVD’s I might add that can’t be played in the UK anyway, because they’re not coded correctly to play on European machines. Even worse than that are the toy helicopters Michelle Obama got from the White House gift store for the Prime Minister’s kids. Could she be anymore cheap and insulting than that?

Also, remember how Barack Obama promised to “repair” the supposedly damaged relationships with our allies? That was all just phony rhetoric anyway, because there is no damage or at least there was no damage — until now. Obama’s first foray into foreign policy was to insult our closest ally who we need more than ever in Afghanistan. Nice one.

To add insult to injury, when questioned about the botched visit by the PM, a State Department official told the Sunday Telegraph the following:

The real views of many in Obama administration were laid bare by a State Department official involved in planning the Brown visit, who reacted with fury when questioned by The Sunday Telegraph about why the event was so low-key.

The official dismissed any notion of the special relationship, saying: "There’s nothing special about Britain. You’re just the same as the other 190 countries in the world. You shouldn’t expect special treatment."

Trading in cowboy diplomacy for dumbass diplomacy — now that’s change we can believe in.

-Chris Jones