May 24, 2011 - 9:38 pm
My fellow English soccer fan, Mike McNally, and I have a slight disagreement over who is to blame for President Obama’s royal toast debacle. I blame the president, he blames the band. Here’s the video, you make the call.
Mike is actually English so he has a better chance of being right about this than I do. But looking at the video, I can’t help but notice that the president needed note cards…to get through a toast. I didn’t count but its length can’t be more than 100 words or so. He can’t memorize that and get the timing down right? For the Queen of England? What a duffer.
In any case, here’s to better seasons next year for Arsenal, Bristol City, and of course, Preston North End.
Bryan, on the one hand, it’s not clear to me what the flub was…was he supposed to talk slower and conclude his toast as the song finished? Did he start toasting too soon? Did the band play too soon? But all that is MUCH less interesting than something unmentioned thus far: Obama didn’t even drink the toast! Cuss, profanity, vulgarity!!!
I’m no fan of O’bama, but I have to say I think I agree w/ Mike on this. I think the band started at the wrong time. The pres was already well into his toast when the band started. Even the Queen seemed a little surprised when the band started playing. Presumably, whoever’s job it was to cue the band to start playing either accidently jumped the gun or did it on purpose to embarrass the pres.
I did not think the look of the Queen was a response to the music. She looked down at Obama’s notes, repeatedly. Even with the notes, Obama sounded horrifically unsure of what he was saying (the stumble on ‘vitality’ was not one of those mispronunciation stumbles, it was an “is this the right word” stumble.
And he did not drink the toast, just as he did not put his hand over his heart for the U.S. national anthem.
Just exhausted with the chronic, constant criticism of President Obama and everyone else. Our culture seems to thrive each and every screw up, there is glee and celebration associated with the mis step. What happened to us, when did we become mean?
I believe the 24/7 media has heavily contributed to this unfortunate cultural change.
You must be kidding. Media/Leftist/Democrat criticism of Obama approaches zero compared with its treatment of Republican presidents and governors. I am Canadian and it is very very obvious from up here.
I care because as Americans lose their freedoms, so do Canadians; and you guys are losing yours, both from the Left and from the Right, FAST!
I believe they were playing God Save the Queen, which I’m pretty sure is the national anthem of Britain. So basically, it would be as if the Queen were visiting the white house and making a toast to O’bama and the band started playing the Star Spangled Banner in the middle of it. The etiquette for the anthem precludes talking and certainly toasting, so what do you do? Stop in the middle of the toast making it completely obvious to everyone that something unplanned happened? Or, keep going and hope that not everyone realized there was something wrong. Tough call.
The band knew its cue. The cue for the band was Obama’s first sentence. He toasted twice – in the first and last sentences of the toast. If the band leader was aware of how dopey Obama is then he should have waited for Obama to finish. Instead he thought Obama was a normal human. As soon as he got his cue he started the music. It is not credible that Obama was not told that the band’s cue would be “…to the Queen”. It is much more likely that Obama was just inexperienced.
Away is right. Ms. O looked nice.Over.
Are you kidding me???
WHO CARES!!!! Aren’t there more pressing things going on in this world???
I think so, as a matter of fact I know so. Let’s just face it people, no matter what he does, or doesn’t do, it will NEVER be enough for some of us!!!
you mean the situation in the middle east that is quickly deteriorating and could soon lead to ww3 thanks, in much part, to our befuddled president
or the state of our economy, so bloated and inefficient from the heavy hand of government, which our president (easily trumping the damage done by bush) glibly describes as “improving”
or the notion of federalism that gives the states the rights to do as they see fit so long as it is not prohibited in the constitution so deftly ignored by the praetorian arm, aka, the holder justice department
you are right
with so many problems too bad our president spends 3/4 of his time joyriding and cavorting instead of executing his duties as president
and when he does execute we lose more freedom and become a weaker nation
while a significant portion of our country rails against any criticism
Daxy says….”when he does execute we lose more freedom”. Actually bro, when he does execute guys like Bin Laden get taken out…and we gain our freedom back!
My country tis of thee, sweet land of liberty, of thee I sing. Land where my fathers died, land of thy pilgrims pride, from every… Mountain side, Let Freedom Ring. From memory, sorry if not exactly correct, but that was the music. Probably sung by those happy to be free of Englands Rule!!! We could be nitpicking but index cards makes obvious what alot of us know, Obama needs his teleprompter to sound Presidential, he’s an empty suit. Now the nitpicky part, Are you suppose to sip glass after a toast to solidify the Toast??
I’m w/ you on this one, Bryan.
(Though the spin from the Press is against you)
OBama is the Head of State of one of Great Britain’s allies. The Queen is the Head of State of Great Britain, and was, in this case, Obama’s hostess. One of the jobs of Obama was to make a very short toast to the Queen, sort of like “Gentlemen, the Queen”, and then SHUT UP, and drink a toast to the Queen, like everyone else in the room. This is what the band expected, and this is why it started playing THE NATIONAL ANTHEM OF GREAT BRITAIN, which Obama ignored.
Hmmm. You can dress him up, but you can’t take him (or his windblown wife) out in public, can you?
At least this visit, Michelle did not pick the Queen up with a great big hug and twirl her around, and then present her with an IPod (with speeches by Obama furgawdz sake). But the visit isn’t over yet, is it?