Obama on state visit to UK

[AndyDT]

https://www.thisislondon.co.uk/standard/article-23951999-how-the-obamas-fell-back-in-love-with-us.do

The truth, however, may have been that he was tremendously busy as a novice President fending off financial collapse and managing two wars. The evidence since has been that he is warming to Britain.

It is a tradition among American presidents, especially Democratic ones, that they start out feeling the special relationship is an anachronism, then slowly come to appreciate it, particularly when America needs a comrade in arms. The more a President must fulfill their role as commander in chief of the US armed forces, the closer they get to the Pentagon, the arm of US government closest to the UK. Once the political usefulness of the special relationship is re-established, the romance returns.

At a press conference on his 100th day in office, Obama spoke admiringly of Winston Churchill's refusal to condone torture even during the depths of the Second World War: "Churchill understood that if you start taking short cuts over time, that what corrodes is what's best in a people. It corrodes the character of a country."

Interesting to see if he gets around more than Bush did.

[Rathma]

The first lady looks so pretty in that carriage.