Barack Obama’s top ten insults against Britain – 2013 edition

[Leroy N. Soetoro]

http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/nilegardiner/100215856/barack-obamas-
top-ten-insults-against-britain-2013-edition/

For the past three years I have published a list of Barack Obama�s biggest
insults (including those of his administration) against America�s foremost
ally, Great Britain, during his time in office.

Here is an updated list to accompany President Obama�s meeting with David
Cameron at the White House today. The major additions this year are the
snubbing of Lady Thatcher�s funeral by the Obama administration, as well
as attempts by senior allies of President Obama in the Senate to hold up a
resolution honouring the Iron Lady.

In addition, the Obama presidency has further entrenched its pro-Argentine
position on the Falklands, and has also lectured Britain on its Europe
policy, warning the UK against leaving the European Union, in a blatant
attempt to influence an internal British public debate.

Since first taking office in 2009, the Obama presidency has displayed what
can only be described as a sneering disdain and contempt for America�s
most important ally, an approach which has continued into Obama�s second
term.

Barack Obama has been the most anti-British US president of modern times,
even kicking off his first term with a decision to remove a bust of Sir
Winston Churchill from the Oval Office and send it packing to the British
Embassy.

He followed this with a sustained campaign against Britain�s biggest
company, with his press secretary Robert Gibbs threatening to put a �boot
to the throat� of BP in the wake of the Gulf oil spill of 2010.

The Obama administration has also sided with Argentine president Cristina
Kirchner in calling for UN-brokered negotiations over the sovereignty of
the Falkland Islands, and flat out refuses to back the Falkland Islanders�
right to self-determination despite the recent referendum which showed
that 99.8 percent of the inhabitants of the Falklands wish to remain a
British Overseas Territory.

1. Siding with Argentina over the Falkland Islands

This has remained the top insult for four years running. For sheer
offensiveness it�s hard to beat the Obama administration�s brazen support
for Argentina�s call for negotiations over the sovereignty of the
Falklands, despite the fact that 255 British servicemen laid down their
lives to restore British rule over the Islands after they were brutally
invaded in 1982. In a March 2010 press conference in Buenos Aires with
President Cristina Kirchner, then Secretary of State Hillary Clinton gave
Argentina a propaganda coup by emphatically backing the position of the
P�ronist regime.

In June 2011, Mrs. Clinton slapped Britain in the face again by signing on
to an Organisation of American States (OAS) resolution calling for
negotiations over the sovereignty of the Falkland Islands, a position
which is completely unacceptable to Great Britain. To add insult to
injury, the Obama administration has insisted on using the Argentine term
�Malvinas� to describe the Islands in yet another sop to Buenos Aires. In
2012, against a backdrop of growing aggression by Argentina, including
efforts to blockade international vessels fishing in Falkland waters, the
Obama administration continued to undercut Britain, again supporting
direct negotiations between Argentina and Britain, parroting Kirchner's
line.

In 2013, the Obama administration declined to formally recognise the
result of the March Falklands referendum, reiterating its call for London
and Buenos Aires to negotiate the sovereignty of the Islands � despite the
fact that 99.8 percent of Falkland Islanders voted to remain a British
Overseas Territory. At a press briefing following the referendum, a senior
State Department official treated Britain and Argentina as equals with
�competing claims� to the Falklands, and refused to support the Falkland
Islanders� right to self-determination. This is hugely insulting to
Britain, not least at a time when 10,000 British troops are fighting
alongside their American allies on the battlefields of Afghanistan.

2. Snubbing the funeral of Lady Thatcher

Incredibly, the Obama presidency declined to send a single serving
official from Washington to attend the Iron Lady�s funeral in St. Paul�s
Cathedral in April. While the United States was represented by former
Secretaries of State George Schultz and James A. Baker III, the only
American official present was Barbara Stephenson, charges d�affaires and
acting ambassador at the US Embassy in London. To put this in context, the
US sent a similar level of representation, in terms of serving officials,
to attend the funeral in March of Venezuelan despot Hugo Chavez.

To say this was a huge insult to the memory of the greatest peacetime
prime minister of the 20th Century would be an understatement. It was an
act of tremendous rudeness towards the British people, who turned out in
large numbers to bid farewell to Lady Thatcher as her coffin was carried
through central London on its way to St. Paul�s. Vice President Joe Biden
usually represents the president at such occasions, but was a no-show
despite receiving an invitation. Also absent were First Lady Michelle
Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry. Former Secretary of State Hillary
Clinton was also nowhere to be seen.

3. Holding up a Senate Resolution honouring Lady Thatcher

Disgracefully, Senate Democrats � key Congressional allies of President
Obama, representing his own party � held up a Senate resolution honouring
the life and legacy of Margaret Thatcher for several days, before it was
finally passed unanimously the day before her funeral. Senior Democrats,
led by Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Robert Menendez,
attempted to remove references in the resolution to the Falklands War and
to IRA terrorism, but relented in the face of strong Republican
condemnation.

The White House remained silent on the matter. As Senate Republican
leader, and sponsor of the resolution, Mitch McConnell remarked, �Margaret
(Thatcher) was one of the most influential and revolutionary figures of
the 20th Century, and failing to name her achievements would do her memory
and her legacy a great disservice. It would be unheard of to commemorate
Churchill for example and ignore his heroic role in steering his
countrymen through the Battle of Britain, nor would we think of honoring
Lincoln without mentioning the Civil War.�

4. Lecturing Britain against leaving the EU

The Obama administration has attempted to intervene on several occasions
over the past few months on the issue of British membership of the
European Union. In an interview with Adam Boulton on Sky News, outgoing US
Ambassador to London, Louis Susman, made it clear that Washington is
firmly opposed to Britain leaving the EU:

From our viewpoint it is something that won�t help us � not without
speaking for the United Kingdom� We believe strongly it�s in America�s
interests to have a strong EU � it�s the key to trading and to certain
diplomatic matters and intelligence matters and military matters. And for
our best ally not to be a strong voice there, not to be there, frankly we
don�t think it�s in our interests.

Susman was echoing the remarks made by Philip Gordon, then US Assistant
Secretary of State for European Affairs, who declared that British
membership of the EU is �in the American interest� and made clear his
support for the EU speaking with �a single voice.� The comments naturally
sparked outrage among Conservative MPs. Barack Obama himself has even
phoned the British prime minister to express his view that a British EU
exit would weaken US-British ties.

As I noted in a previous post on the US Ambassador�s intervention:
Susman�s remarks illustrate how the Obama presidency likes to pay lip
service to the Special Relationship, while actively undercutting it on the
European stage by backing ever-closer union in Europe, and the evolution
of a federal EU. Obama administration officials parrot the language of the
European Commission, as though their words were dictated by Jose Manuel
Barroso or Herman Van Rompuy. It is a sad state of affairs when the
world�s superpower effectively outsources its Europe policy to an
unelected, unaccountable and anti-American entity in Belgium.

5. Throwing Churchill out of the Oval Office

It is hard to think of a more derogatory message to send to the British
people within days of taking office than to fling a bust of Winston
Churchill out of the Oval Office and send it packing back to the British
Embassy � not least as it was a loaned gift from Britain to the United
States as a powerful display of solidarity in the aftermath of the 9/11
terrorist attacks on New York and Washington.

Obviously, public diplomacy is not a concept that carries much weight in
the current White House, and nor apparently is common sense. Four years
on, the Churchill bust incident continues to embarrass the Obama White
House, and remains a sad symbol of this administration�s contempt for the
Special Relationship as well as one of the greatest figures in British
history.

6. Placing a �boot on the throat� of BP

The Obama administration�s relentless campaign against Britain�s largest
company in the wake of the Gulf oil spill was one of the most damaging
episodes in US-UK relations in recent years, with 64 percent of Britons
agreeing at the time that the president�s handling of the issue had harmed
the partnership between the two countries according to a YouGov poll.

The White House�s aggressive trashing of BP, including a threat to put a
�boot on the throat� of the oil giant, helped wipe tens of billions of
pounds from its share value, directly impacting the pensions of millions
of Britons. This led to a furious backlash in the British press, with even
London mayor and long-time Obama admirer Boris Johnson demanding an end to
�anti-British rhetoric, buck-passing and name-calling�.

7. Using a State Dinner for the British Prime Minister as a campaign event

In March 2012, the White House used an official state dinner for David
Cameron to reward over 40 top Obama re-election campaign financiers with
coveted seats at the taxpayer-funded banquet. Collectively, the campaign
bundlers had raised more than $10 million for Obama�s 2012 presidential
run. I wrote in a Telegraph piece on the day of the event:

A state dinner with the British PM should be a celebration of the US-UK
Special Relationship, and not a reward ticket for hugely wealthy
fundraisers who have given large sums of money to the president�s re-
election campaign. David Cameron has been shamelessly used by a cynical
White House that has cared little for the Anglo-American alliance in its
first three years in office before rolling out the red carpet this week.
It is disrespectful towards the leader of America�s closest friend and
ally, as well as an abuse of presidential power.

8. DVDs for the Prime Minister

This insult has featured in all four editions, not least because it
remains a powerful example of breathtaking diplomatic ineptitude that
would have shamed the protocol office of an impoverished Third World
country. British Prime Minister Gordon Brown was treated extremely
shabbily when he visited the White House in March 2009, and was sent home
with an assortment of 25 DVDs ranging from Toy Story to The Wizard of Oz �
which couldn�t even be played in the UK.

9. Insulting words from the State Department

The mocking views of a senior State Department official following Gordon
Brown's embarrassing reception at the White House in March 2009 says it
all:

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.

10. Calling France America�s strongest ally

In January 2011, President Obama held a joint press conference at the
White House with his French counterpart, gushing with praise for
Washington�s new-found Gallic friends, declaring: �We don�t have a
stronger friend and stronger ally than Nicolas Sarkozy, and the French
people.� As I noted at the time:

Quite what the French have done to merit this kind of high praise from the
US president is difficult to fathom, and if the White House means what it
says this represents an extraordinary sea change in US foreign policy.

Nicolas Sarkozy is a distinctly more pro-American president than any of
his predecessors, and has been an important ally over issues such as Iran
and the War on Terror. But to suggest that Paris and not London is
Washington�s strongest partner is simply ludicrous.

These kinds of presidential statements matter. No US president in modern
times has described France as America�s closest ally, and such a remark is
not only factually wrong but also insulting to Britain, not least coming
just a few years after the French famously knifed Washington in the back
over the war in Iraq.

In November 2012, Obama�s Homeland Security Chief Janet Napolitano
repeated her president�s line, telling a French audience that �we have no
greater partner than France, we have no greater ally than France.�



--
Barack Obama, reelected by the dumbest voters in the history of the United
States of America.

Eric Holder, racist black murdering United States Attorney General, still
has his job.

Nancy Pelosi, Democrat criminal, accessory before and after the fact to
improper vetting of Barry Soetoro aka Barack Hussein Obama, a confirmed
felon using SSAN 042-68-4425, belonging to a dead man.

Obama ignored the brutal killing of an American diplomat in Benghazi, then
relieved American military officers who attempted to prevent said murder
in order to cover up his own ineptness.

Obama continues his goal of disarming America while ObamaCare increases
insurance premiums 200% and leaves millions without health care.

Obama helped bankrupt Illinois. Democrat run Chicago closes 54 public
schools.

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