Friday, March 6, 2009

Sir Winston Replies



President Obama has been criticized recently for showing a considerable amount of rudeness toward Great Britain (e.g., the unceremonious return of the bust of Sir Winston Churchill, and a rather amazing lack of thoughtfulness in his treatment of the Prime Minister and his family).

In order to forestall another British invasion – which, frankly, I might not attempt if I possessed a high level of confidence in the likelihood that the British army would succeed in burning Washington again – I propose to give Sir Winston the floor from time to time, and invite him to repeat a few of his past remarks that might be germane to the times. If you please, sir:

“However beautiful the strategy, you should occasionally look at the results.”

A fine phrase, exuding wisdom. And when looking at results, one might not want to wait too long.

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

I assume you know about the site Winstonhurchill.org, full of great stuff including this:

"I was brought up in my father's house to believe in democracy. 'Trust the people'—that was his message....I owe my advancement entirely to the House of Commons, whose servant I am. In my country, as in yours, public men are proud to be the servants of the State and would be ashamed to be its masters. Therefore I have been in full harmony all my life with the tides which have flowed on both sides of the Atlantic against privilege and monopoly."

—First of three speeches to a Joint Session of the States Congress, after Pearl Harbor, delivered 26 December 1941. (The others occurred in 1943 and 1952.)

Retread

Boy on a bike said...

At some point in the next few months, The One is going to have to ask the One-Eyed Git from across the Atlantic for more troops in Afghanistan.

If Gordon Brown has any balls, he'll say; "Thanks for the DVD gift set - but I think I'll pass this time around".

One good snub deserves another.

Mikael said...

To paraphrase Mr. Churchill:

"Mr. Obama, you had the choice between insult and war. You have chosen insult, you will get war."


Or perhaps in the separate room:

Michelle: Ms. Brown, You are drunk!

Ms. Brown: Yes Madam, and you are cheap and uncourteous, but in the morning I shall be sober!


WP: stivaism: The fine art of keeping a stiff upper lip even when being spat in the face by your host.

adagioforstrings said...

Churchill also wrote:

“Socialism is a philosophy of failure, the creed of ignorance, and the gospel of envy, its inherent virtue is the equal sharing of misery.”

which Obama might have found off-putting.

RebeccaH said...

Today the Obama Administration started taking economic advice from Twitter.

Dear God.

Paco said...

adagioforstrings: For Obama (as the saying goes), that's not a bug, that's a feature.

Minicapt said...

WV goresol- beat that happenstance!

Cheers