Nobody’s perfect. Just ask Saint Barack of Obama
The US president has his own history of gaffes.
By Mehdi Hasan Published 28 April 2010 18:02On Twitter, Sunny Hundal has been calling on Gordon Brown to deliver a Obama-style, post-Jeremiah Wright speech on race, immigration and integration in the wake of his "bigot" gaffe. Forget Jeremiah Wright -- Barack Obama himself, the man who can do no wrong, has made a few gaffes of his own -- and lived to tell the tale.
Here are my top four:
1) After being asked by Jay Leno about his bowling scores, and confessing to a "129" in the White House bowling alley, Obama then said:
It's like -- it was like the Special Olympics, or something.
As soon as he was back on his plane home from the New York recording of Leno's show, Obama called the head of the Special Olympics, Tim Shriver, to say sorry.
2) When the Harvard academic Henry Louis Gates, a friend of Obama's, was arrested after a suspected break-in at his own home, the president told reporters at a live news conference:
I think it's fair to say, No. 1, any of us would be pretty angry. No. 2, that the Cambridge police acted stupidly in arresting somebody when there was already proof that they were in their own home. And No. 3 -- what I think we know separate and apart from this incident -- is that there is a long history in this country of African Americans and Latinos being stopped by law enforcement disproportionately, and that's just a fact.
Later, Obama said he regretted the use of the word "stupid" and for "ratcheting up" the row, and admitted he could have "calibrated those words differently".
3) During the presidential primary campaign, Obama was recorded at a private fundraiser explaining why he thought the residents of hard-pressed communities grew angry:
You go into these small towns in Pennsylvania and, like a lot of small towns in the Midwest, the jobs have been gone now for 25 years and nothing's replaced them. And it's not surprising, then, they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren't like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations.
Having been accused by his then rival Hillary Clinton of making "demeaning remarks", Obama conceded the next day, at a rally in Indiana, that his description had been clumsy and had not conveyed the intended meaning.
4) At his first news conference after winning the 2008 presidential election, Obama said he had spoken to all the living presidents for advice ahead of entering the White House. He then added:
I didn't want to get into a Nancy Reagan thing about doing any seances.
Mrs Reagan was said to have consulted astrologers but did not hold seances. Obama later had to call her to apologise personally for the "careless and off-handed remark" that he had made.
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6 comments
This is only a "gaffe" because the media have decided that it is. I'm no fan of Brown, but I'm relieved that the PM isn't a bigot and that he knows one when he sees one! The right analysis of what happened should go like this -
1) Is the woman a bigot? Well, she expressed concern at the mere presence of "all these eastern europeans". She did not elaborate on her her concern. No comment about integration or any other of the usual smokescreens and frocks that are used to hide and dress up bigotry. Just a guttural, grunting expression of the fact that they are here in large numbers. If that ISN'T bigotry, please tell me what is?
2)Was Brown dishonest in his dealings with the horrible old bigot? Well, How many times have we all been to a party, struck up a conversation with someone who hasn't taken their medication, calmly walked away and then rightly pilloried them to our friends after the fact? Who wants to pick an open fight with a bigot? No one does. It can only end in tears and that was Brown's good call on the situation.
3) So what's really going on? Well firstly the thirst for Brown bashing cannot be slaked and the media simply salivated when they heard the tape and then went in for the kill. Nasty Britain (represented by the bigoted old Rochdale woman who I shall now call Mrs Rochester, escaped from the attic) wants to crucify him for something that happens a million times each day across the land amongst ordinary people. Something else is also at play and if you're British you won't get it because you'll probably be in denial. It's the good old fashioned British denial of anything that smells remotely of racism. Why does this society have such a hard time acknowledging that you're going to get some bigotry - sometimes quite a lot. Why can't we just accept that it's there and deal with it honestly when it arises.
He did nothing seriously wrong. The real disgrace in all this is the media's refusal to analyse this properly instead of opting for the knee jerk Brown bashing.
Let he who is without faux-pas spot the first clanger!
Today's technology may soon mean none of us can ever again safely say what we think. I think people should just grow up. Gordon Brown is just a man. Not a God. And certainly not perfect.
None of us are.
Spot on RJD. Brown has risen in my estimation.
I agree with RJD in some respects. Brown came across alot more enlightened on the subject when faced with such simplistic views. Yet it was still a mistake in a political world where presentation counts more than substance.He handed his political enemies in the media a loaded gun to play with.
Agree with RJD & Gary, just proves this is trial by media. Would loved to have heard what David Cameron said after his chat with the disabled childs father the other day. Can't help thinking Brown was set-up!
It's important to remember that competence in a given office does not necessarily correlate with the number of superficial gaffes committed.
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