Brown’s Washington trip: US press reaction
By politics.co.uk staff
While the British press continue to pore over Gordon Brown’s meeting with Barack Obama, journalists on the other side of the pond have taken a somewhat different approach.
Their reaction to the visit of Mr Brown to their shores is notable mostly by its absence.
The vast majority of stories which mention or discuss Obama’s comments to the press during his meeting with Brown fail to mention the prime minister’s presence or add it merely as a throwaway comment.
Those columnists or reporters who did focus on the meeting between the leaders of the US and the UK have tended to focus on British insecurities above and beyond the actual feelings of America toward Britain’s political leadership.
The Washington Post’s Dana Milbank described the occasion as “no Colgate moment”, referring to the first meeting between Blair and Bush where the president remarked they used the same brand of toothpaste.
Time’s White House correspondent Michael Scherer expressed confusion as to why the British press ever believed there was supposed to be a joint press conference, describing the possibility of an outdoor press conference in Washington in March as “extraordinary”.
He noted the level of insecurity in the British government was shocking, highlighting the point that fears over the special relationship arose because of a cancelled meeting that was never scheduled in the first place.
USA Today detailed the reaction of British journalists to being informed there would be no press conference, despite having flown to the US with Brown.
It also echoed Michael Scherer’s comments by noting “there was never any announcement on this side of the Atlantic that there would be a full-blown joint news conference”.
The New York Times’ Jeff Zeleny and David E. Sanger noted Obama did not repeat Brown’s “global New Deal” phrase, either in public or, according to aides, at lunch.
They highlighted that Obama had alluded to the fears of the British that he was not particularly interested in a trans-Atlantic relationship by saying “the relationship is not only special and strong, but will only get stronger as time goes on”.
Time’s senior editor Amy Sullivan argued Brown had even more reason to be nervous after being beaten to the punch by former PM Tony Blair.
