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Obama looks to end Britain's 'poodle' status


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Barack Obama looks to end Britain's 'poodle' status

By Alex Spillius in Washington

Last Updated: 9:12PM BST 09/07/2008

Senator Barack Obama is expected to tell Gordon Brown that he wants the Special Relationship to be a more equal partnership when he visits Britain later this month.

Sources in Washington said yesterday that on his first overseas visit since winning the Democratic Party's nomination, Mr Obama will tell the Prime Minister that he wants to eradicate the impression of Britain being Washington's poodle that emerged during the Bush-Blair years, after the UK followed the US into the unpopular war in Iraq.

"He genuinely appreciates the UK and he genuinely would like to have more balance in the relationship," said a British official. "The vibes between the two men are very good and very positive."

Mr Obama, who is currently the narrow favourite to win the White House in November, will make a one-day visit to London between July 24 and 28, on a trip that will include calls on President Nicolas Sarkozy in France and Chancellor Angela Merkel in Germany.

He will also visit Iraq, Afghanistan and the Middle East as he tries to burnish his foreign policy credentials ahead of his electoral battle with Republican Senator John McCain.

In keeping with the traditional Downing Street approach to US candidates, his meeting with Mr Brown will be a private one-to-one. There will be no press conference afterwards, but simply a "grip and grin" for the cameras.

The two men first met in Washington earlier in the summer, when the Prime Minister also met with Senator Hillary Clinton, then Mr Obama's rival for the Democratic nomination, and Mr McCain.

The triple header was a rare coup during Mr Brown's troubled first year office and reassured the Foreign Office that despite Washington's growing friendliness with France and Germany the relationship with Britain remained its strongest.

The British official said: "Sarkozy will make a real fuss of his visit, but we really don't mind if he flirts with other leaders."

The Prime Minister and Mr Obama are on common ground in wanting to pull their respective troops out of Iraq as fast as is responsibly possible, and in seeing Afghanistan as an equal if not greater security threat.

They also have similar perspectives on the global environment and poverty issues, and in presenting the West in a softer light than during the Bush era.

Full story, source: The Telegraph

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I never quite thought of it that way... :huh:

You wouldnt be a poodle anyway...you guys would be a friggin bulldog if anything.

Poodle?

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I never quite thought of it that way... :huh:

You wouldnt be a poodle anyway...you guys would be a friggin bulldog if anything.

Poodle?

It's a term often used by the media here to describe the way that prime ministers (and the previous one in in particular) would jump obediently to heel the whenever the president snaps his fingers.

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All rather meaningless- with a pretext that a debatable concept is fact.

Like saying-

Obama looks to end USA's 'Israel's b**** boy' status...

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It's a term often used by the media here to describe the way that prime ministers (and the previous one in in particular) would jump obediently to heel the whenever the president snaps his fingers.

Does that mean that if Obama is the next prez, and he sezz something the prime minister will snap to attention and argue?

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