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Tuesday, February 23, 2010

But where are his French cuffs?

(The Dalai Lama being escorted out the service entrance after visiting President Obama at the White House)


When the Dalai Lama visited the White House last week, President Obama reportedly gave him a pair of White House cufflinks (available at the White House gift shop for $35.00) as a gift.

What exactly is the Dalai Lama supposed to do with these? Perhaps he could pin his robe together with them. Or perhaps he could pin them directly to his skin, punk-style, as a reminder of the suffering of the Tibetan people at the hands of the Chinese.

We've seen evidence of Obama's unique gift-giving style before. When he received Prime Minister Gordon Brown of Britain at the White House last year, Brown presented him with a pen holder fashioned from the wood of the 19th century British warship HMS President (whose sister ship HMS Resolute provided the wood for the Oval Office desk). Obama in turn presented Brown with some DVDs of American movies -- which weren't even formatted correctly to play on British television sets.

When Obama met Queen Elizabeth, he presented her with an iPod containing videos of his own speeches.

Obviously, not a lot of thought has gone into these gifts. So, in order to save the White House further effort, I would like to make suggestions for upcoming state visits:

When Prime Minister Angela Merkel of Germany visits, Obama should give her a tie. You know, one of those nice White House-motif ties, perhaps with a USA flag tie pin, of the type which Obama refused to wear during the campaign.

When Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi comes calling, perhaps Obama should present him with the complete DVD set of the Godfather movies -- the director's cut version. (If he waits till they're on sale at Walmart, he can probably pick them up for less than $30.) Oh, and maybe a pair of lifts to put in his shoes.

Perhaps Obama could give Prime Minister Stephen Harper of Canada a "President Obama magnet," available at the White House gift shop for just $1.50. (No need to spend the big bucks on Canada, and now that Obama is a deficit hawk the twenty or thirty bucks he'll save will help out at the Treasury.)

When Premier Wen Jiabao of the People's Republic of China comes to see how his investments are doing, perhaps Obama could give him a nice White House cobalt money clip (available at the White House gift shop for just $25) in which he can hold his collection of U.S. bonds.

When President Nicolas Sarkozy of France visits, Obama could present him with an XXXL gray "Air Force One" t-shirt, along with a matching one in navy (available at the gift shop for just $16 apiece). Sarkozy might not exactly be an XXXL, but better too large than too small: at least he'll be able to fit into it

And when Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin comes to Washington, perhaps Obama could give him "The White House Cookbook, Secrets from the White House Kitchen" (available for $19.95). This would save the KGB the trouble of having to spy on us in order to obtain those secrets. Then perhaps Obama could throw in "The Barack Obama Presidential Coloring Book" ($5.99) as well.

I hope that helps. Sometimes it's just hard to spend a lot of time thinking of appropriate gifts when you're busy trying to stuff a health care bill down the throats of an unwilling public.

12 comments:

Anonymous said...

I'm enjoying the comedy blogs. I also see that your followers are increasing rapidly. With your recent burst of high blog rate I can see that blogger blues are history!
G

John Craig said...

Thank you Guy. Yes, I'm up to six official followers now; there are around forty regular readers that I know of. But I still have to beg people to read it. Doesn't say much for the blog that I have to regularly remind even my own parents to look at it.

Anonymous said...

Perhaps the latest Tiger post was a bit risque for parental viewing?
G

John Craig said...

You're probably right, but my mother doesn't know how to work a computer and my father just has her read the ones he thinks she'll like. Not worried.

Don't know what got into me with that one, hadn't done anything off color before. A couple of guys said (via email) that they found it funny, but a few women probably found it offensive.

Anonymous said...

Maybe it was a bout of blogophoria brought on by your excessive blog rate?
G

John Craig said...

Doc, that sounds like an accurate diagnosis to me.

Anonymous said...

I just found this.
http://laurireflections.blogspot.com/2008/02/blogging-vocabulary.html
Quite funny.
G

John Craig said...

Just looked. Yes, very good. And found "blogophoria." How do you find all these places?

Anonymous said...

I re-read the post which I enjoyed as much as the first time I read it. These details are so telling - they really give the lie to the popular liberal notion that the Obama types are more sophisticated and sensitive to the subtle issues of international sensitivity. Had they been Bushisms, they would have been taken as confirmation of crassness and insensitivity.
The idea of the cuff links as nipple piercings (not quite how you put it but the image nevertheless comes to mind) is hilarious. But who will DL regift them to?
G

John Craig said...

Thanks Guy. I agree, I think the whole idea of an emotional IQ as separate from a regular IQ is bogus. Are there autistics who are very good at things like math who are totally unable to read people? Of course. But in general, the people I've known who've prided themselves the most on their "emotional intelligence" are mostly just sensitive to their own wants and needs and are often quite insensitive to others. I tend to subscribe to Arthur Jensen's "g" factor concept: we're all given a certain amount of brainpower, and we can apply it in whichever direction we wish.

Anonymous said...

Great gift ideas everyone could use. I may try some of these myself, provided I can make it down to the White House gift shop. But as you mentioned, I could probably find some of them at WalMart.

John Craig said...

All of those items (except for the tie and the Godfather DVDs) are actually available at the White House gift shop, for the prices I listed.