October 02, 2009

slapped down in copenhagen

Last night we were talking about the Olympic bid, and thinking through the calculus of Obama making the trip to Copenhagen for the final presentation… I was obviously naive in thinking that this had to be a bit like Bill Clinton heading to North Korea – for someone of his stature to get on a plane, the deal had to already be in the bag.

Obviously not. As Peter Baker puts it so succinctly in his New York Times piece…

Rarely has a president put his credibility on the line on the world stage in such a personal way and been slapped down so sharply in real time.

Ouch.