We've been reading for the past couple of days about an anonymous Romney adviser who assures us that Romney is more qualified to deal with England because of his deep understanding of the Anglo-Saxon heritage.
I guess that Romney foreign policy adviser hasn't been speaking with the other Romney foreign policy advisers who have been whining that President Obama has received WAY TOO MUCH admiration and support from Prime Minister Cameron.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/...
Nile Gardiner, another foreign policy adviser to Mr Romney, previously described the Prime Minister’s behaviour in Washington as a “sad exercise in hero-worship before an extremely liberal White House”, which had shown itself willing to “knife London in the back” over the Falkland Islands.
“David Cameron’s wholehearted support for Barack Obama has significantly harmed the image of the British Conservative Party among US conservatives, who revere its greatest figures: Margaret Thatcher and Winston Churchill,” Mr Gardiner wrote after the visit.
Who wants a President actually getting along gangbusters with the other country's leader when you could have the guy whose affinity for England is just written into his DNA?
I came across a nugget later in the article that I think illustrates how deep Romney's understanding of England goes. With just a few lines, Romney paints a dazzlingly nuanced picture of England, imbued with his understanding of its culture, heritage, and sweeping impact on world history.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/...
"England is just a small island," he wrote in his memoir 'No Apology'. "Its roads and houses are small. With few exceptions, it doesn't make things that people want to buy”.
"England is just a small island."
I can think of only one other writer of travelogues who can take such a complex destination and sum it up in such a succinct manner.
That writer's name is Ford Prefect.
"If you're a researcher on this book thing and you were on Earth, you must have been gathering material on it."
"Well, I was able to extend the original entry a bit, yes."
"Let me see what it says in this edition, then. I've got to see it."
... "What? Harmless! Is that all it's got to say? Harmless! One word! ... Well, for God's sake I hope you managed to recitify that a bit."
"Oh yes, well I managed to transmit a new entry off to the editor. He had to trim it a bit, but it's still an improvement."
"And what does it say now?" asked Arthur.
"Mostly harmless," admitted Ford with a slightly embarrassed cough.
--The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams
Perhaps what we ended up with was Romney's expanded version, the first draft simply being: "England: Island."