Pomp And Circumstance/Compare And Contrast: Obama Gives Calederon The Full White House Monty, Gives The UK The Back Of His Hand

It was quite a morning in Obama-land, with a Full-Monty welcoming ceremony on the White House Lawn, complete with the fife-and-drum corp in full Revolutionary War uniform livery, followed by a joint denunciation of all those bad bad bad racist racist racist people in Arizona who decided to stop waiting for the Federal Government to protect the southern border.

Let's compare and contrast this with the shabby treatment afforded the British Prime Minister when he visited Washington in March 2009.

From the Telegraph, 7 March 2009:

British officials....admit that the White House and US State Department staff were utterly bemused by complaints that the Prime Minister should have been granted full-blown press conference and a formal dinner, as has been customary. They concede that Obama aides seemed unfamiliar with the expectations that surround a major visit by a British prime minister.

But they concede that the mood music of the event was at times strained. Mr Brown handed over carefully selected gifts, including a pen holder made from the wood of a warship that helped stamp out the slave trade - a sister ship of the vessel from which timbers were taken to build Mr Obama's Oval Office desk. Mr Obama's gift in return, a collection of Hollywood film DVDs that could have been bought from any high street store, looked like the kind of thing the White House might hand out to the visiting head of a minor African state.

It isn't like the President has to rehearse the fife-and-drum corps himself.  A career member of State Department Protocol Office makes the arrangements, and everyone shows up at the appointed places and times for the official welcome. The Marine Band is named 'The President's Own' for a reason, as they supply the staff musicians for the White House.

Himself certainly found His Obama-mojo to welcome the Mexican president, who oversees one of the most corrupt and violent countries of the Western Hemisphere. He mounted the Full Monty welcoming ceremony on the White House lawn for a man who doesn't recognize the legitimacy of our border with his country, who thinks his citizens have the inalienable right to enter our country with impunity and without penalty, and who views our country as a dumping-ground for his country's failures to create anything resembling a free society.

OldSouth has a problem with this, namely:

• Our prisons are not overrun with British citizens who make their careers trafficking in drugs and people. 
• Our schools are not bearing the burden of educating millions of British citizens who show up at the door and demand schooling in their native languages, complete with a history curriculum that portrays them as victims of unjust American oppression. 
• The British government concedes that it has no claim on its former colonies. 
• Our citizens are not in danger of being killed or kidnapped by British criminals illegally residing in our country. 
• Britain is not the national discount drug warehouse for North America (or Northern Europe, for that matter). 
• Great Britain has a free press, free elections, more than one effective political party, and power passes from one hand to another without bloodshed. 
• The UK has its problems, but it is a civil and free country, which means those problems can be addressed. Mexico lacks the civility and freedom to even begin to address its crushing problems. Mexico lacks the collective will to develop the qualities necessary to function. Why worry? Just blame the Yanquis and ship them the unemployed, illiterate and criminal. Collect the drug money as it flows south.

The British Prime Minister deserves a lot more than a DVD collection from Wal-Mart. (The Revolutionary fife-and-drum bit might rub him the wrong way, but the Marine Band in dress blues playing Sousa would do nicely, thank-you).

The Mexican President deserves a polite-but-firm welcome, a tour of the wall being constructed along the Arizona border, and should be sent home with a very special gift: Two planeloads of his fellow citizens serving time in our prisons for violent felonies.

And just for good measure, a send-off rendition of the Marine Hymn, performed by The President's Own, sung by the choir for good measure.  The first line tells the story:

 
From the halls of Montezuma, to the shores of Tripoli...