Friday, March 6, 2009

Gaffe Alert: Hillary Clinton's "Reset" Gift Backfires; Instead of "Resetting" Relations; US To "Overcharge" Russians

(AP Photo)

Hillary did her best Joe Biden impersonation today. This is horrible, this entire administration is a bunch of circus clowns!



Reuters reports:



U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton presented Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov with a red "reset button" to symbolise improved ties, but the gift drew smiles as the word "reset" was mistranslated into the Russian for "overcharge".

"I would like to present you with a little gift that represents what President Obama and Vice President Biden and I have been saying and that is: 'We want to reset our relationship and so we will do it together," said Clinton, presenting Lavrov with a palm-sized yellow box with a red button.




Politico reports on the gaffe:




GENEVA—Secretary of State Hillary Clinton opened her first extended talks with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov by giving him a present meant to symbolize the Obama administration’s vow to “press the reset button” on U.S.-Russia relations.

She handed a palm-sized box wrapped with a bow. Lavrov opened it and pulled out the gift: a red button on a black base with a Russian word peregruzka printed on top.

“We worked hard to get the right Russian word. Do you think we got it?” Clinton asked.

“You got it wrong,” Lavrov said.

Instead of "reset," Lavrov said the word on the box meant “overcharge.”

Clinton and Lavrov laughed.

“We won’t let you do that to us,” she said. Trying to recover, Clinton said the new administration was serious about improving relations with Moscow. “We mean it, and we’re looking forward to it.”

Lavrov said he would put the button on his desk and he and Clinton pushed the button together, before sitting down for their meeting.

A State Department official said the misspelling on the button was being corrected, in time for the post-meeting news conference.




I don't find any of this "Obama Experiment" to be particularly amusing.

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2 comments:

  1. The Russians gave her a real gift, and she tries to pull this prank.....what a crappy gift to show your nation's friendship - embarrassing. Thank God she's not our President.

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  2. Yeah, the President has much better taste in gifts, like the Walmart collection of American movie DVD's he gave Gordon Brown when the Brits had just given him a priceless historical artifact. Incidentally, the DVD format is not playable on British machines...super cheap and lame.

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