By Daniel Dombey, Financial Times

 Clinton doesn’t like being told what to do by Rahm Emanuel

It sounds like a story with a happy ending. Eighteen months ago Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama were at each other’s throats as they battled for the White House. Then, after Mr Obama’s inspired selection of his old rival for the top US foreign policy post, the two turned into a team, with Mrs Clinton becoming the most formidable asset of the administration.

There is only one catch to the tale. There is no guarantee that it will finish on an upbeat note.

Mrs Clinton and Mr Obama are now deluged by foreign policy problems and the secretary of state has to contend with an overbearing White House and her own tendency to voice inconvenient truths.

That said, things have gone more smoothly than anyone would have imagined after the two Democrats’ bad-tempered primary fight.

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By Andrew Cline, American Spectator

 Obama was supposed to be smooth and sophisticated, wrong! 

Barack Obama was supposed to be America’s answer to the suave, European head of state. A debonair gentleman of the world, he would charm even the most sophisticated foreign leaders and prove, finally, that the United States is developed culturally, not just economically.
Then he gave some DVDs.

Ian Drury of London’s Daily Mail wrote on March 8, "As he headed back home from Washington, Gordon Brown must have rummaged through his party bag with disappointment.

"Because all he got was a set of DVDs. Barack Obama, a box set of 25 classic American films — a gift about as exciting as a pair of socks."

Brown had given Obama a set of pens made from part of the HMS Gannet, a Victorian-era anti-slave ship. A desk that has sat in the Oval Office since 1880 was made from the timbers of the HMS Resolute, the Gannet’s sister ship. It was a stunningly thoughtful and unique gift left unreciprocated.

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