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"I'm sure he's not fearful of English food."
On being of adventurous culinary proclivity.
George W. Bush, it seems, offended Queen Elizabeth II by bringing
no fewer than five of his personal chefs to Buckingham Palace on his recent trip.
"Her Majesty greeted the news that Bush was coming with
his own chefs in absolute silence."
She was not amused?
"That's her general way of expressing disapproval. She's
not thought to be [thrilled] about the whole visit anyway, but when you consider that she has excellent cooks herself, you
can see why this would be taken as a bit of an insult."
According the Spy -
The five Yankee fajita fillers - rather than being put up in Buck
House - have instead been banished to the servants' quarters at the US Ambassador's Residence, Winfield House. "The chefs,
along with most of the rest of the entourage, will either be staying at Winfield House or in nearby hotels," says a US
Embassy spokesman helpfully. "As for why the President needs five chefs, I really can't say. You'd better ask the
White House."
The White House had no official comment.
Unofficially the Spy reports this for an unnamed
source: "I mean, he's the President of the United States - maybe he needs a late night snack. I'm sure he's not
fearful of English food."
Bush does not come across in this as a trusting sort of fellow.
Or one of adventurous culinary proclivity.
Is he too insular? Ah heck, maybe he just likes what
he likes.
___________
A friend responded with this:
I have heard the food in England has improved. But since I
haven't been there since '91 I don't have any idea if that's true, and if so, how it manifests (where do you find this new
and improved British cuisine?).
Would the Queen Mum served Bush traditional food out of state pride?
Bangers and mash anyone? Mince meat pie? An exciting
bowl of cooked cabbage?
My reponse?
The problem was probably that someone felt the Brits just
couldn't do fried pork rinds right, or that they'd really mess up the chicken-fried steak. They don't do Texas there.
And from another friend in Paris:
London has one of the hottest food scenes in the world right
now. Of course Gordon Ramsey's the star. One of my favourite places there will be St. John's - have not dined
there yet but have had the great pleasure of friends bringing me over some of their stuff. Check out egullet
for their Brit boards.
Ah, one day I will get back to London then. And I
will not take along five personal chefs, or even one.
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Wine with dinner? What?
You must be an anti-Bush liberal!
Don't you just love polls? This one is from the Los Angeles
Times.
We do life-style out here. Consider this result:
Those who drink wine with dinner prefer a Democrat over Bush
for 2004 by seven percentage points, and those who drink beer back Bush over a Democrat by twenty-three points.
Ah HA !
The rest in as expected.
Men prefer Bush over a Democrat by eight percentage points, while
women prefer a Democrat by sixteen points. Whites give Bush an eleven-point lead; minorities prefer a Democrat by forty-one
percentage points.
Among white men, Bush's lead swells to fifty-one percent to twenty-eight
percent, while white women split evenly.
Oddly, single voters give the Democrat a twenty-point edge,
while married voters narrowly prefer Bush. I have no idea why. Tour guess is as good as mine.
Church attendance, a critical predictor of support in 2000,
remains telling: Bush leads by thirteen points among voters who attend church at least once a week, while trailing narrowly
among those who attend monthly, and running fifteen points behind among those who rarely or never attend. Of course.
As expected.
Urban voters prefer the Democrat by two to one, while rural
voters back Bush by more than two to one. Ah, cities ruin you, right? Go there and you get all corrupted
by them there panty-waist liberal gay folks.
And the usual - voters who think abortion should be illegal, gay
marriage banned and gun control laws loosened - all strongly prefer Bush; those on the opposite side of those issues bend
even more sharply toward the Democrats. Yeah, yeah.
But get this - Democrats lead Bush both among Americans earning
less than $40,000 annually and families earning $60,000 to $100,000 -- Bush leads strongly among families clustered right
around the median income those earning between $40,000 to just under $60,000 and those who earn more than $100,000 a year.
Fascinating.
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