Why Won't Obama Honor Our Queen?

Not for nothing was Barack Obama called to London. Queen Elizabeth II invited him. One does not go to Buckingham Palace, one of the Queen's many castles, unless one is invited.

And so, history was made this week when America's current president had the special opportunity of an audience with our Queen. What did he do? He brought his wife, who has arms, and he brought a computer musical device called "the I-pod."

He may as well have brought a message of war against England.


The president's presumptuousness most certainly did not stop with the poison gift of the I-pod. Instead of holding tape recordings of quality music from Great Britain, rumor has it this device was filled with 30 gigabytes (or, a half hour's worth) of sexual American music by the likes of Barry White or Boz Scaggs, with perhaps a sleazy helping of disco fornication music by this Beyonce, or Miley Cyrus.

I may not be the target audience for today's Disney Channel, but I certainly remember quality music: the Beatles. This was the music of important civil rights battles, and I remember. I remember.

Why wouldn't the president put the Beatles music on his Queen's I-Pod? There is more than enough Beatles music to fill the half-hour -- I personally have more than a dozen Beatles albums, each with at least a half-hour's music. I'm no AIG accountant, but by my calculations that is more than six hours of the finest British pop music.

The Queen is no stranger to the Beatles. She was, as I remember, also the Queen when the Beatles were still making their magic, in the 1960s. In fact, this very same Queen Elizabeth gave the British Empire's highest honor to the Beatles. Few will ever forget the excitement of seeing John, Paul and the others receive this award, the "MIB."

Ever since, there's been something special about the relationship between Great Britain and the Beatles.

But try telling that to Barack Obama, who was doing the Hula Hula as a child when my generation gathered 'round the record player to hear those first notes of Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Heart's Club Band. There was a picture of our Queen right on the album cover, which should come as no surprise considering one of the record's greatest songs mentions how the Beatles have "a picture in their pockets of the Queen."

The outrages didn't end with this I-pod scandal, of course -- not with these Obamas, these loose cannons. Before the night was over, First Lady Michelle Obama was all but french-kissing our Queen, which is against the royal protocols and could well see Mrs. Obama censured by the Crown. One must ask, is Buckingham Palace the home of royalty or some Girls Gone Wild lesbian boudoir?

There was hardly time to contemplate this disaster at the Royal Court, as the Obamas were off to their next stop -- a town hall meeting. Was this town hall meeting in America, where our citizens struggle to compete against America's worst car companies, in Detroit? No, not at all.

The town hall meeting was in France.

Ken Layne is the syndicated op-ed columnist from Wonkette, in Washington DC.