And they said Bush was stupid?

[Retdetsgt]

Don't ya think they would have taken the time to get it right? There's nobody in the State Dept. that can read and write Russian?

Clinton gift gaffe: 'Overcharge

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.

[MacLean]

Someone retiring soon from State is enjoying as many free drinks as he can hold.

[Five-0]

Someone retiring soon from State is enjoying as many free drinks as he can hold.

That person will get their heart cut out before retiring.

[Retdetsgt]

You'd think on something like that, given to a head of state, more than one person would verify it was correct. It can't be that friggin' hard!

The other thing that ticks me off so much is that if this had been done by Powell or Rice, it would headline news...

This is going to be a long 4 years.....