Alex Massie is right: the U.S.-British relationship is not like that of Jeeves and Wooster, because unlike Wooster’s deference to Jeeves’ advice Washington hardly ever* heeds British advice. On the contrary, the Jeeves-Wooster dynamic is the relationship that the British probably wished that our governments had, but which they are also keenly aware our governments do not have.
* I would say never, but there must be some isolated case where it happened, albeit probably by accident.
otto says: Sounds good, lots of people in the UK would agree, but its not right in fact. Read a book on e.g. the first Gulf war (Gordon and Trainor’s the Generals’ War e.g.) and see the British involvement from start to finish. And look at e.g. the outcome of international financial regulation where the US and UK tend to make agreements, then impose them on the rest, as per Basle accords (there’s a piece by Oatley on this). UK has really a lot of influence, although not of course Jeeves’ calm dominance.
Well done on finishing the dissertation!
Ah, that’s too great! Wodehouse is alive and well in the blogosphere! What ho…