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HOME > RESOURCES > INDUSTRY NEWS > HILLARY CLINTON'S WRONG BUTTON BLUES
Hillary Clinton’s Wrong Button Blues
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was sent by President Obama to Geneva, Switzerland to bolster foreign relations with Moscow recently. In attempt to break the tension and lighten things up a bit between two nations with a rocky past, Clinton brought along a gift for Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov. Wrapped in a small box with a nice little bow was a red plastic button on a black base reminiscent of the gimmicky Staples Corp. ‘easy’ button. Maybe the Obama administration should have stuck with ‘easy,’ because the gaffe that occurred next was certainly a difficult situation to bow out of gracefully. On this particular button was printed the Russian word ‘peregruzka.’ Apparently, Clinton, and whoever was in charge of English/Russian translation that day intended to mean the word ‘reset.’ In other words, Clinton meant to give the Russians a button that when pushed, even in a symbolic sense, would reset relations between the two former Cold War enemies. In fact, what ‘peregruzka’ means in Russian is ‘overcharge.’ Oops.
One would think that momentous meetings between foreign relations experts would be taken more seriously. The U.S., with its new President and failing economy has quite a bit to prove to a global marketplace expecting leadership. Clumsy translation is not only embarrassing—it’s disrespectful.
Why wouldn’t a government ensure that any instance involving a foreign language challenge warrant a spot-on solution? In the end, despite the glaring mistake, Clinton and Lavrov later claimed that they accomplished their initial goal of reducing the tensions established at the end of the Bush administration era. The bulk of the meeting took place behind closed doors and apparently centered on such topics as Iran, missile defense, Afghanistan, and nuclear arms reduction. | Continue
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