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By Ned Simons - 30th March 2011
The deputy prime minister may find a sympathetic ear when he meets gaffe-prone US vice president Joe Biden today in Washington.
Nick Clegg is due to hold talks on Libya and the Middle East with Biden on Wednesday, following Tuesday's London conference.
It will be the second time Clegg has met the vice president in the United States since the general election.
The Lib Dem leader had a meeting with Biden in September when he was in New York representing Britain at the United Nations Millennium Development Goals Conference.
During that visit Clegg and Biden swapped ideas on how to protect poorer families in both Britain and the US from the recession.
The pair apparently got on well as their meeting overran leading to Clegg cancelling a meeting with former presidential candidate and chair of the Senate foreign relations committee, John Kerry.
Since that first visit Britain's deputy PM has been troubled by stagnant poll numbers and a series of unfortunate PR slip-ups.
Biden, who served as a Democratic senator from Delaware from 1979 until 2009 before being picked as the vice presidential candidate, is famous for making gaffes.
During the last presidential race Biden suggested that then Senator Obama should have picked rival Hilary Clinton as his running mate rather than him.
"Hillary Clinton is as qualified or more qualified than I am to be vice president of the United States of America," he said. "Quite frankly it might have been a better pick than me."
He also famously told a wheelchair-using fellow senator: "stand up, Chuck, let 'em see ya" before realising his mistake.
After his election as vice president Biden marred the signing of a historic piece of healthcare legislation by President Obama when his microphone picked up him telling the president "this is a big ******* deal!"
More recently the vice president's team made a reporter attending a fundraising event wait in a closet before being granted an interview.
The verteran American politician will likely symathise with Clegg, who was last week overheard telling David Cameron the pair risked not finding anything "to bloody disagree on" in the TV debates, fuelling worries within his own party that he is too close to the prime minister.
And he was embarrassed by a joke remark reported in an interview last month that he "forgot" he was in charge of the country while Cameron was abroad.
During the first days of the coalition government Clegg was also accused of making a blunder during a stint at prime minister's questions when he said the Iraq war had been illegal – a statement he had to clarify as being made in a "personal capacity" and not reflective of the government's view.
Aides to the Lib Dem leader must be crossing their fingers that the two men's misfortune does not meet and result in a transatlantic Calamity Clegg moment.
The deputy prime minister will fly to the American capital from Mexico on Wednesday, where he has been leading a delegation of ministers and British businessmen.
He is accompanied on his trip by universities and science Minister David Willetts and foreign office minister, and fellow Lib Dem, Jeremy Browne.
The business delegation on the trip includes representatives of the UK's financial services, energy, construction, consultancy, health care and consumer goods industries.
Also on the deputy prime minister's plane are academics from the Universities of Aberdeen, Southampton, Sheffield and Strathclyde.
Ahead of the trip Clegg said his visit to Mexico marked the start of a "major push" by the government to renew ties with Latin America.
"With our world-class expertise in green technology and financial services, the UK is a good fit for Mexico’s future economic development," he said.
He added: "Our two countries are also natural partners on the global stage, cooperating closely on climate change, the G20 and in the UN."
Clegg will address the Mexican Senate this afternoon, before flying to Washington to meet with Biden tomorrow.
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