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Subscribe to RSSLONDON -- If there’s one sound nobody expects to hear at a Paralympic gold medal ceremony, it’s booing - let alone the sound of the 80,000-seat Olympic Stadium crowd jeering in unison.
But that’s exactly what happened Monday evening when British Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne, who is in charge of steering the country’s economy out of its current doldrums, was introduced to present medals for the men’s (T38) 400-meter race.
Video clips of Osborne's embarrassed reaction quickly went viral.
His anticipated cuts to public welfare spending, which have angered many in the disabled community, may have been behind the huge boo.
'Meet the Superhumans': Paralympians burst onto world stage
Adam Hills, disabled comedian and host of Channel 4’s “The Last Leg” program, joked: “Who went, ‘Hmm, who's the best person to give out medals to disabled people? I know, the guy in charge of funding cuts for disabled people. That won’t go wrong!’”
Most unpopular
A recent poll shows Osborne to be the most unpopular member of the British government, with 56 percent of voters saying he’s doing a “bad job” and 48 percent saying he should lose his job altogether.
Iraq vet: 'Now it's time to win' at Paralympics
Osborne seemed unfazed by his lack of popularity.
“If I was trying to win a popularity stakes, there are some easy things I could do. I could spend a lot more money – that might make me popular in the short term,” he told the BBC’s The Andrew Marr Show on Sunday. “It’s not the right decision... In a difficult environment, it’s not surprising that the Chancellor is not the most popular member of the government.”
Cameras are swarming Prince Harry once again, as he steps out for the first time since his Las Vegas photo scandal, but this time they are catching him doing good works, visiting sick children and appearing at the Paralympics. NBC's Michelle Kosinski reports.
Prime Ministers get booed too
Obsorne wasn’t the only one to feel the crowd’s disdain. Over at the aquatics center, his boss Prime Minister David Cameron was also met with jeers.
Some booing could be heard as he stepped up to present 17-year-old British swimmer Ellie Simmonds with her gold medal for the 200m individual medley.
In this case, though, wild cheers erupted in favor Ellie, drowning out much of the booing and keeping the focus firmly on the champion.
More coverage of the London Paralympics from Britain's ITV News
More world stories from NBC News:
- Pistorious sorry for timing, not content, of Paralympics outburst
- Sun Myung Moon, founder of Unification Church, dies at 92
- Girl accused of blasphemy in Pakistan may have been framed by Muslim cleric
- 'Big enough for all of us': Clinton says US can work with China in Pacific
- Assad stays cool amid reports of bread-line slaughter
Follow World News from NBCNews.com on Twitter and Facebook
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That is like Obama giving a speech at a NRA convention or Romney giving a speech at the NAACP. Oh wait the latter did happen.
Oh, was the President INVITED to speak at the NRA convention?
With all the cold winter weather the past few years and a cool, wet summer this year, British food volume and quality are down and prices are skyrocketing. The populace is clearly unhappy with the status quo and green policies are driving the energy prices through the roof. It will only get worse, as snow and frost have already been recorded in parts of Scotland last month.
danangel
In the United States, the drought, fires, weather, higher energy prices due to closing of 150+ electric plants instead of retrofitting them and the jobs lost in the plants and coal mining, higher tarrifs on solar cells from China, etc., have made things more expensive here as well. There is a lot of discontent with the way the different countries leaders have frivolously spent our countries into debt.
It was 106 dirty, aging coal plants closed since 2010.
Not 150 electric plants!
Finally, I'm proud to be a Brit (dual cit.).
If that happens in the States, cops and grunts would receive the command to quell the uprising, batons would fly, blokes (males) beaten and birds (females) tossed into wagons for later body searching, a few would die, but the police department's internal investigation would conclude the officers were 'fearing for their lives' as the mob threatened them with flags, and were only doing their duty in protecting the public by shooting a few 'drug-crazed anarchists' and then everyone on this site would say 'Yeah, right on, a few less POS.'
The best solution is to raise taxes on any welfare lackies still actually employed in Britain until they can cover all the giveaways.
Yes. Let's balance our budgets on the backs of the weak, and bail out the richest members of our societies with our tax dollars when they gamble our money away. Cut their wheelchairs in half. They only need two wheels. Save Bank of America!!!
In a sane world, no business is too big to fail.
That is what happens when people are truely NOT happy at all they show the only way they can and guess what there isn't a thing anyone can do about it and that is a fact.
It's "unfazed", not "unphased". MSNBC apparently isn't satisfied with hiring people who didn't go to journalism school - now they want people who didn't finish 8th grade.
Ha - looks like they fixed it overnight.
As someone with a disability I think its finally time that people wake up to what these cuts are doing to people.
Yes, let's hope people in the US wake up also to what will happen to them if we let the R&R boys win.
Pres. Obama is our only hope!
Unfortunately, the man has a difficult job. The UK, just like the US, has to do some serious cutting. Entitlements continue to grow at an unprecedented rate, government spending is beyond anything rational, even defense needs to be cut. Obama continues to spend like a drunken sailor in a whorehouse and instigate class warfare. This can't be sustained. I'm all for a reasonable tax on ALL revenue the rich receive including capital gains. We need to kill the loopholes. However, we also need to put a reasonable tax on the lower 50%. You can't have 50% sucking at the government teet demanding that everyone else pay more and expect to balance things. If we don't act and take some bitter medicine now, we are DOA in a few years.
The best they deserve are boos and jeers.
His anticipated cuts to public welfare spending, which have angered many in the disabled community
Maybe the Special Olympics losers should get jobs and quit leeching off working people's taxes..?