The Sketch: Robotic President malfunctions again

The big, black, armour-plated, terror-proof car parked outside the Foreign Office had six aerials on the boot. Experts believe each aerial controls a separate part of the animatronic model that stands in for the American President. The real President is in America, obviously, for security reasons.

Up in the press conference we had a chance to view the model alongside our own Prime Minister. American manufacturing is really very impressive: GBII is a state-of-the-art testament to smart technology that demonstrates many advances in the industry since Jurassic Park III. The model's blink rate is still a bit peculiar, and occasionally the batteries go on to stand-by, which creates a certain blankness at the front of the face. Then again, when mobile phones go off near it, interference patterns cause tics around the mouth area. But this is to carp. The skin texture is excellent, the flesh tones artful, the suit, shirt and tie expertly applied. The speaking unit is also lifelike. Though the processor that drives it could do with a couple of extra gigahertz of Ram, several filters and any number of plug-ins. It has been known to malfunction and did so during the press conference.

"It is an honour to be standing by the side of ..." it said and stopped as firing camera motors drained all the voltage out of its power source. "A friend", it said at last. Other problems developed on account of the humidity. "I believe we worship the same God as Muslims," it said at one point. Some said that was the result of static electricity build-up. But no theory could explain why it said (in the matter of his steel trade policy): "We believe in free trade but all parties have to be treated fairly.'' Nick Robinson asked it a question along the lines of: "How many people have died as a result of your actions and why do people in the free world hate and fear you in such numbers?" This caused an overload error in the system, perhaps a screw worked itself loose as GBII's jaw fell and a gurgling, gargling noise kept on coming out as the synchromesh failed to synchronise. "Freedom's a beautiful thang,'' it said eventually. That was wrong. Freedom is just another word for nothing left to lose. But we all know that.

Our own Prime Minister was more life-like; he's showing signs of personal growth. In profile his nose is clearly longer. But he also says some very peculiar things. For instance: he is going to rid the world of the evil of terrorism once and for all and defeat it utterly. Whatever that means, it can't mean what it seems to mean. It simply doesn't make any sense.

He left us with a briefing paper detailing the death toll from terrorism since 1998. If you exclude 9/11 about 200 people a year have been killed. Terrorism's a terrible thing but more people are killed by falling donkeys - and very many more are killed by American firepower.

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