But several of the MPs had also been taken aback on discovering that when Obama spoke to them, he read from an invisible teleprompter. This had misled his audience into thinking that he was speaking extemporaneously, a skill that is highly regarded in India.

PARIS Why do revolutions so often take professional diplomats by surprise? Is there something in their DNA that makes them prefer the status quo so much that, more often than not, they are taken aback by rapid changes, neither foreseeing them nor knowing how to respond once they begin?

Some of Mitt Romney s advisers seemed taken aback by Obama s victory Wasn t the election supposed to be about economics? They were confident that Americans would forget how the Republicans deregulatory zeal had brought the economy to the brink of ruin, and that voters had not noticed how their intransigence in Congress had prevented more effective policies from being pursued in the wake of the 2008 crisis.