CNBC host appears to be unaware that the UK and Ireland are different countries

Vox.com ^ | Dylan Matthews

[PotatoHeadMick]

Ireland, like most members of the European Union, uses the euro. The United Kingdom, including Northern Ireland and Scotland, kept the pound as its currency instead. This is not particularly complicated, but it is apparently quite confusing to Joe Kernen, co-host of CNBC's "Squawk Box."

The show hosted Martin Shanahan, the head of IDA Ireland, an Irish government agency responsible for promoting foreign investment in the country. When Kernen's co-host Rebecca Quick asked Shanahan how the weaker euro affected tourism to Ireland, Kernen erupted in utter bafflement, as you can see in the above video.

Specifically, Kernen appears unable to grasp that Ireland and the UK are separate countries:

[ROCKLOBSTER]

Ireland is Green and Northern Ireland is Orange.

Wait a minute...what about the Black Irish?

[yarddog]

The Black Irish are White. My Scottish ancestors were Black. They were McDuffies and the word originally meant “Son of the Black Fairy”, only those fairy’s were not the same thing as the Fairy’s in San Francisco.

[dfwgator]

Barry O'Bama.

[PotatoHeadMick]

I’m from Derry and I’m impressed at the immigration officer’s knowledge, I was travelling home via Manchester with my foreign-born wife and we were asked how long she was going to be in the UK, I replied that we would be staying in Derry but would probably cross the border a few times to Donegal but not to worry my wife had a visa for Ireland too.

I could see her face cloud over a bit, so you’re going to Ireland now? She asked. Well, we were flying to Belfast and we’d be staying in Derry (I actually said “Londonderry” at this point to help her out) but would probably cross the border too, I repeated.

She gave up, “Sorry, I don’t understand, what border?”. She was a British immigration officer, so I suppose I shouldn’t be too hard on Kernen.

[Vendome]

I suggested Ireland independence to a guy from Ireland and he went completely nuts.

Went into a real tizzy and ticked off the list of reasons why Ireland should not be independent.

Who knew?

[ROCKLOBSTER]

So now you got green, orange, black and white Irish.

Hmmmm....

Think I’ll have a black and tan.

[353FMG]

How many shillings in a pound and how many farthings in a half crown?

[Cronos]

Technically the U.K. is one country but a group of nations: England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. A union of nations just like the EU or India. The confusion is the difference between country which is a political term and nation which is an ethno linguistic term

[Cronos]

You mean the Picts remained in the Scottish highlands. You are correct about the Scots coming from Ireland. One thing to note is that before the Danes came in the 8th century there were actually FOUR nations I.e. Ethnic groups in what is now Scotland: you had the picts in the highlands, you had Britons(related to the Welsh ) in Alt Cluith the area around Glasgow that is strathylclyde, you had Angles in the southern lowlands and you had Scots between the first and the latter two. To make it more confusing the angles spoke a version of west Germanic that became Scotch ehule is a separate language from English and quite different from thehighlanders Gaelic

[free-in-nyc]

Well, this has been a most entertaining thread - but I’m more confused now than when I started! :)

[the scotsman]

You also had Celts in the south-west pocket of Scotland in Galloway, who were separate from everyone else. The Galldovidians.

[the scotsman]

Cronos has written exactly what I, as a Scot, was about to.

The only thing I would add is that whilst Celts from Ireland came across about 500AD and settled in the SW and W Highlands, the people we know as the Scotti/Scots, recent study has shown that the widely believed mass migration didn’t happen, and that most Celts in the area were already there, King Fergus and his Scotti/Scots came over in far less numbers than most people think.

http://www.electricscotland.com/history/articles/scotsirish.htm

http://www.gla.ac.uk/schools/humanities/staff/ewancampbell/

http://senchus.wordpress.com/2008/08/20/scottish-origins-myths-and-misconceptions/

http://irishtribesman.blogspot.co.uk/2005/04/scots-did-not-come-from-ireland.html

http://www.newsnetscotland.scot/index.php/arts-and-culture/3206-a-new-history-of-scotland-part-3-were-the-scots-irish.html

[ButThreeLeftsDo]

I’m surprised. The customs agent at Gatwick, as well as Belfast were always top notch and very savvy.

[Labyrinthos]

Northern Ireland is still part of the United Kingdom. Probably most Americans would make the same mistake, don’t think it is too embarrassing.

You must be a victim of the government run school system where 2 + 2 = 5 if the answer makes you feel good.

[Lorianne]

What a dolt.

[Buckeye McFrog]

News anchors today are hired on the basis of blondeness and cup size. Fluency in English or knowledge of history and world affairs are no longer must-have skills.

[trisham]

I had a grandmother who was of Irish ancestry, but we didn’t live near her. Who knows what Kernen’s family situation was.

[Cronos]

I did not know that there was no mass migration — from what I’ve read (Norman Davis’ Lost Kingdoms), the place that the Scotti came to was cleared of Picts and had been abandoned by the Romanized Britons (the land between the Antonine and Hadrian walls)