Juncker and his entourage have been telephoning the British mission to the EU in Brussels pleading for an audience.
Others find this an implausible conclusion.Bill Clinton himself underlined the connection between Iraq and Wye by telephoning Binyamin Netanyahu on November 10th to urge an end to Israeli foot-dragging over ratification of the accord.
While loyalist ministers queued up to express poorly feigned surprise at Ms Short's "timing" and "self-indulgence", Downing Street insisted that the prime minister was too busy telephoning "world leaders" about that second resolution to deal with Ms Short just yet.
But Mrs Arroyo herself subsequently admitted telephoning an unnamed election official, without confirming or denying the authenticity of the tapes.
Mr Paterson is said to have meddled in the matter by telephoning Mr Johnson's accuser in a bid to dissuade her from taking legal action.
Perhaps a decent telephone system will eventually emerge, but for now telephoning in Nigeria is a nightmare.At Lagos port, the third crucial lifeline for business, a combination of a new import-inspection regime, a surge in demand and continuing building works has resulted in a line of containers stacked up four high and 16 wide, running for miles while they wait to be checked through.
Mr Bush was telephoning Israel's Ariel Sharon and the Palestinians' Mahmoud Abbas, on May 20th, after five Palestinian suicide bombings in three days stalled the new peace effort as it took its first tentative steps forward.The weekend had appeared to offer a frail glimmer of hope.
A new sex scandal, more mutinous murmurs by his former allies, the threat of an early election, claims that he abused his position by telephoning the police before they released a teenage girl suspected of theft: none of these may prove enough to lever the obstinate old goat out.
Somebody just stole my wallet".Howard Dean, telephoning a speech to the Women's National Democratic Club, when his wallet was stolen.
He first made his mark at the age of 12 by telephoning Bill Hewlett, the co-founder of Hewlett-Packard, at home to ask for electronic parts; a tolerant Mr Hewlett gave him a summer internship.
"I am telephoning to ask", a thin reedy voice said to me last January, "whether you might be interested in considering the possibility of being a judge of the Booker prize this year".
