Our head of state needs to STOP bowing deeply to other heads of state who happen to have inherited their titles. Obama’s behavior demonstrates that ostentatious humility is not an oxymoron.
Not sure if you saw the press conference or not with Hatoyama, but no apologies or reflection of any sort was forthcoming on the justice of the Hiroshima/Nagasaki bombings, when such was fairly obviously demanded by one Fuji TV reporter.
The first page of comments on that LA Times blog post you linked to are uniformly stupid (Obama is a Muslim, etc.), but the post itself is pretty good.
Focus on this kind of thing is unfortunate in that I would rather be having a conversation about other more pressing issues such as U.S. in Okinawa or how pending/ongoing realignment to Guam from Okinawa impacts North Korean boldness.
I suppose the lesson here is one that Chairman Mao would also support: never bow to old people! and acting Confucian will get you into trouble with voters in swing-state Montana.
Has very little to do with ongoing and serious politics of apology in East Asia.
Focus on this kind of thing is unfortunate in that I would rather be having a conversation about other more pressing issues such as U.S. in Okinawa or how pending/ongoing realignment to Guam from Okinawa impacts North Korean boldness.
Can we talk about the photo and the other issues, too? Most of the information we take in is visual, so image matters. I’m not going to vote for Sarah Palin in 2012 because Obama bows to foreign monarchs. I just wish he’d quit doing it.
This bow does nothing to strike any type of chord in me. I was pretty displeased about the bow to the Saudi King. I’d be pretty displeased if Japan today were like it was in the imperial days. But, I had no reaction when I first saw this photo on another site…
no apologies or reflection of any sort was forthcoming on the justice of the Hiroshima/Nagasaki bombings, when such was fairly obviously demanded by one Fuji TV reporter.
As well there SHOULD NOT HAVE BEEN. Obama’s bow is farce, such an apology would be a serious error.
And point taken, Sonagi! Certainly possible to do both. I wonder if additional evidence is available of our other “Pacific presidents” in meeting with Japanese royalty.
Photos on the White House website of the Suntory Hall speech, when one saves them, have file names like “hero_03” –everyone seems a little giddy to be on this trip. I can only imagine what Hillary is thinking.
Obama’s bow itself tells you how ignorant he is about the protocol of foreign affairs. As a head of state he may bow as much as his opponent does. What is it? He is bowing to this Japanese premier as if he is bowing to his school principal. Bowing too much is a contempt, does he know that? It’s a laughable. He probably apologized of American invasion and rebuilding of Japan as well. If there is one he should apologize is the Korea. US let the Korea divided into 2, which caused ensuing tragedy and suffering more than 60 years. It is true US did a lot of bad things, but more good things all over the world. The congress made many many terrible short sighted and selfish foreign policies in the past. What this country needs is a statesman: Bring Reagan Back!!!
Few more more observations:
1. I seem to recall the White House exerting itself recently to deny that President Obama bowed to the king of Saudi Arabia, a loathsome, despotic, medieval, terrorist-supporting, passive-aggressive, misogynist tyranny where they marry off little girls to pedophiles and employ goon squads to whip people for dawdling on the way to the mosque. Now, I’m the kind to make value judgments about such things, but if you’re the kind who believes in treating nominally allied governments equally, then how do you defend an obvious bow to one while denying a bow to the other?
2. A reader forwards a link to this story, in which a very slight bow by President Clinton created controversy years ago.
As I noted earlier, this photo and bow doesn’t mean much to me….but….if I wonder about it…how does it fit in much with the pre-election Obama? the Obama of Alinsky’s Chicago and Columbia’s NY – where he’d smirkingly stamp out his cigarettes into the hallway carpets of his apartment building as a childish form of “sticking it to “the man”” like Ellison’s secret room of lightbulbs? or the Obama who wanted to punch his white prep-school teammate in the stomach after a base party with mostly black people when the white guy had the audacity to say that he kinda understood now what Obama might feel being such a minority all the time in the school and such…?
Bowing deeply to kings and potentates — sounds like something you might expect out of a private prep-school privileged elitist snot…
…but not a mean streets minority kid inspired by visions of Selma and the written words of Malcolm X…
(In short, what would Malcolm say today to see the first African-American president bowing low to every monarch he comes across…???…)
(In short, what would Malcolm say today to see the first African-American president bowing low to every monarch he comes across…???…)
He didn’t bow to the little white lady in London, only the men of color, so maybe Malcolm wouldn’t object.
Let’s not judge President Obama by any different standard because of his race. He’s the President of the United States, not the president of black people. Either it was right to bow or it wasn’t. My distaste for Malcolm only reinforces that.
Are we talking pre-Mecca Malcolm or post-Mecca Malcolm?
I don’t think it depends on Mecca timing. I’d also think by his high school and Columbia days, it wouldn’t/shouldn’t depend on race but on socio-economic status: an inclination to “stick it to ‘the man'” is white (redneck) bread as well as dark.
I think Malcolm might have bowed to the Saudi potentate since he is the leader of the key Muslim state. I can’t really picture him bowing to the Shinto head in Japan…..or the white lady in England…
I can’t really picture anybody who grew up on Malcolm X and stick it to The Man nostalgia (or true belief) breaking diplomatic protocol and bowing low to heads of state regardless of race or creed….
…which is slightly interesting in relation to Obama’s life history and bowing habits (but only slightly….as noted in my first comment)…
usinkorea wrote:
I don’t think it depends on Mecca timing. I’d also think by his high school and Columbia days, it wouldn’t/shouldn’t depend on race but on socio-economic status: an inclination to “stick it to ‘the man’†is white (redneck) bread as well as dark.
I disagree. Malcolm X’s Autobiography demonstrates not just a change of heart in terms of attitudes about race and global society, but a feeling that the hatred he’d been taught by Nation of Islam was deceptive, corrosive, and even anti-Islam.
Yes, but it didn’t change his view that some/most people are downtrodden by a small minority (The Man) and that something needed to be done about that.
So, I don’t see Malcolm bowing to kings of foreign countries except for perhaps the Saudi one, because Malcolm also remained a Muslim even after his racial (tolerance) awakening….
And the tie in to Obama: Obama was not a race-hater in college or high school (as far as we know from things like his own books) even though he was inspired by things like the pre-Mecca writings and speeches of Malcolm X.
Malcolm and Obama both were “stick it to the Man”ers… And that doesn’t match well with low bows to monarchs.
usinkorea, did you read Autobiography of Malcolm X, particularly the part about his break with the Nation of Islam and his conversion to Sunni Islam and his hajj? It’s been a while since I last read it, but his “stick it to the man” philosophy was largely eroded.
It has been a long time since I read it, and I don’t have time to go back through it these days, but as far as I remember, he remained a political activist in the civil rights movement even after his fundamental turn. I don’t remember his break with the Nation of Islam and acceptance of more unity in among the races and ethnic groups including such a fundamental break with the idea of oppression in American society and the need for fundamental reform.
I wonder how Fox News will twist this around lol
Our head of state needs to STOP bowing deeply to other heads of state who happen to have inherited their titles. Obama’s behavior demonstrates that ostentatious humility is not an oxymoron.
China and Korea? I don’t think it will play well in America. At least not in the real America.
Not sure if you saw the press conference or not with Hatoyama, but no apologies or reflection of any sort was forthcoming on the justice of the Hiroshima/Nagasaki bombings, when such was fairly obviously demanded by one Fuji TV reporter.
The first page of comments on that LA Times blog post you linked to are uniformly stupid (Obama is a Muslim, etc.), but the post itself is pretty good.
Focus on this kind of thing is unfortunate in that I would rather be having a conversation about other more pressing issues such as U.S. in Okinawa or how pending/ongoing realignment to Guam from Okinawa impacts North Korean boldness.
I suppose the lesson here is one that Chairman Mao would also support: never bow to old people! and acting Confucian will get you into trouble with voters in swing-state Montana.
Has very little to do with ongoing and serious politics of apology in East Asia.
Focus on this kind of thing is unfortunate in that I would rather be having a conversation about other more pressing issues such as U.S. in Okinawa or how pending/ongoing realignment to Guam from Okinawa impacts North Korean boldness.
Can we talk about the photo and the other issues, too? Most of the information we take in is visual, so image matters. I’m not going to vote for Sarah Palin in 2012 because Obama bows to foreign monarchs. I just wish he’d quit doing it.
This bow does nothing to strike any type of chord in me. I was pretty displeased about the bow to the Saudi King. I’d be pretty displeased if Japan today were like it was in the imperial days. But, I had no reaction when I first saw this photo on another site…
As well there SHOULD NOT HAVE BEEN. Obama’s bow is farce, such an apology would be a serious error.
Chinese media not playing this up in spite of deep antipathy toward Akihito’s family. I recall that Akihito’s bow to the civilian war dead at the Saipan cliffs was front-page photo news in Beijing in August 2005. North Koreans suddenly publishing editorials on the Tokyo Trials.
And point taken, Sonagi! Certainly possible to do both. I wonder if additional evidence is available of our other “Pacific presidents” in meeting with Japanese royalty.
Photos on the White House website of the Suntory Hall speech, when one saves them, have file names like “hero_03” –everyone seems a little giddy to be on this trip. I can only imagine what Hillary is thinking.
Obama’s bow itself tells you how ignorant he is about the protocol of foreign affairs. As a head of state he may bow as much as his opponent does. What is it? He is bowing to this Japanese premier as if he is bowing to his school principal. Bowing too much is a contempt, does he know that? It’s a laughable. He probably apologized of American invasion and rebuilding of Japan as well. If there is one he should apologize is the Korea. US let the Korea divided into 2, which caused ensuing tragedy and suffering more than 60 years. It is true US did a lot of bad things, but more good things all over the world. The congress made many many terrible short sighted and selfish foreign policies in the past. What this country needs is a statesman: Bring Reagan Back!!!
Few more more observations:
1. I seem to recall the White House exerting itself recently to deny that President Obama bowed to the king of Saudi Arabia, a loathsome, despotic, medieval, terrorist-supporting, passive-aggressive, misogynist tyranny where they marry off little girls to pedophiles and employ goon squads to whip people for dawdling on the way to the mosque. Now, I’m the kind to make value judgments about such things, but if you’re the kind who believes in treating nominally allied governments equally, then how do you defend an obvious bow to one while denying a bow to the other?
2. A reader forwards a link to this story, in which a very slight bow by President Clinton created controversy years ago.
As I noted earlier, this photo and bow doesn’t mean much to me….but….if I wonder about it…how does it fit in much with the pre-election Obama? the Obama of Alinsky’s Chicago and Columbia’s NY – where he’d smirkingly stamp out his cigarettes into the hallway carpets of his apartment building as a
childishform of “sticking it to “the man”” like Ellison’s secret room of lightbulbs? or the Obama who wanted to punch his white prep-school teammate in the stomach after a base party with mostly black people when the white guy had the audacity to say that he kinda understood now what Obama might feel being such a minority all the time in the school and such…?Bowing deeply to kings and potentates — sounds like something you might expect out of a private prep-school privileged elitist snot…
…but not a mean streets minority kid inspired by visions of Selma and the written words of Malcolm X…
(In short, what would Malcolm say today to see the first African-American president bowing low to every monarch he comes across…???…)
(In short, what would Malcolm say today to see the first African-American president bowing low to every monarch he comes across…???…)
He didn’t bow to the little white lady in London, only the men of color, so maybe Malcolm wouldn’t object.
Let’s not judge President Obama by any different standard because of his race. He’s the President of the United States, not the president of black people. Either it was right to bow or it wasn’t. My distaste for Malcolm only reinforces that.
Are we talking pre-Mecca Malcolm or post-Mecca Malcolm?
I don’t think it depends on Mecca timing. I’d also think by his high school and Columbia days, it wouldn’t/shouldn’t depend on race but on socio-economic status: an inclination to “stick it to ‘the man'” is white (redneck) bread as well as dark.
I think Malcolm might have bowed to the Saudi potentate since he is the leader of the key Muslim state. I can’t really picture him bowing to the Shinto head in Japan…..or the white lady in England…
I can’t really picture anybody who grew up on Malcolm X and stick it to The Man nostalgia (or true belief) breaking diplomatic protocol and bowing low to heads of state regardless of race or creed….
…which is slightly interesting in relation to Obama’s life history and bowing habits (but only slightly….as noted in my first comment)…
usinkorea wrote:
I disagree. Malcolm X’s Autobiography demonstrates not just a change of heart in terms of attitudes about race and global society, but a feeling that the hatred he’d been taught by Nation of Islam was deceptive, corrosive, and even anti-Islam.
Yes, but it didn’t change his view that some/most people are downtrodden by a small minority (The Man) and that something needed to be done about that.
So, I don’t see Malcolm bowing to kings of foreign countries except for perhaps the Saudi one, because Malcolm also remained a Muslim even after his racial (tolerance) awakening….
And the tie in to Obama: Obama was not a race-hater in college or high school (as far as we know from things like his own books) even though he was inspired by things like the pre-Mecca writings and speeches of Malcolm X.
Malcolm and Obama both were “stick it to the Man”ers… And that doesn’t match well with low bows to monarchs.
usinkorea, did you read Autobiography of Malcolm X, particularly the part about his break with the Nation of Islam and his conversion to Sunni Islam and his hajj? It’s been a while since I last read it, but his “stick it to the man” philosophy was largely eroded.
It has been a long time since I read it, and I don’t have time to go back through it these days, but as far as I remember, he remained a political activist in the civil rights movement even after his fundamental turn. I don’t remember his break with the Nation of Islam and acceptance of more unity in among the races and ethnic groups including such a fundamental break with the idea of oppression in American society and the need for fundamental reform.