Barack Obama is no stranger to controversy – his whole presidential campaign revolved around that, if you remember. More so, this is not the first time that the President of the United States has showed deference to a leader of another country. Remember him bowing to the King of Saudi? Now THAT irked a lot of Americans.
If you haven’t heard yet, President Obama did a repeat of the bowing thing. This time, he bowed before Emperor Akihito, again generating a lot of buzz. Of all the articles, blog posts, and commentaries that I have been reading on this event, I found Jake Tapper’s most interesting. He writes:
“This picture shows two things,” my friend writes.
“1) The ‘right’ is wrong about Obama’s bow.
“2) The ‘left’ is wrong about Obama’s bow.
“His bow is neither (1) unprecedented nor (2) a sign of cultural understanding.“At their 1971 meeting in Alaska, the first visit of a Japanese Emperor to America, President Nixon bowed and referred to Emperor Hirohito and his wife repeatedly as ‘Your Imperial Majesties.’”
So what’s the difference between Obama’s bow and Nixon’s bow? The latter got it right – angle and all. Apparently, Obama’s angle was all wrong, and the addition of the hand shake was just NOT right. The overall effect?
Kyodo News is running his appropriate and reciprocated nod and shake with the Empress, certainly to show the president as dignified, and not in the form of a first year English teacher trying to impress with Karate Kid-level knowledge of Japanese customs.
The bow as he performed did not just display weakness in Red State terms, but evoked weakness in Japanese terms….The last thing the Japanese want or need is a weak looking American president and, again, in all ways, he unintentionally played that part.
I wonder what Obama thinks about the buzz that he has once again generated? What do YOU think about it?
Do you like this article? Submit it to Blogosphere News!
Posted November 21st, 2009 by Maki | Comments (10)10 Responses to “President Obama Bows To Japanese Emperor”
Leave a Reply
I don’t mind him bowing but yes it was too low and shaking his hand at the same time was odd.
I bet Obama has not paid any attention to the issue. He has bigger things to worry about.
I wish people would look at the bigger picture of our president in Japan, and hope that it will create new, significant relationships.
I agree with Ruth, this is hopefully overlooked in comparison to what it will bring to the future relations between the US and Japan.
I wonder if he ever found the contact he was looking for? Probably would have been easier if he’d let go of the nice Emperor’s hand…
No matter how deferential he personally feels, it is inappropriate for an American president (or any leader of similar rank) to show deference to another head of state, even a figurehead. Nation-states have a lot in common with wolf packs: you’re either alpha, one of the middle letters or omega. If you act like an omega, you’ll be treated like one. That’s why itty bitty countries act like they are one of the big dogs – submit and you’re puppy chow. President of the United States or Potentate of Podunk, a nation’s leader represents his nation as an equal or he does his nation harm.
Granted, the US is unquestionably the alpha but that only makes deferential gestures like bowing all the more damaging. When the leader of the pack starts acting like the low one on the pack totum pole it confuses the heck out of everyone. Confusion in international relations is a really bad thing. World leaders tend to be hyper attentive to anything that might remotely communicate intent or direction. They also tend to over read things. It doesn’t take much to cause confusion and that confusion can lead to really bad decisions on the part of other world leaders.
Mr. President, stop bowing, already! Sheesh! Didn’t the State Dept teach you anything when they were covering protocol? Don’t imitate other cultural gestures unless you are absolutely sure you can do it right. Looking stupid is an improvement over looking weak, but not by a lot. Dang, even the bad fake Japanese guys in the 1950’s B movies did it better than that…
Hope you found that contact….
Who cares,americans just watnt something to b**ch about. I’m american and i found nothing wrong with it. I’m also black and found nothing wrong with it. Just more people being petty. Stop trying to nit pick crap and be more worried why you all let our economy go to hell(by letting bush be a idiot while in office).
I guess people still arent use to the fact of s looking at a president that isnt white? Or is it that they just want to find someone to blame bush’s mess on?
Either way it’s annoying and they all need to get over him bowing and worry about more important things.
Yeah, that’s it Karen. Obama is getting criticized because he’s not whit. Brilliant observation. Can you tell my sarcasm. So there can be no criticism of Obama? Because if there is, then is must be because it’s racist? That stupid.
I’m not saying there shouldn’t be but there should be an extent to the importance of the situation. This, to me does not seem important for people to act the way they did. People have been criticizing him. I get that because he’s a new president but if you compare him to bush why didn’t they do the same with bush? I’m just comparing both and seeing how they are being. They should of been on top of things with bush as well. No one is being grateful that this president actually gives a shit about us. Are you saying that even if its petty they should still criticize him? How childish of them. Shouldn’t they be grateful that there is an actually person that is cleaning up the left behind mess. They are asking so much of him like it didn’t take TIME(8 years) to put us in the situation and state this country is in. It’s as if they think everything should be perfect and taken care of in a couple of weeks. Maybe its because i’m only 18 years old and viewing this from my point of view, but this is my opnion and i’m entitled to it.
Are you serious Karen? Are you saying there was not petty criticism of Bush? Every President gets criticized, both petty and significant criticism. Reagan, Clinton, Bush, Obama all get the same criticism.
The fact is you stated in your original comment “I guess people still arent use to the fact of s looking at a president that isnt white?” That would lead people to believe you think he is receiving criticism, petty or not, because he is not white and that’s wrong.
I actually agree with you that the bow criticism is petty. But it has nothing to do with his skin color and every President gets huge amounts of petty criticism, including Bush.
There werent putting pressure on bush to actually be a good president as much as they should have. I mean the man was making up words for god’s sake. Anyway, i give up because i’m just going to keep repeating myself. I’m not saying EVERYONE is criticizing him because of his skin color and i’m not just talking about the people around him. I’m talking about the people in the united states. I’ve talked to people that have thought sarah palin would make a better president which doesnt register AT ALL in my head. I just feel that he’s not getting the respect he deserves. Yes, there are those that truly respect him and acknowledge him. Then there are other’s that dont and that baffles me since we are making some kind of improvement. I guess i’m not really getting my point across. Surprisingly I wasnt pissed off at your sarcasm nor at your disagreement. It was rather refreshing.
OK.