Posted on 11/14/2009 10:30:44 AM PST by jimbo123
"IF I see another king, I think I shall bite him," Teddy Roosevelt once growled. Offered that opportunity with the Japanese equivalent last week, Bill Clinton turned out to have had quite something else in mind.
It wasn't a bow, exactly. But Mr. Clinton came close. He inclined his head and shoulders forward, he pressed his hands together. It lasted no longer than a snapshot, but the image on the South Lawn was indelible: an obsequent President, and the Emperor of Japan.
Canadians still bow to England's Queen; so do Australians. Americans shake hands. If not to stand eye-to-eye with royalty, what else were 1776 and all that about? But Mr. Clinton, alas, is not the only one since George Washington who has seemed not quite to know what to make of monarchs.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
The NYT’s editors are now pondering whether they can backdate one of their corrections to 1994.
Great find.
The Japanese emperor is very short.
Winston Smith is on the case.
But the Russians have a better sense of class. Click on any of the videos at the left.
http://video.google.com/videosearch?q=obama+snubbed+by+russians&hl=en&emb=0&aq=1&oq=obama+snu#
Secret Service: “Ahem, Mr President, Mecca is to your left.”
Being the “most intelligent President evah”, hasn’t done too much for his learning ability, has it?
Obama is simply not a very bright man, and he is too intellectually lazy to do the remedial learning he clearly needs to do to know how a President is supposed to behave. This is just another in a long list of mistakes we should expect from a man who had none of the qualifications serious countries look for in a President.
“Just wanted you to see, Your Excellency, that I have been completely deloused.”
Obama is truly disgusting.
I've been looking for it with no luck, anyone have a picture of Clinton bowing to the Emperor of Japan?
Someone may want to forward it to the 'Won' so he will know how to do it like a real liberal next time....
Regarding the pic, this is what the LAT had to say:
“This photo will get Democrat President Obama a lot of approving nods in Japan this weekend, especially among the older generation of Japanese who still pay attention to the royal family living in its downtown castle. Very low bows like this are a sign of great respect and deference to a superior.”
But it is my understanding that it would elicit the exact opposite response. The older Japanese who “still pay attention” regard bowing to the emperor as a privilege and would regard an upstart non-Japanese who clearly feigned respect by not understanding their custom at all, less than favorably.
If I am wrong on this, someone please correct me.
Having said that, it also represents a huge loss of face for America. obama is a disgrace and an embarrassment everywhere he goes.
Certainly it is a disgrace for an American to bow to a foreign monarch as if to a superior. That is very clear.
But I suspect you are right. The Japanese have always been extremely insular. If you are not Japanese, there is no way that you can become Japanese.
At best, I suspect that the Emperor and Empress regarded Obama as something like a puppy trying to shake hands. Cute, but rather funny.
He’d might as well have given them a Samurai DVD pack.
I just figured it out! It’s now a bow! They are in a friendly match of strength! The Emperor, small as he is, is putting obama down to the ground with a VERY strong hand. LOL Not!
Get up obama, you look like a subservient tool!
The Emperor employed bushido while the President relied on his usual bullshito. It was clearly no contest!
Not that I really care, but how is this going to be perceived by the Chinese? Afterall, Japan committed an awful lot of atrocities in China.
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