Big Bows and Glad Hands
First the bow to Saudi King Abdullah now the handshake with Venezuelan despot Hugo Chavez. What next, a You Tube video of Barack Obama humping Castro’s leg or dancing the Lambada with Kim Jong-Il?
The John McCain campaign commercial that compared Barack Obama’s mass hysterical popularity to that of Brittany Spears and Paris Hilton is proving to be nothing less than prophetic. Every autocratic dictator on the planet is lining up to have his picture snapped with this photo-happy leader of the free world. I hear they are thinking if digging up Edi Amin and Chairman Mao to have their images immortalized with Obama in a scene right out of “Weekend at Bernie’s”.
The first incident had Obama bowing before the dictator that was assigned the number five spot on the 2008 World’s Worst Dictator List, King Abdullah bin Abdul Aziz Al Saud of Saudi Arabia. Initially it was explained that Barack Hussein Obama bowed before the king as a sign of respect. But respect for what? In Saudi Arabia under King Abdullah, it is punishable by death for a Saudi citizen to practice a religion other than Islam. Just last year, the U.S. State Department judged Saudi Arabia one of the top eight offenders of religious freedom. According to a 2006 report by the Center for Religious Freedom, Saudi school textbooks continue to be virulently anti-Christian and anti-Semitic. It is also possible to be executed for witchcraft or for just being in a room alone with someone of the opposite sex that is not related to you. It is a country that still employs the use of indentured slaves. Is that what the first black president is bowing to?
More importantly, when Barack Obama makes these trips to visit world leaders he is not just Barack Obama, thoughtful autobiographer from Illinois, he represents the people of the United States of America. The United States bows before no nation. It is not a sign of respect to bow before a king; it is a sign of subjugation and obeisant submission. And when the president does it, it is one country bowing before another.
After much public outcry for the humiliating act the White House announced that in fact Obama had not bowed before the king. “It wasn’t a bow. He grasped his hands with both hands and he’s taller than King Abdullah” said a presidential aide. This may have been an appropriate dismissal had there been no cameras in the room, but the video shown repeatedly around the world and posted on You Tube clearly shows Obama bowing low enough to see if the royal carpet matched the royal drapes, if you get my drift. If height was the issue it was a bow low enough that Obama would have been eye to eye with King Herve Villachez.
The next big photo-op came during a three day meeting of Western Hemisphere leaders in Trinidad. With cameras rolling Venezuelan dictator Hugo Chavez made a determined stroll around the table to shake hands with Obama while purposefully displaying the book “Open Veins of Latin America: Five Centuries of the Pillage of a Continent”. The book written by extreme left wing South American author Eduardo Galeano blames the United States for all of South America’s troubles damning American Imperialism while omitting any commendation for the substantial American financial support. Obama said it “was a nice gesture to give me a book. I’m a reader”.
I have read “Open Veins” and it is anything but accurate or factual. It is a rambling story by an author that admits he is far from a historian. It blames Europe and the USA for all of South America’s troubles taking no responsibility for any of the corrupt dictators that have devistated their own countries. It could have been written by almost any left wing socialist, like Bill Ayers or Barack Obama for instance. Having called Obama an imbecile just a few weeks prior, Chavez was certainly giving Obama a gesture. But it wasn’t meant to be nice. It was meant to bolster Chavez as a world leader who was able to publicly spit in the eye of America.
During the campaign it was pointed out time and again that Obama lacked any experience whatsoever in foreign policy. That minor league rookie status has been on full display every time Obama makes a foreign visit. The embarrassment of this presidential on the job training has the whole world laughing.
And they’re not laughing with us.
