Obama bowing againFollow

maybe if the japanese weren't so short, he wouldn't have to bow so far.


clearly this is their fault with their inferior genetics.

My invisible gardener says that you're full of sh*t. You won't ever get verifiable evidence of that, and there's no way to prove him wrong, but just trust me okay?



He hasn't. The fact that you think a simple gesture like this is significantly detrimental to America's status of power says more about you than it does anyone else: your conception of the world is so atrociously pessimistic and intuits evil under every corner to the extent that your view of diplomacy is waiting five seconds before you thrust your ***** into the other party's face. The slightest deviation is equivalent to the most egregious for you...



Does it depress you, gbaji, to know that you've completely resigned your life to total impotence, and that you've destroyed any hope, and thus power, you might have ever had towards the aims of doing something constructive for the world? For yourself?

You gave up the farm ages ago. The least you could do is let someone else try.

Edited, Nov 16th 2009 9:44pm by Pensive

Hah, let it fall on Japantoday of all the Japanese news websites to report it. Its pretty expat dominated though.

That and it is a terrible website in general .

Though what Jophiel says is true, almost nobody here in Japan did care about the bowing, those who did felt a tiny bit of mild surprise at the bows angle, but the number is negligable. There was no, "America shows weakness! It is time to rise and strike again!" or any snickering or downplaying of the USA's strength amongst the Japanese people or its politicians.

On an amusing note, somebody actually went and put together 46 other major world leaders meeting with Emperor Akihito.

Here.

They seem to be really going all out arent they?

Edited, Nov 17th 2009 3:52am by Keikomyau

Edited, Nov 17th 2009 3:56am by Keikomyau

Your Japan Today and our USA Today have much in common and can bridge the gap between us during these difficult times of bowing/not-bowing.

I guess, but it's not very good practice. Probably hurts you in fact, because you get fooled into a false sense of ease of victory, and then you're not as prepared for a worthwhile opponent.

Just because level 9 CPUs are no substitute for a real player doesn't mean you can't master the wavedashing and move-cancels on them!

Lol. You're kidding right? You do understand that the very things that most posters in this thread are praising him for are the very things I'm talking about right? It's not that we disagree on what he's done literally in terms of his foreign policy actions, but what signals those actions actually send and how they're likely to be received.

So no. It's not "incorrect". You just don't agree with what it means.



It's not pessimism. It's realism. What you (and frankly Obama as well) are being is naively optimistic. You can be forgiven that. Obama can't.



Are you saying that if we did all get around a fire and sing Kumbya, that it would magically solve the worlds problems? It's not cowardly to point out which methods have actually worked in history, and which have been horrific failures. And guess what? The "If I'm just really nice to all the other world leaders, they'll be nice to me" approach has never worked.



I have a very good idea. See. Because I've studied history. You apparently have not. Does the name Neville Chamberlain ring any bells? Peace in our time? Someone who was sure that if he just made sure that Hitler didn't think he as a threat, and just tried to be friends, that everything would all work out fine...


It didn't work out fine though, did it?


Policies of appeasement don't work. They historically only embolden the other guy. While you can be "nice" to your friends as well, even they will likely just take advantage of you over time as a result. You may view this as pessimistic, but it is the reality of foreign politics. Each side is looking out for their own nations best interest. Where those interests and yours happen to align, everything is wonderful. But things would have been anyway. The real trick is dealing with situations where they aren't in alignment. And the sort of approach Obama is using is the worst way to approach that situation.


Does Obama bowing to the Japanese Emperor really hurt us that much? No. However, it's indicative of a pattern of behavior. As I said earlier, if it was just this, people would shrug it off. But when you take into account statements he made during the campaign, his world "apology tour" he took right after getting in office, the similarly inappropriate bow he gave in the middle east, and then this one, you see a pattern of a man who seems to want to please others. That's wonderful in a butler, but not so great in a Head of State.

That's why it's called an "opinion"...

Funny on so many levels.

This is beneath even you...

You honestly can't tell the @#%^ing difference. I can't really be surprised or anything, but it's kind of painful to know that someone could be so far gone that he could see no difference between playing nice with a fascist dictator who has annexed like three countries, and playing nice with a nation who is an ally.



Not like your actions have anything to do with that, no sir. It just happens that way. We can't stop it! It's best to just let the progress of humanity stagnate I'm sorry what was I thinking? We don't let anything happen. It just happens that way. Not my responsibility. Nothing to be done about it.

You let these things happen because you are afraid to try. The betrayals of your friends and the aggression of your self-created "enemies" do not happen in a ******* vaccum. Have some personal responsibility; I hear republicans like that sort of thing.

***

Oh, anna

Honestly I'm not seeing it, or perhaps I'm misunderstanding what you're trying to say.

Charitably, if a conservative thinks that Obama is too much like some sort of servant (charitably) they want him to rise above. Intuitively (and still charitably) if the right sees obama as a servant, it should be in spite of his race.

Or perhaps you mean that the right, in an effort to invent or locate fault with a black man in power, uses charged words in an attempt to associate the perception (though not necessarily truth) of weakness with said black man?

The second makes more sense, but your post is unclear to me, such that I cannot precisely determine what you mean.

Edited, Nov 17th 2009 1:48am by Pensive

This. And not just weakness, but a charge of weakness tinged with racist stereotyping. Calling a black president a "house servant" (in the press) is really charged language. Calling someone a butler is a less controversial but related characterization.

Edited, Nov 17th 2009 1:37am by Annabella

This. It's stupid, and anyone who cannot see it for such is equally stupid. **** like this poisons the minds of idiots, nothing more.

But then again, you are totally misrepresenting my post. I can talk about the use of racism to advance partisan politics without saying "A wild racist appears." And i think its been a MAJOR problem when the right can consistently make all these subtley (or not so) racist and xenophobic comments about the president but when you call them on it, people act like it's a hyperbolic reaction. It's not. The right wing press knows exactly what they are doing and who they are appealing to when they do it.

gbaji is just a mouthpiece for the rightwing press in the Asylum.