Photo showing President Barack Obama bows to Japanese Emperor Akihito
Obama’s critics said the president should stand tall when representing America overseas. Obama on Monday was in China, having wrapped up the Japan leg of his Asia trip two days earlier. But Washington’s punditocracy was still weighing whether or not the US president had disgraced his country two days earlier by having taken a deep bow at the waist while meeting Japan’s Emperor Akihito.
Political talk shows have played and replayed the moment from the second day of Obama’s week-long Asia tour, which set the blogosphere on fire and chat show tongues wagging. Conservative pundit William Kristol said on the Fox News Sunday program:
“I don’t know why President Obama thought that was appropriate. Maybe he thought it would play well in Japan. But it’s not appropriate for an American president to bow to a foreign one.”
“I’ll bet if you look at pictures of world leaders over 20 years meeting the emperor in Japan, they don’t bow.”
Bill Bennett, another conservative said on CNN’s “State of the Union” program:
“It’s ugly. I don’t want to see it. We don’t defer to emperors. We don’t defer to kings or emperors. The president of the United States — this coupled with so many apologies from the United States — is just another thing”.
Some said the gesture was particularly grating coming after Obama’s bow to Saudi Arabia’s King Abdullah at a G20 meeting in April. The US president’s Asia trip comes just over a year after he won election to the White House, and is designed to shore up US power in a region increasingly dominated by rising giant China.
But back home, Obama’s bow in Japan seems to have grabbed much of the attention being paid to the trip. The gesture appears to have touched a particularly raw nerve among Obama critics who said the president has hastened America’s decline as a world superpower by being too apologetic and too deferential in his dealings with other world leaders.
While most of the commentary about the bow in Japan was decidedly negative, some political observers, like longtime Democratic activist Donna Brazile, came to the president’s defense saying that the bow appeared intended to show “goodwill between two nations that respect each other.”
“I think it’s a gesture of kindness.”
An unnamed senior Obama administration official said that the president had simply been observing protocol.
“I think that those who try to politicize those things are just way, way, way off base. I don’t think anybody who was in Japan — who saw his speech and the reaction to it, certainly those who witnessed his bilateral meetings there — would say anything other than that he enhanced both the position and the status of the US, relative to Japan.”
“It was a good, positive visit at an important time, because there’s a lot going on in Japan.”
Watch Obama Bows to Japanese Emperor Video
The controversial video showing President Barack Obama bows to Japanese Emperor Akihito
{ 4 comments… read them below or add one }
maybe he understood he represented the country that a-bombed two japanese cities- and appreciated the fact the japanese still respected him.
why? why must we go through this again? everyday i despair more and more as i read more dumb-ashdofhasoie ideas spoken by people talking outta their ahfsdohaweio
seriously….in japan its custom, other country’s not us’, custom to bow as a sign of respect. what brendan said doesn’t hurt either.
i mean…how would americans like it if some foreigner came by, didn’t shake hands, greet the american people. course they wouldn’t like it cause its disrespectful. Sure most of the world greets this way but its the same in Japan, they bow as a sign of greeting.
maybe “differing” to kings/emperors is not really differing but actual diplomacy.
ever think of that? too many pundits, too many people, not just americans see the world as black and white, us and them. tolerance and an understanding of other people and their customs and cultures is the only way to bring america back to the international community. yelling USA over and over again while treading over the rulers’ feet hardly help. and heck, last time i checked…the emperor of japan is a figurehead and ceremonial figure.
ahoefhawioehf ugh so annoying.
o great sarah palins back too….why?
PPL Get a life. Those who have travelled outside their circle of five are fully aware that people in Japan bow to their elders. It is a sign of respect and courtesy. In this case the bow appears exxagerated by the difference in height. Come on President Obama is like twice as tall as Emperor Akihito. Had he bowed any less it would have appeared he didn’t bow at all whch would have been disrespectful. It doesn’t appear so exxageratd when he bows to Mrs Akito (assumings that’s who the lady is) Now what I fid disrespectful is all these people who feel perfectly fine with referring to the President. The Honorable Barack Husain Obama, simply as Obama. As if it hurts thm to say President before his name. These are the same people who have a problem addressing a judge as Your Honor. Wake up people.
When in Rome…… President Obama will be criticized no matter what he does and he is fully aware of this fact and handles it better than most people could. We should support our President rather than constantly throwing stones.