So if the custom in another country is different then they should both stick to their own custom and demand it be the other one who change. So no onternational relations would be possible unless both countries share the same manners. This is beyond stupid. Showing respect eases relations and costs nothing.
And I can’t think of any reason to show any respect to the president of a country who kills, tortures and starts wars. Except that it is better to be on talking terms with them, even if they are scum, than to not be on talking terms.
Pretty spectacular misread there - there is nothing there that says that bowing is an act of subordination, or that the president cannot bow to others, or that others cannot bow to the president, or anything even remotely of the kind to any of that.
It says that the president (or other person holding office in america) can’t be crowned, knighted or granted an earldom either locally or abroad, or take a job in a foreign government (or be given a gift basket of decorative soaps by them) without congressional clearance. And nothing else.
I bow before your skill at ‘creative interpretation’.
It’s my understanding that - and please correct me if I am wrong - Saudi Arabia is an extremely oppressive and discriminatory place. As far as I know, non-Muslims have basically no rights, and women have basically no rights. If this is true, or if it is even true that most women and most non-Muslims are deprived of liberties, then that makes Saudi Arabia an oppressive theocracy in my eyes. And add to that the question of Saudi money going towards the funding of terrorism.
Now, consider this. Imagine there was a country that had an official policy of discriminating against BLACKS. Would Obama bow to their king? If Rhodesia still existed, would Barack Obama bow to Ian Smith? At least Rhodesia never sent money to terrorist groups.
I’m fine with bowing to leaders of other countries. I’m fine with our president bowing to kings or queens from all over the world, if that’s what their custom dictates. However, I don’t agree with our president bowing to the leader of an oppressive theocracy.
So you don’t mind us having diplomatic relations with this horrifyingly oppressive country, buying their oil, or selling them our state-of-the-art military hardware… but it bothers you that the President gave their head of state a perfunctory bow?
I didn’t misread a thing. We have a political tradtion of not bowing in subordination to other leaders and it goes back to the codified view that we are not subordinate to our own leaders.
The President of the United States bowed to a king. It is a subordinate gesture which brings with it the symbolic bowing of one nation to another.
Why do you assume that I don’t mind that other stuff? I do mind it. I do not think that America should do business with Saudi Arabia. I sure as hell don’t think we should give them our military hardware or anything else. I don’t think we should give them anything at all. I think we should completely cut off ties with them; without our oil money, they would shrivel up and die. They would have nothing; they’d be back to living in mud huts, as they were before WESTERN geologists and entrepreneurs came over there and drilled their damn oil.
I have to agree with others that, traditionally, US citizens (and Presidents) don’t bow to other leaders…or expect bows to our own. This would be, IMHO, equivalent to expecting someone from the Middle East to eat their food only using their left hand at a state dinner, because that is the way the host country does it.
Obviously Obama can do as he likes…but I don’t think this is simply right wingers grousing about Obama in this case. I find it personally distasteful to see an American president bow to a foreign king…and ESPECIALLY to the Saudi King. Other posters MMV of course, but I think the ‘right wingers’ are onto something this time…
Oh dear. First, the Bedouin lived in tents, not huts. The urbanized Saudi population lived, shocking though it may seem, in cities made out of brick and mortar, just like us. Second, we can’t “stop buying their oil”, unless we stop buying everyone else’s too. We buy oil on the world commodity markets. There’s no way to control where it comes from.
Even if we could somehow stop buying Saudi oil, other people would buy it instead.
Well, I’m still not happy that we purchase their oil, and I think an effort should be made to gradually get off of that oil addiction in general and find new kinds of energy (I don’t think I’m alone in this desire, either.)
IF the entire world stopped buying Saudi oil, their economy would collapse, and I would love to see that happen. There is nothing I like about Saudi Arabia. It’s an oppressive theocracy. That is the real issue here, not the oil. Our president should not be bowing to the leader of a place like Saudi Arabia.
So what’s your point? Seriously, you think it’s nothing to bow before a King who rules over the most sexually repressed/anti-Zionist nation on the planet?
My guess is that no one really paid all that much to what Bush was doing…or really cared. Left wingers had other fish to fry…so, it didn’t become news. Obama’s actions are scrutinized and hugely watched and dissected. So…when Obama does it, it gets on the nation radar.
For my part, I’m no more happy that Bush did it than that Obama has now done it…and, personally, I don’t think that saying ‘well, Bush did it first!’ is really a good yard stick to measure Obama’s actions by. Do you?
Exactly. The fact is that in Saudi Arabia the king IS the sovereign and IS above any foreign dignatary so it is not inappropriate for the invited dignatary to show respect and recognition.
Americans would go nuts if a visiting foreign dignatary did not show deference for the President. Suppose a foreign president did not stand up, explaining that it shows subserviency. Many Americans would go nuts and pretty much say it is an “act of war”. (They love that phrase.)
