Should we scold Obama for shaking Chavez’ hand?
posted at 3:12 pm on April 20, 2009 by Ed Morrissey
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Barack Obama may have made some mistakes at the Trinidad Summit of the Americas this weekend, but does greeting Hugo Chavez with a handshake qualify as one of them? Andrew Malcolm reports on the latest eruption over protocol by the President:
Bad enough, in conservative thinking, that President Obama appeared to bow to Saudi King Abdullah during the G-20 meetings in Europe earlier this month.
Now, Republican critics are pouncing on the president for his charm offensive at the just-concluded Summit of the Americas in Trinidad and Tobago. The charge: He let Venezuela dictator Hugo Chavez maneuver him into a smiling one-on-one photo, and he failed to answer Nicaraguan leader Daniel Ortega’s 50-minute anti-American rant.
“Ortega disrespected America,” fumed conservative commentator Pat Buchanan on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” today. Recalling that President Reagan rebutted Soviet leaders who trashed America, Buchanan said Obama should have responded to the rant.
Chavez broke off diplomatic relations with the US in 2008 after years of ranting incoherently about George Bush being the devil. Last weekend, Chavez announced that he might consider restoring diplomatic ties in consideration of Obama’s change in policies towards Latin America. At this point in time, however, neither country has initiated diplomatic contact.
Technically, protocol would dictate that the two leaders should not have public contact at the summit. A handshake with Chavez doesn’t represent the egregious break from protocol and tradition that bowing to the king of Saudi Arabia does, though. It probably isn’t as bad as a handshake with Raul Castro would have been, either, although that would have been a similar protocol failure.
Obama has specifically promised to improve relations with Venezuela, including holding presidential-level talks, so this greeting was to be expected. At least this time, Obama limited himself to a handshake for a head-of-state greeting, rather than bowing (and scraping) as he did on the European Grand Tour.
Letting Ortega’s rant pass with just a quip about its length, though, deserves some scorn. If the President doesn’t want to defend his country at these international gatherings from unfair diatribes, what’s the point of attending at all?
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The drug addled hippies are in charge now, American is DOOMED.
kirkill on April 20, 2009 at 4:55 PM
Personally, I think the slimeball-in-chief’s highlight from this conference was when he pulled out his idiotic line, used to excuse his buddy Ayers, this time to distance himself from the rantings of another one of his comrades:
What a friggin’ clown. Blame HIM? This guy is such an unbelievable POS that it defies the imagination. And the moron just keeps using the same stupid lines over and over.
The Precedent hates the US and undermines our interests at every turn. I hope he is eventually held to account for this.
progressoverpeace on April 20, 2009 at 4:59 PM
Last time I saw a smile like was when a guy came out of a massage parlor.
I said I saw it….it wasn’t me. That’s my story and I’m stickin to it.
Old Hippie Vet on April 20, 2009 at 5:00 PM
Naw, just make fun of him.
Isn’t that what clowns are for?
http://www.cuial.com/obama_love.jpg
izoneguy on April 20, 2009 at 5:06 PM
But that’s still a step up from the idiot and idiots who were in charge for the last 7 years.
Idiots vs Drug addicts … hmmm, give me the drug addicts any day.
Monkei on April 20, 2009 at 5:08 PM
I wonder, did Bush every shake hands with Hugo?
Monkei on April 20, 2009 at 5:09 PM
No, and until the critics knock off this type of criticism, their words will float out into la-la land, where it belongs.
However, the criticism that there wasn’t even a token remark made on behalf of the United States?
That’s the issue.
AnninCA on April 20, 2009 at 5:11 PM
Obama didn’t shake hands with either Chavez or Ortega. Who are you going to believe Obama or your lying eyes.
eaglewingz08 on April 20, 2009 at 5:12 PM
If the MSM and the left can criticize Bush for defendng America, then we can criticize Obama for shaking hands with a terrorist supporting communist dictator and accepting a book that bashes the U.S.
Yes we can.
Hog Wild on April 20, 2009 at 5:16 PM
Shaking hands..ok. But, yuk it up with this thug and saying he is no threat to the USA is just stupid. We have elected a bumbling amateur to the most powerful position in the world.
d1carter on April 20, 2009 at 5:24 PM
Given the circumstances I don’t know that he was supposed to pull away and make an obvious attempt not to shake his hand. Chavez setting him up with the book in the photo op seems to me to be giving the same message as Ortega’s rant, though. The guy will shake his hand and tomorrow or sometime in the next week or so he’ll insult Obama publicly again. He’s no friend of ours.
scalleywag on April 20, 2009 at 5:31 PM
Ed — Why would Obama *not* give Ortega’s rant a pass, when he clearly agrees with it? He sat in TUCC for 20 years listening to similar crap and agreed with it. His background clearly shows that he agrees with America’s enemies about America. What’s the point of attending? To show his allegiance with these people, duh.
Have you and everyone else just decided to not put anything Obama has been doing the last 2 years into context with his 2-decade background of being mentored by racists, socialists, communists, Marxists and America-haters?
Seriously, wake up. Why is anyone surprised here? The man agrees with our enemies. If you need to, go back and read up on Obama’s background, read up on Rev Wright’s mentoring of him, read up on Billy Ayers’ mentoring of him, read up on all the policies and America-hating with which Obama agrees with his mentors and these enemies of capitalism and America.
Please, stop being so dense as to why Obama is doing this stuff. It is plainly obvious: he agrees with them.
Obama isn’t apologizing about the last 8 years of the Bush Administration, he’s apologizing for America’s entire history. Obama’s CHANGE is not about changing and transforming America back to Clinton from Bush, but changing and transforming America of the last 200+ years into a new Obama America, which is the vision of Wright, Ayers and people such as Chavez and Castro.
Please, stop looking at this in a gawddamned political vacuum and put this in proper context. We are never going to wake people up to this man’s plans for America and prevent it from happening by getting enough people to vote him out of office if we can’t even build up the courage to call him out for what he is.
Michael in MI on April 20, 2009 at 5:48 PM
You aren’t really that ignorant are you? We had diplomatic relations with those people at the times of the photos. We do not have diplomatic relations with Venezuela. This was at the very least a break in protocol, but it really is simply Chavez owning Obama. It was not pre-arranged by Obama and other heads of state as in the past. It was Chavez all the way, and the book gift was a real gem for Hugo too. Barack has been had, and that is what is so embarrassing about the incident.
Deanna on April 20, 2009 at 5:59 PM
Handshake? – No need to be an ass, Obama should be the bigger man and shake hands. However, no need to be all smiles about it though. But, that is small potatoes.
50-minute rant? – Definitely need to counter. Also, need to highlight the state of affairs in those nations which promote socialism and authoritarianism. However, I really didn’t expect Obama do that because he is (a) non-confrontational (spineless?) and (b) he might just agree with those anti-American sentiments. He probably does harbor some ill will towards America as it has been in the past, imagining all of the evils and ill will that the Left believes about America (the *worst* of all possible worlds).
I’ve already come to grips with the idea that America is on its way into history, that the fall is inevitable so this pandering to dictators and mini-men does nothing but speed the process and in my mind, its better to rip off the bandaid and get it over with than to suffer for years on end (which we’ll still probably do). Just call me Eeyore.
Geministorm on April 20, 2009 at 6:02 PM
Exactly. Obama didn’t have the cojones to get up and walk out but some Europeans at least did when they walked out on Ahmadinejad today. A conference we refused to attend, by the way.
Deanna on April 20, 2009 at 6:03 PM
“If the President doesn’t want to defend his country at these international gatherings from unfair diatribes, what’s the point of attending at all?”
huh?
Obama isn’t tweaking at the edges with the US’s traditions and public policies. He’s thrown them in the toilet and he’s jammin in Obamanation as quickly as the press can keep up.
The “point” of attending the conference was to bring the US down to the level of the banana republics.
notagool on April 20, 2009 at 6:16 PM
Exactly.
2 years of campaigning exposing 2+ decades of his radical Leftist background and 5 months in office as President and usually intelligent bloggers on the Right *still* cannot figure out why Obama does what he does. If even righty bloggers like Ed are still clueless, — or continuing to play dumb — then it’s no surprise that 60+ million Americans were clueless back in November (and the vast majority of those people are still bowing down and worshiping at the altar of Obama to this day).
This really is sad. Ed, I respect your blogging and op-eds a great deal, but this playing dumb about why Obama is doing what he is doing is really getting old. Not just by you, mind you, but by most bloggers and pundits on the Right. 2+ damn decades of background. Come on! Add it all up and connect the damn dots already, would you please?
This is like what the Left does with Operation Iraqi Freedom and the “War on Terror”. They ignore 10-15 years of terrorism and Saddam’s actions leading up to 2001-2003 and call it all BS. That is exactly what you and many others on the right are now doing with Obama. You’re ignoring 2+ decades of his background and all the corruption and lies during his campaign and just analyzing his actions as President in a political vacuum. I expect this kind of nonsense from the Left, not the Right.
Michael in MI on April 20, 2009 at 6:29 PM
I’m surprised Obama didn’t crawl over to Ortega and give him a BJ.
GarandFan on April 20, 2009 at 7:07 PM
It depends. Does Chavez have any highly communicable diseases?
Daggett on April 20, 2009 at 7:17 PM
Chavez called him an ignoramous before the handshake, if memory serves. It’s kind of hard to imagine where Obama’s line is, but is there any doubt he is the very model of a beta male at this point?
capitalist piglet on April 20, 2009 at 7:35 PM
I really think minimizing and mitigating unpleasant events in an effort to display an “See?! I’m very very fair” attitude achieves just the opposite. It’s very unfair to what is right and what is true.
Obama could have shaken Chavez’s hand in a presidential manner, not as if he was greeting a long lost friend with a big goofy grin and two hands clasping to underscore his joy at the encounter.
Obama did not have to remark on how he is a book reader (I am not being paranoid to interpret a dig at President Bush there, he who in fact is a voracious reader) and could have and should have included some pro-American comment along with his words on accepting the tome.
But also on Ortega, Obama did NOT merely make a “quip” about the length of Ortega’s diatribe. He said:
When I heard this I was appalled. Charles Krauthammer had the same reaction and noted on today’s Fox News roundtable that Obama’s narcissism apparently knows no bounds. He’s not there representing himself, he’s representing this country. Yet he again gives tacit endorsement to the content of Ortega’s rant and also manages to work in a reference to himself.
Unreal.
Let’s please try to focus and comment on what really happened and was said and then we can discuss whether we’re being fair rather than misrepresenting in order to appear so.
KittyLowrey on April 20, 2009 at 8:20 PM
It was the huge grin that pushed it over the top.
amkun on April 20, 2009 at 11:35 PM
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