Those Who Re-Invent History
Are doomed to bollix it. Politico, with “America’s First Pacific President,” on the current president’s latest self-aggrandizement, diminishment of his predecessor, and creative rewriting of history:
TOKYO — Trying to reassure allies and rivals, President Barack Obama billed himself Saturday as “America’s first Pacific president,” promising the nations of Asia “a new era of engagement with the world based on mutual interests and mutual respect.”
Turning tough, Obama also said that the U.S. “will not be cowed by threats” from North Korea, which he said for decades “has chosen a path of confrontation and provocation, including the pursuit of nuclear weapons.”
In a slap at President George W. Bush, Obama spoke of the importance of “multilateral organizations [that] can advance the security and prosperity of this region.”
“I know that the United States has been disengaged from these organizations in recent years. So let me be clear: those days have passed,” Obama said during the first major address of a four-country Far East swing, which will continue from Japan to Singapore, China and South Korea. “As an Asia Pacific nation, the United States expects to be involved in the discussions that shape the future of this region, and to participate fully in appropriate organizations as they are established and evolve,” Obama said.
The White House wants to signal U.S. re-engagement with Asia, and the speech was designed to provide an overture to Asia similar to the outreach to the Arab world in the president’s famous Cairo address.
OK, where to start. We’ve had a few “Pacific presidents.” Nixon was born and raised within eyeshot. Reagan spent most of his adult life there. JFK boated and swam there, significantly, while engaging heavily with the Japanese, as it happens. Ditto George Bush the elder.
Speaking of positive engagement with Asia, the current president didn’t exactly invent that, either. You can go back to the middle of the 19th century, when Commodore Perry encouraged Japan to abandon its hostile isolationism under President Millard Fillmore. William McKinley ousted an autocratic foreign empire and established a foothold for enduring democracy in Asia … OK, maybe a problematic example, but all’s well that ends well. Follow-thru by TR. FDR, very heavily and postively engaged to the benefit of Asia. Ditto Truman, Eisenhower, JFK, LBJ, Nixon, for better and worse. You can quibble with the particulars of engagement with the People’s Republic of China, but you can’t say every president since Nixon hasn’t taken a stab at it, notably both Bushes. And let’s not forget George W. Bush’s landmark engagement with both India and Pakistan, as well as high levels of cooperation with China, Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand and the Philipines in the war on terrorism, as well as high-levels of multilateral cooperation on North Korea and Iran. Also, don’t forget his dad throwing up in the Japanese prime minister’s lap. Pretty significant level of engagement.
Then, we’ve got the old Bush-bashing “disengaged” with “multilateral organizations” canard. He never disengaged with them. He just never took any crap from them, and expected them to behave responsibly, refusing to succumb to what former Australian Foreign Minister Alexander Downer so aptly refered to as “multilateralism of the lowest-common denominator.”
Which is what, if Cairo and Tokyo are indicators, is a kind of engagement Obama may yet lay claim in unprecedented fashion.
To give Obama his due, living in Indonesia as a kid is a new one. Having grown up in Indonesia, East Pakistan and Thailand myself, I can assure you, it is a formative experience. The question becomes whether one’s mind is expanded or flops open as a result. Complex issues about which questions have been raised.
(So, what’s all that pan-Pacificism get us? What else … a deep kowtow. via Powerline. Gateway helpfully includes the Saudi bow vid to go with the Japanese imperial bow still, and wonders if the White House will deny this one, too. Here we go: HotAir snags some Japanese TV footage of O going low before Akihito, son of Hirohito. Riehl, hurtfully: “Let’s hope he bends over this easy in 2012.” Ha! Newspigs, awfully huffy, mix up Obama bowing to the Saudi king with Bush. And declares the United States to be a nation full of pompous assholes! Well, a bunch of them are in Japan right now. Speaking of bowing, Surber notes that under “Obamanomics,” growing U.S. exports can’t make a dent in the grownig deficit, despite the weak dollar boost.)
Anyway, like everything else, it turns out Obama invented it. All of it. Let’s hope he doesn’t catch any stomach bugs while he’s over there. He might re-invent George H.W. Bush’s lateral motley-lappism.
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Posted by Jules Crittenden at 9:57 am Comments (4) on Saturday, November 14, 2009
4 Responses to “Those Who Re-Invent History”
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November 14th, 2009 at 11:43 am
And, once again, Barack Obama shows his backside to the American public. I can’t wait to get rid of this clueless pigstain.
November 14th, 2009 at 2:14 pm
Obama is such a pompous ass. Bush also made agreements with countries like Japan and India concerning environmental issues and the exchange of new technologies to reduce green house gas emissions.
As usual Obama is making a fool of himself rather than diminishing anyone else.
November 14th, 2009 at 9:08 pm
[...] Not ready to lead (well, he wants to rule…) Baldilocks: Sand in the Tent Jules Crittenden: Those who reinvent history Comments [...]
November 15th, 2009 at 10:08 am
But…but…did those other presidents bodysurf like our Prince of Tides?
Reagan could see the Pacific from his house. too–but you didn’t see him claiming to be Pres. Vasco Núñez de Hússeiñ Balboa. He was too busy bringing down the Berlin Wall. You remember the Berlin Wall, don’t you? It was in all the papers.
We’ve elected the Fifth Beach Boy and we’re sittin’ on top of the world.