Sunday, 22 November 2009
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Hype Over Substance
Obama Returns From His Asian Fluff and Stuff Tour
Rock Star Pres Barack Hussein Obama II returned from his Asian Fluff and Stuff self promotion tour alive and well. At least those are two things we can point to that were accomplished.
Of course the end result was "they liked him". Whew! Now that is a huge relief. Asia likes Obama better than they liked Bush. For a second I thought the whole tour was a waste !
SNL does their take on the Obama tour in China.
So how did that translate out in policy decisions? They liked him, but they weren't about to be told what to do, nor were they swooned by his charisma. They spotted Obama's hype over substance and just figured it for another act in the Pacific Theater.
Update:
Victor David Hanson had a good recap of the tour in his column Circling Sharks Smell American Blood (link) Hanson posits:
On his trip to Asia, President Obama found China, Japan and South Korea — like many nations these days — in no mood to hear more American lectures.
Beijing is worried about owning so much American debt. Tokyo is tiring of an American military base in Okinawa, and wants to redefine its relationship with us. Seoul is starting to doubt American commitment to keep it safe from North Korea.
Why all the sudden pushback to our charismatic president?
Our dollar is crashing, while the price of gold is soaring. The budget deficit has never been worse — and the president wants to float even more debt for health care and energy initiatives.
By the end of this presidential term, we may add another $9 trillion to our already astronomical $11 trillion debt. Unemployment has already topped 10%. This quarter's trade deficit reached a near-historic high. Our debtors and oil exporters talk of scrapping the dollar as the common international currency.
American hesitation abroad reflects the shaky economic news. In Afghanistan, we can't decide whether to seek victory or admit defeat — or simply vote present by keeping the status quo.
President Obama reached out to enemies like Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran and Hugo Chavez of Venezuela. But so far they remain unimpressed, despite his apologizing for an assortment of supposed past American sins.
The Chinese don't listen all that much anymore to our sermons on their human-rights, coal-burning and free-trade abuses — not when they hold $1.5 trillion in U.S. assets. ..more (link)
So back to the original point I was making with sarcasm, how much are we spending on this dog and pony show anyway? It is more important to get it right than sending out Obama our on tour like another Ringling Brothers Side Show.
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Comments (14)
Someone liking you is not the epitome of diplomacy. A lot of people don't understand that. Heck, someone liking you can be a very bad thing since its entirely possible that they like you because they realize that they can roll over you like a steamroller over a leaf.
China has no reason to negotiate with us since they are the economic powerhouse and likely have a military of comparable strength to what we do. Japan isn't likely to discuss much since as I understand it one of the big issues for them is the closure of our military bases there which our government won't even entertain as a theoretical.
@mrcolorful - PART a) Spot on Tim. There are a lot of people who command respect that you neither like nor dislike, it is the position, not the person. That is one error of his worldview, among many.
@ProvokingThought - There are a lot of errors in his worldview. However, those errors aren't just in his worldview, they are in the worldviews of many many other people both in government and out of government.
@mrcolorful - that worldview is readily propogated in our public school system, as you are well aware.
@ProvokingThought - I am well aware of that, much more so than most everyone I know.
@mrcolorful - I meant to say on your first point that is one of the things that frustrated me the most with recent graduates who came into mgmt. training programs-they were trying to get people to like them, especially other department heads. They didnt get that you treat people with respect and common courtesy but doing your job is not normally conducive to people liking you. In fact, it is conducive to being manipulative.
OTOH, they did not see the value of having a repore with the employee but wanted to be either a hard nose I am the boss or their friend (kind of like parenting) THey didnt get the lead by example is where respect is built. It is one of the most common failures of managers, the need to be liked. The second is similar-not seeing any need to having good working relationships built on respect and trust.
BTW, I added a update to this that increases its relevance.
VDH is one of my favorite commentators.
@soccerdadforlife - I have a high rate of sharing opinions with VDH.
At least SNL is showing Obama's "show" for what it is...
@ProvokingThought - Schools being out of touch with reality does create a lot of problems.
@firetyger - That is surprising.
@mrcolorful - Seems the comedians are the only ones getting it right these days
@firetyger - Yup...
Shoot. I can't see the SNL clip.