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Charlie Sykes: Sykes Writes

FRIDAY HOT READ: WHO WAS HU?

By Charlie Sykes

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The Washington Post's Dana Milbank was struck by how our "transparent" president spread American values in China.

Listening to President Obama and his Chinese counterpart this week, it was hard to tell who was Hu.

One is the leader of a great democracy. The other is the head of a repressive regime. But as the two men faced reporters in Beijing's Great Hall of the People, Obama deferred to the wishes of President Hu Jintao: They would not take questions. In lieu of this rite of freedom, the two leaders exchanged platitudes. ...

It was, to put it charitably, a low-key way of spreading American values. A decade earlier, in that very same hall, President Bill Clinton criticized China's Tiananmen Square crackdown during a news conference with then-President Jiang Zemin. President George W. Bush, no fan of the media, made Hu squirm at the White House three years ago when he insisted that they take questions from U.S. and Chinese journalists.

Obama, by contrast, didn't hold a news conference in China.

**

Bonus read: What did The One actually accomplish on his Asian junket besides bowing to the Japanese emperor? Fred Barnes says, bupkus.

 

Has a president ever been less successful on a trip overseas than President Obama has on his eight-day excursion to Asia? I've been covering presidents since Gerald Ford and I can't think of one.

Obama struck out on his entire agenda in China and he acquiesced as the Chinese subjected him to the humiliation of a choreographed town hall meeting with student members of the Young Communist League. And he suffered through a 30-minute news conference with Chinese President Hu Jintao in which no questions from the media were allowed. Presidents normally come away on visits to foreign countries with "deliverables"--that is, tangible signs of progress like a treaty signing. All Obama got was a list of things the United States and China would do in the future. There's a name for this: diplomatic boilerplate.

 

 

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  1. Whitefish Bay Mike - Nov 20, 2009 7:02 AM

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    This is what happens when you elect a man who's never had to live in the real world on his own, without some person or organization protecting him from the blows of chance. He thinks it's all just debating team gamesmanship, and in the end, you get an A just for showing up and being a good sport, i.e. bowing to everyone.

  2. John Gault - Nov 20, 2009 7:45 AM

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    We elected a man who does not hold to the same basic freedoms as most Americans do. He is an elitist who would rather not be among the unwashed. He feels more comfortable with people who thinks like he does.

  3. ijeff - Nov 20, 2009 8:11 AM

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    Have we ever had a president so ignorant of history? If he merely studied Ronald Reagan he'd know better. I presume he prefers the liberal caricature of Reagan that has been so thoroughly discredited by reality.

  4. Bjorn Yesterday - Nov 20, 2009 10:47 AM

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    Would you want to be in the country as its falling apart if you didn’t have to? As the Chinese say “Man who bows leaves gaping hole exposed in his agenda”.

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