by Warner Todd Huston
BigGovernment.com
11/22/2009
The Japanese media has reported that Obama’s recent state visit to their island nation was a big failure, but the U.S. media is mum on the mess that Team Obama made in Japan. He made multiple diplomatic gaffs and this is quite aside from the absurdly low bow that the incompetent president perpetrated upon greeting the Japanese Emperor Akihito…
…The inappropriate bow, however, wasn’t the only mistake that Obama committed in Japan. According to the mainstream Japanese weekly magazine Shukan Bunshun the visit was termed “miserable,” and “the worst US-Japan summit meeting in history” by Japanese insiders. Worse, the Japanese government was so upset at the visit that it retaliated at various points issuing slights right back to President Obama during his stay on Japanese soil.
From a translation by an American living in Japan comes news that Obama began the trip on a sour note when, with little advanced notice, the president seemed to arbitrarily change his arrival schedule in Japan throwing Japanese officials into chaos.
Obama was originally set to land in Japan on November 12, attend a summit meeting with Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama on the 13th, and then leave for Singapore on the 14th to attend the APEC Summit meeting. But according to the Japanese magazine, on Nov. 7 the Obama Administration abruptly changed plans and rescheduled the president’s arrival for the 13th instead of the 12th, shaving a day off the visit.
… their excuse for the delay was the shooting at Ft. Hood, Texas on the US Army base on November 5. But the fact of the matter is, the memoral service was on the November 10 and only took a day trip for Obama whereupon he returned immediately to Washington. After that, he had the National Security Council meeting on policy in Afghanistan on November 11th. However, he could have departed Washington D.C. right after that and could have still landed in Japan as everyone agreed and planned on, for the 12th.
In another slight to Japan, a Japanese ruling party spokesman noted that it was obvious to them that Obama was more interested in China on this trip anyway as four days were scheduled for the Communists while only two were scheduled for them…
Read the rest at BigGovernment.
