I admit that when I saw the photo of Tampa Mayor Pam Iorio meeting President Obama on the tarmac at MacDill Air Force Base last week, I thought that critics of the President might seize upon the shot as seemingly another example of him bowing to another official (albeit not a foreign official, which really set them off). If memory serves, it was noted in the local press that Obama was leaning into listen to the Mayor.
But that's not how it's being played out in the conservative blogosphere. On the site RedState, a blogger writes:
The mayor of Tampa isn’t a Third World potentate, totalitarian dictator, or terrorist leader so I can’t understand why Obama would be in full-bow mode. Is bowing now the standard way the President greets people these days? Is he misoriented, for some reason, and thinks Tampa is a terrorist stronghold or an enemy of the United States? Does the US owe Tampa a boatload of money and the bow just good business practice?
From the Web site Ace of Spades:
I guess I don't mind so much when he's bowing to an American. I'm not happy about it, but bowing to foreign heads of state pegs my OH HE DID NOT meter while this just rises to "what a buffoon"-levels of presidential misbehavior.
The liberal media watchdog group Media Matters has a clip on their site today showing the folks at Fox & Friends had a good chortle about this Monday morning on their program.
This article appears in Jan 27 – Feb 2, 2010.