The Obama bow to the Saudi King

Ok, another conservative ruckus over the bow to the Saudi King. What’s wrong with these Americans ? It may not be meant as a bow but if it is, what’s the big deal ? Is it wrong to show a bit of courtesy and maybe observing some customs of the other party. It just exposes how extremely insecure and narrow these people are. They are afraid to show weakness and any outward attempt by our president to show respect and deference is automatically taken as a sign of shame. What happened to us, have we become Chinese all of a sudden where saving one’s face is more important than substance in politics ? We all know the power equation that exists between nations today. Why do we have to fear what the Saudis think of us or, for that matter, what others think of us. It is pretty obvious still who’s boss today but of course that is slowly eroding away. And it will erode away faster if we don’t do something to save the economy, health-care, energy, education, blah. Sooner or later, future presidents will really end up bowing to Saudi kings for fear of them turning off the oil taps. It is a ploy to buy time. Whether we drill baby drill ( which is not a viable long term solution ) or we transition to other energy sources, we still need time to implement solutions to the energy problem. In the meantime, we need to make sure oil does not go to 10 bucks a gallon if not we all have to kowtow to the Saudi king. C’mon, people, the issue is not whether President Obama bows to the Saudi king, the issue is our president is telling us in no uncertain terms that we have to put our energies to coming up with alternative clean energy sources so that we do not have to coddle these monarchs in future any more. So shut the frak up and get to work instead of whining !