McCain had to rummage through his 71 year old brain to come up with a classic early example of what Atrios calls "the stupid" in our political discourse. McCain in Miami:
"Roosevelt didn't talk with (Adolf) Hitler, Reagan didn't talk with (Soviet leader Leonid) Brezhnev or his two successors until (Mikhail) Gorbachev was ready to change his position. Reagan didn't do what Jimmy Carter did. Carter went over and kissed Brezhnev, remember?" he said.
Obama must renounce, deject kissing enemy leaders so the Democrats do not lose ground on national security issues. Republican President might hold hands with foreign leaders but it stops right there. We all remember Nixon holding off a passionate Kruschev during the famous "bedroom debate" of 1959.
The event that McCain referred to was at a treaty signing in 1979.
The superpowers had agreed new limits on strategic arms in June 1979 -- completing the SALT II treaty.
Carter met Brezhnev for the first time when they both came to Vienna to sign the treaty.
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Interview: Anatoly Dobrynin, Soviet ambassador to U.S.A.
"So the treaty was signed. Marshall Ustinov asked Gromyko, 'Are they going to kiss each other?' because Brezhnev liked to kiss. Gromyko said, 'I don't know, we'll see.' Ustinov said: 'No, they aren't.' Gromyko said, 'I'm not sure.' Brezhnev began to kiss Carter and Carter was forced to kiss Brezhnev, for which the American media gave him a telling off."
George Stephanopoulos recalls how Bill Clinton avoided a passionate hug from an enemy during a treaty signing that included Arafat.
In September, in a historic moment, perhaps the biggest foreign policy success of the first year is the handshake with Arafat and Rabin. But this has to be carefully choreographed, because the wrong picture can send the wrong message. So what do you do to prep for that?
We didn't have a lot of time, but we did an awful lot of prep for a single handshake. We actually choreographed it. We did dress rehearsals in my office on the Saturday. There were about four of us, Rahm and John Podesta, and a couple of others. Everybody played a character and tried to figure out which order the handshakes go in. And we got all that worked out on Saturday.
But then the final dress rehearsals didn't come until we got to the Oval Office the morning of the event. And the big concern that morning was not the handshake itself, but the potential hug. And there was a deep concern that all of these months and years of negotiations would be upset by Arafat's exuberance -- when Clinton reached over to shake Arafat's hand, he would reach over to Clinton and hug him. And that would just be unacceptable to the Israelis, who were happy to be signing this agreement, but didn't want it to be seen like purely a moment of great joy.
How did they prep to avoid a hug?
Tony Lake is playing Arafat. And Clinton comes up with the defensive maneuver that he would use in case Arafat goes for the hug. If Arafat went for the hug, Clinton would squeeze in underneath the biceps and block him. If that didn't work, he'd do a knee to the groin. Everybody broke up laughing
Can we trust Obama to know how to reject the passionate advances of lusty enemy leaders? Our country is in danger.