If I Shake Your Hand in Greeting at a Memorial Service for Nelson Mandela — Does that Mean I Approve of You and the Government You Represent? — a Comment on Why Bombs and Missiles Will always Come First for Reflexively Aggressive People Like Senators McCain and Rubio — and the Irony of these Nitwits Making the Comments They Did — while in Temporal Proximity to the Applauded Meaning of Nelson Mandela’s Life

© 2013 Peter Free

 

10 December 2013

 

 

Gosh, can you think of a stupider thing to get incensed about?

 

President Obama shook Cuban President Raul Castro’s hand at the memorial service commemorating Nelson Mandela’s life and passing:

 

 

Arriving on stage at FNB stadium in Johannesburg to pay tribute to Nelson Mandela, President Barack Obama shook hands with dozens of other world leaders, pausing briefly to grasp the hand of Cuban President Raul Castro.

 

The greeting quickly sparked a strong debate on Twitter between those who praised and disagreed with the handshake, given that the United States does not share diplomatic relations with Cuba.

 

© 2013 Jill Dougherty, A brief but important handshake between Obama, Castro, CNN Politics (10 December 2013)

 

 

Naturally there was outrage from representatives of the Predictable Gang of White Boys and White Boy Wannabes

 

Tom Kludt reported:

 

 

"It gives Raul some propaganda to continue to prop up his dictatorial, brutal regime, that's all," McCain said of the handshake between the two world leaders that took place at a memorial service for Nelson Mandela.

 

When asked if Obama should have extended his hand, McCain was quick to respond.

 

"Of course not," the senator said. "Why should you shake hands with somebody who's keeping Americans in prison? I mean, what's the point?"

 

Then, after a slight pause, McCain went there.

 

"Neville Chamberlain shook hands with Hitler," he added.

 

Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) took a more mild jab at Obama for the handshake, arguing that the President could have at least asked Castro about human rights violations in Cuba.

 

© 2013 Tom Kludt, McCain On Obama-Castro Handshake: 'Chamberlain Shook Hands With Hitler', TPM Livewire (10 December 2013)

 

By those standards we would not be shaking anybody’s international hands.

 

 

Perhaps a drone threat would have satisfied this illustrious duo of airheads

 

Something along the lines of:

 

 

Mr. Evil President Castro, we’re gonna drone ya and all yer Commie rabble.

 

No back talk, now.  Ya hear?

 

Yup.  That’d be good.  Diplomacy how it should be done.  Right?

 

 

The moral? — When you’re too stupid to recognize that talk and occasional forgiveness solve problems . . .

 

You concentrate on dumb stuff, like who shook whose hand.

 

Apparently, Senators McCain and Rubio are both too red-meat-headed to understand the forgiveness implications of Nelson Mandela’s life.  And too hypocritical to see all the rights-stomping that the United States itself does, every day.