Is Obama a leader?

Recently the leader of China Hu Juntao has made a request of the white house that President Obama not meet with the Dalai Lama. The Dalai Lama is a world renown public speaker worldwide, often described as charismatic, he promotes ethics and interfaith harmony world wide. In 1989 he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. In 2007 he was awarded the United States Congressional Gold Medal of Honor in October. He has received more than 100 honorary conferment’s and major awards. In November or 2008 he announced his semi retirement. No longer the ruler of the Tibetan government in exile; they are now a parliamentary government.



I wondered why it would be so important for the Chinese government to continue to go after the Dalai Lama when he is no longer in power?


At best his influence is limited to humanitarian causes and Buddhist teachings.


But why China does not like the Dalai Lama is not as important as why China feels it has the position of influence to make such a demand.


China does own about 350 billion of our debt but this number out of 1.4 trillion is about one quarter. These numbers are off of wikipedia. But economists know that the old saying, “if you owe the bank a million, your in trouble, if you owe the bank several billion than the bank is also in trouble. China, by buying up so much of our national debt is now inexorably tied to us financially. But the sheer magnitude of the amount means that they can’t dump the Us dollar with out severely harming there own economy. So essentially even though they may feel entitled by there investment to dictate who our president can and can’t talk to they have no real leverage.


The key lies with President Obama. And the question - is he a leader?


If he does bend to the demand of china this is a small thing on the surface but a huge event concerning the credibility of the united states. With China receiving 15% of it’s oil from Iran, and Chinese businesses invested in Iran to the tune of over 100 billion this directly speaks to the strength of America.


We as a country can still be a part of the international community while still being a leader of the free world. As our leadership goes, so the country goes.


The president can not afford to cow-tow to what are silly demands that could have huge respect repercussions. In a global community that has been frankly laughing at us behind our backs and defying us to our face. I.e. Iran.


Please Mr. president, regardless of your policies, please be the leader that we need.