Dec 20 2008
A shoe in the hand is worth two thrown at Bush?
I think everyone on the planet has heard about the shoe-throwing incident that occurred earlier this week during George W. Bush’s unannounced visit to Iraq. I won’t start in on how long it took the Secret Service to step in or question how much longer people will be allowed to wear shoes around the presence (at least he wasn’t wearing heels, right?). I won’t parody what happened, even though the subject matter does lend itself to jest.
No, I want to know why an Iraqi reporter would throw his shoes at President Bush at this particular moment. I understand that his shoes were a close-by projectile and that he is most likely upset with Bush’s foreign policy; I can follow that part. But why now? I found a clip of Bush’s reaction, writing the reporter’s actions off as an attention-getting ploy.
There must be more to this than a simple publicity stunt. I assume that he plays off the attack in an effort to appear strong to the public. And while shoe-throwing is not the most intimidating tactic one can come up with, I still question the reporter’s motives.
Unfortunately I cannot find very much information about exactly what W. was doing over there in the first place, but I know he was signing some sort of security agreement. As he threw his shoes, the reporter yelled in Arabic that it was a farewell gift from the Iraqi people. Is there more than meets the eye here? Is this act a protest against George W. Bush? The agreement he signed? His other actions while in office? America? Non-Iraqis? There are so many possible grievances at stake that I can’t even begin to fathom this man’s reasoning. Any thoughts?
