News Watch NewsBusters Shout-Out On Obama Refusal To Defend Japan Nuking

November 15th, 2009 7:44 AM

On Friday, this NewsBuster noted how Pres. Obama, questioned at a news conference in Japan, twice refused to say whether he thought the United States' dropping of atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki was "the right decision."

Yesterday on Fox News Watch, Jim Pinkerton noted the NewsBusters nugget.  The Fox News contributor and New America Foundation fellow observed that PBO's failure had huge implications for America's nuclear deterrent.

Video after the jump of PBO's duck-and-cover at the Tokyo press conference.

It was panelist Judy Miller's pronouncement about PBO's proclivity to jump on any airplane in sight that set things off . . .

JUDY MILLER: Why isn't the constant travel a story? Why isn't the fact that the man has never seen an airplane he doesn't want to get onto or a speech he doesn't want to give a story? I mean, where is the media skepticism that we're supposed to be expecting from all of us.

JON SCOTT: You've worked in the White House, Jim [for Presidents Reagan and George H.W. Bush].  Isn't it the case that when you've got problems at home you hop on a plane and go generate some headlines overseas?

JIM PINKERTON: That is totally true, although in the Reagan years when unemployment went to 10%, [the MSM] managed to find an angle every day.  CBS News did a famous special called People Like Us, that was all about people suffering hour after hour.

I will say this, though: that when he goes overseas, you've got to watch him as well.  Mark Finkelstein, I think, was the first to catch it, at NewsBusters, when he noted that Obama wouldn't answer a question: do you think that the bombing of Hiroshima by Pres. Truman that ended WWII back in 1945 was a good idea?  And he dodged the question. This is huge in its implications not only for Pres. Truman's legacy, but also for our nuclear deterrent, which Obama clearly doesn't think much about.