DICK CHENEY GOT HIS PANTIES IN A BUNCH! SO WHAT IF THE PRESIDENT BOWED TO THE JAPANESE EMPEROR! ISENT THAT THE CUSTOM IN JAPAN!

Dick Cheney is blasting Barack Obama for plunging the presidency to a new low - by bowing to the Japanese emperor.
The White House deemed the weekend gesture as a sign of respect. But Cheney chided it was downright wimpy.

"There is no reason for an American president to bow to anyone," Cheney complained to the Politico.com. "Our friends and allies don't expect it, and our enemies see it as a sign of weakness."

Maybe Cheney would prefer if Obama and Emperor Akihito had simply walked hand-in-hand like, as former President George W. Bush did with Saudi Crown Prince Abdullah in 2005 - a traditional sign of Middle Eastern friendship.

Or perhaps Cheney is forgetting that ex-President Richard Nixon, a Republican, bowed in 1971 to Akihito's father, Emperor Hirohito - who ruled when Japan bombed Pearl Harbor in 1941.

No matter, Obama's bow - a full-on, bend-to-the-waist affair - had the Miss Manners set all atwitter yesterday as those on both sides debated the diplomatic meaning of the gesture.

State Department spokesman Ian Kelly told reporters that the bow was "a sign of respect to the emperor."

In an online State Department posting from 2007 titled "Protocol for the Modern Diplomat," envoys are advised to be aware of greeting rituals such as kisses, handshakes or bows and to follow a country's tradition.

"Failure to abide with tradition may be interpreted as rudeness or a lack of respect for colleagues," advises the posting, which make no mention of whether the rules should apply to a President as well.

Others suggested that if Obama flubbed, it was not in bowing to Akihito but in then following the bow with a vigorous handshake - something not normally done.

White House officials suggested that the bow was simply an extension of Obama's pledge, first made during last year's campaign, to scale back the so-called "cowboy diplomacy" of Bush and set a more respectful, engaged tone with the world.

"This is part of what the president says all the time - that he wants to be mindful of other cultures," one senior administration official told Politico. "That doesn't take anything away from our culture."

Many conservatives, however, complained that Obama's deference had gone too far.

"Maybe he thought it would play well in Japan," said conservative pundit William Kristol. "But it's not appropriate for an American President to bow to a foreign one."

Nonsense, said longtime Democratic activist Donna Brazile.

"I think it's a gesture of kindness," she told CNN, adding that the bow appeared intended to show "goodwill between two nations that respect each other."

John Park, a senior researcher at the U.S. Institute of Peace think tank, said it is a respectful tradition for visitors to bow to the emperor in a formal setting.

But, he said, "We're in an environment right now where everything is hypersensitive. Any type of move that you do, there will be some group that sees some sort of message within all that."