Do you all remember all of the hoopla about Obama being weak and "selling us out" when he smiled and shook hands with Hugo Chavez? And I'm sure you can all remember the chest beating that took place for the last eight years.
"Wanted... Dead or Alive!"
"You are either with us or against us!"
and my personal favorite....
"Bring 'em on!"
As he sits safely behind his podium under the watchful eye of the secret service.
As Denzel Washington's character pointed out in the movie 'American Gangster'
The loudest one in the room is the weakest one in the room.
Obama is a chameleon. He can bring the Havard intellect. He can connect with inner city youth and speak their language. He can reach into the homes of the single working mom, Jim the construction worker and Bob the CEO and connect with them.
The reason he can do these things is because his background is so diverse.
On camera Obama the does what good statesmen do. He acts in a dignified and appropriate manner. He could have publicly snubbed him but that's not Obama's style.
So Hugo Chavez sees this young, energetic and relatively docile new President and figures he can condescendingly "educate" him with an anti-American book. What Mr. Chavez didn't realize is that this [seemingly] sheepish, optimistic new President also spent time on the streets of Chicago.
Obama said screw talking tough to the cameras. I'm going to get into this guy's face. No media rhetoric, no public threats and no public denouncements. He thinks he can walk all over me and I'm going to make sure he knows otherwise. We could have had weeks of coverage of the same old back and forth between the leaders of two countries. Instead, Obama metaphorically bitch-slapped him right then and there.
Did you see the look on his face? It's priceless!
And here's the cherry on top. A large portion of Chavez's power is based on his anti-American platform. When the media cameras were running Obama smiles and shakes hands with him - effectively neutralizing the wind at his sails.
Chavez must have went home that day thinking 'what the fuck just happened?'