Iraqi Hurls Shoes at President Bush
Monday, December 15th, 2008Yesterday, during a news conference in Iraq, a man threw his shoes at the President of the United States of America (watch the BBC video). President Bush certainly knows how to duck. His comments are appropriate coming from an American cultural perspective and perhaps the most effective deflection of what is in Iraqi culture an insult. The other Iraqi journalists present who were quick to tell the President that this one man’s insult does not speak for the Iraqi people, disagree with President Bush on one matter: Bush said that the throwing of the shoes is no big deal; Every Iraqi in the room knew and felt that it was a big deal. Recently I preached through the Book of Ruth at Evergreen Presbyterian Church in Beaverton, Oregon, and what one does with his shoe/sandal in semitic cultures is a big deal. Does President Bush know the significance of the shoe insult? I don’t know (we have been accustomed to thinking that he doesn’t know much). But what is certain is that our President knows how to rise above personal conflict to serve the greater purposes thrust upon all of us in this world.