I’d get flayed for putting this on the other blog, so I’ll put it here. James Fallows has an interesting analysis of Obama’s trip to China. Far from being an embarrassment, some genuine progress was made.

The difference is that where Bush went in with useless bluster — bluster being the only thing that the Right Wing Echosphere cares about — Obama went in with quiet negotiation. Foreign policy should be like an iceberg — 90% of it being invisible to the public. I have no idea if any of it is going to work in the end (and nothing, it seems, can fix Israel). And I suspect that, as always, I won’t like some of what Obama does. But I like the long-term approach.

Honestly, it sometimes seems like the punditshere learned everything the know about foreign relations by playing Civilization.