Vladimir Putin is better at taekwondo than you are, probably
In late October, Forbes made some waves when theydeclared that President Barack Obama was no longer the most powerful person in the world and that it was instead Russia’s President Vladimir Putin. They cited his iron-grip over a country that has a “permanent seat on the UN Security Council and some of the world's largest oil and gas reserves.”
Well, now he’s getting recognition for being powerful in another way: his mastery of taekwondo. Yes that’s right, President Putin has just been awarded the highest possible rank in the martial art, a ninth-degree black belt, by the World Taekwondo Federation.
The World Taekwondo Federation, by the way, charmingly refers to itself as “WTF.” Not even lyin’. In a press release, they wrote “WTF President Chungwon Choue today awarded Russian President Vladimir Putin an honorary 9thdan (degree) black belt certificate and a taekwondo dobok (uniform) in recognition of President Putin's work in developing taekwondo in Russia.”
But what is the significance of a black belt? We took a spin on over to the American Taekwaondo Association’s explanation of the belts, and about the black belt they wrote, “The color black is created when all the colors of the light spectrum have been absorbed into an object. That object has "taken control" of the colors and retained them. If one color was to "escape", the object would no longer be black but would appear as that color.”
So, uh, yeah, that pretty much sounds like this guy. Especially the taking control part. As the BBC reports, this isn’t his first ride at the ol’ martial arts achievement rodeo. He has a black belt in judo.
Does this mean our country sits in peril, one judo chop or taekwondo kick away from submitting to Russian masters in a winner-takes-all octagon fight? Nah. But…maybe let’s get Joe Biden some karate classes to be safe.
