Jonathan, I wanted to (hopefully) close the circle on our exchange by making two points. First, you stated that President Bush “only” met privately with the Dalai Lama. Clearly that is not “only” what he did. Second, where should President Bush have met with him? In Lafayette Park?
Presidential meetings with foreign leaders tend to be private, unless there is a ceremony in which they appear together publicly — which, in this case, they did.
In addition, Bush met several other times with the Dalai Lama — in 2001, in 2003, and in 2005. See this story — and picture — of Bush and the Dalai Lama in White House.
So President Bush met several times with the Dalai Lama. Pictures were released. And Bush appeared in public with the Dalai Lama, where the president presented him with the U.S. Congress’s highest civilian honor and, for good measure, urged Chinese leaders to welcome him to Beijing. And I’m not sure it’s fair to blame Bush for not meeting publicly with the Dalai Lama and then, having been reminded that he did, dismiss it as “one photo op in the rotunda” — especially since that “one photo op in the rotunda” also turned out to include several photo ops in the White House.
Debating Bush’s policy on China is another topic for another day. My point was a fairly simple and narrow one: Bush did a good deal more with the Dalai Lama than your original post said. That’s all I was pointing out.