Well, not really. Is this really so? Will he not attend?
1. Germany is going to have to wait longer than expected for US President Barack Obama’s first official visit. Citing government sources in Berlin, Reuters reported on Friday that Obama will not attend the anniversary festivities marking two decades since the fall of the Berlin Wall. – Spiegel Online/International
2. Spouses and even children–researchers combing the Stasi files after the Wall fell were horrified to discover the payroll included 10,000 informers under the age of 18–were potential eyes and ears of the regime; friends were suspect; and strangers were presumed to be Stasi until proven innocent, and probably well beyond that. “Relations between people were conditioned by the fact that one or the other of you could be one of them,” writes Australian journalist Anna Funder in Stasiland: True Stories from Behind the Berlin Wall. “Everyone suspected everyone else, and the mistrust this bred was the foundation of social existence.” – Glenn Garvin, Reason
3. The pivotal scene in the magnificent new ( OPS: it’s a 2006 film) German movie The Lives of Others–which won the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film last week–takes place in an elevator. The year is 1984, and the occupant of the elevator is a severe and profoundly intelligent senior functionary of the East German security service named Wiesler. A stray word about the inhumanity of Stasi interrogations, or a joke about the dictator Erich Honecker, is all Wiesler needs to hear to make a simple mark on a piece of paper that will ruin someone’s life. – John Podhoretz, The Weekly Standard
UPDATE: Communist-era store windows, via boing boing.
Is he still mad cause Merkel didn’t want him to speak at the Brandenburg Gate prior to the election?
Very interesting how radical leftists use those under 18. Obama has used his younger supporters in this same way – encouraging them to turn in bloggers who didn’t support His leftist vision.
So ‘Stasi’ Obama is now engaged in trying to control Fox News. We’ll see what DDR methods Team Obama can dredge up to shut down the free press.
At least Obama throws in a bit of humor here and there, such as by rolling out Joe Biden to be the expert policy wonk on Afghanistan. ( for more humor this week, you can hit: http://www.conservativeblog.thewebinfocenter.com/conservative-blog/where-the-real-wild-things-are )
We all need a laugh after these past nine months. We’ll need a lot more until 2012.
I served on attack submarines in the US Navy during the mid 70’s and saw, up front and close, what the Soviet Union was about when it came to projecting its military force. And, at some risk, since that was dangerous duty. I remember watching the Berlin Wall coming down, live on television, through my tears, because I’d thought I’d never see that happen in my lifetime. And now, this callow, inexperienced and insensitive Chicago politician has found yet another group of people to throw under the bus. Not just we veterans of that struggle in the West, but the brave people behind the Iron Curtain who struggled as we did. My stomach churns and I shudder to think what we all will reap from this cheap and tawdry sowing of the winds.
Brooks
“The Lives of Others” is a really excellent film.
Brooks,
Obama has apologized for what you did when you defended our country, and he has handed the Russians a reset button so that they can rebuild the Soviet Union.
Sol, not only that, but people behind Obama want to transform the Union of American States into the Soviet Union.
I still regret my failure to follow through on a plan to go to Berlin for New Years Eve as the Wall came down. A friend’s kids went and brought him back a piece of the Wall. I was worried about finding a hotel room, etc, and missed one of the seminal events of the century.
A guy I knew in medical school was traveling around in Europe hitchhiking when the Wall was put up in 1961. He had already visited East Berlin but decided he wanted to go back to see the Wall. He hopped a freight through East Germany and rode in a gondola car to West Berlin. If they had caught him, he would have been a cooked goose but he got there and saw the Wall.
At the time, I was busy having my reserve unit called up. I spent a year on active duty then was able to go back to medical school.
Maybe Obama thinks the wrong side won the Cold War and doesn’t want to see anyone celebrate. Just kidding.
I’ll post a link to an article describing a trip to both of the countries mentioned in the post above.
Regretfully, I only read it now and not a 1.5 months ago when it was written. Excellent observations.