This is one of the most disturbing things about the Obama ‘candidacy’. These vile scumbag ReThugs like Pat Buchanan and CrapHammer keep popping up with criticism’s of Obama that…

…make sense.

Is Obama to be praised and defended now because he wants to do stupid shit at the Brandenburg Gate as Booosh did on ‘his’ aircraft carrier’?

I wonder does adopting Republican memes for the campaign imagery carry over to say….

Social Security?

The occupation of Iraq?

The removal of embarrassing folks from your campaign rallies?

Sorry Jane I am not defending Obama for doing the same things Booosh did.

Nu guh happen.

And he’d better start acting a lot more like a Democrat if he wants my vote. I don’t have to tap dance on the head of a pin, ala Markos, to retain my credibilty.

Yeah funny how so many of the folks like Krauthammer thought all the posed pictures of Little Boots at Mt Rushmore (and other locales) was such a wonderful idea. I seem to recall only one photographer who shot Bush from a distance at Rushmore and actually captured the true essence of Bush when compared to his predecessors.

Oh yes, by all means — let’s not have presidential candidates using backdrops! Perhaps their entire campaign should be conducted in front of a green screen; then citizen-subjects could superimpose their candidate (or the opposition’s!) over their backdrop of choice….

Wait, didn’t Stephen Colbert already have this idea?

Even after all this time, it is still shocking how people like Kraphammer have so little self awareness.

Markos can tapdance on the head of a pin?

Is there nothing he can’t do?

Damn you, Markos!

Would it be fair to reply all when I receive e-mails about elitist, racist, or socialist Obama, with sorry I just can’t vote for a man who calls his wife a c**t and a trollop or tells and laughs about rape jokes (which by the way I still don’t get) and when Chelsea was 13 said she looked as though Janet Reno was her father.

Say what? This criticism is about using a prop. After Bush’s egregious and cynical manipulation of props, for someone to get their panties in a twist because Obama wants this prop is hypocritical and insane.

Sure, you don’t like Obama. We know that. But that’s not relevant to this piece.

Taegan Goddard’s Political Wire
Sen. Barack Obama will give a speech at the Victory Column in Berlin next week, “avoiding the Brandenburg Gate after a political spat broke out over plans to speak there,” according to Berliner Zeitung.

According to Bloomberg, “a stage will be set up at the column, a 19th-century fluted structure that lies at the opposite end of a tree-lined boulevard from the Brandenburg Gate… An appearance at the Victory Column, capped by its trademark gilded angel, will still give the Illinois senator the Brandenburg Gate as a backdrop in the distance. A political squabble erupted after Chancellor Angela Merkel expressed apprehension about the gate being used for electioneering.”

Seems the original objection was from the German Chancellor who objected to the visit being used for a political photo op rather than a visit to a foreign country for the purpose of getting information. If this is a fact finding mission it is off to a rocky start.

Ian Welsh:
Thank you!!

Reading Craphammer, Bobo, et al, doesn’t rise to the level of low-brow drama any more. They remind me of the cartoon character with the “The End Is Near” sandwich boards.

Yes, thank you Ian.

So where did “Charlez” earn the right to tell someone where they can or can’t speak?
Seen the First amendment much?
Idjit.

WaPo had better be careful, people will stop reading their shit….

Charlie, Charlie, so many things to itch, so little time. One is almost tempted to say that space on the WaPoo OpEd page has to be earned, too. But then, Holy Joe cornered the market on all the ChapStik in Metro DC, so Fred Hiatt might need to be more creative about what that means.

Kennedy, when uttering his “I am a ’sausage’” speech in Berlin (but let’s not talk, amigo, about Shrub’s misutterances and mistranslations), was willing to go to war to defend United States’ interests, of which West Berlin was a dramatic expression when Soviet troops filled East Germany. Kennedy almost went to war over Cuba, too. But his diplomatic temperament and learning curve helped him avoid it, for which we, and the school desk tops under which our forebears hid while hoping to avoid nuclear fallout, are eternally grateful.

Ronald Reagan, in comparison, took us dangerously close to war perpetuating the myth that Russia was invincible in order to buy more war toys. He outspent a reeling Soviet government into a peace it had already signaled it wanted. He did so in between illegally selling arms to little brown people in Asia so that he could finance the killing little brown people in Latin America who weren’t sufficiently humble towards their American investors.

Mr. Bush earned his many photo-op backdrops? Indeed. Taking the “Made in China” labels off the boxes in a factory where he was about to talk about American jobs and competitiveness. Taking photos with kids, fire fighters and others just before he cut their funding. Taking photos in New Orleans — flying in equipment, lights and supplies, then flying them out again when the cameras stopped rolling. All while restricting John and Mary Q. Citizen to far away “free speech” zones while he did it.

In expressing his distemper, Mr. Krauthammer ignores that it’s up to the German government where it allows visiting foreign politicians to give speeches. As long as he promises not to give the Chancellor a back rub, and not talk in Sgt. Schultz stage German, she might be happy to associate Berlin’s symbol of freedom and national unity with the American presidential candidate who has promised to be very unlike George Bush.

Chancellor Merkel is being very very stupid. If Obama or McCain want to do a photo op in your country, you let them do a photo op in your country and you smile politely. Because men like McCain and Obama have long memories and the US president is a very very powerful man.

And this smacks of meddling to me, because I am quite sure the right wing Merkel would not have objected to something similiar by McCain.

Lots of foreign leaders, like Canada’s Harper and now Germany’s Merkel, are being very very stupid this election season.

We’re lucky Marion In Savannah does it for us (and with breakfast for all!)

I keep forgetting to hit the refresh page button.

She came to visit Bush while she was running to be Germany’s chancellor, as Berlin’s gay mayor pointed out when she begin this silliness.

Ian, Good point. Merkel acts like she enjoyed her shoulders being rubbed.

Seems the original objection was from the German Chancellor who objected to the visit being used for a political photo op rather than a visit to a foreign country for the purpose of getting information.

Yes, her opinion is that election campaigns shouldn’t be held with support of other countries. Germany has to be unbiased in the presidential election in the USA. Klaus Wowereit (mayor of Berlin) would like to have Obama make that speech. He doesn’t see this as bias, and told he would welcome John McCain as well, if he wanted to make a speech.

Ah, perhaps Jody’s back. Cookies anyone? They’re fresh!

Very True Chancellor Merkel is going to have a very hard time if Obama holds a grudge.

Is Harper toast next election? I’d have to believe since he only won because Canada was PO’ed at the Liberal party because of corruption. Merkel, I don’t know what her electoral prospects are.

I don’t know how she does it. Read that shit, that is. I figure she’s got breakfast down, though. Makes great waffles.

Probably another minority government. While I expect an oil price pullback this year or first half of next, the full fall will occur in 5 or 6 years. When that happens, Harper will be out on his ass. The job in the meantime is to make sure he never gets a majority, because a Canadian PM with a majority is damn near an elected dictator and Harper wants to change some very fundamental things in ways that will fuck Canada up for decades.

Harper’s a very dangerous man, and he’s smart, but he’s also hamstrung by too much intellectual arrogance. He should have been able to get a majority but he alienated key groups which would have been willing to vote for him in larger numbers. (People attached to the forestry industry, for example, whom he sold down the river.)

Appearances mean everything to an administration built by PR hacks and a President who does whatever his Vice President asks. Chancellor Merkel may have gone on record requesting Obama to choose another site, but then we don’t know what expressions of unhappiness - to use a typical diplomatic understatement - Mr. Bush’s government may have made to Ms. Merkel.

BTW, I think the world regarded her expression as one of gobsmacked surpise and disdain, not enjoyment, when a bored American head of state gave her an on camera neck rub at an international conference.

Harper is a Canadian neocon who would be delighted to see Bush have a third term in the body of John McSame. Merkel may hesitate to offer Obama his desired stage prop, but she, Harper and every other foreign leader would take their position on such issues as a function of domestic local politics.

Given Bush’s record of brutal, petty browbeating to manufacture his coalition of the billing and to find hosts for his expensive-but-not-yet-working missile defense [sic] system, those local politics might include petty retaliations by the United States, as well as being unwilling to be close to the United States at all, given its growing reputation as a pariah state.

If Krauthammer wants less to promote less hypocrisy between appearance and reality, I suggest he clean up his own columns first, then recommend Fred Hiatt do the same.

I am with you on this one Ian, as far as I’m concerned , if I was Obama, as far as he’s come in the last 2 years, I probably would have Mt. Everest as my backdrop, LOOKING DOWN.

uh-huh.

Someone went to great lengths to ensure the backdrop for President Bush’s sales pitch Wednesday on his economic stimulus plan sent all the right messages – and none of the wrong.

Bush delivered his remarks from a warehouse floor at JS Logistics, a trucking, courier and warehouse business that provided a visual image for his argument that his proposal carries economy-boosting benefits for small businesses. The audience was flanked on all sides by piles of cardboard boxes – with additional piles in front of and behind his podium.

Each one of the hundreds of boxes had a piece of paper obscuring its “Made in China” label.

White House spokeswoman Claire Buchan laughingly attributed the clearly gargantuan paper-affixing effort to an “overzealous volunteer” on the president’s advance team.

A backdrop made-to-order for the White House filled the space directly behind Bush, which is most likely to show up on TV news clips of the event. Blaring a logo of “Strengthening America’s Economy,” it exactly mimicked the real-life box piles, down to perfectly aligned shelves.

Except the boxes on the backdrop were labeled, “Made in the USA.”

Or, dress up clothes on the Carrier…they loved it.

Did they have an “Applause” sign? I can hear the workers after Shrub left now.

Der Speigel has been covering this flap for quite a while, and it’s been pretty funny to see it play out.

Berlin Mayor Klaus Wowereit said he would love to see the candidate hold a major trans-Atlantic speech in the heart of Berlin. “We will prepare a warm welcome for him and will undertake all measures necessary so that he can deliver his message in Berlin,” Wowereit said on German television.

Many have accused Wowereit, an ambitious Social Democratic politician, of being primarily interested in the rub-off effect of being seen together with Obama, who is immensely popular in Germany. Even still, others would also like to see the speech take place. Guido Westerwelle, head of the business-friendly Free Democrats, said that any objection to the Obama speech based on the idea that only elected presidents should be allowed to speak at the Brandenburg Gate is just “bureaucratic balderdash.”

Westerwelle was referring to Merkel administration concerns that the Brandenburg Gate be turned into little more than a backdrop for political campaigning. The site played host to President Ronald Reagan’s famous “tear down this wall” speech, and President Bill Clinton also spoke there. There are even some in Obama’s campaign team that are concerned that a major speech at the Brandenburg Gate could backfire on the candidate were he to be seen as being immodest by appearing there.

The German government, however, is more concerned with other possible side-effects of the speech. An overly warm welcome for Obama could anger the Republican candidate, John McCain, as it would not exactly be a good starting point should McCain be elected this autumn. Furthermore, any indication that Berlin is over-eager to see the end of the Bush administration is not likely to play well in Washington.

Indeed, Deputy Treasury Secretary Robert Kimmitt told the mass circulation tabloid Bild that “it would be nice if the German government would focus on strengthening its contacts to us rather than already beginning to look for our successors.”

Adding to the fun is that various political opponents of Merkel’s have noted that she travelled to the US as the opposition leader trying to get some conservative political support from Bush, prior to her election as Chancellor. “Oh no — we can’t let some foreign politician try to score some electoral points over here . . .”

Fun, fun, fun . . .

Link here to Der Speigel (in English)

Preview is my friend . . .

Klaus Wowereit (mayor of Berlin) would like to have Obama make that speech. He doesn’t see this as bias, and told he would welcome John McCain as well, if he wanted to make a speech.

Some wallow in the past.
Some want to make a future.

It’s kind of heartwarming to see Krauthammer unpack his sense of irony from the mothballs, where it’s obviously been for the past eight years.

I’d love to see the size of the line item in the White House travel budget for “backdrops, Presidential, making and deployment of”. Or would that come out of the WH Press Office budget?

Those costs are buried in the “political office” under “miscellaneous expenses”

Obama will have stadium sized crowds. But Merkel has made our presumptive nominee look VERY presumptuous. I wonder how discretely this was handled by the Barack team? Were THEY clumsy, MERKEL doing some kind of political opportunism, or did MSM do its thing after Merkel’s move? Well, we all know MSM did its thing… but how early on?

Love the title of this, “Irony Runneth Over.” Yeah, this next to George Bush’s BLINDING CHUTZPAH??? GWB doesn’t even deserve to speak in front of the proposed Sewage Plant to sport his name.

Krauthammer in his OpEd in the WaPo today displayed almost all the reasons why NeoCons lack ANY sense of style (Not to mention right, wrong, civility, ethics, grace, etc..the list is endless) when they try to make any point.

These has beens’ are trying to revive something that past twenty/thirty years ago for them - any sense of reality. All they can hope to do is inspire the repub base who collectively seem to have the IQ of a Nectarine with things THEY would have like to have done but were too stupid to make it happen.

Hopefully, Krauthammer will just fade away like a smelly old pair of socks.

Seems the original objection was from the German Chancellor who objected to the visit being used for a political photo op rather than a visit to a foreign country for the purpose of getting information. If this is a fact finding mission it is off to a rocky start.

My understanding was that the Bush Administration was the first to raise the “issue” with Merkel. It was very much an “unusual” back-channel complaint to a foreign leader interfering with the time and place of a Presidential candidates public speeches.

While it’s true that Obama had nothing to do with the falling of the Berlin Wall…it is a testament to “people power” pushing governments to do the things their leaders won’t. That is a “theme” of Obama’s campaign (whether or not he actually is holding to it).

The McCain Campaign has a lot of “backdrops” that are pretty difficult to evade, though…”the hug”, the Birthday Cake on the runway while Katrina ravaged New Orleans, etc.

reported one of Ms Merkel’s top advisers had been lambasted at the recent G8 Summit in Japan by a Bush advisor over the planned Obama visit.

“Christoph Heusen, the Chancellor’s foreign policy spokesman, was approached by an adviser from the Bush team and ticked off about Obama’s plans,” the paper wrote. Ms Merkel’s government refused to comment on the allegations yesterday, but opposition politicians went on the offensive. Klaus Wowereit, Berlin’s governing Social Democrat mayor, who favours an Obama speech at the gate, warned: “Ms Merkel must be careful not to let herself be used as a pawn. It might be that she received directions from President Bush in Japan.”

Jürgen Trittin, the deputy leader of the Green party, accused Ms Merkel of “acting in the interests of President Bush and John McCain, who wants to continue Bush’s foreign policy”.

The possible Obama Brandenburg Gate speech has split the coalition German government. Frank Walter Steinmeier, the Social Democrat Foreign Minister, along with some renegade conservative and liberal politicians, backed the speech. “The Americans contributed decisively to saving the city of Berlin: that is why we should make historic sites like the Brandenburg Gate available to them,” Steinmeier said.

The above came from an article in Germany’s conservative Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung. Hardly the sort of paper that would attack Merkel without appropriate sourcing.

Thanks so much for the background on this. Enlightening.

I’d also like to point out that the Plaza in front of the Gate is one of Berlins’ largest public spaces and has been the site of classical music, as well as David Hasselhoff, Live 8, and Genesis, and Shakira “World Cup” concerts. There are public and crafts markets held there on weekends. It may be the only spot in which a large audience could see such a speech…short of holding it in a private football stadium (who pays?)

Sounds like the Obama campaign will use the Plaza but shift the podium a bit.