I just came back from a seminar on how to organize and support patriot media - and I can tell you that resistance to our oppressors is alive and well - even vigorous. Now, before I catch up on my sleep, I will send you the rest of the newsy items and Letters to the Zundelsite I caught and collected for the past few days:
* From an article written by journalist Tony Paterson, plans to build an expensive American embassy next to the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin
". . . have provoked a distinctly undiplomatic row between Germany and America.
"John Kornblum, the normally respected US ambassador, is accused by Berliners of arrogance and rudeness bordering on imperialism."
Kornblum, for his part,
". . . argues that his hosts are displaying a complete absence of gratitude for America's role in defending the city during the Cold War." He would like his embassy to be completely surrounded by a 30-metre wide cordon.
The Berlin city government ". . . insists that this would involve moving roads and disrupt access to the Brandenburg Gate - a symbol of restored German unity and a great tourist attraction."
Writes Germany's influential Der Spiegel magazine, commenting on the touchy issue:
"US ambassador John Kornblum is putting a strain on German-American relations because of his stubborn and rude attitude. There is already speculation about when he will leave Berlin."
Mr Kornblum doesn't like such hints with the fence post, as we say. He complained recently in a US newspaper about "these permanent diatribes about the arrogant Americans" in the German press.
He is also reported to have complained to a group of American journalists visiting Berlin that the Germans were "beginning to behave like a superpower".
The article goes on to say:
"Others have accused Mr Kornblum of turn-of-the-century 'imperial nostalgia' and 'failing to accept that Germany had changed since reunification'."
Pouts Ambassador Kornblum: "We defended this place for 40 years."
At public gatherings such as a recent opening of Berlin's Transatlantic Centre, Mr Kornblum opined that a reunited Germany still needed time before it could "strike the right tone" in the international arena.
Furthermore, at a reception given by the US Consulate in Munich, Mr Kornblum is reported to have given Uwe Zimmer, the editor of the city's tabloid newspaper AZ, a public dressing down. On that occasion, the haughty American ambassador informed the German editor:
"I don't read such papers."
Mr Zimmer, for his part: "I felt as if I had been belted round the ear."
Said Dr. Birnbaum, an American sociology professor, credited with the "imperial nostalgia" comment:
"In some respects Kornblum is a survivor from a bygone epoch."
* A ZGram reader wrote:
". . . as to books, I came across a fair stash of the Deborah Lipstadt 1993 book (title escapes me) excoriating "holocaust Revisionists" the other day- in a Half-Price Book store. The S&S (Simon and Schuster?) firm who printed it had it listed at 24.95. It was on sale for $5.00, and there were an awful lot of copies on a table with civil war rejects, and poly sci dry as dust books. It seems the Wiesenthalers are losing market share. . ."
* Another of my faithful readers, commenting on the Pokemon controversy:
"The swastika is at minimum 6,000 years old, and is _venerated_ by Hindus, Buddhists, and Shintos. To cast scorn on it is no different than protesting the cross or the star of David. In this case, the ADL and its associates have definitely crossed the line into flat-out religious intolerance and religious bigotry."
* And, finally, a bit about that Jewish intellectual renegade, political scientist Norman Finkelstein, who took on the despicable Jonah Goldhagen who developed the thesis that all Germans carry the criminal gene:
"A look at past experiences suggests that the Jewish Claims Conference is not the least bit interested in justice and that the actual Jewish survivors will see very little of the money that is eventually paid. The true profiteers of any compensation agreement will be Jewish associations which falsely claim to represent the survivors of the Holocaust.
"If German or Swiss people do not want to pay compensation, then the righteous outrage among the organised American Jewry is virtually boundless. But when Jewish associations steal from Jews, morals are left outside the door. It's only a question of money.
"Ultimately, one must be permitted to ask who all the needy Holocaust survivors actually are, whom the Claims Conference purports to represent."
(Taken from the English version of DER SPIEGEL, Nov. 29, 1999.)
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Thought for the Day:
"There's now an antidote to the ADL, the Jewish Anti-Defamation League. It's also called the ADL, and stands for Anti-Demonization League. You can find it on the Internet."
(overheard)