Barack Obama speaks in Berlin

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“This is our moment. This is our time.” Barack Obama in Berlin

24 July 2008 107 views 6 Comments

Obama in Berlin.Copyright CNN.com After much controversy (about the when and where) Barack Obama just delivered his much awaited speech in Berlin, Germany in front of 200,000 people.

I imagine it must have been quite a challenge to write the speech, since it had to appeal to his potential US voters, to us Germans and to Europeans alike. Not an easy task.

As it is with many political speeches - they sound great, but little will ever be done to reach all the aims proclaimed. This has to be taken into account and if we accept this as a given I would say: it was a good speech.

As far as the poor audio quality of the internet live stream (I wanted to watch and listen in English) allowed, I think there were three parts that got the most cheering from the crowd:

Obama said he that he supports a world without nuclear weapons. Tracing down free floating nuclear material and reducing the arsenals from the cold war were among his goals. That sounds fantastic, to be honest! I hope that the USA will start with their own pile of nukes, as I find it rather curious how one country, that probably owns the largest assembly of nuclear weapons, can damn others for acquiring some. Let’s hope Obama will really stick to this.
The second time the crowd went crazy - and I clapped as well, sitting on my couch - was when Obama tackled the topic of environmental preservation and cutting carbon pollution. Amazingly enough, this topic was mentioned right after world politics. After all, there seems to be hope that the next US administration, if headed by the Senator from Illinois, will be more accessible and supportive when it comes to environmental issues. Maybe all the warning and preaching Al Gore has done over the years will finally pay off.
Another surprise was Obama’s acknowledgment of his country using torture and violating human rights. He didn’t even get to finish the sentence before the crowd erupted in cheers. If we are to believe Obama (and again, I don’t call him a liar, but it’s a political speech after all), this too could end once he’s in charge.

But there were also parts about his speech that I did not like very much. Call me old fashioned, but his constant snide remarks about communism and Russia bothered me. Hey, the cold war is over! Even when I consider that those remarks were probably meant for the people “back home”, they were still inappropriate. True, the UdSSR wasn’t exactly democratic and freedom loving (and neither is Russia today), but I am sick of this country being portrayed as the big bad. As if the US didn’t heavily influence western Europe and used West Germany as a cold war playing ground. As if the methods employed by the Bush administration towards people who challenge its course of action are less scary, less cruel and more just than what the Russian government is doing. Remember the proverb about the glass house and throwing stones?

Obama also admitted that the US would not be able to solve all her problems on her own and would depend on outside help. That actually will earn him some bad press back home, I guess. After all, I can imagine that many Americans won’t like to hear that they have to depend on others. But he is right and he explicitly said that Europe, instead of continuing the icy relationship that set in when Bush started his “Either you are for us or against us” policy, should come and help the US to get back on track. Well, I guess we’d love to! And it isn’t as if didn’t try before! But really, how do you argue with a president who paints his world in black and white, good and bad, and even well meant criticism is considered an attack? I hope that Barack Obama will be open for suggestions, critique, and help even if might not come in the form he hopes for (troops, for example).

If Obama will keep to half of what he sets out to achieve, the US might really be an ally again, a partner in global politics and economy, and not a constant bully who destabilizes whole regions and offends entire nations without giving it any thought.

This was Barack Obama’s moment in Berlin. Maybe he will be able to stretch this moment of hope, promises and positive energy over a presidential term and make this our time. I wish him luck. For the sake of all of us.

NY Times article // Artikel in Zeit Online // FAZ Artikel

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6 Comments »

klti said:

I actually have a bit of a problem with candidates carrying their propaganda machinery through the whole world just to get elected. Don’t get me wrong, I think Obama would be way better than McCain, and both can’t be as worse as Bush. But you have to keep in mind, all he is thinking about right now is the upcoming elections.

You remeber how Angela merkel made her trip to the USA while she has just been opposition leader? IMHO, thats the same stuff. Just smells a bit bad.

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tschilai Reply:
July 25th, 2008 at 3:39 am

So not the same. Merkel was there inspite (or actually because) of severe tensions between US and German government because of the impending Iraq war. In my book, that was some of the worst “arschkrieching” I’ve ever seen.

Anyway, I was there, I’ll probably do a short entry in my blog later today.

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Starstuff Reply:
July 25th, 2008 at 8:01 am

I have to go with tschilai here. When Angela Merkel went to the US, she did so after our (and her) government had taken a clear stand on the Afghanistan and Iraq issue. She was completely out of place to go to the US and assure Bush of her support because she had neither the power nor the authority to do so. Talk about stabbing in the back! That is one thing I will never ever forgive her. It it would have been for her, we would be out there with the US soldiers, helping them to secure oil resources for the US and not really liberating the Iraqui people. This is also the reason I will never vote for her.

As for Obama: he is the designated democratic candidate and I think it is very smart of him to visit the countries he either will have a lot do deal with later on or the countries which’s support he needs. And, as he said, he will certainly need Europes and Germanys support, for a number of reasons. In this regard (him being on a campaign) I thought it was ok to not let him speak in front of the Brandenburg gate and not giving him a motorcycle escort as that ís reserved for country leaders. But I thought it was pretty neat that Obama chose Berlin to give his ONLY public speech during his weeklong trip. It seems that he is really serious about improving the relationship with Germany (or he just needs our troops really badly).

@tschilai: I thought you might have been there. Please, please write something about it; I’d love to hear an account from someone who was there in the masses. Or I’ll just call you if your arm is giving you a hard time.

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# 24 July 2008 at 10:30 pm

Jarsto said:

Your comments on the nature of political speeches, and playing to the prejudices of the folks back home remind me of a good quote (though I can’t recall who said it originally right now): “Democracy is the worst possible way to run a country, except for all the other methods that have been tried.”

And of course of the classical dilemma Plato creates for democracy by saying that anyone who wants power should on no account be given power. Which, in a democracy, basically means that anyone capable of getting elected should by no means be elected.

So if, on the whole, we take democracy as the least worst option for running a country, I’m pretty sure Obama is the least worst option for to be the next US President. Whether that actually means he’s a good option only time will tell. Who knows, he might prove Plato wrong.

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# 25 July 2008 at 10:38 am

Matthias said:

First of all, I was lucky being able to watch his speech on CNN. The internet live stream was poor indeed, so CNN was the only acceptable way for me to listen to his speech without an interpreter. I accidentally stumbled across a rerun of his speech yesterday night on Phoenix - oh boy, the translation was an impudence. I mean, Obama spoke real slowly and took a few breaks here and there due to cheering, but the interpreter managed to screw up anyway. She didn’t really mistranslate anything, but her monotonous voice and the mumbling rendered it unbearable. Funnily, I’ve heard that the interpreters on N24 and n-tv were even worse.

I have to agree that this speech must’ve been extremely hard to write. However, they really did a good job. No American can complain that Obama’s speech was focused solely on Europe, and the Germans can’t complain either, because it wasn’t your average speech delivered in the US. It was a campaign speech all right, make no mistake about it, but it was tailor-made for the Berlin audience and the folks back home as well.

And being a campaign speech it didn’t really include anything substantial. Of course, Obama mentioned some important tasks ahead of us (fight global warming, improve transatlantic relations), but he didn’t really present any concrete approaches on how to achieve these goals. Controversial topics like the missile shield in the Czech Republic or the flagging US economy were deliberately left out.

I cannot agree on that observation of yours that Obama constantly made snide remarks about Russia. Granted, the behavior of the Soviet Union in former communist times during the Berlin blockade served as a rhetoric figure (and was thus repeated several times) intended to point out the importance of multilateral cooperation to overcome a common enemy, but Obama didn’t refer to the Russia of today in a derogative way. In contrast, he explicitly stated we must leave behind the Cold War mindset. It might be, however, that I missed something. In this case, please enlighten me. May be there’s a transcript around.

When Obama talked about improving the relations between Europe and the US, he meant of course (without explicitly saying so yet) that Europe has to send more troops into Afghanistan in order to help the American war effort. This issue will spark many controversial discussions in all of Europe in the near future.

Finally, a world without nuclear weapons sounds extremely tempting. This goal will be particularly hard to achieve but it is a prerequisite so that “we will at last know peace in our time.” (B5, “The Fall of Night”)

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Starstuff Reply:
July 25th, 2008 at 3:44 pm

That is a very appropriate quote, Matthias! I was searching for one yesterday but couldn’t come up with anything nice. Yours really nails it.

About the snide remarks: I am not talking about his references to the aftermath of WW2 or the Cold War itself. As far as I understood, he also commented on present day Russia and those were the comments I disliked. I have to try to find a reprint of the speech somewhere online so I can quote. Maybe I misunderstood him, but there were a couple of times when I raised my eyebrow and though, ‘Can’t you give it a rest now?’ I’ll find out and post it here.

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# 25 July 2008 at 10:59 am