The Book Thief

I saw this trailer for The Book Thief at The Robinson Film Center a couple of weeks ago:



I'm reading the book now.  It came out in 2007: how did I miss it?   I wonder if the Common Core people will let my sophomores read this?

It is just mesmerizing.  Beautifully written.

I can't wait to see this film.

Take a Trip to Dallas, Texas and the West End

It's official:  we are grandparents!

It's amazing how quickly a little guy can get into your heart.  Steve and I left Benjamin and his parents in Dallas today and it was hard saying goodbye!  Happily for them, they were preparing to leave the hospital and head home to settle into new routines and a new life with their precious baby boy.

I posted a picture of him when he was born and will post one or two on this post but as Ben's parents are very private and don't want to run a play by play of his life on the internet we are certainly going to respect that choice.  But he's probably the cutest little boy ever!

We took advantage of this trip to do a couple of side adventures that have been on our list for a while.

Our hotel was near the DART so we took advantage of that as much as possible.  It just seemed silly to get in the Jeep and battle Central Expressway over to the hospital two or three times a day, so we took the DART.  We got on right by the hotel and got off right at the hospital.  Could not have been easier.

I like riding the DART and it all reminds Steve of the trains in Europe.

I'm a people watcher and I like to watch the people on the train.  Most are plugged into iPods, a few are reading, some doze, others stare tiredly out the windows.  I'm sure we look like the rubes we are as we gaze and point out the windows.  "Look at that building!"  "Oh, there's Taco Cabana!"

As we drove to Dallas after getting "the call," I stayed in constant contact via text with Ben's daddy and kept up with labor progress.  Ben waited for us to arrive; as we drove into the parking lot I got a text that said, "I see his head!"  Perfect timing!

We spent Wednesday afternoon at the hospital waiting and visiting.  Once baby and mother were settled into their room we left to check into the hotel and find dinner.

One of our favorite places to eat in Dallas is The Twisted Root.  As it happens, a famous Texan likes Twisted Root, too:

There are several locations and the restaurant was even featured on Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives!  We love the sweet potato chips/fries and the spicy pickle chips.

That is a bacon cheeseburger and sweet potato fries.  Fabulous!

We ran a couple of errands after we ate then went to the hospital to see the baby one more time before calling it a day.

Thursday we decided to jump on the DART and check out Dealey Plaza.  We've never been to the museum there and have always wanted to, so we did.  We, of course, stopped to see Ben who was sleeping:

His parents looked a lot more rested than the last time we'd seen them so we left them to spend time with their baby and head out to the West End.

First stop was Sonny Bryan's Smokehouse.  We didn't have a lunch destination when we set out but it smelled so good the choice was easy.

The West End is that part of Dallas "where it all began," where the city was born.  It is now a historic district comprised of some 20 blocks and is filled with shopping, dining, offices and historic landmarks.  Many of the restaurants have patios or terrace dining and even on a hot day there's a breeze blowing through keeping things comfortable outside.

At Sonny Bryan's we both had BBQ plates: mine was a beef sandwich and Steve had the jalapeno sausage sandwich.  I got mac 'n cheese and he got potato salad and we both had the baked beans.  That Corona bottle is filled with BBQ sauce:

The atmosphere at Sonny Bryan's was as you'd expect, raw brick and wood floors, neon signs and a busy lunch crowd.  The service was fast and friendly!

Once we'd stuffed ourselves we walked a couple of blocks over to Dealey Plaza.  We explored outside before going into the museum.  This is the old Textbook Depository from where Lee Harvey Oswald fired at President John F. Kennedy from the sixth floor corner window.  President Kennedy's motorcade was moving down this street, away from the building, when the shots were fired.

If you look carefully you can see one of the two "x" marks in the street.  Incredibly, people run out there and stand on the X to have their picture made.

This strikes me as very dangerous and more than a little bit creepy, but whatever rocks your boat, I guess.  This isn't exactly a low traffic location and that's three lanes of traffic coming at you.

The grassy knoll:

This shot looks toward the triple underpass through which President Kennedy's motorcade was about to pass:

This is Houston Street and the reflecting pool; the motorcade drove north on this street, toward the Depository, then turned west onto Elm, passing in front of the Depository, where the president and Governor John Connally were hit.

Today, the entire plaza area is, as I said, an historic district and preserves as much of the scene as possible as it was the day of the assassination.

No photography is allowed inside the museum.  No cameras, no cell phones.  Security guards patrol the exhibit and keep an eye on things.

The museum consists of large photographic panel displays with textual information, artifacts and video.  You wind your way through and listen to a guide through headphones.  Periodically you are prompted to stop the audio tour and watch one of the short videos which might be of one of Kennedy's speeches, a press conference, or Walter Cronkite's coverage of the assassination.

The exhibit takes you chronologically though Kennedy's election, his presidency, the Bay of Pigs, the space program, the "Camelot" family life, and on through the assassination, the investigation, and the conspiracy theories.

The actual site where Oswald sat is preserved behind plexiglass.  Boxes of books are preserved behind this plexiglass cube and you can see how he arranged boxes upon which to rest the rifle he aimed out the window as he lined up his shots.  You can't actually get to the window  yourself, but on the seventh floor, which is gallery space, you are allowed to take pictures.  This is taken from the seventh floor just above the sixth floor window:

We enjoyed the tour and seeing the whole scene really gives you a better sense of perspective than just looking at pictures.

From there we took a quick trip into the Holocaust museum; it was right around the corner and I'd been wanting to go see it.  The museum is growing and will be moving to a larger facility in the near future.

The main exhibit takes you through a day in the Holocaust through several different perspectives.  This is a self-guided audio tour but there are often guides taking groups of school children through and we tagged on to one of those.

There are lots of photographs that are synced with the audio tour:

There are also plenty of artifacts:

And displays:

We were lucky enough to meet a survivor, Max Glauben, who was a child in Poland who smuggled food and weapons to the Jewish resistance in the Warsaw Ghetto.  He was sent to five different concentration camps.  Now he tells his story and hopes to teach young people about intolerance as a cautionary tale in the hopes that genocide and hate will not prevail.

Mr. Glauben is a charming fellow who has cheated death several times (he's also a Korean War veteran and a cancer survivor).  Read Mr. Glauben's story here.  I purchased a copy of his DVD, "Plagues of the Soul" which he autographed for me.  I'll treasure it!

Exhausted from our day, we head back to the DART and the hospital to check on our little grandbaby!

I hope little Ben's mother will forgive me but I have to share this picture; I just thought it was so sweet.

They're going to be wonderful parents and I can't wait to watch this little guy grow!

After a rest at the hotel we climbed into the Jeep and drove over to get some dinner at the Texas Land and Cattle Steak House.  It was close to the hotel and a good rare steak sounded just fine to me so off we went.

I highly recommend this place if you go to Dallas.  (They have other locations, too; check the site). I can't remember a time that I've had better, friendlier service.  Our server was friendly and helpful; when he learned it was our first visit he told his manager who came by to speak to us and gave us a card for a free appetizer on our next visit.  The food was perfectly prepared, the atmosphere was lovely, and the beer cold!

Fabulous!

We had to go back to the hotel pool after that and swim off some of those calories.  I did slow, lazy laps, but I felt better when I was done.

This morning?  Back to see Baby Ben; the happy family was packing and getting ready to head home.

I guess it seems like we eat all the time, but people eat, you know.  So we grabbed lunch at Henk's European Bakery and Deli.

Steve is a big fan of German food, and I'm a big fan of German beer so it works out perfectly.

We both ate brats, red cabbage, and hot German potato salad.  I picked up a piece of chocolate raspberry cake to bring home and Steve bought a couple of rounds of crusty German bread.

Two hundred pounds later, I crawled back into the Jeep and we made our way back to Shreveport and our dogs.

We already miss our little grandson and can't wait to go back and see how much he's grown!  We're already planning our next trip.

The SIGIS Take a Trip Series:

Take a Stocking the Freezer Trip to Ed Lester Farms and Find a Cool Truck!

Take a Trip to Coushatta Down Louisiana Backroads

Take a Sunday Drive in North Caddo Parish

Take a Trip to Minden's First Annual Cinco de Mayo Festival

Take a Trip to the 2012 Defenders of Liberty Air Show at BAFB
Take a Springtime Trip to Second Hand Rose Antiques in Minden, LA
Take a Trip to Logansport, Louisiana
Take a Trip to the Lock and Dam on Red River
Take a Trip to the 2012 Barkus and Meoux Parade
Take a Christmas Shopping Trip to Second Hand Rose in Minden
Take a Trip to Grand Cane's Fifth Annual Pioneer Trade Day
Take a Trip to the 2011 Highland Jazz & Blues Festival
Take an Autumn Trip to Jefferson, Texas
Take a Fall Trip to Second Hand Rose Antiques in Minden
Take a Trip to the 8th Air Force Museum at Barksdale Air Force Base
Take a Summertime Trip to Grand Cane
Take a Trip to Desoto Parish
Take a Summer Trip to Second Hand Rose Antiques in Minden
Take a Trip to Natchitoches and Melrose Plantation 
Take a Trip to Ed Lester Farms and a Random Antique Stop
Take a Trip to the Norton Art Gallery and the Masters of Cuban Art Exhibit
Take a Trip to Natchitoches to See the Christmas Lights
Take a Trip to Natchitoches and Oakland Plantation

Dallas Holocaust Museum

Loose Thoughts and Roosters

I'm getting sick.  I'm so disappointed.  I wasn't going to mention it for fear of breaking the good luck string, but I missed out on getting the "fall crud" this past fall and up until now I thought I would skate on the "spring crud" too.  I was getting worried that my ENT guy might forget about me.  I guess I'll be visiting him soon.  Meh.

I've been in a funk this week after a local election this week for the schools.  For you non-locals, there were 3 issues on the ballot.  One of the three passed.  The one that passed is designated for building new schools and upgrading existing structures.  My school will benefit from this as every time someone on the first floor turns on their electric heater all the fuses blow and the custodian has to change it out and restore power.  We're long overdue for an electrical upgrade, especially to accommodate all the technology that  is now running through this very old building.  So that was good.

What didn't pass was the five percent teacher pay raise (we haven't had one in seven years; I'm bringing home less now than I did just three years ago) or the technology upgrade.

I'm not going to get into my emotions on all that right now; I'm toying with a post on it but I'm not ready to go there yet.  I'll just say that though there were a lot of people in support of the teachers, there were plenty of nasty comments made that really disheartened me.  One person left a comment on a local news article that suggested teachers should "just eat less and not drive such fancy cars."  He said every teacher he knows is driving a Lexus or some other expensive car.  I'm not even going to go there.  There's an idiot in every crowd.

But, I've been disheartened and discouraged.  Governor Jindal is coming after us with everything he's got and now the local voters have smacked us.  Teacher morale is low low low.  But,  HEY I'm about to get  THE WHOLE SUMMER OFF.  Not.  Anyone who believes that malarky is in need of counseling.

But, what has made me feel better this week is my kids.  I just love my students.  That's another post in itself, too.  But I've had great kids and that's what keeps me going to work every day.  One of my former students took the picture above today outside at lunch of me and her stuffed rooster (kidnapped from the art teacher) Pancho.  I'm not sure if his name is Pancho, but that's what I called him.  We have great kids at my school.  Love!

Elsewhere on the web:

Stacy McCain is following the trail of Trayvon Martin related attacks.  What the hell is wrong with people?  My god.

A Cop's Watch is also on the trail.

Ed Driscoll has an alarming wrap-up on the whole thing.

However, Adrienne has the most compelling story I've seen today in defense of the Second Amendment.

Is the secret to a great presidential legacy all in one's alcohol intake?  Pirate's Cove reports.

In the spirit of Holocaust Remembrance Day, let me again point you to my friend Nico Van Thyn's blog; he is the son of two Holocaust survivors and has been telling their story.  I had the privilege of meeting his parents several times and am glad Nico is recording their history.  Please read.

I'm off to take some cold meds, some allergy meds, and some more vitamins just to cover all my bases.

Centenary to Screen Van Thyn Holocaust Testimonies Friday

This Friday Centenary College and the Van Thyn lecture series will commemorate the 67th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz:

The all-day event will honor the memory of local survivors Dr. Rose and Louis Van Thyn and feature a continuous screening of their video testimonies on their struggles during the Holocaust. The screening is free and open to the public and visitors may stop in throughout the day.

"Sadly, we will soon be in a world without any living Holocaust survivors to teach us about the dangers of hatred and intolerance," said Dr. Lisa Nicoletti, Professor of Art and Visual Culture. "Collections such as this one are vital to Holocaust remembrance and education. For the last decade, Dr. Rose with Louis by her side, regularly spoke on our campus about life before, during, and after the Holocaust. We miss them terribly."

• What: Van Thyn Holocaust Testimony
  
• When: Friday, January 27, 8:00 a.m.-7:30 p.m.
  
• Where: Kilpatrick Auditorium, Smith Building
  

This showing marks the introduction of Centenary College as the first Shoah Foundation Visual History Collection in the state of Louisiana. The College will provide the public with free future access to these testimonies, which will be housed in Magale Library. The testimonies are from the archives of the University of Southern California Shoah Foundation Institute for Visual History and Education.

Steven Speilberg created the Survivors of the Shoah Visual History Foundation in 1994 when he was inspired by his experience making Schindler’s List. The Institute aims to overcome prejudice, intolerance, and bigotry—and the suffering they cause—through the educational use of the Institute’s visual history testimonies that it gathers from survivors and other witnesses of the Holocaust.

More here.

If you're not local and can't attend, I encourage you to listen to Rose's story here.  I heard Rose deliver her testimony a few years ago; it's an amazing story and one I share with my students each year.  While I've met Louis (he was always beside Rose when she spoke), I've never heard his full testimony so this will be an experience for me.  These were two very special people. 

Never forget.

(H/T: Nico)

Rose Van Thyn: 1921-2010 (Updated - Obituary & Editorial Added)

Local Holocaust survivor Rose Van Thyn has passed away.  With apologies to The Shreveport Times, I'm going to quote their entire article here, the reason being, when Louis Van Thyn passed away in 2008, I quoted from and linked their article, only to find it a missing link later on when the article was taken down.  I had lots of people find my blog by doing searches for Louis Van Thyn and surely they were disappointed when they got here to find the article missing.

So, here's the story in The Times, then I'll add a brief comment:

Holocaust survivor and community educator Rose Van Thyn, who spoke to literally thousands of local schoolchildren during her life about the horrors of the Jewish genocide, passed away Sunday at the age of 88.

"Rose was the most remarkable human being you would ever meet in your life," said Ron Nierman, a family friend. "She and (husband) Louis escaped horrors none of us could even imagine."

Van Thyn, originally from Holland, survived internment at the notorious Auschwitz concentration camp in Poland and emigrated to the United States in 1956. Both she and her husband, Louis, who passed away in 2008, met after they were liberated in Europe. They were originally married to separate spouses, both of whom died inside Nazi concentration camps.

"My mother was a very determined, very deep, very complex person," said her son, Nico Van Thyn. "She loved to speak at schools and civic clubs for anyone who wanted to hear about her experiences."

For the past 25 years, Rose and Louis were prominent fixtures at numerous community events, reminding children of the pain she and six million others had to endure at the hands of Nazi persecution. In May, she received the Shreveport Bar Association's Liberty Bell Award, given annually to a person or organization for outstanding community service.

"I'm very sad to hear that she has passed away," said Shreveport Mayor Cedric Glover. "It is a tremendous loss not just to Shreveport but to the entire world to know that someone who possessed the knowledge and experience and the history that she lived has now passed on."
After World War II, Holocaust survivors could be granted permission to live and work in the United States if sponsored by a family here. The family that brought the Van Thyns to Shreveport was that of Abe Gilbert, who owned the A.A. Gilbert Pipe and Supply company in Shreveport, which still exists today.


Nierman, who is Abe Gilbert's grandson, recalled how when the couple first arrived they could speak only a little English, and originally thought the pipes in question Louis was supposed to be working on were smoking pipes. Learning to convert his measurements from the metric system to English units took a little while, Nierman said.

Though in declining health recently, Van Thyn still obliged as many requests to speak as possible, saying that as more and more Holocaust survivors pass away, remembering each one of their legacies became doubly important so that what they had to endure would never be repeated again.

"She felt like it was her mission to try to educate as many kids and people in general about the Holocaust," Nico Van Thyn said. "She wanted to teach them about why it happened and how it happened, what happened to her, and about racial and religious prejudice."

Van Thyn is survived by five grandchildren, Nico and daughter Elsa, and two great-grandchildren.

I was fortunate enough to hear Rose tell her story about five or six years ago during a Holocaust seminar taught by Lisa Nicoletti at Centenary College.  Rose brought the entire class to tears with her story.  I can only imagine the impression she left on the minds and hearts of the thousands of young people she has spoken to through the years.  She was funny; she told the saddest, most tragic story you can imagine, but she still kept a sense of humor and could make you smile while she talked.

Someone asked her at the end of her story that day if she would ever be able to forgive Hitler for what he did to the Jews.  She said, "It's not up to me to forgive Hitler.  It is up to God." 

In my sophomore English class we always read an excerpt from Elie Wiesel's Night and we also read The Devil's Arithmetic by Jane Yolen.  I have three poems Rose gave us at that seminar that I share with the class and I tell them about her.  Some of the students have heard her speak before, but not all of them.  I believe Rose wanted to speak to every young person she came across.

She truly did believe it was her mission to share her experience with young people today.  Never forget.  It can happen again.  And as more and more of these survivors leave us, Rose's words are even more poignant.

She will truly be missed.

You can hear Rose tell her story here.

Update: Via KTBS: A memorial service is set for Sunday, July 11 at 2 p.m. at Brown Chapel on the campus of Centenary College. A reception will be held immediately after the memorial at Kilpatrick Auditorium.

Update:  Again, apologies to The Times, but here's a copy/paste of the obituary:

SHREVEPORT, LA - Rozetta "Rose" Van Thyn, 88, honored often in Shreveport-Bossier and the area for her commitment to educating the public about the Holocaust, passed away Sunday, June 27, 2010.

She was a survivor of the Auschwitz concentration camp, where she was a prisoner for three years as a young woman. Over the past three decades, she told her story to thousands at area schools, churches and civic groups, and was often a featured speaker at Shreveport-Bossier's annual Holocaust memorial service. As an Attaway Fellow in Civic Culture, she made regular visits to speak to students at Centenary College.

Born and raised in Amsterdam, The Netherlands, she lost her parents, sister and first husband in the camps. She met fellow survivor Louis Van Thyn in Amsterdam after the war and they married in 1946. Louis died on Aug. 27, 2008.

Rose was liberated from Auschwitz by American soldiers and vowed to someday live in the United States. In 1956, the Van Thyns and their two children immigrated to Shreveport, with sponsorship from the Shreveport Jewish Federation and the A.A. Gilbert family.

A homemaker, excellent cook and professional seamstress, she was most proud of her family, of becoming a U.S. citizen in May 1961, and of receiving an Honorary Doctorate of Humane Letters from Centenary in 2002. In 2003, she and Louis were recognized by the National Conference of Community and Justice for service to the city. Her most recent honor was the Liberty Bell Award from the Shreveport Bar Association.

Survivors are son Nico (wife Bea) of Fort Worth, Texas; daughter Elsa (husband Jim Wellen) of Voorhees, N.J., grandsons Jason Key (wife Ann) of McKinney, Texas, Adam Wellen (fiancee Tania Welker) of Washington, D.C. and Josh Wellen of Baton Rouge; granddaughters Rachel (husband Russell) Smith of Knoxville, Tenn., and Abby Wellen of Pittsburgh, Pa., and great-grandchildren Josephine Smith and Jacob Key.

A memorial service will be Sunday, July 11, at 2 p.m. at Centenary's Brown Memorial Chapel. She will be honored with a plaque in the Centenary rose garden and a bench at LSU-Shreveport. At her request, her body was donated to LSU Medical Center.

Memorial donations may be made to Van Thyn Endowed Professorship Chair at Centenary College and the Rose and Louis Van Thyn Master of Liberal Arts Scholarship at LSUS.


And here is their editorial today:

Rose Van Thyn's survival of the Holocaust meant succeeding generations would hear of humanity's capability for darkness. But her life also illuminated mankind's great capacity to heal, to find hope and purpose in the indelible marks of tragedy.

Just as the passing of each World War II citizen soldier robs us of living reminders of the nobility of sacrifice for a greater good, so does the passing of Holocaust survivors separate us from the eyewitness testimony to horrors we forget at our own peril.

"People tell me I was lucky. That is really not the word," the 88-year-old Auschwitz death camp survivor told attendees at April's Holocaust Remembrance Service. "Lucky is when you win a lottery. I did not win anything. I was given something, the most precious gift, a second chance at life."

We count it fortunate that after Nazi death camps, northwest Louisiana and businessman A.A. Gilbert were able to provide a fresh start to the Dutch couple, Rose and her husband, Louis Van Thyn, who died in 2008. In return, they gave back productive lives and friendship.

More important, they taught any who would listen the value of justice and compassion, having witnessed a society that lost both. The Holocaust claimed 11 million victims, 6 million of whom were Jews.

Despite their passing, the Van Thyns' mission will continue not just in the memories of those they reached but in the halls of academia. The Rose and Louis Van Thyn Endowed Professorship is being established at Centenary College in Shreveport, a chair that will focus on issues related to the Holocaust.

More than a half century after her liberation from Aushwitz, where she was subjected to medical experimentation and beatings, Van Thyn wrote as a survivor of that "hell on earth" that her mission was to speak for those who could not, "to educate as many people as we can so that the truth will be known."

Her work is done. Ours continues.



And finally, The Times has a photo gallery here in commemoration.  I love the one of Rose and Mayor Glover; she was so tiny and anyone who knows Mayor Glover...well, he's not tiny.

Miep Gies: 1909 - 2010

Miep Gies has died at age 100. She was, of course, the woman who preserved Anne Frank's diary.

Via The New York Times:

“I am not a hero,” Mrs. Gies wrote in her memoir, “Anne Frank Remembered,” published in 1987. “I stand at the end of the long, long line of good Dutch people who did what I did and more — much more — during those dark and terrible times years ago, but always like yesterday in the heart of those of us who bear witness.”

She was the last of the four people who helped shelter the Franks; she spent the last few years of her life traveling and speaking to people about intolerance.

I am reminded of that scene in "Freedom Writers" when the students write letters to Miep Gies and she comes to speak to them - how they were moved by what she said. I am also reminded about Shreveport's own Holocaust survivor, Rose Van Thyn who I was fortunate enough to hear speak about her Holocaust experience. Rose is still with us, but her husband, Louis Van Thyn, also a survivor, died in 2008.

There are so few of these people left now.

Obama's Holocaust Speech

I somehow missed the Obama speech on Holocaust Remembrance Day earlier this month. But Michael Ledeen didn't and he wrote about it here. The speech, as Mr. Ledeen says, isn't all bad, but there is a passage which illustrates a bigger global philosphy that we should note.

I've studied a lot about the Holocaust and I'd have to agree with Ledeen when he says that Obama's view of the genocide is a great deal different than pretty much everyone else's. In NRO's The Corner this afternoon, Ledeen highlights a passage of the speech and expounds:

Obama:

"We find cause for hope as well in Protestant and Catholic children attending school together in Northern Ireland; in Hutus and Tutsis living side-by-side, forgiving neighbors who have done the unforgivable; in a movement to save Darfur that has thousands of high school and college chapters in 25 countries and brought 70,000 people to the Washington Mall, people of every age and faith and background and race united in common cause with suffering brothers and sisters halfway around the world. Those numbers can be our future, our fellow citizens of the world showing us how to make the journey from oppression to survival, from witness to resistance and ultimately to reconciliation. That is what we mean when we say 'never again.'

Ledeen:

"It may be what he means by "never again," but most everybody else means "we're going to act to throttle the next would-be Hitler." Not "resistance and ultimately . . . reconciliation." Action, quite possibly military action. But Obama doesn't talk about military action anywhere in his speech. There is no mention of the Second World War, nor, for that matter, the belated military action that terminated the slaughter in Rwanda, or the decades-long police action in Northern Ireland, and of course no criticism of the total lack of action by the "international community" in Darfur.

"And yet he has the nerve to suggest that we should learn from 'our fellow citizens of the world showing us how to make the journey . . . ' Isn't it the other way round? For if "our fellow citizens" in Europe had had the same willingness to fight evil that we have so often displayed, there wouldn't have been a Holocaust to remember. But such unpleasant facts would have led him to praise American exceptionalism, and, as we know, he's not comfortable with such themes."

Certainly this was not the occasion for a militant speech. But one thing that stands out here is how his perspective fits right in with his apology tour, which Ledeen aptly points out. It is also consistent with his policy to never praise America. Americans helped liberate the camps - doesn't that count for something? Not in Obama's world; at least, he gives no indication that was the case.

He does speak of "the hope of a chosen people who have overcome oppression since the days of Exodus, of the nation of Israel rising from the destruction of the Holocaust, of the strong and enduring bonds between our nations," but some in Israel are questioning those strong bonds right now and doubting that Obama feels them.

I'm willing to be that had he been president during the Holocaust he'd have been willing to meet with Hitler "without preconditions" and search for that reconciliation he mentions.

While dipolomacy and conversation has its place, not all problems can be solved that way despite what Mr. Obama seems to think. There are times when military action is necessary. Obama does not seem to think so. Ronald Reagan left no doubt for our enemies that he would respond with force when necessary. He drew the line in the sand. No nonsense.

Our enemies need to know that we are willing to take action if necessary. The only message Obama seems to be putting out is "Let's talk!" Clearly Iran isn't afraid of us, nor is North Korea or Cuba or Venezuela or Hamas, or any of the other global terrorists who have challenged him.

Gird your loins kids; it's going to be a long four years.

Update: Via Memeorandum, here is a great post on the same topic.

Related:
Obama Refuses to Meet with Netanyahu
Louis Van Thyn

Deception in Publishing

You've probably heard by now of the scandal surrounding this book, Angel at the Fence, by Herman Rosenblat. The book was set to be published in February, is being made into a film, and had been touted by The Oprah. It seems that Mr. Rosenblat fabricated parts of his memoir; there was no boy at any fence and no young girl tossing him apples. As it turns out, the book will not be published.

This reminds me of the James Frey scandal a few years ago; The Oprah endorsed Mr. Frey's book, A Million Little Pieces, and was then humiliated when it came out that he had embellished parts of his story.

In both cases, it seems, the essential story was true. Part of the fault lies in the books being published as "memoir" rather than fiction. I've not read Angel a the Fence, but I did read Mr. Frey's book. I read his book AFTER the deception was revealed, so I was not one of those souls that felt "lied to" or "deceived" by Mr. Frey. I just found it to be a riveting good read. He has a bizarre writing style, to be sure, but it was such a good story; so much so that I went out and bought My Friend Leonard, the sequel, and cried through that one. I think even after it was revealed that he had fabricated parts of A Million Little Pieces, lots of folks that hadn't read it (like me) went out and bought it just to see what all the fuss was about.

I suspect Angel at the Fence is also a really great read and I hope that the publisher can find a way to actually get the book out. Who is at fault here? Yes, Mr. Rosenblat was not totally forthcoming. I'm not excusing his actions of deception; but, didn't the publsihing house have an obligation to do some fact-checking? Especially after the Frey scandal? (It wasn't the same publisher.) The genre of memoir was under such scrutiny after that. Should we move Mr. Frey's book to fiction or leave it in non-fiction? Hmmmmm. It's essentially lying to call it non-fiction.

Anyway, Mr. Rosenblat's intentions were good. In a statement released by Rosenblat, he said, "I wanted to bring happiness to people, to remind them not to hate, but to love and tolerate all people," he wrote in the statement. "I brought good feelings to a lot of people and I brought hope to many. My motivation was to make good in this world."

The Holocaust has provided fodder for many decepetive memoirs (Misha: A Memoire of the Holocaust Years comes to mind), and that's a shame. As one who has heard true stories of survival from real Holocaust survivors (Rose and Louis Van Thyn for example) I know there are true, heart-warming stories there than can convey the same message Mr. Rosenblat was trying to say: Don't hate anyone.

I remember when Rose Van Thyn was asked if she forgave the Nazis, she said that it wasn't up to her to forgive, it was up to God.

At any rate, there is enough truth in Mr. Rosenblat's story that I hope it is still published, although probably under the fiction label!

Louis Van Thyn

Update: 4/28/09: Sorry - The Times link in this post is no longer active. I should have copy/pasted the article!

I was saddened this morning to see that we lost Louis Van Thyn. Louis and his wife Rose are remarkable people and have done so much for our community in sharing their story of the Holocaust and the story of their lives. I first met them when I was a participant in Lisa Nicoletti's Holocuast seminar at Centenary College a few years back, sponsored by the LEH. Rose and Louis came to speak to us and, as it was every time she spoke, it was a very emotional event. Louis was Rose's "designated driver" but that day he shared a bit of his story, too. I encourage you to go to this Times link and read about their lives for a really inspiring story. That Louis and Rose were able to live such full and happy lives after the war is a testament to the human spirit.

(Photo credit: Val Horvath/The Times)