"We are here because enough people ignored the voices who told them that the world could not change!"

 In honor of President Obama's achievements in signing a new START treaty with Russia this week in Prague, I'm reposting my original blog post about his Prague speech on nuclear weapons.  Having just watched the speech again yesterday, I was struck by how clearly he laid out exactly what he was going to do and his timeline for doing so. He accomplished exactly what he said he would accomplish in the first year.  Congratulations President Obama!


What's Latin for "they came, they saw, they charmed?"  That's what President and Mrs. Obama did when he spoke to the Czech people on April 5th, 2009 on a hazy Sunday morning at Hradcany Namesti (Prague Castle Square).

Beginning with Czech history from Chicago (something well-known to Czech people and hardly known outside of Chicago within America), President Obama shared his Chicago roots in a way that charmed the Czechs and Americans like me in the audience.  He honored Czech people for things they love about themselves and by extension, that Czechs teach foreigners to love about them as well:  their humor, their high level of culture, their "unconquerable spirit despite empires rising and falling, and the "revolutions ... led in arts and sciences, politics, and poetry. "

My very favorite part of the speech was one I did not expect.  When he was establishing connection with his Czech audience, President Obama talked about the improbability of him serving the United States as President and of Czech people being free to live their lives in democracy:

"We are here today because enough people ignored the voices who told them that the world could not change." 

What a perfect thing to say to a nation of skeptics who don't believe that democracy will change anything, who don't believe that corruption can ever end, and that don't believe their politicians will stop arguing and start governing.  President Obama was asking Czechs to believe.  It was easily the most moving part of his speech.

He was asking them to recognize their own power as citizens and visionaries if they organize and work for and believe in change.  After all, it was their first democratically-elected President, President Vaclav Havel, who proved that "moral leadership is more important than any weapon." Believe, Czech people, believe!

He did not come here to argue the merits of the proposed missile defense system to the Czech people.  He aimed much bigger than that.  He came to propose a nuclear-free world.  Now if any other politician proposed such a thing in a speech, I have to admit, I would roll my eyes that he expected me to believe such a Pollyanna vision is possible.  But if there is anything I have learned about my President is that he accomplishes things that others might not even dream up.  This is a man who had his credit card denied trying to get into the Democratic convention in 2000 in Los Angelas just so he could attend and eight years later was the nominee of his party.  I'm not discounting the possibility that he could actually do it.

He broke the whole idea of eliminating nuclear weapons down to manageable short-term goals, any one of which would be an accomplishment in it's own right. Godspeed, Mr. President.

He even labeled the Czech Republic as a being in the heart of Central Europe, not Eastern Europe!  Americans labelling the Czech Republic as "Eastern Europe" drives Czech people crazy. We Yanks can't help it, we still have that Iron Curtain line in our heads.  When I talk to Czech friends my age, I realize they do too.  It is a new generation, born in freedom, that has a new reality.  Major charm points, President Obama.  Thanks for coming to the Czech Republic!

There are great photos of President and Mrs. Obama in Prague on the White House blog dated April 9, 2009 at http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog.

After Prague, What's Next for Arms Control?

Often Americans hear news reports from countries around the world crying out "why won't America lead on this?"  Here's an exciting article that shows just the opposite.  When it comes to nuclear weapons, we've got a prophet, he's got a plan, now he just needs some followers. Click on my title to read the essay.

Growing U. S. - Central European Ties

How to reassure Central Europe that America still cares since the missile shield moved elsewhere? Two Americans with strong ties to the region argue that America can help grow the bond between Germany and Central Europe so that the tie becomes as important to the EU as Franco-German ties were to NATO in the 1950's.  Click on my title to read the essay.

In Prague, you can enjoy reading the "Cafe Europa" at the Cafe Europa

Slavenka Drakulić continues her look at life after communism in the book "Cafe Europa" her sequel to “How We Survived Communism and Even Laughed.” It's a great read and an honest read that rings true still 14-18 years after she wrote it.

If you think regular consumers in the West sometimes have trouble recognizing that TV advertisements and media showcase a fantasy, unobtainable lifestyle, imagine how hard it was for people exiting 40 years of communism to know what’s real and what isn’t.

Croatian novelist and essayist Slavenka Drakulić says that every Eastern and Central European formerly-communist capital expresses their longing for the perfect Europe of their imagination with a Cafe Europa.  There's one in all the major capitals; indeed, the one in Prague is spectacular.

One of the most powerful parts of her book discusses the complicity that citizens of fascist/communist countries feel having worked to sustain a system that is now on the dustheap of history. As countries like Croatia tossed aside old street names, square names, and place names to reflect the change in power from communism to democracy, citizens saw their own personal history erased at the same time as everyone glossed over how they participated. She discovers that nations as a whole, don’t look back with probing insight. When the author went to Isreal and was questioned by the citizens there about Croatia's role in the Holocaust, Ms. Drakulić realized with shock that people there were asking her questions about history that went unexamined back home. It’s hard to take responsibility, on a personal and a civic level if that isn’t part of the civic culture.

I enjoyed this book because the author beautifully explains that many of the emerging democracies infantilized under communism are actually stuck in feudal behavior as much as communist behavior. The political system may have changed for the better, but it will be years until citizens know how to work the system, rather than subvert the system (the old way of surviving) and also how to look to themselves as personally responsible.

Celebrating My Accountable President Returning Once Again to Prague

One year ago today, my President was in Prague, giving a speech calling for the elimination of all nuclear weapons.  That speech contributed greatly to his Nobel Peace Prize.

Exactly one year and three days after that speech, he will return to Prague to sign a treaty with the Russians lessening the number of nuclear weapons in their respective arsenals. It probably helps that both of them need to find ways to save money.

In addition to the treaty, President Obama has eliminated the vagueness from America's policy of exactly when it would use nuclear weapons and when it wouldn't through a process called the Nuclear Posture Review.  He has taken a more measured, deliberate and probably honest approach to exactly what circumstances would merit a nuclear response.  To those who decry eliminating the vagueness and instead that we should keep our enemies guessing, I would ask them to look where bluffing got Saddam Hussein.

If that were not enough progress toward the goals outlined in his speech, this month my President is hosting the largest gathering of world leaders since the founding of the United Nations 65 years ago to discuss how to keep nuclear weapons out of the hands of rogue states and terrorists.

I don't see how lowering the number of nuclear weapons in the world could be a bad thing.  I have no opinion on whether lowering the temperature on nuclear response is good or bad.  I am not an expert although I am a big fan of clarity.

What I celebrate today, is the sheer joy of having a President who feels accountable and reports progress.  He did it by returning to Iowa City, Iowa where he had first called for health care reform on the campaign trail to report that he had done it.  One year later, he returns to Prague to report the steps he has taken to make the world safer from nuclear weapons. I like many others who heard the speech, have closely followed what has or hasn't happened on the issue.  My President feels and acts accountable to the people and reports back to the initial audience who heard his goals.

To have a President of the United States that I both respect and love is just a completely joyous, wonderful thing.  And I agree with his politics.  It's a political trifecta! I and many other Americans, are the beneficiary. Godspeed, Mr. President. Congratulations on your achievements. Thank you for "ignoring the voices who said the world could not change."

Czech/American marriages

I heard a funny story from an American woman married to a Czech.  I asked her if she would recommend marriage to a Czech man.  "No actually, I recommend the other way around," she intimated with a laugh.  "Czech women are raised to do everything domestically and expect nothing from a man around the house.  He gets away with doing less than he would have to do married to an American." So when a Czech woman marries an American it's a very peaceful marriage because both people are getting more than they expected.  She continued, "but when a Czech man marries an American woman and he doesn't do anything and she expects the same sort of help an American man would give, it's not at all peaceful."

There you have it.  Choose accordingly!

The Need for Mythic Narrative

Scratch any American and you'll find someone in love with the mythic narrative of his or her own country.  That's why I could never understand George Bush's invasion of Iraq.  He was depriving the Iraqi people of the opportunity to create their own mythic narrative to cherish as we cherish ours.

That love and nostalgia of one's story is a deep human need.  I read this New York Times story about an underappreciated photographer of Eastern European Jewish life pre-WWII with the full knowledge that I have this same need as much as anyone for romanticized mythic narrative about my own people.   

Scholar Maya Benton studied the photos which represented her parent's past and wanted to know more.  She began to look into the photographic narrative of Roman Vishniac, known for his pious poverty-stricken pictures of Eastern European Jewish life taken pre-WWII and she wondered at the specificity of his photographic focus.  As she researched, she discovered that Vishniac's view of shtetl life was too narrow and much of his best work was unpublished because it didn't fit the requirements of the mythic narrative being constructed.

Who knows what romantic notions I hold about the mythic narrative of my own country that may be selective rememberings?  But as Ms. Benton says, "the fuller picture is so much more interesting." She continues, "Even the selection of what Vishniac chose to publish now seems, broadly, like a distortion. “It’s as if we took pictures of homeless people in New York and then the city fell into the sea, and 50 years from now people looked at those photos and thought, That’s what New York was.”  Click on my title to read the whole article and to see a selection of Mr. Vishniac's photography of Eastern European Jewish life.