Betty MacDonald fan club fans,
let's praise first unique Betty MacDonald fan club honor member Monica Sone, author of Nisei Daughter and described as Kimi in Betty MacDonald's book The Plague and I.
Monica Sone passed away in 2011 shortly after her 92th birthday.
To me it's quiete a shock to learn the depressing facts of internment of Japanse, Japanese Americans, European and European Americans in a democratic society.
Over 31.000 people were kept interned until July 1948 - more than three years after the war in Europe had ended.
I hope we can learn from the past and we are willing to.
Betty MacDonald Fan Club honor member Monica Sone was furious at the blatant disregard of her civil rights.
Monica Sone said to Betty MacDonald Memorial Award winner Wolfgang Hampel:
I didn't move from Seattle - they moved me away and I never came back.
( only for family visits )
Of course everybody can understand Monica Sone's feelings.
A democratic society has to protect the civil rights of their people. Otherwise it's no longer a democratic society.
A simple fact.
In the camps, internees were seen more as prisoners of war than as civilians.
To name such camps for example Camp Harmony is simply awful.
Just imagine the loss of property, the personal insults, the barbed wire, armed guards, the dust storms, horrible food, unfinished barracks, barren land, shared huts, inadequate washing and toilet facilities, green uniforms, military work details, snapping to attention at an officer's approach.
Therefore Monica Sone's Nisei Daughter is a very important book.
Betty MacDonald Fan Club founder, author, poet and Monica Sone's good friend Wolfgang Hampel told us that Nisei Daughter belonged to the very few books he was rereading. I know many of us do the very same.
Betty MacDonald encouraged her friend Monica Sone in publishing her book 'Nisei Daughter'.
Betty MacDonald said:
'Nisei Daughter ' is a very remarkable book, humorous and delightfully readable, that takes you into the heart of a Japanese-American family and into the mind of the sensitive, perceptive eldest daughter.
The internment of the American born Japanese during World War II is handled with honesty and rare dispassion.
It is certainly to Monica Sone's credit that she she still sings God bless America.
Betty MacDonald was right. Having Monica Sone's experiences I'm not sure I would.
I agree with John Heitman "In a world where there are lots of smoke screens and J. Edgar Hoovers, an individual can really be hurt."
Betty MacDonald fan club honor member Monica Sone and other Betty MacDonald fan club honor members will be included in Wolfgang Hampel's new project 'Vita Magica'.
Wolfgang Hampel's next Vita Magica guest is a famous politician.
Wolfgang Hampel's stories and satirical poems will be published in Betty MacDonald fan club newsletter March and future newsletters.
We hope Betty MacDonald fan club honor member Mr. Tigerli is well.
We can imagine how very busy our darling is because of many very important politicial problems all over the world.
Don't miss new breakfast with Brad and Nick, please.
This video of Mount Rainier National Park is really magical.
Take care,
Lasse & Ulla
Vita Magica
Betty MacDonald fan club
Betty MacDonald forum
Wolfgang Hampel - Wikipedia ( English )
Wolfgang Hampel - Wikipedia ( German )
Wolfgang Hampel - Ma and Pa Kettle - Wikipedia ( English )
Wolfgang Hampel in Florida State University
Betty MacDonald fan club founder Wolfgang Hampel
Betty MacDonald fan club interviews on CD/DVD
Betty MacDonald fan club items
Betty MacDonald fan club items - comments
Betty MacDonald fan club organizer Linde Lund
Angela Merkel with Guido Wolf and Julia Klöckner. Photo: DPA
Party colleagues ‘stabbing Merkel in back’ over refugees
Published: 22 Feb 2016 10:58 GMT+01:00
Updated: 22 Feb 2016 11:43 GMT+01:00
Updated: 22 Feb 2016 11:43 GMT+01:00
Over the weekend Julia Klöckner and Guido Wolf demanded in an open letter
that the government implement daily quotas for the number of asylum
seekers allowed into the country and set up processing centres at the
country’s borders.
Merkel has long resisted demands from more hawkish members of her government that she impose an upper limit on the amount of refugees Germany takes in.
Klöckner and Wolf, both of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU), are vying to become minister-president - the German equivalent of governors - in state elections due to be held in mid-March in Rhineland-Palatinate and Baden-Württemberg.
Both candidates are fighting fiercely close contests and have the chance to win back control of the states for the conservative party.
In Rhineland-Palatinate, an INSA survey published on Monday puts Klöckner two point ahead of the Social Democratic Party (SPD) on 35 percent. In Baden-Württemberg Wolf lies half a point behind the ruling Green Party on 30 percent.
In the German proportional representation system parties try and form a coalition with junior partners which will give them a controlling majority in the parliament.
The open letter, demanding a stricter approach to dealing with refugees, has widely been interpreted as an attempt to win votesrs away from the Alternative for Germany (AfD).
Populist right-wing AfD have seen their poll share soar in recent months as large sections of the German public have grown sceptical of Merkel’s refugee stance.
In Rhineland-Palatinate the AfD are currently polling at 8.5 percent, while in Baden-Württemberg they are predicted to win 10 percent of the vote, according to INSA.
Those scores are comfortably above the five percent threshold needed to enter state parliaments - a first in the party's history in the two south-western states.
‘Back stabbing’
But Sigmar Gabriel, vice-Chancellor and SPD leader, accused Klöckner and Wolf of betraying their party leader at a time when she desperately needs their support.
“It’s neither smart nor decent to stab the German Chancellor in the back in the middle of European negotiations,” Gabriel told Spiegel Online, referring to last week’s EU summit in Brussels at which Merkel called for European solidarity in the refugee crisis.
Gabriel aimed his wrath particularly at Klöckner, who is also party deputy to Merkel at the national level - and seen by some as a potential future successor.
“Frau Klöckner is undermining the German negotiating position and she’s
weakening the position of the German Chancellor,” Gabriel stated.
“We need to defend Europe’s external borders and to cooperate with Turkey on controlling people smugglers - we don’t need to follow some self-interested course like Austria or the eastern European states,” the vice-Chancellor said.
The two election candidates also drew fire from within their own party, with one European politician accusing them of “descending into panic” in the run-up to the state elections.
Merkel herself has so far stayed silent on Klöckner and Wolf's letter.
SEE ALSO: Merkel isolated as allies slam door on refugees
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Merkel has long resisted demands from more hawkish members of her government that she impose an upper limit on the amount of refugees Germany takes in.
Klöckner and Wolf, both of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU), are vying to become minister-president - the German equivalent of governors - in state elections due to be held in mid-March in Rhineland-Palatinate and Baden-Württemberg.
Both candidates are fighting fiercely close contests and have the chance to win back control of the states for the conservative party.
In Rhineland-Palatinate, an INSA survey published on Monday puts Klöckner two point ahead of the Social Democratic Party (SPD) on 35 percent. In Baden-Württemberg Wolf lies half a point behind the ruling Green Party on 30 percent.
In the German proportional representation system parties try and form a coalition with junior partners which will give them a controlling majority in the parliament.
The open letter, demanding a stricter approach to dealing with refugees, has widely been interpreted as an attempt to win votesrs away from the Alternative for Germany (AfD).
Populist right-wing AfD have seen their poll share soar in recent months as large sections of the German public have grown sceptical of Merkel’s refugee stance.
In Rhineland-Palatinate the AfD are currently polling at 8.5 percent, while in Baden-Württemberg they are predicted to win 10 percent of the vote, according to INSA.
Those scores are comfortably above the five percent threshold needed to enter state parliaments - a first in the party's history in the two south-western states.
‘Back stabbing’
But Sigmar Gabriel, vice-Chancellor and SPD leader, accused Klöckner and Wolf of betraying their party leader at a time when she desperately needs their support.
“It’s neither smart nor decent to stab the German Chancellor in the back in the middle of European negotiations,” Gabriel told Spiegel Online, referring to last week’s EU summit in Brussels at which Merkel called for European solidarity in the refugee crisis.
Gabriel aimed his wrath particularly at Klöckner, who is also party deputy to Merkel at the national level - and seen by some as a potential future successor.
“We need to defend Europe’s external borders and to cooperate with Turkey on controlling people smugglers - we don’t need to follow some self-interested course like Austria or the eastern European states,” the vice-Chancellor said.
The two election candidates also drew fire from within their own party, with one European politician accusing them of “descending into panic” in the run-up to the state elections.
Merkel herself has so far stayed silent on Klöckner and Wolf's letter.
SEE ALSO: Merkel isolated as allies slam door on refugees
