 |
Hello 'Pussy' this is Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle:
Stephen K. Bannon brought the battle plan. You brought the fight.
A
day after your secretive chief strategist laid out a hard-edged new
definition of conservatism animated by attacks on “the administrative
state,” globalism and the “corporatist media,” you delivered a
visceral gut punch of a speech that executed almost all of the tactics
that define the forever-war philosophy of the Trump-Bannon West Wing.
Do you have any idea why we feel so ashamed? I do!
Should I remain in bed, leave my country or fight against the dragon?
( see also the story by Wolfgang Hampel,
' Betty MacDonald: Nothing more to say ' )
Betty and Don MacDonald in Hollywood
Betty MacDonald's mother Sydney with grandchild Alison Beck
Mary Bard Jensen and Betty MacDonald
artwork by Perry Woodfin
Betty MacDonald fan club fans,
you can join Betty MacDonald fan club on Facebook.
Thank you so much in advance for your support and interest.We enjoy this excellent Betty MacDonald poem by Betty MacDonald fan club honor member, artist, author and poet Perry Woodfin very much.
We adore Perry Woodfin's outstanding artwork.
I agree it's very sad that Alison Bard Burnett never published her autobiography.
The interviews with Wolfgang Hampel are terribly funny and it's such a great feeling to hear Alison Bard Burnett's wonderful voice and laugh.
The same with Betty MacDonald.
When Betty MacDonald and Alison Bard Burnett are talking about life in Butte, Chimacum, Seattle, Laurelhurst, Vashon Island and Carmel you can feel the typical Bard magic.
I hope we can hear and see Betty MacDonald's filmed interview and her radio interview in the near future. wok.
Wolfgang Hampel and Betty MacDonald fan club research team are working on an updated Betty MacDonald biography.
This very new Betty MacDonald biography includes all the results we got during a very successful Betty MacDonald fan club research which started in 1983.
You'll be able to find unique Betty MacDonald treasures in our Betty MacDonald biography.
Betty MacDonald biography includes for example interviews with Betty MacDonald, her family and friends.
We got many letters by Betty MacDonald and other family members even very important original ones.
Our goal is to publish a Betty MacDonald biography that shows all the details of Betty MacDonald's life and work but also to present her fascinating siblings.
Dear Betty MacDonald fan club fans let us know please what you are interested most in a future Betty MacDonald biography.
Do you prefer an e-book or a so called real book?
Wolfgang Hampel and Friends of Vita Magica visited Minister of Science of Baden-Württemberg, Theresia Bauer in Stuttgart.
They visited Landtag and had a great time there.
Do you have any books by Betty MacDonald and Mary Bard Jensen with funny or interesting dedications?
If so would you be so kind to share them?
Our next Betty MacDonald fan club project is a collection of these unique dedications.
If you share your dedication from your Betty MacDonald - and Mary Bard Jensen collection you might be the winner of our new Betty MacDonald fan club items.
Thank you so much in advance for your support.
Thank you so much for sending us your favourite Betty MacDonald quote.
You'll be able to read more info during February.
We are so glad that our beloved Betty MacDonald fan club honor member Mr. Tigerli is back.
New Betty MacDonald documentary will be very interesting with many new interviews.
Alison Bard Burnett and other Betty MacDonald fan club honor members will be included in Wolfgang Hampel's fascinating project Vita Magica.
Betty MacDonald fan club founder Wolfgang Hampel interviewed Betty MacDonald's daughter Joan MacDonald Keil and her husband Jerry Keil.
This interview will be published for the first time ever.
New Betty MacDonald documentary will be very interesting with many interviews never published before.
We adore Betty MacDonald fan club honor member Mr. Tigerli
Thank you so much for sharing this witty memories with us.
Wolfgang Hampel's literary event Vita Magica is very fascinating because he is going to include Betty MacDonald, other members of the Bard family and Betty MacDonald fan club honor members.
It's simply great to read Wolfgang Hampel's new very well researched stories about Betty MacDonald, Robert Eugene Heskett, Donald Chauncey MacDonald, Darsie Bard, Sydney Bard, Gammy, Alison Bard Burnett, Darsie Beck, Mary Bard Jensen, Clyde Reynolds Jensen, Sydney Cleveland Bard, Mary Alice Bard, Dorothea DeDe Goldsmith, Madge Baldwin, Don Woodfin, Mike Gordon, Ma and Pa Kettle, Nancy and Plum, Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle and others.
Linde Lund and many fans from all over the world adore this funny sketch by Wolfgang Hampel very much although our German isn't the best.
I won't ever forget the way Wolfgang Hampel is shouting ' Brexit '.
Don't miss it, please.
It's simply great!
You can hear that Wolfgang Hampel got an outstandig voice.
He presented one of Linde Lund's favourite songs ' Try to remember ' like a professional singer.
Thanks a million!
Betty MacDonald fan club honor member Mr. Tigerli and our 'Italian Betty MacDonald' - Betty MacDonald fan club honor member author and artist Letizia Mancino belong to the most popular Betty MacDonald fan club teams in our history.
Their many devoted fans are waiting for a new Mr. Tigerli adventure.
Letizia Mancino's magical Betty MacDonald Gallery is a special gift for Betty MacDonald fan club fans from all over the world.
Don't miss Brad Craft's 'More friends', please.
Betty MacDonald's very beautiful Vashon Island is one of my favourites.
I agree with Betty in this very witty Betty MacDonald story Betty MacDonald: Nothing more to say by Wolfgang Hampel.
I can't imagine to live in a country with him as so-called elected President although there are very good reasons to remain there to fight against these brainless politics.
Speaking to the Conservative Political Action Conference on Friday, Mr. Trump launched what was easily the most blistering attack on the media and corporate elites of his already bellicose and eventful presidency. His speech also included a promise to throw undocumented immigrants “the hell out of the country” and a recitation of his law-and-order campaign promises. It represented a not-entirely friendly takeover of CPAC, an establishment Republican group whose leadership once viewed the party’s surprise standard-bearer as a noisy interloper.
Lately,
it appears Trump has gone back into the field to drag in a whole new
bunch of State contenders.
My favorite is Representative Dana Rohrabacher of California, a person you have probably never heard of even though he’s been in Congress since the 1980s and is currently head of the prestigious Subcommittee on Europe, Eurasia and Emerging Threats.
Rohrabacher
is also a surfer and former folk singer who once claimed global warming
might be connected to “dinosaur flatulence.” My favorite is Representative Dana Rohrabacher of California, a person you have probably never heard of even though he’s been in Congress since the 1980s and is currently head of the prestigious Subcommittee on Europe, Eurasia and Emerging Threats.
I think the future dinosaur flatulence will be the behaviour of 'Pussy' and his very strange government.
Poor World! Poor America!
Don't miss these very interesting articles below, please.
The most difficult case in Mrs.Piggle-Wiggle's career
Hello 'Pussy', this is Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle.
You took calls from foreign leaders on unsecured phone lines, without consultung the State Department. We have to change your silly behaviour with a new Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle cure. I know you are the most difficult case in my career - but we have to try everything.......................
Betty MacDonald fan club founder Wolfgang Hampel sent his brilliant thoughts. Thank you so much dear Wolfgang!
Hi Libi, nice to meet you. Can you feel it?
I'll be the most powerful leader in the world.
Betty MacDonald: Nothing more to say
Copyright 2016 by Wolfgang Hampel
All rights reserved
Betty MacDonald was sitting on her egg-shaped cloud and listened to a rather strange guy.
He said to his friends: So sorry to keep you waiting. Very complicated business! Very complicated!
Betty said: Obviously much too complicated for you old toupee!
Besides him ( by the way the First Lady's place ) his 10 year old son was bored to death and listened to this 'exciting' victory speech.
The old man could be his great-grandfather.
The boy was very tired and thought: I don't know what this old guy is talking about. Come on and finish it, please. I'd like to go to bed.
Dear 'great-grandfather' continued and praised the Democratic candidate.
He congratulated her and her family for a very strong campaign although he wanted to put her in jail.
He always called her the most corrupt person ever and repeated it over and over again in the fashion of a Tibetan prayer wheel.
She is so corrupt. She is so corrupt. Do you know how corrupt she is?
Betty MacDonald couldn't believe it when he said: She has worked very long and very hard over a long period of time, and we owe her a major debt of gratitude for her service to our country.
Afterwards old toupee praised his parents, wife, children, siblings and friends.
He asked the same question like a parrot all the time:
Where are you? Where are you? Where are you?
I know you are here!
Betty MacDonald answered: No Pussy they are not! They left the country.
They immigrated to Canada because they are very much afraid of the future in the U.S.A. with you as their leader like the majority of all so-called more or less normal citizens.
By the way keep your finger far away from the pussies and the Red Button, please.
I'm going to fly with my egg-shaped cloud to Canada within a minute too.
Away - away - there is nothing more to say!
I can understand the reason why Betty MacDonald, Barbara Streisand, other artists and several of my friends want to leave the United States of America.
I totally agree with these comments:
This
is incredible! I'll You get what you pay/vote for and Trump is the
epitome of this ideology. America I won't feel bad for you because you
don't need my sympathy for what's coming but I am genuinely scared for
you. 'Forgive them lord for they know not who they do' or maybe they do
but just don't care about their future generations who will suffer for
this long after the culprits have passed away.
Daniel Mount wrote a great article about Betty MacDonald and her garden.
We hope you'll enjoy it very much.
I adore Mount Rainier and Betty MacDonald's outstanding descriptions
Can you remember in which book you can find it?
If so let us know, please and you might be the next Betty MacDonald fan club contest winner.
I hope we'll be able to read Wolfgang Hampel's new very well researched stories about Betty MacDonald, Robert Eugene Heskett, Donald Chauncey MacDonald, Darsie Bard, Sydney Bard, Gammy, Alison Bard Burnett, Darsie Beck, Mary Bard Jensen, Clyde Reynolds Jensen, Sydney Cleveland Bard, Mary Alice Bard, Dorothea DeDe Goldsmith, Madge Baldwin, Don Woodfin, Mike Gordon, Ma and Pa Kettle, Nancy and Plum, Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle and others - very soon.
It' s such a pleasure to read them.
Let's go to magical Betty MacDonald's Vashon Island.
Betty MacDonald fan club organizer Linde Lund and Betty MacDonald fan club research team share their recent Betty MacDonald fan club research results.
Congratulations! They found the most interesting and important info for Wolfgang Hampel's oustanding Betty MacDonald biography.
I enjoy Bradley Craft's story very much.
Don't miss our Betty MacDonald fan club contests, please.
You can win a never published before Alison Bard Burnett interview by Betty MacDonald fan club founder Wolfgang Hampel.
Good luck!
This CD is a golden treasure because Betty MacDonald's very witty sister Alison Bard Burnett shares unique stories about Betty MacDonald, Mary Bard Jensen, Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle and Nancy and Plum.
Wolfgang Hampel's Betty MacDonald and Ma and Pa Kettle biography and Betty MacDonald interviews have fans in 40 countries. I'm one of their many devoted fans.
Many Betty MacDonald - and Wolfgang Hampel fans are very interested in a Wolfgang Hampel CD and DVD with his very funny poems and stories.
We are going to publish new Betty MacDonald essays on Betty MacDonald's gardens and nature in Washington State.
Tell us the names of this mysterious couple please and you can win a very new Betty MacDonald documentary.
Betty MacDonald fan club honor member Mr. Tigerli is beloved all over the World.
We are so happy that our 'Casanova' is back.
Betty MacDonald fan club founder Wolfgang Hampel
and Betty MacDonald fan club research team are going to share very
interesting info on ' Betty MacDonald and the movie The Egg and I '.
Another rare episode (from March 21 1952) of the short-lived comedy soap opera, "The Egg and I," based on best selling book by Betty MacDonald which also became a popular film.
The series premiered on September 3, 1951, the same day as "Search for Tomorrow," and ended on August 1, 1952.
Although it did well in the ratings, it had difficulty attracting a steady sponsor. This episode features Betty Lynn (later known for her work on "The Andy Griffith Show") as Betty MacDonald, John Craven as Bob MacDonald, Doris Rich as Ma Kettle, and Frank Twedell as Pa Kettle.
Betty MacDonald fan club exhibition will be fascinating with the international book editions and letters by Betty MacDonald.
I can't wait to see the new Betty MacDonald documentary.
Enjoy a great breakfast at the bookstore with Brad and Nick, please.
Take care,Another rare episode (from March 21 1952) of the short-lived comedy soap opera, "The Egg and I," based on best selling book by Betty MacDonald which also became a popular film.
The series premiered on September 3, 1951, the same day as "Search for Tomorrow," and ended on August 1, 1952.
Although it did well in the ratings, it had difficulty attracting a steady sponsor. This episode features Betty Lynn (later known for her work on "The Andy Griffith Show") as Betty MacDonald, John Craven as Bob MacDonald, Doris Rich as Ma Kettle, and Frank Twedell as Pa Kettle.
Betty MacDonald fan club exhibition will be fascinating with the international book editions and letters by Betty MacDonald.
I can't wait to see the new Betty MacDonald documentary.
Enjoy a great breakfast at the bookstore with Brad and Nick, please.
Sanna
Vita Magica Betty MacDonald event with Wolfgang Hampel, Thomas Bödigheimer and Friedrich von Hoheneichen
Vita Magica
Betty MacDonald
Betty MacDonald fan club
Betty MacDonald fan club on Facebook
Betty MacDonald forum
Wolfgang Hampel - Wikipedia ( English )
Wolfgang Hampel - Wikipedia ( English ) - The Egg and I
Wolfgang Hampel - Wikipedia ( Polski)
Wolfgang Hampel - Wikipedia ( German )
Wolfgang Hampel - LinkFang ( German ) Wolfgang Hampel - Academic ( German )
Wolfgang Hampel - cyclopaedia.net ( German )
Wolfgang Hampel - DBpedia ( English / German )
Wolfgang Hampel - people check ( English )
Wolfgang Hampel - Memim ( English )
Vashon Island - Wikipedia ( German )
Wolfgang Hampel - Monica Sone - Wikipedia ( English )
Wolfgang Hampel - Ma and Pa Kettle - Wikipedia ( English )
Wolfgang Hampel - Ma and Pa Kettle - Wikipedia ( French )
Wolfgang Hampel - Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle - 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 - The Stove and I
Betty MacDonald fan club groups
Betty MacDonald fan club organizer Linde Lund
Betty MacDonald fan club organizer Greta Larson
Betty MacDonald fan club fan Heiderose Teynor
Rita Knobel Ulrich - Islam in Germany - a very interesting ZDF ( 2nd German Television ) documentary with English subtitles
Trump Tears Into the Media at CPAC
President Trump spoke at length about
news coverage of his administration on Friday, just hours before some
news outlets, including The New York Times, were turned away from a
press briefing at the White House.
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS.
Photo by Doug Mills/The New York Times.
Watch in Times Video »
OXON HILL, Md. — Stephen K. Bannon brought the battle plan. President Trump brought the fight.
A
day after his secretive chief strategist laid out a hard-edged new
definition of conservatism animated by attacks on “the administrative
state,” globalism and the “corporatist media,” Mr. Trump delivered a
visceral gut punch of a speech that executed almost all of the tactics
that define the forever-war philosophy of the Trump-Bannon West Wing.
Speaking to the Conservative Political Action Conference
on Friday, Mr. Trump launched what was easily the most blistering
attack on the media and corporate elites of his already bellicose and
eventful presidency. His speech also included a promise to throw
undocumented immigrants “the hell out of the country” and a recitation
of his law-and-order campaign promises. It represented a not-entirely
friendly takeover of CPAC, an establishment Republican group whose
leadership once viewed the party’s surprise standard-bearer as a noisy
interloper.
Mr.
Bannon, the former Breitbart chief executive who has a hand in nearly
every scripted public Trump utterance, had expressed a similar sentiment
at the conference the day before. “If you think they’re going to give
you your country back without a fight, you are sadly mistaken,” he said
during an appearance with Reince Priebus, the White House chief of
staff. “Every day, it is going to be a fight.”
His
onstage discussion, it turned out, was a philosophy-infused preview of
Mr. Trump’s populist broadsides, with an admonition to anyone who
continues to underestimate the determination of the Trump White House to
disrupt the Washington establishment.
Mr.
Trump’s less restrained approach energized CPAC attendees who had once
viewed the developer-turned-reality-star as a self-promotional celebrity
curiosity — they serenaded him with chants of “Trump” and “U.S.A.” And
his message is resonating with Republican voters, over 80 percent of
whom approve of his job performance, despite historically low levels of
support among all voters.
But
Mr. Trump is intensifying his assault on his enemies on the eve of his
first national address before a joint session of Congress, a time when
most new presidents are moving in the opposite direction, pivoting from
martial campaign rhetoric to the more positive, inclusive language of
governance needed to build the coalition necessary to pass major
legislation.
On
an operational level, Mr. Trump’s inexperienced but confident White
House staff members — dominated by Mr. Bannon — are leaning on Hill
Republicans to draft tax overhaul measures and a replacement bill for
the Affordable Care Act. In the meantime, they have focused on enacting a
series of quick-splash executive orders, an approach often adopted by
presidents at the end of their terms when their legislative leverage has
been exhausted.
As
they did during the campaign, Mr. Trump and Mr. Bannon believe they are
tapping into an American public less interested in the standard
optimistic tropes of presidential politics and more interested in
someone who speaks truth to their anxieties. Moreover, aides to Mr.
Trump say he fares best when he’s able to target — and nickname — an
opponent, whether it is “Little Marco” Rubio, “Crooked Hillary” Clinton
or the “Fake News” media.
Mr.
Bannon, bookish and prone to surrounding himself with like-minded young
acolytes, previewed Mr. Trump’s media-bashing during the Thursday
session. “They’re corporatist, globalist media that are adamantly
opposed — adamantly opposed to an economic nationalist agenda like Donald Trump
has,” he said. “I think if you look at the opposition party and how
they portray the campaign, how they portrayed the transition and now
they’re portraying the administration, it’s always wrong.”
The
attacks on the news media come at a time when the press has been
reporting on the Trump campaign’s apparent connections to Russia, the
botched rollout of Mr. Trump’s executive order on immigration and the
forced resignation of Michael T. Flynn, the national security adviser,
after less than a month on the job.
“They’re very smart, they’re very cunning and they’re very dishonest,” Mr. Trump said on a day when his press secretary scrapped his daily briefing
for an invitation-only off-camera gaggle for selected reporters. The
move, people familiar with the situation said, was enthusiastically
backed by Mr. Bannon.
The
symbiotic political and personal relationship between the two men — the
rumpled near-recluse and the compulsively public and image-conscious
president — is driving much of the momentum and dysfunction of the White
House, aides say.
For
all his talk of creating a blueprint for a Trumpian conservatism that
outlasts the president’s career, Mr. Bannon is not regarded as a
detail-oriented manager, and he let slip during his CPAC appearance that
things in the White House have gone well — but only “to the degree we
were planning” them.
There
is not a lot of daylight between Mr. Trump and Mr. Bannon on the
issues, although the president often jokes that Mr. Bannon’s economic
populist agenda makes it hard to tell if the former Naval officer and
Goldman Sachs executive is “alt-right or alt-left,” according to a Trump
associate friendly with both.
The
biggest difference between the president and his chief strategist is
that Mr. Trump is far less constrained by the dictates of any single
philosophy — even Mr. Bannon’s vision of Trumpism — than Mr. Bannon, who
sees history as a succession of movements and power struggles.
And
while Mr. Bannon described the president as “maniacally focused” on
fulfilling his campaign promises, Mr. Trump often loses focus, as he did
during numerous digressions from his scripted remarks on Friday.
He
unleashed the latest in a succession of surprise rhetorical attacks on
longstanding American allies, extemporizing about a friend named Jim who
had told him to avoid the “City of Lights” because after several
terrorist attacks, “Paris is no longer Paris.”
Clearly
reveling in the adulation of a room that had once been hard to win, the
president alternated between a theme of dark days — once again singling
out violence on the streets of Chicago — and light comedy. Speaking of a
meeting with business leaders this week that included food producers,
he quipped, “I like Campbell’s soup.”
He also joked about his first appearance at this annual conservative conclave.
“If
you remember, it was my first major speech. They said he didn’t get a
standing ovation — because everybody stood,” Mr. Trump said of the
speech, in 2011.
“I
had very little notes and even less preparation,” he said. “And then
you leave, and everybody is thrilled, and I say, ‘I like this
business.’”
Get politics and Washington news updates via Facebook, Twitter and in the Morning Briefing newsletter.
China hits back at Trump 'champion of currency manipulation' jibe
US president risks ratcheting up tensions with latest currency claims and repetition of desire for nuclear supremacy
Beijing has hit back at Donald Trump after the US president risked reigniting a simmering feud with China by accusing it of being the “grand champion” of currency manipulation.
After months of turbulence and uncertainty between the world’s two biggest economies, relations appeared to settle two weeks ago after the US president and his Chinese counterpart, Xi Jinping, held their first phone conversation since the billionaire’s inauguration.
However, in an interview with Reuters on Thursday that also saw Trump reiterate his desire for American nuclear supremacy, the US president, who has attacked China over trade, Taiwan, North Korea and the South China Sea, threatened to undermine the tentative rapprochement with a fresh verbal assault.
“I think they’re grand champions at manipulation of currency. So I haven’t held back. We’ll see what happens,” Trump said.The president’s comments were reported just hours after the incoming treasury secretary, Steven Mnuchin, made apparently contradictory remarks signalling that the White House had no immediate plans to label China a currency manipulator – something Trump had pledged to do on his first day in office.
Beijing rejected Trump’s claims on Friday, with the foreign ministry spokesperson Geng Shuang claiming his country had “no intention of deliberately devaluing its currency to gain a trade advantage”.
Asked by the Guardian about Trump’s claims of currency manipulation, Geng said: “If you must pin the label of ‘grand champion’ ... on China, then we are a grand champion of economic development. We’ve made great achievements since the start of economic reform and opening-up, making us the undisputed grand champion.”
Chinese scholars expressed frustration at the president’s allegation. “He has such a big mouth. What can we do about it? Let him talk,” said Zhu Feng, a professor of international relations at Nanjing University.
Economists both within and outside China reject Trump’s claim – repeatedly aired during his campaign – that China is guilty of purposefully forcing down the value of its currency, the renminbi or yuan, in order to boost its own exporters and hamstring US manufacturers.
“The logic of Trump’s claim is that he believes other countries keep their currencies artificially cheap to increase their exports to the US. [But] as a matter of fact, the Chinese yuan has seen a 13% devaluation since last year,” Zhu said, pointing out that Trump had previously also accused South Korea and Japan of manipulating their currencies.
Christopher Balding, a Peking University finance professor, said: “China is clearly manipulating its currency, there’s no two ways about it. But at this point they are essentially propping up the value of their currency rather than manipulating it lower to gain an unfair trade advantage.
“To some degree Trump is correct, that of any major economy they probably are the grand champions of currency manipulation,” he added.
“But we need to very clearly distinguish between manipulating a currency to gain an unfair trade advantage – which they were pretty clearly doing maybe a decade to five years ago but they are clearly not doing that these days – and propping up the currency.”
Over the past year, China’s central bank has spent billions of dollars in foreign exchange reserves shoring up the yuan to counter capital outflows, Reuters reported.
Trump told Reuters that he wants the US to expand its nuclear arsenal, in his first comments on the issue since taking office.
He said: “We’re never going to fall behind any country even if it’s a friendly country. We’re never going to fall behind on nuclear power.It would be wonderful, a dream would be that no country would have nukes, but if countries are going to have nukes, we’re going to be at the top of the pack.”
In statement, the Arms Control Association said Trump’s position was misguided: “Mr Trump’s comments suggest, once again, that he is ill-informed about nuclear weapons and has a poor understanding of the unique dangers of nuclear weapons.
“The history of the cold war shows us that no one comes out on ‘top of the pack’ of an arms race and nuclear brinksmanship.”
Additional reporting by Wang Zhen
After months of turbulence and uncertainty between the world’s two biggest economies, relations appeared to settle two weeks ago after the US president and his Chinese counterpart, Xi Jinping, held their first phone conversation since the billionaire’s inauguration.
However, in an interview with Reuters on Thursday that also saw Trump reiterate his desire for American nuclear supremacy, the US president, who has attacked China over trade, Taiwan, North Korea and the South China Sea, threatened to undermine the tentative rapprochement with a fresh verbal assault.
“I think they’re grand champions at manipulation of currency. So I haven’t held back. We’ll see what happens,” Trump said.The president’s comments were reported just hours after the incoming treasury secretary, Steven Mnuchin, made apparently contradictory remarks signalling that the White House had no immediate plans to label China a currency manipulator – something Trump had pledged to do on his first day in office.
Beijing rejected Trump’s claims on Friday, with the foreign ministry spokesperson Geng Shuang claiming his country had “no intention of deliberately devaluing its currency to gain a trade advantage”.
Asked by the Guardian about Trump’s claims of currency manipulation, Geng said: “If you must pin the label of ‘grand champion’ ... on China, then we are a grand champion of economic development. We’ve made great achievements since the start of economic reform and opening-up, making us the undisputed grand champion.”
Chinese scholars expressed frustration at the president’s allegation. “He has such a big mouth. What can we do about it? Let him talk,” said Zhu Feng, a professor of international relations at Nanjing University.
Economists both within and outside China reject Trump’s claim – repeatedly aired during his campaign – that China is guilty of purposefully forcing down the value of its currency, the renminbi or yuan, in order to boost its own exporters and hamstring US manufacturers.
“The logic of Trump’s claim is that he believes other countries keep their currencies artificially cheap to increase their exports to the US. [But] as a matter of fact, the Chinese yuan has seen a 13% devaluation since last year,” Zhu said, pointing out that Trump had previously also accused South Korea and Japan of manipulating their currencies.
Christopher Balding, a Peking University finance professor, said: “China is clearly manipulating its currency, there’s no two ways about it. But at this point they are essentially propping up the value of their currency rather than manipulating it lower to gain an unfair trade advantage.
“To some degree Trump is correct, that of any major economy they probably are the grand champions of currency manipulation,” he added.
“But we need to very clearly distinguish between manipulating a currency to gain an unfair trade advantage – which they were pretty clearly doing maybe a decade to five years ago but they are clearly not doing that these days – and propping up the currency.”
Over the past year, China’s central bank has spent billions of dollars in foreign exchange reserves shoring up the yuan to counter capital outflows, Reuters reported.
Trump told Reuters that he wants the US to expand its nuclear arsenal, in his first comments on the issue since taking office.
He said: “We’re never going to fall behind any country even if it’s a friendly country. We’re never going to fall behind on nuclear power.It would be wonderful, a dream would be that no country would have nukes, but if countries are going to have nukes, we’re going to be at the top of the pack.”
In statement, the Arms Control Association said Trump’s position was misguided: “Mr Trump’s comments suggest, once again, that he is ill-informed about nuclear weapons and has a poor understanding of the unique dangers of nuclear weapons.
“The history of the cold war shows us that no one comes out on ‘top of the pack’ of an arms race and nuclear brinksmanship.”
Additional reporting by Wang Zhen
Since you’re here …
…
we’ve got a small favour to ask. More people are reading the Guardian
than ever, but far fewer are paying for it. Advertising revenues across
the media are falling fast. And unlike some other news organisations, we
haven’t put up a paywall – we want to keep our journalism open to all.
So you can see why we need to ask for your help. The Guardian’s
independent, investigative journalism takes a lot of time, money and
hard work to produce. But we do it because we believe our perspective
matters – because it might well be your perspective, too.
If everyone who reads our reporting, who likes it, helps to support it, our future would be much more secure.
From an Anchor’s Lips to Trump’s Ears to Sweden’s Disbelief
PALM
BEACH, Fla. — On Friday night, Fox News aired an alarming six-minute
segment in which the host, Tucker Carlson, interviewed a documentary
filmmaker about a crisis of violence in Sweden ignited by the recent wave of Muslim migration.
“The government has gone out of its way to try to cover up some of these problems,” declared Ami Horowitz, the filmmaker.
“That is grotesque,” Mr. Carlson responded.
One
of his viewers agreed, and in that moment was born a diplomatic
incident that illustrates the unusual approach that President Trump
takes to foreign policy, as well as the influence that television can
have on his thinking. After watching the program, Mr. Trump threw a line
into a speech the next day suggesting that a terrorist attack had
occurred in Sweden the night before.
Just
like that, without white papers, intelligence reports, an interagency
meeting or, presumably, the advice of his secretary of state, the
president started a dispute with a longtime American friend that
resented his characterization and called it false. The president’s only
discernible goal was to make the case domestically for his plans to
restrict entry to the United States.
The Swedes were flabbergasted.
“We
are used to seeing the president of the U.S. as one of the most
well-informed persons in the world, also well aware of the importance of
what he says,” Carl Bildt, a former prime minister of Sweden, said by
email on Monday. “And then, suddenly, we see him engaging in
misinformation and slander against a truly friendly country, obviously
relying on sources of a quality that at best could be described as
dubious.”
While
aides sought to clarify that Mr. Trump’s remarks were about a rising
tide of crime in general, rather than any particular event or attack,
the president chose to escalate. In a Twitter post on Monday, he accused
American journalists of glossing over a dark and dangerous situation in
Sweden. “Give the public a break,” he wrote. “The FAKE NEWS media is trying to say that large scale immigration in Sweden is working out just beautifully. NOT!”
Sweden’s
prime minister, Stefan Lofven, responded hours later at a news
conference, noting that Sweden ranks highly on international comparisons
of economic competitiveness and human development.
“We
have challenges, no doubt about that,” he allowed. But he added
pointedly, “We must all take responsibility for using facts correctly
and for verifying anything we spread.”
Sweden
is hardly the first American friend to find itself uncomfortably at
odds with the new president. Mexico’s president canceled a meeting with
Mr. Trump over his plans to build a border wall and bill the United
States’ southern neighbor for it. Mr. Trump reportedly lit into
Australia’s prime minister over refugees in a telephone call that was
said to have ended abruptly.
But
the episode underscored that Mr. Trump obtains, processes and uses
information differently from any modern president. He watches television
at night and tends to incorporate what he sees into his Twitter feed,
speeches and interviews.
“It
begs the question of where the president gets his information as he
articulates his administration’s global approach,” said Mark Brzezinski,
the ambassador to Sweden under President Barack Obama. “To do so in an
improvisational way, based on snippets picked up from cable news, is a
major mistake.”
Immigration
is a hotly debated issue in Sweden, Germany and many other European
countries. Sweden, which prides itself as a humanitarian leader,
processed a record 163,000 asylum applications in 2015. But statistics
in Sweden do not back up the suggestion that immigrants have created a
major crime wave.
Preliminary
data released last month by Sweden’s crime prevention council found no
significant increase in crimes from 2015 to 2016, even with the influx
of migrants. The council did note an increase in assaults and rapes last
year, but it also recorded a drop in thefts and drug offenses. Still, a
Pew Research Center survey last year found that 46 percent of Swedes
said refugees were more to blame for crime than other groups.
Manne
Gerell, a doctoral student in criminology at Malmo University in
Sweden, said in an interview that immigrants were disproportionately
represented among crime suspects, particularly in more serious and
violent offenses. But he noted that many of the victims were other
immigrants, whether members of criminal networks or simply residents of
poor neighborhoods.
“Immigration
will come with some cost, and we will likely have a bit more crime —
but that’s in a society with low crime rates and in a society that works
really well, so in my opinion, it’s something we can live with,” he
said. “I know everybody won’t agree with that. But immigration will not
double the crime rate, make everybody go broke or turn Sweden into a
living hell.”
Although terrorism is a concern for Sweden — an Iraqi-born Swede blew himself up in central Stockholm in 2010 — the authorities say they are equally worried about racist hate crimes, including attacks on migrants.
The
Fox News segment featured an interview with Mr. Horowitz, whose short
film, “Stockholm Syndrome,” depicted Sweden as a place where rape and
violence have been on the rise since it began accepting more refugees
from Muslim countries.
In
the Fox interview, Mr. Horowitz acknowledged that most Swedes do not
see the situation as he does. “They’ll make excuses for it,” he said.
“The majority of the population in Sweden still wants to have an
open-door policy. It’s confounding.”
Mr. Trump was clearly struck by the interview, and he cited Sweden at a rally in Melbourne, Fla.,
on Saturday as he argued for stronger borders. “You look at what’s
happening last night in Sweden,” he said. “Sweden! Who would believe
this? Sweden. They took in large numbers. They’re having problems like
they never thought possible.”
Aides later said “last night” referred to the Fox program, not to an episode the night before. Mr. Carlson argued on Monday that although “the president ought to be precise in what he says, there should be no confusion about what he means.”
Mr.
Carlson said that assimilation had failed and that immigration was “in
the process of totally changing these ancient cultures into something
different and much more volatile and much more threatening.”
Critics
of Sweden’s migration policies have pointed to a Facebook post on Feb. 3
by a police officer, Peter Springare, who said that migrants were
taxing Sweden’s pension, education and health systems and that they were
the principal culprits in assaults. “Half of the suspects we cannot
even be sure of because they don’t have any valid papers,” he wrote.
“Most often this means they are lying about their country of origin and
identity.”
But the Swedish newspaper Dagens Nyheter on Monday quoted
two police officers interviewed by Mr. Horowitz, Anders Goranzon and
Jacob Ekstrom, as saying that the filmmaker had selectively edited and
distorted their comments to prove his thesis. They said that Mr.
Horowitz had asked them about high-crime neighborhoods and that they did
not agree with his argument about links between migration and crime.
“We don’t stand behind what he says,” Mr. Goranzon said. “He is a
madman.”
Mr.
Horowitz did not respond to a request for comment, but he went back on
Mr. Carlson’s show on Monday night to defend his work, citing crime
statistics and asserting that the police officers had recanted because
they were under pressure. “My record stands for itself,” he said, “and
what you saw on that video clear as day stands for itself.”
Donald Trump Will Leave You Numb
Almost
any five minutes of Donald Trump’s mesmerizing, terrifying news
conference on Thursday would have been enough to do another politician
in.
Almost
every day of his administration so far contains sufficient grandiosity
and delusion to be the end of a normal president’s productive
relationship with Congress and support from all but the most stubbornly
blind voters.
And
if you rewind to his campaign, you see the same pattern, with each
rally, interview and debate packing in more petulance and vulgarity than
an adult in a civilized society is supposed to get away with.
But
that’s actually his secret. That’s his means of survival: the warp
speed and whirl of it all. He forces you to process and react to so many
different outrages at such a dizzying velocity that no one of them has
the staying power that it ought to or gets the scrutiny it deserves.
They blend together under the numbing banner of what a freak show he can be, of Trump being Trump. And so the show screams on.
Part
of this excess is his nature. Part of it is design. Not by accident did
he put on that 77-minute performance for the media — hurling insults, flinging lies,
marinating in self-pity, luxuriating in self-love — just three days
after the resignation of his national security adviser, Michael Flynn,
and amid intensifying questions about collusion between Team Trump and
the Russians.
He
was cluttering the landscape. Overwhelming the senses. Betting that a
surfeit of clangorous music would obscure any particularly galling note.
That wager got him all the way to the White House, though he has no
place being there, and so he sticks with it. The news conference was a
case study in such orchestrated chaos.
It
was, in both senses of the phrase, too much. If you became too
transfixed by his laughable boast that his administration was operating
like “a fine-tuned machine” — an assertion he made twice, for emphasis —
you paid inadequate attention to his utterly fictitious claim that he’d
done better in the Electoral College than any president since Ronald
Reagan.
He
wasn’t just a little off. He was spectacularly wrong. He got 304
Electoral College votes. Back in 1988, the first President Bush got 426.
Four years later, Bill Clinton got 370. Clinton got 379 when he was
re-elected, and Barack Obama, in his two victories, got 365 and then
332.
In fact, only one president since Reagan did worse in the Electoral College than Trump, and that was George W. Bush, twice.
A reporter at the news conference, Peter Alexander of NBC News, corrected Trump, telling him that he was in error.
Trump
shrugged. “I was given that information,” he said, as if it’s fair game
and above reproach to repeat any old tidbit you’re told. “I don’t
know.” More to the point, he doesn’t care. He’s wowed by his win and
expects everybody else to be equally impressed. Precise numbers don’t
matter. Facts are just spoilers. They get in the way of the proper
adoration of Trump.
Such a self-serving hallucination about the Electoral College would have been the takeaway
from any other president’s news conference — good for a solid week of
media mastication. But from Trump’s news conference, there was an
overflow of jaw-dropping wonder.
Like
the nonsense that Delta Air Lines, not his own administration’s
incompetence, was to blame for the cruel mess of the travel ban’s
implementation.
Or
like his incessant insistence that Hillary Clinton had been given
debate questions in advance. He said this with an air of grievance
entirely disproportionate to what happened, which concerned all of two questions across two events during the Democratic primary.
Or
like his statement that a “nuclear holocaust would be like no other,”
as if this were some profound epiphany and he needed to share it with
the many unsuspecting Americans who thought that there were all sorts of
holocausts and the nuclear variety wasn’t really so bad.
Or
like his narcissistic meltdown when a Jewish journalist raised the
subject of rising anti-Semitic incidents. Trump whined that he had been
promised a nicer, simpler question, then said, with customary
self-congratulation and hyperbole, “I am the least anti-Semitic person
that you’ve ever seen in your entire life.”
“I
hate the charge,” he added. “I find it repulsive.” In fact he hadn’t
been charged with anything. He had been given the opportunity, for the
second day in a row, to make clear that he deplored any hate crimes and
that he denounced anyone committing them.
And for the second day
in a row, he reverted to me, me, me, me, me. This is why he’ll never be
an effective leader or one worthy of our respect. The world he
genuinely cares about ends at the tip of his nose.
Early
last week someone I was talking with flashed back to Trump’s campaign
and asked me: “How is it that he wasn’t ruined when he mocked John
McCain’s experience as a prisoner of war?”
“How
is it that he wasn’t ruined when he suggested that gun-loving Hillary
haters might think about putting a bullet in her?” I said.
My
question was my answer. Each fresh Trump astonishment overrides an old
one, as if it were a new file on a hard drive that has reached storage
capacity. And the accumulation of astonishments lowers the bar for
what’s expected of him and turns all the astonishments into a blur.
How
long can it continue to work? I stopped trusting my Trump-related
intuition on election night, but I do think that his fine-tuned machine
is in palpable trouble, and not just because a Gallup poll released on
Friday put his disapproval rating all the way up at 56 percent and his
approval rating down at 38 percent.
His
administration’s fate rests largely with Republicans in Congress and
how much they’ll turn a blind eye to, and I have to believe that they
watched Trump’s news conference in horror and slept fitfully that night.
John
McCain traveled to Munich afterward, and in remarks there about the
state of the world and of the West he rued “the hardening resentment we
see toward immigrants and refugees and minority groups, especially
Muslims.” He expressed alarm about “the growing inability, and even
unwillingness, to separate truth from lies.”
I
think he was talking about America, and about Trump, who has succeeded
at nothing so much as devising an analogue to the shock-and-awe military
campaign: It’s the appall-and-anesthetize political strategy.
Betty MacDonald fan club fans,
we share a very special gift by beloved and very popular Betty MacDonald Fan Club Honor member Letizia Mancino.
We know you'll enjoy it as much as we do.
Thanks a Million, dear Letizia Mancino.
You are an outstanding writer and artist.
We are so proud and happy to have you with us.
Letizia writes: One should not underestimate Wolfgang Hampel’s talent in speedily mobilizing Betty MacDonald’s friends.
We agree. Thank you so much dear Wolfgang Hampel for doing this. You founded Betty MacDonald Fan Club with four members.
Now we have members in 40 countries around the world. A dream came true.
Mary Holmes did an excellent job in translating this great story.
Thank you so much dear Mary Holmes.
We are really very grateful.
All the best to Letizia, Wolfgang and Mary and to all Betty MacDonald Fan Club fans from all over the world!
Lenard
Following in Betty’s footsteps in Seattle:
or some small talk with Betty
Copyright 2011/2016 by Letizia Mancino
All rights reserved
translated by Mary Holmes
We were going to Canada in the summer. “When we are in Edmonton”, I said to Christoph Cremer, “let’s make a quick trip to Seattle”. And that’s how it happened. At Edmonton Airport we climbed into a plane and two hours later we landed in the city where Betty had lived. I was so happy to be in Seattle at last and to be able to trace Betty’s tracks!
Wolfgang Hampel had told Betty’s friends about our arrival.
They were happy to plan a small marathon through the town and it’s surroundings with us. We only had a few days free. One should not underestimate Wolfgang’s talent in speedily mobilizing Betty’s friends, even though it was holiday time. E-mails flew backwards and forwards between Heidelberg and Seattle, and soon a well prepared itinerary was ready for us. Shortly before my departure Wolfgang handed me several parcels, presents for Betty MacDonald's friends. I rushed to pack the heavy gifts in my luggage but because of the extra weight had to throw out a pair of pajamas!
After we had landed we took a taxi to the Hotel in downtown Seattle. I was so curious to see everything. I turned my head in all directions like one of the hungry hens from Betty’s farm searching for food! Fortunately it was quite a short journey otherwise I would have lost my head like a loose screw!
Our hotel room was on the 22nd floor and looked directly out onto the 16-lane highway. There might have been even more than 16 but it made me too giddy to count! It was like a glimpse of hell! “And is this Seattle?” I asked myself. I was horrified! The cars racing by were enough to drive one mad. The traffic roared by day and night.
We immediately contacted Betty MacDonald's friends and let them know we had arrived and they confirmed the times when we should see them.
On the next morning I planned my first excursion tracing Betty’s tracks. I spread out the map of Seattle. “Oh dear” I realized “the Olympic Peninsula is much too far away for me to get there.”
Betty nodded to me! “Very difficult, Letizia, without a car.”
“But I so much wanted to see your chicken farm”
“My chickens are no longer there and you can admire the mountains from a distance”
But I wanted to go there. I left the hotel and walked to the waterfront where the State Ferry terminal is. Mamma mia, the streets in Seattle are so steep! I couldn’t prevent my feet from running down the hill. Why hadn’t I asked for brakes to be fixed on my shoes? I looked at the drivers. How incredibly good they must be to accelerate away from the red traffic lights. The people were walking uphill towards me as briskly as agile salmon. Good heavens, these Americans! I tried to keep my balance. The force of gravity is relentless. I grasped hold of objects where I could and staggered down.
In Canada a friend had warned me that in Seattle I would see a lot of people with crutches.
Betty laughed. “ It’s not surprising, Letizia, walking salmon don’t fall directly into the soft mouth of a bear!”
“ Betty, stop making these gruesome remarks. We are not in Firlands!”
I went further. Like a small deranged ant at the foot of a palace monster I came to a tunnel. The noise was unbearable. On the motorway, “The Alaskan Way Viaduct”, cars, busses and trucks were driving at the speed of light right over my head. They puffed out their poisonous gas into the open balconies and cultivated terraces of the luxurious sky- scrapers without a thought in the world. America! You are crazy!
“Betty, are all people in Seattle deaf? Or is it perhaps a privilege for wealthy people to be able to enjoy having cars so near to their eyes and noses to save them from boredom?”
“When the fog democratically allows everything to disappear into nothing, it makes a bit of a change, Letizia”
“ Your irony is incorrigible, Betty, but tell me, Seattle is meant to be a beautiful city, But where?”
I had at last reached the State Ferry terminal.
“No Madam, the ferry for Vashon Island doesn’t start from here,” one of the men in the ticket office tells me. ”Take a buss and go to the ferry terminal in West Seattle.”
Betty explained to me “The island lies in Puget Sound and not in Elliott Bay! It is opposite the airport. You must have seen it when you were landing!”
“Betty, when I am landing I shut my eyes and pray!”
It’s time for lunch. The weather is beautiful and warm. Who said to me that it always rains here?
“Sure to be some envious man who wanted to frighten you away from coming to Seattle. The city is really beautiful, you’ll see. Stay by the waterfront, choose the best restaurant with a view of Elliott Bay and enjoy it.”
“Thank you Betty!”
I find a table on the terrace of “Elliott’s Oyster House”. The view of the island is wonderful. It lies quietly in the sun like a green fleecy cushion on the blue water.
Betty plays with my words:
“Vashon Island is a big cushion, even bigger than Bainbridge which you see in front of your eyes, Letizia. The islands look similar. They have well kept houses and beautiful gardens”.
I relax during this introduction, “Bainbridge” you are Vashon Island, and order a mineral water.
“At one time the hotel belonging to the parents of Monica Sone stood on the waterfront.”
“Oh, of your friend Kimi!” Unfortunately I forget to ask Betty exactly where it was.
My mind wanders and I think of my mountain hike back to the hotel! “Why is there no donkey for tourists?” Betty laughs:
“I’m sure you can walk back to the hotel. “Letizia can do everything.””
“Yes, Betty, I am my own donkey!”
But I don’t remember that San Francisco is so steep. It doesn’t matter, I sit and wait. The waiter comes and brings me the menu. I almost fall off my chair!
“ What, you have geoduck on the menu! I have to try it” (I confess I hate the look of geoduck meat. Betty’s recipe with the pieces made me feel quite sick – I must try Betty’s favourite dish!)
“Proof that you love me!” said Betty enthusiastically “ Isn’t the way to the heart through the stomach?”
I order the geoduck. The waiter looks at me. He would have liked to recommend oysters.
“Geoduck no good for you!”
Had he perhaps read my deepest thoughts? Fate! Then no geoduck. “No good for me.”
“Neither geoduck nor tuberculosis in Seattle” whispered Betty in my ear!
“Oh Betty, my best friend, you take such good care of me!”
I order salmon with salad.
“Which salmon? Those that swim in water or those that run through Seattle?”
“Betty, I believe you want me to have a taste of your black humour.”
“Enjoy it then, Letizia.”
During lunch we talked about tuberculosis, and that quite spoilt our appetite.
“Have you read my book “The Plague and I”?”
“Oh Betty, I’ve started to read it twice but both times I felt so sad I had to stop again!”
“But why?” asked Betty “Nearly everybody has tuberculosis! I recovered very quickly and put on 20 pounds! There was no talk of me wasting away! What did you think of my jokes in the book?”
“Those would have been a good reason for choosing another sanitorium. I would have been afraid of becoming a victim of your humour! You would have certainly given me a nickname! You always thought up such amusing names!” Betty laughed.
“You’re right. I would have called you “Roman nose”. I would have said to Urbi and Orbi “ Early this morning “Roman nose” was brought here. She speaks broken English, doesn’t eat geoduck but she does love cats.”
“Oh Betty, I would have felt so ashamed to cough. To cough in your presence, how embarrassing! You would have talked about how I coughed, how many coughs!”
“It depends on that “how”, Letizia!”
“Please, leave Goethe quotations out of it. You have certainly learnt from the Indians how to differentiate between noises. It’s incredible how you can distinguish between so many sorts of cough! At least 10!”
“So few?”
”And also your descriptions of the patients and the nurses were pitiless. An artistic revenge! The smallest pimple on their face didn’t escape your notice! Amazing.”
“ I was also pitiless to myself. Don’t forget my irony against myself!”
Betty was silent. She was thinking about Kimi, the “Princess” from Japan! No, she had only written good things about her best friend, Monica Sone, in her book “The Plague and I”. A deep friendship had started in the hospital. The pearl that developed from the illness.
“Isn’t it wonderful, Betty, that an unknown seed can make its way into a mollusk in the sea and develop into a beautiful jewel?” Betty is paying attention.
“Betty, the friendship between you and Monica reminds me of Goethe’s poem “Gingo-Biloba”. You must know it?” Betty nods and I begin to recite it:
The leaf of this Eastern tree
Which has been entrusted to my garden
Offers a feast of secret significance,
For the edification of the initiate.
Is it one living thing.
That has become divided within itself?
Are these two who have chosen each other,
So that we know them as one?
The friendship with Monica is like the wonderful gingo-biloba leaf, the tree from the east. Betty was touched. There was a deep feeling of trust between us.
“Our friendship never broke up, partly because she was in distress, endangered by the deadly illness. We understood and supplemented each other. We were like one lung with two lobes, one from the east and one from the west!”
“A beautiful picture, Betty. You were like two red gingo-biloba leaves!”
Betty was sad and said ” Monica, although Japanese, before she really knew me felt she was also an American. But she was interned in America, Letizia, during the second world war. Isn’t that terrible?”
“Betty, I never knew her personally. I have only seen her on a video, but what dignity in her face, and she speaks and moves so gracefully!”
“Fate could not change her”
“Yes, Betty, like the gingo-biloba tree in Hiroshima. It was the only tree that blossomed again after the atom bomb!”
The bill came and I paid at once. In America one is urged away from the table when one has finished eating. If one wants to go on chatting one has to order something else.
“That’s why all those people gossiping at the tables are so fat!” Betty remarks. “Haven’t you seen how many massively obese people walk around in the streets of America. Like dustbins that have never been emptied!” With this typically unsentimental remark Betty ended our conversation.
Ciao! I so enjoyed the talk; the humour, the irony and the empathy. I waved to her and now I too felt like moving! I take a lovely walk along the waterfront.
Now I am back in Heidelberg and when I think about how Betty’s “Princessin” left this world on September 5th and that in August I was speaking about her with Betty in Seattle I feel very sad. The readers who knew her well (we feel that every author and hero of a book is nearer to us than our fleeting neighbours next door) yes we, who thought of her as immortal, cannot believe that even she would die after 92 years. How unforeseen and unexpected that her death should come four days after her birthday on September 1th. On September 5th I was on my way to Turkey, once again in seventh heaven, looking back on the unforgettable days in Seattle. I was flying from west to east towards the rising sun.
Is this Mr. Tigerli?
 |
