OpinionBug.com

Nein! That was German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s response to Barack Obama’s planned election rally at Berlin’s Brandenburg Gate.

Jacob Heilbrunn at National Interest Online wrote in response:

“Good for Merkel. Obama’s desire to speak before the Brandenburg Gate, as did Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton, is the equivalent of his bungled appearance before a faux presidential seal on a lectern in June: foolish, misguided and arrogant. Obama may believe he is the next John F. Kennedy, but Kennedy was already president when he announced, “Ich bin ein Berliner” in 1963. Just as Americans would flinch at the sight of a foreign candidate trying to use the White House as a prop for a major address, so Germans such as chancellor Merkel are right to recoil at the notion of Obama pontificating about peace and understanding at the symbol of German unification.”

Over at No Quarter, Charles Lemos writes:

“To Obama, all the world is a stage, hence a stadium in Denver or the Bradenburg Gate seem fitting backdrops to his delusions of grandeur. Misanthrophic is the word that comes to mind. Contemptuous is another. However, the Germans do not seem to be willing to play his games.”