Yesterday, during a campaign stop at "Schmidt's Sausage Haus und Restaurant", John McCain criticized Barack Obama's speech before 200,000 people at Berlin's Victory Column, saying:

Well, I’d love to give a speech in Germany, a political speech, or a speech that maybe the German people would be interested in, but I’d much prefer to do it as president of the United States rather than as a candidate for the office of presidency.

Does John McCain have a valid point? Or, could it be argued that while there aren't any electoral votes to be won in Germany, we do have many shared interests that need our attention? And given that Germany is a friend to our country, wasn't Obama's speech both necessary and appropriate?

Let's check with noted foreign policy expert, Senator John McCain:

There aren't any electoral votes to be won up here in the middle of a presidential election. But there are many shared interests that require our attention today, and many Canadians here I am proud to call friends.

Uh oh. Does that mean John McCain isn't proud to call Germans his friends? Or was he just having some whine with his sausage?

I received this email from someone I do not know but who I think is a member of a yahoo message board I belong to. It is not a political message board - in fact, the message board relates to a health issue. In any event, this woman apparently believes she can send email out to me about political matters. And boy, did she send me an egregiously disgusting email about Obama today.

Pew Hispanic Center. 7/9-13. Registered Hispanic voters. MoE 4.4% (

Remember, exit polls gave Bush 44 percent of the Latino vote in 2004, with Kerry getting just 53 percent. These Pew numbers represent the utter collapse of GOP support amongst Latinos which started in 2006, when xenophobic anti-immigrant rantings scared Latinos away from the GOP. Only 30 percent of Latinos voted Republican that year. I'm guessing today that Democrats earn as much as 75 percent of the Latino vote this year.

That will be significant, as the rest of Pew's report (PDF) makes clear.

[S]ome 78% of Latino registered voters say they are following the election very closely or somewhat closely this year, up from the 72% who said the same thing at this stage of the 2004 campaign. These poll findings, coming on the heels of a spirited Obama-Clinton nomination fight that led to rises in the Latino share of the vote in many Democratic primaries, suggest that the Hispanic community is politically energized heading into the fall election campaign.

More than three-quarters (76%) of Hispanic registered voters have a favorable opinion of Obama, and 73% have a favorable opinion of Hillary Rodham Clinton. In contrast, 44% of Hispanics have a favorable opinion of McCain and 27% have a favorable opinion of George W. Bush.

More than three-in-four Hispanics who voted for Clinton in a Democratic primary or caucus this year say they would vote for Obama or lean toward voting for him, while 8% of Clinton voters say they would vote for McCain or lean toward voting for him.

Latino registered voters are almost three times as likely to say that being black will help Obama (32%) with Hispanic voters than hurt him (11%); the majority (53%) say his race will make no difference.

More than half of Latino voters (55%) say that the Democratic Party is better for Latinos while just 6% say the Republican Party is better for Latinos.

By 2010, the Census Bureau expects the Latino population to be at 47.8 million, or 15.5 percent of the total population. By 2050, they project 102.6 million of us, or 24.4 of the country's total. With Republicans assiduously alienating this key and rapidly growing block, to the point that just 6 percent think Republicans are better for them, it has put a serious strain on their future ability to win.

So yes, this is all great news for Obama this year, but it portends huge things for the future of American politics, quite possibly the death of the modern Republican Party.

As for Obama, we've been mocking the whole "Latinos won't vote for a black guy" thing for months, ever since the Clinton campaign first used that ridiculous (and insulting) line of attack. The numbers since then have been quite clear. Latinos are more than happy enough (and excited) about voting for Obama as anyone else, and likely more so. I'm glad we're finally moving on from that ridiculousness.

Lets be honest, Obama is not the strongest candidate, in that his race and lack of national experience have been a hindrance for people to readily support him. In the real world, a lot people ask what has this guy done to think that he could be president.  On that note, Gore or even HRC would have been stronger. I say HRC may be stronger because toward the end of the primary she was running a general campaign.  I really don't think that this is a fair question but we must recognize that it is an elephant in the room.

Obama's speech in front of the Victory Column in Berlin was an unqualified campaign success. Check the photos in Al Rodgers's diary, here is one again (photo from SPIEGEL).

This diary however is meant as a deeper look at the event and its significance. Some of the points covered will be critical, others will be further appraisal:

• Ridiculous reaction from the McCain campaign
• Symbolism of the place
• The crowds and their reaction
• An analysis in German media
• European blacks watching
• Meeting Merkel, the wily tactician
• Meeting the gay mayor

I was just checking out 538 and had this little brainwave about how Obama wins. Instead of talking about change, talk about the future.

Well, the pictures from Berlin were truly something.  The Newseum in Washington, DC, publishes the front pages of over 600 newspapers from around the world every morning.  I thought some would be nice to share here.  

If you want to check this site out, here's the link: http://www.newseum.org/...

It is interesting how some papers have absolutely nothing on their front page about yesterday's speech...I haven't included them here.

There are also some papers that aren't posted yet.

Pictures after the jump:

By Stephen Silver/North Star Writers Group

For the past few weeks I've been doing small community development projects and co-instructing a course on international development in the small town of Kayanga, Tanzania - Karagwe District. Smashed between Rwanda, Uganda, and Lake Victoria, this place has seen its share of global disasters. This is an area ignored by travel guides and disconnected from much of the continent. News travels slowly here, and most families have been farming these lands since well before Livingstone rolled through. But thanks to this new internet cafe that I'm sitting in, the sporadic television set, and the two new radio stations in town, Kayanga is connected to the world, and the people here have an important message for you...

We can not afford a third Bush term, John McCain represents four more years of George W. Bush's failed policies.

It's an incredibly simple statement, yet devastating and for some reason I haven't been hearing it from the Obama campaign for a while. JMHO, but the reason John McCain has been making up ground isn't simply because of his advertising and campaigning but because the Obama campaign has been passively allowing him to pursue his message without going after him for supporting George Bush's failed policies. It used to be every speech at the end of the primaries and at the MN acceptance and a while beyond was calling McCain out on supporting Bush. The MSM will not make the contrasts, Obama has to take his microphone and like Iowa, go after John McCain every day as a third Bush term. MAKE McCain the incumbant. MAKE the election about McCain. The dynamics as they now stand give McCain a 50/50 shot of negative campaigning winning the day for Republicans. We can't let this be about Obama but about ideas: John McCain is running for George Bush's third term. EVERY democratic surrogate and talking head should be saying this EVERY day about EVERY subject. And so should we in our diaries.

Much of the commentary on Obama's Berlin speech (watch it) has focused on the "optics" (the MSM's fav word this week it seems) with little on the substance.  For those interested in what Obama's foreign policy would be like, however, I think this would be a mistake.  I believe Obama meant this to be a serious, landmark speech; one that laid out his vision for the role of Europe, America and the West after Bush, after 9/11, after the Cold War, after the world wars of the 20th century.  For a candidate who so emphasizes tomorrow rather than today or yesterday, I believe the speech is a roadmap to what Obamaism is going to be about (What Is Obama-ism?).

First, it was Condi Rice's memo to American consulates abroad, now Pentagon...

There was much of noise last night over Der Spiegel's report that Obama camp cancelled his previously planned trip to the hopsital in Berlin. Rush, Hannity, all had crap to talk about. Some at Faux Noise suggested the trip was cancelled because there was no photo op, developing a new meme against Obama.

It is now confirmed that Pentagon played a crucial role in cancellation:

"Senator Obama had hoped to and had every intention of visiting our troops to express his appreciation and gratitude for their service to our country," retired Air Force Major General Scott Gration, an Obama adviser, said in a statement.

"We learned from the Pentagon [Wednesday] night that the visit would be viewed instead as a campaign event. Senator Obama did not want to have a trip to see our wounded warriors percieved as a campaign event...and decided instead not to go."  

http://blog.washingtonpost.com/...

Yesterday John McCain announced his Vice Presidential selection to a crowd of tens in a parking garage in Columbus, Ohio. Unfortunately, there was no media present, no one in the crowd thought to video the event and there was no cell phone coverage in the 3 story underground facility. Asked if it was true he had named his running mate McCain responded, "Are you my economy czar? No, have you seen him?" Later at a restaurant near his home former Congressman Rob Portman was asked if he was the choice. "Yes it is," said Portman, "and the wine is superb."

People of Berlin. People of the world.

Today, I feel tremendous pride in my country.

200,000 people showed up to hear Barack deliver his major speech in Berlin yesterday.

Many of them were waving American flags. Barack was not booed nor heckled. Nor was he worshiped.

The crowd listened, applauded, chanted a few O-BA-MA's. Often, the camera revealed pensive people, intent people, expressionless, not even applauding, pondering the weight of every single word.

There was little to indicate a throng of listeners caught up in the hysteria of watching a rock star, despite the chorus of corporate media shills and demoralized detractors.

By now, we've all figured out that you guys are pissed about Sen. Barack Obama's speech in Berlin, his visit to Iraq and his media coverage. You think it's a bunch of unwarranted hype. You're free to go ahead and stew in the rancid juices of jealousy for the rest of the campaign, but know this:

It's your own damned fault.

That childish 'day counter' at GOP.com is one of the main reasons for Obama's hype. Without the goading from the GOP website and other republican megaphones of ignorance such as the sycophants at Fox News, this hype probably wouldn't exist. I say 'probably' just because I'm an open-minded lefty and I leave room for other possibilities (like Obama's brilliant campaign).

But if I were more like you, I would say something like this:

Dear Journal,
The other I visited what Americans call the "grocery store". It was quite an experience. After all these years, I thought tha Frank my driver accumulated all of my food and delivered it. I had no idea that these stores existed.

Barack's speech in Germany, was a message for the 21st Century and for the survival of the Planet -- of Earth.

I am breaking the rules - but please read exmearden's diary and rec it up.  An excellent piece on walls.

That's it. Since the diary auto-police say I have to use 150 words ....