Al Gore: "Ich bin ein DU'er! "

[Stephanie]

http: //news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/060116/ids_photos_ts/r1458198113.jpg

[LizW]

1. LOL!

:applause:

[catnhatnh]

2. Ein DUer????

are we just another pastry???

[Stephanie]

3. leave me alone!

I don't speak German either! :)

[catnhatnh]

5. Kay...

The original knock was that Kennedy said "Ich bin Ein Berliner" as opposed to "Ich bin Berliner"-the second meaning I am a Berliner as opposed to the first which in the vernacular meant "I am a jelly donut"....Just like I am a "Philly" might mean you were a cheesesteak sandwich...but since they knew what the reference was the crowd recognized the reference and loved him in spite of the pastry reference....

[TahitiNut]

9. Just plain FUCKING WRONG!

How many times do people have to be told in 40 years that this is horseshit?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ich_bin_ein_Berliner#.22Jelly_doughnut.22_urban_legend

[johnaries]

4. Shame on you! Buying into another RW lie!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ich_bin_ein_Berliner

-A common urban legend falsely asserts that Kennedy made an embarrassing grammatical error by saying "Ich bin ein Berliner," referring to himself not as a citizen of Berlin, but as a common pastry....

There is no grammatical error in Kennedy's statement; the indefinite article does not change its meaning. -

:hi:

[TahitiNut]

8. It's really tiresome and annoying, isn't it?

(I wonder if that makes it illegal, now.) I can't even count the number of times I've seen that bullshit repeated. After taking five years of German (high school and college) at the time Kennedy said it, I'm even more annoyed than most. No matter how many times I've told people who continue to peddle that horseshit that they're wrong, they keep doing it. Sometimes the human skull seems more dense than lead ... or DU. :grr:

[catnhatnh]

10. I may be mistaken...if so I do apologize....

but I would rather here this from a native speaker...I have several years of spanish,but to assume I get vernacular of an area or even general idiom would be stretching it...

[TahitiNut]

11. It's a GUARANTEE that you didn't hear the 'jelly doughnut' myth ...

... from a native-speaking German. So, why must it be dispelled by one? Hmmm?? :eyes:

It's been fully and thoroughly debunked, today on a multitude of reputable web sites, and in those days by my native-speaking German instructors. It sems to betray some strange desire to besmirch and trivialize one of the more profound and uplifting speeches by any American President ... a Democrat, in this case. I lived through those days when the Berlin Wall was built and the Cold War escalated. I did "duck and cover" in school as a child. I lived through the Bay of Pigs. I watched as our nuclear submarine fleet went to sea from Groton, fully loaded. I can't even begin to tell younger people how ridiculous it sounds when there's some pretense the we're in some novel, new "dangerous" age. The total failure to comprehend the impact of that speech and the times in which is was made is appalling to me.

[catnhatnh]

14. Dude-I'm 52

Been there and done that....It was appearently one take on a speech given in what year???I thought it was MORE uplifting that he may have been in the minds of some mispoken and was still embraced-read "Armegeddon"..And now an apology IF I am mistaken is insufficient???Get a grip, Please...

[TahitiNut]

16. It's so tired an issue that it's even in DU's Demopedia.

http://demopedia.democraticunderground.com/index.php/Ich_bin_ein_Berliner

[catnhatnh]

18. Jesus Christ Dude....

...I did everything but beat myself...What will it take to get you off my case...

[Matariki]

15. actually, i *did* hear it from native germans

friends in berlin while i was living there. although if i remember correctly - the truth seemed to lie somewhere between it being technically grammatically correct and it being a colloquialism (the 'philly' example given above is probably close) and that people weren't laughing at him, nor was it that big of a deal there.

[TahitiNut]

17. Absolutely NOBODY mistook the meaning. Nobody.

The regionalism 'Berliner (Pfannkuchen)' is used only in western Germany, along the Rhine, and not that commonly at that. Nobody in Berlin used that slang.

[Matariki]

19. yeah well, i did hear it from Berliners non-the-less

they weren't ignorant of the double entendre. of course they were post kennedy generation, so the 'myth' of 'i am a jelly donut' is probably known in modern german culture as well.

[catnhatnh]

20. Bingo

...but in local vernaculr,he may have missed it...

[haktar]

21. At high noon, behind the saloon ?

You all are correct somehow.
Kennedy was correct, everybody would have said it this way. But Kellevaned,who wrote the demopedia article,
ist ein Berliner(<- correct here) himself
But in other parts of germany there are tongue in cheek jokes about berliner, frankfurter(sausages) amerikaner
(also a sort of pastry) ...
so, cancel the showdown.

Btw. i watched Al Gore's great speech on C-Span.
If he had become president, i'm sure, we all would still be americans.

[johnaries]

12. Read the article for the German's take on it. Or, find a video clip of the

original speech. The statement is followed by thunderous applause, not laughter.

[haktar]

13. LOL

As a german, i may assure you, the wikipedia article is absolutly correct. In this context Kennedy had to say "Ich bin ein Berliner".

on edit: I may be speaking german, but obviously i have some major problems writing in english ;-)

[C_U_L8R]

6. J'ACCUSE !!!

today was a defining moment in the downfall of the Bush regime.
Thank you Al Gore !!

[Swamp Rat]

7. President Al Gore

[FarLeftRage]

22. "And you know, if I had been allowed

to be President, as I was elected to be...this was not have happened:"