Obama speech yesterday in Berlin was wonderful.

Political Tidbit: The Obama speech yesterday in Berlin was wonderful. First, the man can speak, unlike the guy we’ve got now.

He voiced American idealism, something we haven’t heard for a while

instead of getting the second-rate but still nasty Kissinger-esque Realpolitick of the current administration. Second, the crowd was applauding everything Obama said and waving American flags (instead of “Yankee, Go Home” banners). When was the last time we saw that? They threw tomatoes at Nixon in Venezuela and today’s banners for Bush are unprintable in a family newsletter.

Third, some 200,000 people attended, a very large crowd to listen to a foreign politician in any city. Fourth, the speech incorporated references to the American involvement with Berlin, from the 1948-49 Berlin airlift, to Kennedy’s “Ich bin ein Berliner” in the early 1960’s, to Reagan’s “Mr. Gorbechev, tear down this wall!,” to the Berliners actually tearing the thing down in 1989, as the rest of world watched on television with tears streaming down their faces. If you are going abroad to make a speech during a US presidential election, you can’t beat Berlin for a venue.