Historians criticize governor for flubbing Austrian history at GOP convent

[Kadie]

Historians criticize governor for flubbing Austrian history at GOP convention

ROLAND PRINZ, Associated Press Writer
Friday, September 3, 2004


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(09-03) 03:39 PDT VIENNA, Austria (AP) --

Austrian historians are ridiculing California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger for telling the Republican National Convention that he saw Soviet tanks in his homeland as a child and left a "Socialist" country when he moved away in 1968.

Recalling that the Soviets once occupied part of Austria in the aftermath of World War II, Schwarzenegger told the convention on Tuesday: "I saw tanks in the streets. I saw communism with my own eyes."

No way, historians say, challenging Schwarzenegger's knowledge of postwar history -- if not his enduring popularity among Austrians who admire him for rising from a penniless immigrant to the chief executive of America's second-largest state.

"It's a fact -- as a child he could not have seen a Soviet tank in Styria," the southeastern province where Schwarzenegger was born and raised, historian Stefan Karner told the Vienna newspaper Kurier.

more...
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/news/archive/2004/09/03/state0639EDT0034.DTL

[tabasco]

1. We already knew he was a liar.

Nice to see the smart guys chime in to re-confirm our beliefs. Arnie is a fkkking nazi, and yearns for power ....MORE POWER!!!!

[oneighty]

2. Ray-gun

All over again; remembering things that never were (Or from movies he forgot he was in).

A pretend world.

180

[Jeff in Cincinnati]

12. As I recall...

and to avoid pulling a "Ronnie" I would have to double check, but he once boasted Yitzhak Shamir that he was "with our boys" when they liberated Auschwitz. That's damned fine trick for a guy who spent all of World War Two making training films at the Hal Roach Studios. And it's even more curious when you recall that Auschwitz was liberated by troops of the Soviet Army.

"Our Boys," Ronnie? Just whose side were you on?

[supernova]

3. Eh. Book smarts where never Arnie's forte

My ex MiL was a 3 year-old living in Vienna during the war. She doesn't remember much of it either. Vienna got the shit bombed out of it.

She does remember food rationing and that kind of thing. Her dad was career military so she remember seeing him in his uniform. But the rest of it is a blur to her.

[Hobarticus]

4. Facts? I do not need FACTS!

What a lunkhead. His life's been on a stage, artificially pumping himself up...why stop now?

[yellowcanine]

5. I thought that was a "Reagan memory fact" when I heard it. My knowledge

of post WWII history wasn't good enough to know but I doubted that Arnold would have seen Soviet troops in Austria.

[xultar]

6. We've only proven again that GOP pres wannabes are dumb as rocks n/t

[Howardx]

7. as much as i hate arnold

he actually could have seen soviet tanks in austria, i did a lot of research on this the day after his speech trying to bust him on it, what he said was that he saw them when he and his father went to the soviet zone of austria, theres no doubt that he COULD have seen them, whether he really did? i doubt it.

[ignatius 2]

16. Thing is, they were there to LIBERATE Austria from the

Nazis,part of the WWII coalition.

[stavka]

19. You know, Nazi's, just like pappa was.....

[ignatius 2]

24. AND Arnold, for that matter.

[lostnfound]

30. You can bust him on lying about Nixon-Humphrey debates.

That was a centerpoint of his speech, yet no such debate never took place.

[lfairban]

31. He didn't say he heard them debate . . .

. . . he said he heard them both speak on TV.

[truthisfreedom]

8. they need vets to vet the stuff that's vetted. everything about the 'thugs

at the RNC was absolutely bizarre this year.

[cybildisobedience]

9. yes, but....

was Kerry REALLY in Cambodia on Christmas Eve??!?!??

[ignatius 2]

10. Yep, instead of pumping iron he should'a been pumping the

history books.

Funny how the repugs adore Reagan, John Wayne, and Arnie..all movie heroes and smear McCain,Cleland and Kerry, all real heroes. They definitely have a problem with real men and reality versus make believe movie girlie-men. Dr. Freud would have a field day with the sickos in the repug party.

Best line of the week..John McCain on the daily show. When asked by John S. what he thought of Zell Millers rantings he said, Did John Kerry shoot Zells dog or something?

How did McCain, Powell and other moderates let the lunatics take over their party?

[UpInArms]

11. who wrote the dimbulb's script?

But Martin Polaschek, a law history scholar and vice rector of Graz University, told Kurier that Austria was governed by coalition governments, including the conservative People's Party and the Social Democratic Party. Between 1945 and 1970, all the nation's chancellors were conservatives -- not Socialists.

What's more, when Schwarzenegger left in 1968, Austria was run by a conservative-only government headed by People's Party Chancellor Josef Klaus, a staunch Roman Catholic and a sharp critic of both the Socialists as well as the Communists ruling in countries across the Iron Curtain.

[Freddie Stubbs]

13. The AP writer certainly flubbed up things also

America's second-largest state?

[UpInArms]

14. so did they forget

Texas or was it Alaska?

[Thor_MN]

25. Coulf they have meant population or economy rather than acreage?

[Freddie Stubbs]

27. Either way they screwed up

It has the largest population,

http://207.21.203.96/statepopulation.html

The third largest in area

http://geography.about.com/library/faq/blqzlargestates.htm

And it has the largest state economy

http://www.nemw.org/gsp.htm

[tom_paine]

15. The lies were told, heard and believed by the Sturmtruppen

That is all that is required.

Facts have no meaning in Imperial Amerika.

None.

None at all.

The words "lie" and "truth", as in Orwell's "1984" are an anachronism in Imperial Amerika.

[markses]

17. Some call it flubbing - I call it LYING

Let's remember that Al Gore was widely chastised for saying he went to Texas with the head of FEMA, rather than a deputy head of FEMA. Meanwhile, Arnold "forgets" that Austria was run by a staunch anti-communist when he left in 1968, and imagines Soviet tanks in the streets where there were none, and nobody says boo, or they chuckle at his "historical mistake." It is not a historical mistake. It is a pack of lies, as per usual.

[lefador]

18. Indeed Russian advance stopped at the Hungarian border

Austria (esp Vienna) was under British/US control, you can watch the movie "The third man" which is set in post WWII Vienna to get a clue if you are not much into History books. In any case if Russian tanks indeed invaded his hometown, there is a case to be made on why those tanks where in Austria to begin with. I guess the whole WWII may be a little fact according to Ahnold, but not to the 20+ million Russians slaughtered by the German/Austrian armies.

Ahnold's dad was indeed a member of the Nazi party, Ahnold claims to have strained relations with his dad, however he refused to denounce an Austrian presidential candidate in the mid 80's with whom Ahnold had close ties. This Austrian politician, Kurt Waldheim, was an intelligence officer in Army Group E at the same time that it committed mass murder in Bosnia. His name is on the group's "Honor List" of those who participated in the atrocities. His name appears on anti-Semitic propaganda directed at Russian soldiers that read "enough of the Jewish war, kill the Jews, come over."

Ahnold's warped historical facts do not stop there, during his speech he did indeed thought that Nixon was a "breath of fresh air" after he watched a TV debate in the 68 election between Nixon and Humphrey. Besides the gall of anyone calling Nixon a "breath of fresh air" in the 21st century, there is an even bigger problem that none of the pundits acknowledged: There was never any TV debate between Nixon and Humphrey. The Democrat did indeed challenge Nixon to several debates, but Nixon, still wary of his lackluster performance against Kennedy during the first TV debates in the 60 election (which is credited with part of the reason for his defeat), refused to debate his democratic opponent.

It gets even better, by the time Ahnold left Austria, late 60's. Austria was a western democracy w/o ties to the soviet block. In fact Austria has remained relatively neutral in its aligment during the past half century, with a succesion of conservative governments (staunchly anti-communist). What Ahnold fails to mention is that he fled Austria while he was in the middle of his military service, which he never finished and because of which he had a warrant. That is right, Mr. Girlie man himself did not finish his military commitment to his own country (wich was one of the frontlines in a hypothetical Communist WWIII advance against western Europe). So Ahnold himself felt so strongly against communism that he did not even want to actually defend his homeland against a possible Communist invasion... but he actually left that responsability because he figured out that walking around in speedos and oiling his pectorals was more important.

The final straw is the actual circumstances in which Ahnold came into the country. He came with a tourist visa, he could not go back to Austria, and the US would not give him an actual inmigration visa due to his warrant by the Austrian authorities (due to cross-treaties within the US and its allies). So Ahnold did indeed spend a large portion of his early stay as an illegal inmigrant.

Indeed the American dream.

[stavka]

20. No it didn't...Soviets Liberated Vienna

Austria was made neutral during the cold war however.

[lefador]

23. My bad

You are correct, but I was under the impression that all allied forces had left Austria after 1950. And the Russian had setup the iron courtain in the Hungarian border leaving Austria out of it (I guess I misread the encyclopedia, not enough sleep lately). I know Vienna was pretty much a hotbed of Russian/Western counter intelligence.

I think Ahnold was born in '47/'48 so it would make him 3 yrs old to have such a vivid recollection of the bad Russian tanks is rather impressive. I don't recall anything from my early youth that well, and the things I do remember are pretty much political-free as I did not give a rats ass about politics when I was 3 years old.

But I stand corrected.

[CBHagman]

21. If a Democrat had said that...

...we would be hearing coverage of it 24/7 for, oh, about a year, and it would be proof of how A) stupid and B) mendacious the Democrats are, and we would be warned against voting for them.

:eyes:

[Endangered Specie]

22. A little Revisionist history from Arnold... I suppose next he'll say:

"It was probably only about 200,000 people, no more than a half a million."

[Book Lover]

26. Even if he did, those tanks would have been driving out Nazis (nm)

[Pale_Rider]

28. He looks like a condom stuffed with walnuts ...

... according to Molly Ivins. And with brains to match.

[Javaman]

29. Maybe he was having visions of a future America...

"But Martin Polaschek, a law history scholar and vice rector of Graz University, told Kurier that Austria was governed by coalition governments, including the conservative People's Party and the Social Democratic Party. Between 1945 and 1970, all the nation's chancellors were conservatives -- not Socialists."

Tanks...Conservatives...