From German newspaper Der Spiegel -
Trans-Atlantic Conspiracy Theory Du Jour
Spiegel online
April 11, 2005
Germany's highest ranking female member of parliament [and Vice-President of the Bundestag-the German Parliament] has a new theory:
The US government set the Catholic pedophilia scandal in motion because it wanted to weaken an already frail pope. That's also why it made Poland its chief partner in the Iraq war: to make the Vatican look bad. Yeah right.
She may not be the country's most powerful politician, but as the vice-president of the Bundestag, Germany's parliament, Antje Vollmer of the Green Party is one of its highest-ranking women in political office. When she talks, people listen. But last week we were a little baffled when we saw her shameless contribution to the growing canon of anti-American conspiracy theories and baseless analogies circulating in Germany.
First, in Sept. 2002, then-Justice Minister Herta Däubler-Gmelin compared George W. Bush to Adolf Hitler. Then came Andreas von Buelow, the former federal education and research minister whose 2003 conspiracy theory alleging the CIA and Israeli intelligence were responsible for the 9/11 attacks in New York and Washington made for a best-selling book. Now Vollmer comes along, implying that the US government chose to draw attention to the Catholic pedophilia scandal not because of the crimes in and of themselves, but because Washington wanted to weaken the pope.
As a guest on the weekly talk show "Berlin Mitte" on Wednesday, Vollmer seemed to be starting off with the right intentions. She spoke of the "wonderful image" of President George Bush, his son President George W. Bush and President Bill Clinton before the body of the pope in St. Peter's Basilica. But then, out of nowhere, she veered straight off a cliff.
Her theory? It seems the U.S. had to do something to weaken the influence of the pope, who was an outspoken opponent of the war in Iraq. Vollmer finds it all very suspicious that after the war, "Poland was made a top occupying power in Iraq, naturally to weaken the pope's hinterland. Or how then, of all times, the campaign against the Catholic Church and the pedophilia was started, which was, of course, totally justified, but at this point in time was definitely a tit-for-tat response." Vollmer found it somehow strange that the US presidents traveled to the Vatican despite the "tough power struggles."
Like a good conspiracy theorist, she doesn't point fingers directly, but lets her comments hang in the air so that others can piece together the message. In essence, with her bizarre ramblings she was saying that the US tried to undercut John Paul II's political influence in Poland by giving his countrymen an important role in occupying Iraq and instigating a pedophile scandal against the church as a sort of smear campaign against the Catholic leader.
In an editorial, DER SPIEGEL's Henryk M. Broder remarks: "Statements like this aren't even commented on these days, just like the popular opinions that that terrorism is the result of poverty and SUVs are responsible for climate change. None of the guests (on the show) attempted to contradict these statements in any way." He points out that, in truth, "the Poles didn't need to be forced to send troops to Iraq, because they trust Washington more than Brussels, Paris or Berlin. The Catholic Church has a recurring history of pedophile scandals in the US as in Europe -- even before the Iraq war. "But all this is meaningless compared to the rage of a Green politician trying to impose her conspiratorial views on a complex reality until everything fits together seamlessly. Whatever the deceased pope had longed for and meant: He does not deserve Antje Vollmer as the executor of his will." (2:30 p.m. CET)
www.spiegel.de
Trans-Atlantic Conspiracy Theory Du Jour
Spiegel online
April 11, 2005
Germany's highest ranking female member of parliament [and Vice-President of the Bundestag-the German Parliament] has a new theory:
The US government set the Catholic pedophilia scandal in motion because it wanted to weaken an already frail pope. That's also why it made Poland its chief partner in the Iraq war: to make the Vatican look bad. Yeah right.
She may not be the country's most powerful politician, but as the vice-president of the Bundestag, Germany's parliament, Antje Vollmer of the Green Party is one of its highest-ranking women in political office. When she talks, people listen. But last week we were a little baffled when we saw her shameless contribution to the growing canon of anti-American conspiracy theories and baseless analogies circulating in Germany.
First, in Sept. 2002, then-Justice Minister Herta Däubler-Gmelin compared George W. Bush to Adolf Hitler. Then came Andreas von Buelow, the former federal education and research minister whose 2003 conspiracy theory alleging the CIA and Israeli intelligence were responsible for the 9/11 attacks in New York and Washington made for a best-selling book. Now Vollmer comes along, implying that the US government chose to draw attention to the Catholic pedophilia scandal not because of the crimes in and of themselves, but because Washington wanted to weaken the pope.
As a guest on the weekly talk show "Berlin Mitte" on Wednesday, Vollmer seemed to be starting off with the right intentions. She spoke of the "wonderful image" of President George Bush, his son President George W. Bush and President Bill Clinton before the body of the pope in St. Peter's Basilica. But then, out of nowhere, she veered straight off a cliff.
Her theory? It seems the U.S. had to do something to weaken the influence of the pope, who was an outspoken opponent of the war in Iraq. Vollmer finds it all very suspicious that after the war, "Poland was made a top occupying power in Iraq, naturally to weaken the pope's hinterland. Or how then, of all times, the campaign against the Catholic Church and the pedophilia was started, which was, of course, totally justified, but at this point in time was definitely a tit-for-tat response." Vollmer found it somehow strange that the US presidents traveled to the Vatican despite the "tough power struggles."
Like a good conspiracy theorist, she doesn't point fingers directly, but lets her comments hang in the air so that others can piece together the message. In essence, with her bizarre ramblings she was saying that the US tried to undercut John Paul II's political influence in Poland by giving his countrymen an important role in occupying Iraq and instigating a pedophile scandal against the church as a sort of smear campaign against the Catholic leader.
In an editorial, DER SPIEGEL's Henryk M. Broder remarks: "Statements like this aren't even commented on these days, just like the popular opinions that that terrorism is the result of poverty and SUVs are responsible for climate change. None of the guests (on the show) attempted to contradict these statements in any way." He points out that, in truth, "the Poles didn't need to be forced to send troops to Iraq, because they trust Washington more than Brussels, Paris or Berlin. The Catholic Church has a recurring history of pedophile scandals in the US as in Europe -- even before the Iraq war. "But all this is meaningless compared to the rage of a Green politician trying to impose her conspiratorial views on a complex reality until everything fits together seamlessly. Whatever the deceased pope had longed for and meant: He does not deserve Antje Vollmer as the executor of his will." (2:30 p.m. CET)
www.spiegel.de