No, we're not talking about Egypt, or Palestine under Arafat, we're talking about Germany. And in the best tradition of Maureen Dowd, Spiegel's interview with State Dept. spokesman Karen Hughes has been totally butchered in the German.
Via No Paseran (who points out Germans don't use the word "fuhrer", which simply means leader, except when they choose to), here is an example from Davids Medienkritik:
Unfortunately, as has been the case so often in the past, the German version was noticeably different from the English version. What you see is not always what you get at SPIEGEL ONLINE. Here is a summary of serious discrepancies:
Read the whole thing.
- In her response to the second question on the recent release of Abu Ghraib photos, Hughes says: "We don't want to be defined by those pictures, any more than the people of Germany would want your country to be defined by pictures of crimes." The segment in bold (emphasis ours) is omitted from the German version.
- In a response on Guantanamo, Hughes states in the English version: "I hope that the people of Germany would be able to recognize that we should not allow a difference over how we handle 490 terrorists who have pledged to kill Americans and others to divide our two countries and our historic friendship." The segments in bold (emphasis ours) are omitted from the German version.
Maybe Rumsfeld wasn't talking about Karen Hughes when he said we were losing the media war overseas, but clearly we need someone who knows who she's dealing with, so that her judicious words aren't butchered.
1 comment:
I think this critisizm is ridiculous. The english and the german version of the interview don't differ really, except for the length of the english version, but nothing that has been omitted really changes her message.
And another thing: "Führer" is simply the german word for "leader". The literal translation for "He is a wonderful leader" IS "Er ist ein wunderbarer Führer". So Spiegel can't be blamed for simply translating what she said.
"Der Führer" (The Leader) was the title of Adolf Hitler, that's right, but "ein Führer" is simply "a leader". So there is no reason to bash Spiegel over this.
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