Posted on 05/27/2008 7:09:52 PM PDT by Libloather
Obama mistaken on name of Nazi death camp
By CHRISTOPHER WILLS, Associated Press Writer
28 minutes ago
NORTH LAS VEGAS, Nev. - The Barack Obama campaign said Tuesday the candidate mistakenly referred to the wrong Nazi death camp when relating the story of a great uncle who helped liberate the camps in World War II.
The Democratic presidential candidate said the story is accurate except that the camp was Buchenwald, not Auschwitz.
"Senator Obama's family is proud of the service of his grandfather and uncles in World War II — especially the fact that his great uncle was a part of liberating one of the concentration camps at Buchenwald," campaign spokesman Bill Burton said in a statement. "Yesterday he mistakenly referred to Auschwitz instead of Buchenwald in telling of his personal experience of a soldier in his family who served heroically."
Aides said Tuesday that his grandmother's brother, Charlie Payne, helped liberate a Buchenwald sub-camp in April 1945 as part of the 89th Infantry Division.
In a meeting Monday with veterans, Obama discussed the importance of improving treatment for soldiers suffering post-traumatic stress. To illustrate his point, he talked about his own family.
"I had an uncle who was part of the first American troops to go into Auschwitz and liberate the concentration camps. The story in our family was that when he came home, he just went up into the attic and he didn't leave the house for six months," Obama said. "Now, obviously something had really affected him, but at that time there just weren't the kinds of facilities to help somebody work through that kind of pain."
Auschwitz was liberated by Soviet forces as they marched across Poland in January 1945. The U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum says Americans liberated several death camps in Germany, including Buchenwald, Dachau and Mauthausen.
"On April 4, 1945, the 89th overran Ohrdruf, a subcamp of the Buchenwald concentration camp. Ohrdruf was the first Nazi concentration camp liberated by U.S. troops in Germany," according to the museum. "A week later, on April 12, Generals Dwight D. Eisenhower, George S. Patton, and Omar Bradley visited Ohrdruf to see, firsthand, evidence of Nazi atrocities against concentration camp prisoners."
Obama's mistaken mention of the camp on Monday quickly generated Internet chatter, ranging from puzzlement to outrage. The Republican Party demanded an explanation.
"It was Soviet troops that liberated Auschwitz, so unless his uncle was serving in the Red Army, there's no way Obama's statement yesterday can be true," said Alex Conant, a spokesman for the Republican National Committee.
Yeas - he basically said that all vets were messed up and he would see to it that they all were screened for PTSD. He's totally bought the left's lie that all soldiers are monsters. That seems worse to me than the lies, which are very bad.
Even more diabolical is the mandatory PTSD screening, which could be used to deny all veterans the right to bear arms, given the new mental health screening prohibitions put into place after Virginia Tech.
"As we landed at the local airport today, I had to run from the plane ducking Bosnian sniper bullets until I got into my 50' stretch bullet proof SUV. While running and ducking sniper bullets, I remembered my crazy uncle in the attic, who might have served in WWII, in the Army or maybe the Navy."
Hussein ObamaMessiaHamas will not be known as Honest Abe. Instead he will be known as: Dishonest Ibrahim Hussein ObamaMessiaHamas !
Damn Pajama Media and Internet. I can’t lie anymore!
Cool. What’s that website? I’d like to look up some family.
Can I just eat my waffle or are you guys gonna have me stick my foot in my mouth even at breakfast?
No, Obie, we’re the guilt-ridden lib media, we’d never have you for breakfast. Gaffe or make up stuff as you wish.
I wouldn’t say he was really lying. I know in my own family, I was told things that turned out not to be exactly the way it was told to me. He should have made sure of his facts before blabbing them publicly, however. He is rather incompetent.
The campaign specified 89th Infantry Division, so they’d better hurry up and substantiate that. Of course, now they run into the tricky issue that it’s not up to Obama to release any service records, etc. - it involves the privacy of an 84 year old family relation who may not appreciate having been dragged into this - will Charlie Payne, who is alive IIRC, have to get involved in clearing this up or will he tell the Obama campaign to shove off?
It would be incredible if they pulled that out of thin air or off the web, but then they have shown that they are not a very professional organization. Still, as critical as I am of Obama, I would be astonished if they released the specifics about 89th ID and a sub-camp of Buchenwald and “Charlie Payne” was never even there. That would be an unbelievable whopper, even for them. Surely they know at this point some people are going to keep checking, digging, pushing. They’d better try to put this to rest soon.
Just wondering why Obama never served in our military.
THAT is reserved for Bad Mouthing this Pubbie administration.......
LOL, the one where he looks like Honest Abe is a riot.
So this would be the brother of the same white grandmother he threw under the bus to get street cred?
We would have to know more about "uncle Charlie's" unit,i.e. regiment, battalion, company, etc. to know whether he was, in fact, a part of the 89th that liberated the camp. WW-II infantry divisions consisted of about 10,000 men divided into many separate functions such as infantry, armor, supply, communications, medical, reconnaissance, etc.
This is not intended in any way to diminish or denigrate Charles Payne's service to his country during WW-II.
Indeed.
Yep - that’s how I interpreted him. He made these comments to a group of veterans, right? Clearly he has no idea how inappropriate any of this is.
see my post at #98...
He says it's because he wasn't drafted, ie., forced to serve.
Really? One has to be forced? I guess he wouldn’t have made a very good soldier then, would he? Thank God he DIDN’T join.
So who is C.T. Payne?
Concerning the service of Mr. Charles Payne: C.T. Payne was a soldier in the 89th Infantry Division. He served in the 355th Infantry Regiment, Company K. The 355th Infantry Regiment was the unit to liberate Ohrdruf. Mr. Payne was there
This website has been created to honor the service of the 89th Infantry Division during the Second World War. The 89th, known as the Rolling W, served with distinction during combat operations in Europe from March-May, 1945.
This website was created by 89th veteran Raymond E. Kitchell and his son Mark R. Kitchell. We are grateful to the contributions of histories, stories and pictures from numerous 89th Infantry veterans and their families, and from the 89th Infantry Division Society.
http://www.89infdivww2.org/ is a moonbat site. Charles T. Payne (born 1924 or 1925) did not serve in the 89th division.
CAW! :-)
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