From the Huffington Post:
The White House said President Barack Obama misspoke on Tuesday when he referred to a “Polish death camp” while honoring a Polish war hero.
The president’s remark had drawn immediate complaints from Poles who said Obama should have called it a “German death camp in Nazi-occupied Poland,” to distinguish the perpetrators from the location. Polish Foreign Minister Radek Sikorski called it a matter of “ignorance and incompetence.”
Obama made the comment while awarding the Medal of Freedom to Jan Karski, a resistance fighter against the Nazi occupation of Poland during World War II. Karski died in 2000.
During an East Room ceremony honoring 13 Medal of Freedom recipients, Obama said that Karski “served as a courier for the Polish resistance during the darkest days of World War II. Before one trip across enemy lines, resistance fighters told him that Jews were being murdered on a massive scale and smuggled him into the Warsaw Ghetto and a Polish death camp to see for himself. Jan took that information to President Franklin Roosevelt, giving one of the first accounts of the Holocaust and imploring to the world to take action.”
Sikorski tweeted that the White House would apologize for “this outrageous error” and that Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk would address the matter on Wednesday.
“It’s a pity that such a dignified ceremony was overshadowed by ignorance and incompetence.”
Alex Storozynski, president of the Kosciuszko Foundation, said Obama’s comment “shocked the Poles present at the White House and those watching on C-SPAN. … Karski would have cringed if he heard this.”
National Security Council spokesman Tommy Vietor said: “The president misspoke. He was referring to Nazi death camps in Poland. We regret this misstatement, which should not detract from the clear intention to honor Mr. Karski and those brave citizens who stood on the side of human dignity in the face of tyranny.”
Anxious to quell the controversy, the White House also noted that the president had visited the Warsaw Ghetto Memorial while in Poland and that he has repeatedly discussed the bravery of Poles during World War II.
Then there is the SCREW YOU that comes after the apology for misspeaking. Good grief. The president obviously, to even the dumbest rube, intended to honor Jan Karski and other Poles who fought with the resistance during WWII. Why would some low class moron [read “communist bastard”] call the President of the United States of America “incompetent” and “ignorant?” Perhaps the Poles have forgotten who helped bail their asses out of a sling some 65-70 years ago? They seem awfully defensive.
Foreign Minister Sikorski needs to be sent home in disgrace for failing Diplomacy 101 and Appreciation to Host Country. There are ways to handle things like this. Mr. Sikorski chose the wrong way as did any other Pole who publicly criticized this gesture of honor and good will from the United States of America. A quiet message through diplomatic channels could have cleared this issue up without incident. Sikorski got out a cannon to kill a fly. Not a good decision.
Several, just google Obama, Walesa and they come up. It is just starting.
http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/301474/president-obama-shuns-lech-walesa-rory-cooper
Perhaps they will declare war on us. That will teach us!!!
I am curious why you side with a foreign country rather than your own.
I have no idea what you are talking about. I hope you are not suggesting that any failure accept Obama’s spin on this insult to Poland or any other issue is unpatriotic, when he is clearly acting like a fool? If this were the only example of where he has embarassed us it would be one thing, but, as you know, its not.
Perhaps you are embarrassed but I certainly am not. Are you Polish?
I find your support of the obnoxious behavior of Poland to be unacceptable.
You obviously read materials that support your opinion rather than forming your opinion based on facts. Try the Wall Street Journal. It isnt an obviously biased article.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702303674004577435262640946168.html?mod=wsj_share_tweet
Someone might want to ask the overly sensitive Polish govt why they don’t rename the Warsaw Ghetto the “Nazi Ghetto” in keeping with their sensitivty on about death camps.
They can protest until the cows come home. Not every Pole was innocent and non-complicite. War sucks. No one disagrees with that. However, being disrespectful to the United States isn’t going to fix that problem. Walesa has a history of unacceptable behavior. You don’t refuse to meet publically with the President of the US. They don’t forget. There was the GAFFE.
And yes, I am suggesting that siding with a foreign country against your own simply because of your dislike of the president is unAmerican. Funny how Walesa’s last rumblings in his trouble making union-loud manner was about coming here to support “Occupy.” So he disses the President of this country, demands a one on one meeting with him, (gets told NO) plans to come stir up Occupy even more than it is, and then accuses the president of being socialist.
Do you not see why he might, just might be persona non grata at the White House? Do yoiu think George Bush would have had a different reaction? Bill Clinton? I don’t think so.
To say that Walesa is rough around the edges is an understatement. I believe it might be the equivalent of waking up and finding Joe the Plumber occupying the White House.
Incredible. Obnoxious. Insulting. Dangerous. So sadly overboard as to be unable to distinguish between patriotism from fealty to the false messiah. A cheap – really juvenile -effort to get even and its all ok. Amazing. I do understand though as we can all see it slipping away. 155 odd days to a solution.
There it is….Blue. So who is incredible, obnoxious, insulting, dangerous? Who is the false messiah? Let’s spell all this out.
Are you speaking of Polish Patriots? I wouldn’t even call Tusk and Walesa “patriots” in their own country. I believe I have discovered the hidden agenda.
Is Mitt Romney the answer to your prayers?
I stand by my statement of siding with another country….simply because you hate your president so much. Even the Dixie Chicks didn’t do THAT.