ironweed
12-28-2005, 11:29 AM
Not that I'm a huge fan of Schwarzenegger, but could someone please tell the people of Graz to stop acting like such pussies? Especially about a human waste product like Stanley "Tookie" Williams. The world is a far better place without him in it.
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Link (http://www.courant.com/news/nationworld/wire/sns-ap-austria-schwarzenegger,0,2761186.story)
Schwarzenegger May Not Be Back to Hometown
By GEORGE JAHN
Associated Press Writer
December 27 2005, 5:12 PM EST
GRAZ, Austria -- "I'll be back." That pledge from the Terminator traditionally has had special meaning in Arnold Schwarzenegger's hometown.
But the romance is now over between Schwarzenegger and Graz, Austria's second-largest city, after the California governor refused to spare the lives of three convicted murderers and shows no signs of preventing another execution scheduled for next month.
Acting on Schwarzenegger's orders two weeks after the Dec. 13 execution of former Crips gang leader Stanley Tookie Williams, city leaders Tuesday deleted all references to the bodybuilder-turned-governor on Web sites linked to Graz. Over the weekend, they also stripped his name from the city's soccer stadium.
And "Arnie," as he is known in the city of his youth, also sent back Graz' highest award -- its ring of honor -- as part of moves provoked by city council threats to rename the stadium because of his support for the death penalty.
He tried to soothe passions in a Dec. 19 letter, saying he still planned to visit. But that pledge is now more threat than promise for Austrians, who overwhelmingly consider the death penalty barbaric.
Sigi Binder of the environmentalist Green party in Graz says that in just two days more than 1,500 people signed her party's online petition to rename the stadium. The appeal was closed to further signatures when Schwarzenegger himself demanded that his name be dropped.
Thousands backed a separate similar petition, and hundreds of supporting phone calls came in from Germany and German-speaking parts of Switzerland, she added.
Her message to Schwarzenegger? "Mr. Governor, please push to have the death penalty abolished."
Other Arnie-bashers are less polite.
"Schwarzenegger has proven that he is truly the total dolt that he plays in his films," read a recent e-mail signed "Mario" on the Web site of the daily Kurier -- one of hundreds of impassioned readers' commentaries on the controversy, which has dominated Austrian headlines for the past two weeks.
But the dispute goes beyond Arnie. The tarnishing of Austria's idol in his home country is a renewed sign of a general European disenchantment with an America many here consider out of step with their ideals.
After his election as California's governor two years ago, Schwarzenegger held onto cult status in Austria even though most Europeans disagreed with his positions on the Iraq war and the death penalty.
Austrians focused instead on Schwarzenegger's successes since he left for America in 1968, first as Mr. Universe, then as "Conan the Barbarian" and the "Terminator" -- and finally his 2003 move into the governor's mansion in Sacramento.
One of Austria's most popular folk groups, Die Stoakogler, paid homage to him 13 years ago in a mixture of English and the dialect of Styria, his home province. The song, which sold more than 2 million copies on vinyl and CD, begins with: "Steiermen san (are) very good, when they go to Hollywood."
A special stamp bearing his image and issued to commemorate his election sold out within days.
But his decision last January to allow California's first execution in three years triggered protests in front of the U.S. Embassy in Vienna. A month later, he denied clemency for condemned inmate Kevin Cooper, whose execution was then stayed by a federal appeals court. Williams' execution less than a year after that was the final straw for many Austrians.
For Schwarzenegger, the rationale was simple in ending the formal relationship with the city of his youth, about 120 miles south of Vienna.
"It is relatively likely that I will have to meet similarly difficult decisions as governor," he wrote Graz Mayor Siegfried Nagl, suggesting that cutting ties with the city was the best way to spare further controversy the next time he needed to make such a decision.
Next time is just weeks away. Lawyers for Clarence Ray Allen, 75, who suffers from multiple maladies, have asked the governor to block their client's Jan. 17 execution for ordering hits on three people while he was behind bars in 1980.
A refusal by Schwarzenegger to grant clemency and commute Allen's death sentence to life without parole is sure to provoke a new protest across Austria and Europe.
Still, some continue to back their idol.
While emphasizing that he, too, is against the death penalty, Nagl told The Associated Press that "no one here has the right to sit in judgment" of Schwarzenegger.
Whenever he returns, "he is welcome to sit down with me for a bite of apple strudel," said Nagl, whose conservative People's Party is outnumbered in city council by the anti-Schwarzenegger opposition.
Kurt Marnul, a former "Mr. Austria" who put the first set of weights on the young Arnie's shoulders and still works out in a gym plastered with hundreds of pictures showing him with Schwarzenegger, accused Graz politicians of "stabbing Arnie in the back."
"More than 70 percent of Americans are for the death penalty," said Marnul, 75. "This issue is none of Austria's business."
==========
Link (http://www.courant.com/hc-austria1227.artdec27,0,496497.story)
`Arnie's' Name Off Stadium
By WILLIAM J. KOLE
Associated Press
December 27 2005
VIENNA, Austria -- Officials in Arnold Schwarzenegger's hometown of Graz quietly and under cover of darkness removed giant metal letters spelling out his name on a soccer stadium.
The California governor had asked for his name to be stricken from the 15,300-seat arena after critics in his birthplace, where opposition to capital punishment runs high, scorned him for refusing to block this month's execution of convicted killer Stanley Tookie Williams.
Late Sunday night or early Monday, authorities in the southern Austrian city unbolted the 20 letters spelling out the action star-turned-politician's name from Arnold Schwarzenegger Stadium. They timed the work to take advantage of the Christmas lull to avoid attracting attention "and keep the media from taking photos," a local city hall official who declined to be named told Austrian television.
Capital punishment is illegal in Schwarzenegger's native Austria, where many people consider it barbaric. Opposition had run especially high in Graz, whose official slogan is "City of Human Rights."
Williams' Dec. 13 execution triggered a firestorm in Europe and reignited calls for Graz's stadium to be stripped of Schwarzenegger's name. The governor opted for a pre-emptive strike: A week ago, he dashed off a letter to local officials ordering his name to be removed and said he was returning an ornate ring of honor that Graz officials gave him in 1999.
With the Hollywood star's name gone, the sign atop the main entrance to the stadium in Graz, about 120 miles south of Vienna, read simply, "Stadium Graz Liebenau," as it was known before it was renamed in Schwarzenegger's honor in 1997.
The overnight removal caught locals by surprise.
"Arnie banished from the stadium's name," the Graz daily Kleine Zeitung headlined Monday.
Calls to the city hall in Graz went unanswered on Monday, a national holiday.
Last week, Graz Mayor Siegfried Nagl wrote to Schwarzenegger urging him to reconsider his decision to cut ties to the city and to keep the ring. Nagl said he reassured Schwarzenegger that most local residents still admire him despite fierce opposition to his pro-death penalty stance.
Nagl said he was worried that severing ties to Schwarzenegger, one of Austria's most famous sons, could cost the city millions in tourist revenue.
But the movement to scrap Schwarzenegger's name from the stadium, led by local officials of the pacifist Green Party, had gained momentum in recent weeks, and a majority of the city council in Graz was said to support the idea.
The ring arrived at Graz's city hall late last week, and officials were considering putting it on display at a local museum, Nagl told the weekly newspaper Die Woche.
Many Europeans have scorned the United States' use of capital punishment in general, and Schwarzenegger's refusal to grant clemency to convicts on California's death row in particular. They are now waiting to see how Schwarzenegger deals with the scheduled Jan. 17 execution of a 75-year-old inmate.
Schwarzenegger was born in 1947 in the village of Thal just outside Graz, where he began his bodybuilding career. He emigrated to the United States in 1968 and became a naturalized U.S. citizen in 1984, but has retained his Austrian citizenship.
He remained quite popular in Austria, where he is known simply as "Arnie," and enjoyed a surge of celebrity after his 2003 election as governor. In July 2004, when Austria's post office issued a special postage stamp in his honor to coincide with his 57th birthday, the 600,000 stamps bearing his likeness sold out within a few days.
====
Link (http://www.courant.com/news/nationworld/wire/sns-ap-austria-schwarzenegger,0,2761186.story)
Schwarzenegger May Not Be Back to Hometown
By GEORGE JAHN
Associated Press Writer
December 27 2005, 5:12 PM EST
GRAZ, Austria -- "I'll be back." That pledge from the Terminator traditionally has had special meaning in Arnold Schwarzenegger's hometown.
But the romance is now over between Schwarzenegger and Graz, Austria's second-largest city, after the California governor refused to spare the lives of three convicted murderers and shows no signs of preventing another execution scheduled for next month.
Acting on Schwarzenegger's orders two weeks after the Dec. 13 execution of former Crips gang leader Stanley Tookie Williams, city leaders Tuesday deleted all references to the bodybuilder-turned-governor on Web sites linked to Graz. Over the weekend, they also stripped his name from the city's soccer stadium.
And "Arnie," as he is known in the city of his youth, also sent back Graz' highest award -- its ring of honor -- as part of moves provoked by city council threats to rename the stadium because of his support for the death penalty.
He tried to soothe passions in a Dec. 19 letter, saying he still planned to visit. But that pledge is now more threat than promise for Austrians, who overwhelmingly consider the death penalty barbaric.
Sigi Binder of the environmentalist Green party in Graz says that in just two days more than 1,500 people signed her party's online petition to rename the stadium. The appeal was closed to further signatures when Schwarzenegger himself demanded that his name be dropped.
Thousands backed a separate similar petition, and hundreds of supporting phone calls came in from Germany and German-speaking parts of Switzerland, she added.
Her message to Schwarzenegger? "Mr. Governor, please push to have the death penalty abolished."
Other Arnie-bashers are less polite.
"Schwarzenegger has proven that he is truly the total dolt that he plays in his films," read a recent e-mail signed "Mario" on the Web site of the daily Kurier -- one of hundreds of impassioned readers' commentaries on the controversy, which has dominated Austrian headlines for the past two weeks.
But the dispute goes beyond Arnie. The tarnishing of Austria's idol in his home country is a renewed sign of a general European disenchantment with an America many here consider out of step with their ideals.
After his election as California's governor two years ago, Schwarzenegger held onto cult status in Austria even though most Europeans disagreed with his positions on the Iraq war and the death penalty.
Austrians focused instead on Schwarzenegger's successes since he left for America in 1968, first as Mr. Universe, then as "Conan the Barbarian" and the "Terminator" -- and finally his 2003 move into the governor's mansion in Sacramento.
One of Austria's most popular folk groups, Die Stoakogler, paid homage to him 13 years ago in a mixture of English and the dialect of Styria, his home province. The song, which sold more than 2 million copies on vinyl and CD, begins with: "Steiermen san (are) very good, when they go to Hollywood."
A special stamp bearing his image and issued to commemorate his election sold out within days.
But his decision last January to allow California's first execution in three years triggered protests in front of the U.S. Embassy in Vienna. A month later, he denied clemency for condemned inmate Kevin Cooper, whose execution was then stayed by a federal appeals court. Williams' execution less than a year after that was the final straw for many Austrians.
For Schwarzenegger, the rationale was simple in ending the formal relationship with the city of his youth, about 120 miles south of Vienna.
"It is relatively likely that I will have to meet similarly difficult decisions as governor," he wrote Graz Mayor Siegfried Nagl, suggesting that cutting ties with the city was the best way to spare further controversy the next time he needed to make such a decision.
Next time is just weeks away. Lawyers for Clarence Ray Allen, 75, who suffers from multiple maladies, have asked the governor to block their client's Jan. 17 execution for ordering hits on three people while he was behind bars in 1980.
A refusal by Schwarzenegger to grant clemency and commute Allen's death sentence to life without parole is sure to provoke a new protest across Austria and Europe.
Still, some continue to back their idol.
While emphasizing that he, too, is against the death penalty, Nagl told The Associated Press that "no one here has the right to sit in judgment" of Schwarzenegger.
Whenever he returns, "he is welcome to sit down with me for a bite of apple strudel," said Nagl, whose conservative People's Party is outnumbered in city council by the anti-Schwarzenegger opposition.
Kurt Marnul, a former "Mr. Austria" who put the first set of weights on the young Arnie's shoulders and still works out in a gym plastered with hundreds of pictures showing him with Schwarzenegger, accused Graz politicians of "stabbing Arnie in the back."
"More than 70 percent of Americans are for the death penalty," said Marnul, 75. "This issue is none of Austria's business."
==========
Link (http://www.courant.com/hc-austria1227.artdec27,0,496497.story)
`Arnie's' Name Off Stadium
By WILLIAM J. KOLE
Associated Press
December 27 2005
VIENNA, Austria -- Officials in Arnold Schwarzenegger's hometown of Graz quietly and under cover of darkness removed giant metal letters spelling out his name on a soccer stadium.
The California governor had asked for his name to be stricken from the 15,300-seat arena after critics in his birthplace, where opposition to capital punishment runs high, scorned him for refusing to block this month's execution of convicted killer Stanley Tookie Williams.
Late Sunday night or early Monday, authorities in the southern Austrian city unbolted the 20 letters spelling out the action star-turned-politician's name from Arnold Schwarzenegger Stadium. They timed the work to take advantage of the Christmas lull to avoid attracting attention "and keep the media from taking photos," a local city hall official who declined to be named told Austrian television.
Capital punishment is illegal in Schwarzenegger's native Austria, where many people consider it barbaric. Opposition had run especially high in Graz, whose official slogan is "City of Human Rights."
Williams' Dec. 13 execution triggered a firestorm in Europe and reignited calls for Graz's stadium to be stripped of Schwarzenegger's name. The governor opted for a pre-emptive strike: A week ago, he dashed off a letter to local officials ordering his name to be removed and said he was returning an ornate ring of honor that Graz officials gave him in 1999.
With the Hollywood star's name gone, the sign atop the main entrance to the stadium in Graz, about 120 miles south of Vienna, read simply, "Stadium Graz Liebenau," as it was known before it was renamed in Schwarzenegger's honor in 1997.
The overnight removal caught locals by surprise.
"Arnie banished from the stadium's name," the Graz daily Kleine Zeitung headlined Monday.
Calls to the city hall in Graz went unanswered on Monday, a national holiday.
Last week, Graz Mayor Siegfried Nagl wrote to Schwarzenegger urging him to reconsider his decision to cut ties to the city and to keep the ring. Nagl said he reassured Schwarzenegger that most local residents still admire him despite fierce opposition to his pro-death penalty stance.
Nagl said he was worried that severing ties to Schwarzenegger, one of Austria's most famous sons, could cost the city millions in tourist revenue.
But the movement to scrap Schwarzenegger's name from the stadium, led by local officials of the pacifist Green Party, had gained momentum in recent weeks, and a majority of the city council in Graz was said to support the idea.
The ring arrived at Graz's city hall late last week, and officials were considering putting it on display at a local museum, Nagl told the weekly newspaper Die Woche.
Many Europeans have scorned the United States' use of capital punishment in general, and Schwarzenegger's refusal to grant clemency to convicts on California's death row in particular. They are now waiting to see how Schwarzenegger deals with the scheduled Jan. 17 execution of a 75-year-old inmate.
Schwarzenegger was born in 1947 in the village of Thal just outside Graz, where he began his bodybuilding career. He emigrated to the United States in 1968 and became a naturalized U.S. citizen in 1984, but has retained his Austrian citizenship.
He remained quite popular in Austria, where he is known simply as "Arnie," and enjoyed a surge of celebrity after his 2003 election as governor. In July 2004, when Austria's post office issued a special postage stamp in his honor to coincide with his 57th birthday, the 600,000 stamps bearing his likeness sold out within a few days.