Word: hitlering
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...spare time enjoyed an occasional beer at the pub. Last Saturday, though, a moment of vandalism turned Frank L. into something of a national hero, mentioned by some in the same breath as the legendary Claus Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg, who led a failed assassination attempt against Hitler in 1944. Frank L. accomplished his extraordinary rise from obscurity to national celebrity through a simple act of decapitation...
...Three minutes after the opening of the new Madame Tussauds in Berlin, Frank L., who had been second in the line to enter the waxwork museum, stormed past security and toward an exhibit that had aroused controversy during the weeks prior to the opening: a wax figure of Adolf Hitler, depicting the dictator as a broken man, sitting behind his desk during his last days in the "Führerbunker." The attacker shouted "No more War!" several times, while tackling the figure, and managed to yank off its head before being seized by the police...
...Instead of condemning Frank L.'s action, many Germans expressed admiration for his attack. One commentator raved, "75 years after the 'seizure of power' and 63 years after the end of the Third Reich, finally an assassination attempt against Hitler succeeded ... a 41 year-old Berliner accomplished what Johann Georg Elser, Claus Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg ... and many others paid with their lives: he decapitated Hitler..." Even the policeman answering the questions of the gathered journalists at the scene of the crime couldn't suppress a gleeful smile when he announced: "Speaking as a human being, the attack was successful...
...turns out that Frank L. had been dared by his pub mates the previous night to destroy the waxen Hitler, and he returned home, after several hours of interrogation, to a hero's welcome from his girlfriend and neighbors. The man, who describes himself as "politically left-leaning, but not extreme" and has expressed regret about his deed since, told the German left-wing daily Die Tageszeitung, "Somebody had to do something. Berlin mustn't become a pilgrimage site for neo-Nazis...
...Many Berliner's had expressed similar concerns after Madame Tussauds had announced plans to feature Hitler in its waxwork collection. The museum tried to mollify critics by banning visitors from taking pictures of the exhibit, and by depicting Hitler as the broken, deranged figure in his final days as portrayed by German actor Bruno Ganz in the 2004 movie Downfall. Still, many voices, such as Johannes Tuchel, head of the German Resistance Memorial Center in Berlin, rejected the presence of a Hitler waxwork, and attacked Madame Tussauds' decision to restore it on show "as soon as possible", saying the museum...