Latvian President Vaira Vike-Freiberga visited Washington last week. The former World War II displaced person, resident of Morocco, and Canadian university professor addressed a joint session of Congress on Thursday, and met with President Bush and Vice President Cheney the following day. Say what? You didn't hear about it? The MSM, and yes, even the blogs ignored this story.
Vike-Freiberga is a fascinating woman. She is a fluent speaker of Latvian, German, French, English, and Spanish.
The five teenage years she spent living in Morocco probably left a strong effect on the psyche of the future psychology professor. Her family left Morocco for Canada for safety reasons: Moroccan pro-independence terrorists were killing Europeans in a random fashion.
Vike-Freiberga began her improbable rise to the presidency of the Latvian Republic when she was chosen to head the Latvian Institute, a Latvian version of the now-defunct US Information Agency.
A year later, she was elected president. Although Latvia is a parliamentary democracy, the president is not a figurehead. Vike-Freiberga's powers are roughly on par with those of French President Jacques Chirac.
She is adamantly pro-American and pro-defense. This fall, Latvia will host the annual NATO summit.
In the Name of Freedom is Ausma Cimdina's biography of President Vike-Frieberga.
Cimdina included this Vike-Freiberga response--before she was elected president--to a newspaper reporter's question to her on what she would do if Latvia's national security was threatened.
Freedom is the highest value, because it includes all other values within itself. Freedom must be defended to the very last. One must sacrifice one's life for freedom if necessary, because that means defending one's own rights and those of one's nation, defending one's own values and those of one's nation. Anyone who cannot defend his own values must live under someone else's values. (Emphasis mine.) Someone who cannot defend his own rights loses all rights and becomes someone else's servant. Anyone who wants to live as a free individual with full rights must be prepared to defend what he believes, armed if necessary, sacrificing his life if necessary. Nothing of value in life comes without cost. One has to be ready to fight, and that requires courage. As the folk song would have it, "The coward had five sons, none wanted to go to war." If there were no alternative, I would be prepared to order an attack. I would be ready to go to battle myself, just like the sister of the cowards in the same folk song: "The daughter went to off to war, her shawl streaming behind her."
This remarkable woman spoke in front of Congress on Thursday, and it seems no one bothered to report on it.
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