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Book excerpt: “Freedom: Memoirs 1954-2021” by Angela Merkel
St. Martin’s Press
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In “Freedom: Memoirs 1954-2021” (published by St. Martin’s Press), former German Chancellor Angela Merkel writes about two lives: her early years growing up under a dictatorship in East Germany, and her years as leader of a nation reunited following the fall of the Berlin Wall.
Read an excerpt below, and don’t miss Mark Phillips’ interview with Angela Merkel on “CBS Sunday Morning” December 1!
“Freedom: Memoirs 1954-2021” by Angela Merkel
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Prologue
This book tells a story that will not happen again, because the state I lived in for thirty-five years ceased to exist in 1990. If it had been offered to a publishing house as a work of fiction, it would have been turned down, someone said to me early in 2022, a few weeks after I stepped down from the office of federal chancellor. He was familiar with such issues, and was glad that I had decided to write this book, precisely because of its story. A story that is as unlikely as it is real. It became clear to me: telling this story, drawing out its lines, finding the thread running through it, identifying leitmotifs, could also be important for the future.
For a long time I couldn’t imagine writing such a book. That first changed in 2015, at least a little. Back then, in the night between September 4 and 5, I had decided not to turn away the refugees coming from Hungary at the German-Austrian border. I experienced that decision, and above all its consequences, as a caesura in my chancellorship. There was a before and an after. That was when I undertook to describe, one day when I was no longer chancellor, the sequence of events, the reasons for my decision, my understanding of Europe and globalization bound up with it, in a form that only a book would make possible. I didn’t want to leave the further description and interpretation just to other people.
But I was still in office. The 2017 Bundestag election followed, along with my fourth period of office. In its last two years the containment of the COVID-19 pandemic was the predominant theme. The pandemic, as I said publicly on several occasions, made huge demands on democracy, on a national, European, and global level. This also prompted me to broaden my outlook and not only write about refugee policy. If I was going to do it at all, I had to do it properly, I said to myself, and if I was, then I would do it with Beate Baumann. She has been advising me since 1992, and is an eyewitness.
I stepped down from office on December 8, 2021. After sixteen years I left it, as I said at the Bundeswehr’s Military Tattoo in my honor a few days before, with joy in my heart. By the end I had in fact longed for that moment. Enough was enough. Now it was time to take a break and rest for a few months, leave the frantic world of politics behind me, to begin a new life in the spring, slowly and tentatively, still a public life, but not an active political one, find the right rhythm for public appearances—and write this book. That was the plan.
Then came February 24, 2022, Russia’s attack on Ukraine.
It was immediately clear that writing this book as if nothing had happened was completely out of the question. The war in Yugoslavia at the beginning of the 1990s had already shaken Europe to its core. But the Russian attack on Ukraine was a greater threat. It was a breach of international law that shattered the European peace which had prevailed since the Second World War and was based on the preservation of the territorial integrity and sovereignty of its states. Profound disillusionment followed. I will write about that too. But this is not a book about Russia and Ukraine. That would be a different book.
Instead I would like to write the story of my two lives, the first up to 1990 in a dictatorship and the second since 1990 in a democracy. At the moment when the first readers hold this book in their hands, the two halves are of more or less equal length. But in fact, of course, these are not two lives. In fact they are one life, and the second part cannot be understood without the first.
How did it happen that, after spending the first thirty-five years of her life in the GDR, a woman was able to take over the most powerful office that exists in the Federal Republic of Germany and hold it for sixteen years? And that she left it again without having to step down during a period of office or being voted out? What was it like to grow up in East Germany as the child of a pastor, and study and work under the conditions of a dictatorship? What was it like to experience the collapse of a state? And to be suddenly free? That’s the story I want to tell.
Of course, my account is deeply subjective. At the same time, I have aimed for honest self-reflection. Today, I will identify my misjudgments and defend the things I think I got right. But this is not a complete account of everything that happened. Not everyone who might have expected, or who might have been expected, to appear in these pages will do so. For that I request understanding. My goal is to establish some points of focus with which I attempt to tame the sheer mass of material, and allow people to understand how politics works, what principles and mechanisms there are—and what guided me.
Politics isn’t witchcraft. Politics is made by people, people with their influences, their experiences, vanities, weaknesses, strengths, desires, dreams, convictions, values, and interests. People who need to fight for majorities in a democracy if they want to make things happen.
We can do this—Wir schaffen das. Throughout the whole of my political career, no phrase has been thrown back at me with quite such virulence as this one. No phrase has been so polarizing. For me, however, it was quite an ordinary phrase. It expressed an attitude. Call it trust in God, caution, or simply a determination to solve problems, to deal with setbacks, get over the lows and come up with new ideas. “We can do this, and if something stands in our way it has to be overcome, it has to be worked on.” That was how I put it in my summer press conference on August 31, 2015. That was how I did politics. It’s how I live. It’s also how this book came about. With this attitude, which is also something learned, everything is possible, because it isn’t only politics that contributes to it—every individual person has a part to play.
Angela Merkel
With Beate Baumann
Berlin, August 2024
From “Freedom: Memoirs 1954-2021” by Angela Merkel. Copyright © 2024 by the author and reprinted by permission of St. Martin’s Press.
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Chef, restaurateur and TV cooking judge Tom Colicchio offers “Sunday Morning” viewers a recipe from his latest book, “Why I Cook,” what he calls Possibly the Best Grilled Cheese You’ll Ever Have. He writes:
“Like many other dads, I make a lot of grilled cheese sandwiches for the kids. This one started as a way to utilize the mozzarella from Lombardi’s Love Lane Market, an Italian deli in Mattituck that makes the world’s best fresh mozz. Paired with ‘nduja, a peppery spreadable Italian sausage, the grilled cheese essentially becomes a spicy pizza. It’s decadent for sure, but the spice of the ‘nduja cuts through the richness of the mozzarella. As always, but here especially, low and slow heat is important. It’s the key to developing a nice crust on the bread, while also melting the cheese.”
From “Why I Cook” by Tom Colicchio, courtesy of Artisan
Possibly the Best Grilled Cheese You’ll Ever Have
By Tom Colicchio
Makes 2 sandwiches
Ingredients:
2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
½ pound fresh mozzarella cheese, thinly sliced
4 thick slices peasant bread (see Note)
3 ounces soft ‘nduja
4 tablespoons unsalted butter
Instructions:
Pour 1 tablespoon of the olive oil into a heavy-bottomed skillet and set over medium-low heat.
Layer the mozzarella slices on 2 pieces of the bread. Layer the ‘nduja on the other 2 slices of bread.
Add 1 slice of mozzarella bread and 1 slice of ‘nduja bread open face to the pan. Add 2 tablespoons butter to the pan. Cook for 2 minutes. Cover the pan and cook (still open face) for another 2 to 3 minutes, until the cheese is melted. Remove the hot melted slices from the pan and immediately flip them together to make a sandwich. Slice the sandwich in half crosswise.
Wipe the pan clean and repeat the process to make the second sandwich and serve immediately.
Note:
Any bread will do, but I prefer one without a heavy sourdough flavor.
From “Why I Cook” by Tom Colicchio. Copyright © 2024 by Tom Colicchio. Reprinted by permission of Artisan, an imprint of Hachette Book Group. All rights reserved.
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Chef, restaurateur and TV cooking judge Tom Colicchio offers “Sunday Morning” viewers a recipe from his latest book, “Why I Cook,” for Skirt Steak with Shishitos, Hot Cherry Peppers, and Onions. He writes:
“This recipe started as a salad for our babysitter Tenzin, who is a vegetarian. I, clearly, am not. But the flavors of that salad — sweetness, acid, spice, saltiness, and umami — work so well together I knew they would go perfectly with steak. For the record, this combo of hot cherry peppers, shishitos, and red onions, which touches every flavor receptor, works just as well with grilled pork, chicken, or fish. Sometimes I’ll add raw cucumbers at the end; sometimes I’ll cut the onions into rings and grill them. And if you have leftover steak, just slice it, toss it briefly on the grill, and use.”
From “Why I Cook” by Tom Colicchio, courtesy of Artisan
Skirt Steak with Shishitos, Hot Cherry Peppers, and Onions
By Tom Colicchio
Serves 4
Ingredients:
1¼ pounds skirt steak
6 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
2 red onions, cut into 1-inch wedges
Kosher salt
½ pound shishito peppers
Freshly cracked black pepper
1 tablespoon fish sauce
1 tablespoon chili crisp
¼ cup sliced pickled hot cherry peppers
½ cup fresh cilantro leaves
½ cup fresh mint leaves
½ cup fresh parsley leaves
½ cup fresh basil leaves
2 or 3 scallions, sliced
Juice of 1 lime
Instructions:
Allow the steak to come to room temperature.
Warm a large heavy-bottomed sauté pan over medium heat. Add enough oil to coat the bottom of the pan, about 2 tablespoons. Place the onions in the pan, season with salt, and cook until browned and soft, 6 to 7 minutes. Transfer the onions from the pan to a large bowl.
To the same pan, add 1 tablespoon oil and the shishito peppers. Season with salt and cook, turning occasionally, until the shishitos are charred and blistered, 6 to 8 minutes.
Transfer the shishitos to the bowl with the onions. Toss the onions and peppers with 1 tablespoon olive oil and salt and black pepper to taste. Add the fish sauce, chili crisp, and pickled peppers. Taste and adjust the amount of chili crisp and pickled peppers based on how much spice you like. Add the fresh cilantro, mint, parsley, and basil and mix.
Dry the skirt steak with paper towels and cut crosswise into pieces that will fit in the same heavy-bottomed sauté pan. Generously season the steak with salt and black pepper.
Heat the pan over medium-high heat. Pour in enough oil to coat the bottom, about 2 tablespoons. When the oil shimmers, add the steak to the pan (in batches, if needed, so as not to overcrowd the pan) and sear for 2 to 3 minutes per side for medium-rare.
Transfer the steak to a cutting board and allow to rest for 5 minutes before slicing against the grain and tossing with the onion/shishito/herb mixture. Spoon any accumulated juices over the steak, top with the scallions and lime juice, and enjoy.
From “Why I Cook” by Tom Colicchio. Copyright © 2024 by Tom Colicchio. Reprinted by permission of Artisan, an imprint of Hachette Book Group. All rights reserved.
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CBS News
Canada’s Trudeau says Trump would raise prices on Americans if he follows through on tariff threat
Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said Friday that if President-elect Donald Trump follows through on this threat to impose sweeping tariffs on Canadian products, he would be raising prices for Americans and hurting American businesses.
Trump has threatened to impose tariffs on products from Canada and Mexico if the countries don’t stop what he called the flow of drugs and migrants across southern and northern borders. He said he would impose a 25% tax on all products entering the U.S. from Canada and Mexico as one of his first executive orders.
“It is important to understand that Donald Trump, when he makes statements like that, he plans on carrying them out. There’s no question about it,” Trudeau said to reporters in Prince Edward Island in Atlantic Canada.
“Our responsibility is to point out that he would not just be harming Canadians, who work so well with the United States, but he would actually be raising prices for American citizens as well and hurting American industry and business,” he added.
Trudeau said Trump got elected because he promised to bring down the cost of groceries but now he’s talking about adding 25% to the cost of all kinds of products, including potatoes from Prince Edward Island.
Those tariffs could essentially blow up the North American trade pact that Trump’s team negotiated during his first term. Trudeau noted they were able to successfully re-negotiate the deal, which he calls a “win-win” for both countries.
“We can work together as we did previously,” Trudeau said.
Trump made the tariff threat Monday while railing against an influx of illegal migrants, even though the numbers at the Canadian border pale in comparison to the southern border.
The U.S. Border Patrol made 56,530 arrests at the Mexican border in October alone — and 23,721 arrests at the Canadian one between October 2023 and September 2024.
Trump also railed about fentanyl from Mexico and Canada, even though seizures from the Canadian border are few in comparison to the Mexican border. U.S. customs agents seized 43 pounds of fentanyl at the Canadian border last fiscal year, compared with 21,100 pounds at the Mexican border.
Canadian officials say lumping Canada in with Mexico is unfair but they are ready to make new investments in border security.
“We’re going to work together to meet some of the concerns,” Trudeau said. “But ultimately it is through lots of real constructive conversations with President Trump that I am going to have, that will keep us moving forward on the right track for all Canadians.”
Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum said Thursday she is confident that a tariff war with the United States will be averted. Trump posted on social media that he had spoken with her and she had agreed to stop unauthorized migration across the border into the United States.
When Trump imposed higher tariffs during his first term in office, other countries responded with retaliatory tariffs of their own. Canada, for instance, announced billions of new duties in 2018 against the U.S. in a tit-for-tat response to new taxes on Canadian steel and aluminum.
Canada is already examining possible retaliatory tariffs on certain items from the U.S. should Trump follow through on his threat to impose sweeping tariffs, a senior official told The Associated Press this week.
A government official said Canada is preparing for every eventuality and has started thinking about what items to target with tariffs in retaliation. The official stressed no decision has been made. The person spoke on condition of anonymity as they were not authorized to speak publicly.
In the U.S., business groups were quick to warn about rapidly escalating inflation. House Democrats put together legislation to strip a president’s ability to unilaterally apply tariffs this drastic, warning that they would likely lead to higher prices for autos, shoes, housing and groceries.
Canada is the top export destination for 36 U.S. states. Nearly $2.7 billion worth of goods and services cross the border each day.
Canada is also the largest foreign supplier of steel, aluminum and uranium to the U.S. and has 34 critical minerals and metals that the Pentagon is eager for and investing in for national security.
