Translation - English-Finnish - I stand by this man, I stand by this man, because...

Here, the expression "stand by this man" means to support this man, and Colbert is talking about President G. W. Bush. However, it's satire, so in fact he means the opposite of what he says. Colbert ei sanonut, että energiakriisi saattaa olla *tosiasia*, väin että se on mahdollista (may be an energy crisis).

Kiinnostava että käytätte sana parhaiten, ei hän sanonut parhaiten, hän sanoi voimakkaimmin, koska hän puhuu kaikista voimakkain maa maailmassa.

"Seisoa jonkun rinnalla" also means supporting the person.

There are different ways of saying that "there may be an energy crisis" in Finnish, even better ways than the one I used, but isn't it more or less the same as saying that "the energy crisis might be a fact"?

Kirjoitin "parhaiten järjestetyistä", koska voimakkaasti järjestämisessä ei ole mieltä. Vaihdoin kuitenkin adverbiksi "tehokkaasti", vaikka ei sekään aluksi niin hyvältä tuntunut.

Well, yes, I would say so, but why add a word that isn't in the original text? Maribel would have my head for such inaccuracies. "Seisoa jonkun rinnalla" sounds kind of weird, but my Finnish was mostly learned from reading Aku Ankka and Tintin.

Karjatilallaan is "ranch". Other than that "tosiasia" part, the meaning looks correct to me. Maybe "ponahtaa takaisin"? and kaupungin toreilla?

Karjatila fits better here, so I chenged it.

The phrase with "tosiasia" good but after a few days I though it could be better. I replaced it as follows:

"Energiakriisi saattaa olla tosiasia." => "Voi olla, että nyt on energiakriisi."

Also I had had ponnahtaa in mind when I first worked on this text, but it's something that happens involuntarily like when a spring is released. However, I really wasn't happy with ponkaisee either, so I've rewritten it using another expression, hopefully a more fluent one:

"se ponkaisee takaisin maailman tehokkaimmin järjestettyjen poseeraustilaisuuksien kera" => "se nousee aina takaisin jaloilleen maailman tarkimmin järjestettyjen poseeraustilaisuuksien voimin"

Tori is a square _in a town_, so it isn't necessary to specify it in Finnish. On the other hand tori is not just any city square but one used as a market place. Aukio would be more general but should also be accompanied with "kaupungin". Anyway, tori should be fine as they have been used for other activies too.

And last (and perhaps least) I've made the following change: leikkaamassa => raivaamassa

Well, I think it's really good now. I can't comment on the grammar obviously, but I think the meaning is correct. :-)

A tori is a market square, as you said. Maybe kaupunkikortteleilla, since Colbert really means city blocks, not just market squares.

Does he really mean just any block? I thought city square is a block without buildings (but not a park).

Finnish Wikipedia supports my perception of tori as just about any kind of square: "Today almost any square can be called tori, whether it's used for commerce or not."

Ok. When I hear tori though I think of the market where they sell strawberries and blueberries. Yes, there can be buildings (including very large ones) on city blocks.

A lot of discussion already, nice! (btw i have great difficulties with my connection and computer which are not solved yet...)

The style is very good in the translation and this one obviously needs words that fit the idea and those may not be found directly in the dictionary. (f.ex. "tori" is definitely the word for us)

Only thing I would still think about here is "tarkimmin järjestettyjen poseeraustilaisuuksien". I would use "suunniteltujen" instead of järjestettyjen because staging is a kind of a premeditated plan. The adjective to go with that might be "parhaiten". As for the noun, I can't find a good one, so maybe we have to be contended with the one translator used. It has the staging and performance in it. I was thinking of something like advertising campaigns or "information" via carefully chosen pictures which convey a suitable message and image. If it is photo operation then it could even be translated as (valo)kuvakampanja which is quite concrete...I guess something more abstract (like image) is meant here, then we could consider imagokampanja or mielikuvakampanja.

>>>parhaiten suunniteltujen mielikuvakampanjoiden voimin (or better "avulla", but then again "voimin" comes from the word power...)

Translating the part with "photo-ops" was really the toughest part for me. I changed it to "parhaiten suuniteltujen mielikuvakampanjoiden voimin" as Maribel suggested. Thanks for the help and the comments.

LOL, I have no idea either what photo-ops really are but sometimes we have to be a bit creative. And if you think you can agree then I guess we are close enough

I'm sure. :-) Actually neither I had never seen the word but I cheated and checked at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Photo-op

photo-op = photo-opportunity: going somewhere or doing something so that you will get a good photo in the newspapers eg appearing with important people, being seen to be helping or at least present after a disaster etc.

Kummallinen, kun tästä osasta Colbertin puheesta löysin toinen käännös Suomeksi toiselta nettisivulta:

”Seison tämän miehen rinnalla. Seison tämän miehen rinnalla siksi, että hän seisoo asioiden edustamiensa asioiden edessä. Eikä pelkästään edustamiensa asioiden edessä, vaan myös yleensäkin asioiden päällä. Asioiden kuten lentotukialukset, rauniot, ja äskettäin tulvineet kaupunkikorttelit. Ja se lähettää vahvan viestin: vaikka Amerikalle tapahtuu mitä tahansa, niin se ponnahtaa takaisin – maailman voimakkaimmin lavastettujen valokuvasessioiden kera.”

http://paholaisen-asianajaja.blogspot.com/2007/10/colbert-report.html