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From February 13 to 17, GMF and the Robert Bosch Foundation hosted the 6th Annual Congress-Bundestag Forum 2009 at Schloss Elmau in Bavaria and Berlin. The purpose of the forum is to bring together influential members of the U.S. Congress and the German Bundestag for discussions of policy issues affecting the United States and Europe in order to strengthen the transatlantic partnership. This year´s forum was attended by seven members of the U.S. Congress and ten members of the German Bundestag, as well as several spouses and children. Speakers ranged from academics like Professor Harald von Witzke, Humboldt University, and Professor Carlo Jäger, Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, to policymakers like Volker Stanzel, Political Director, Federal Foreign Office, and Jürgen Stark, a member of the European Central Bank´s Executive Board, to journalists like Daniel Brössler, Süddeutsche Zeitung, and Ulrich Ladurner, DIE ZEIT. GMF Fellows Joseph Quinlan and Joseph Wood also spoke. The Elmau Program included working sessions on the following topics: China and India; food security; international financial and economic crisis; Afghanistan; environment, climate, and innovative technologies; transatlantic relations after the U.S. elections; and Russia. Among the highlights of the social program were a ride by horse sleighs through a snow-covered mountain landscape and a Bavarian evening in a mountain hut with a Bavarian music group that played unusual homemade instruments. The Berlin Program started Monday, February 16, with a dinner at the Regent Hotel. Volker Perthes, Director of the German Institute for International and Security Affairs (SWP), focused his keynote on the "Middle East and beyond: Challenges for transatlantic cooperation." The ensuing discussion was very frank and open. Liberal Bundestag member Otto Fricke did a great job in translating German views, opinions, and points of view to the U. S. members of Congress, who in general asked for more responsibility from Germany in international affairs. Fricke, who as chair of the Bundestag Finance Committee, invited the members of Congress to visit his office the next morning and offered to give them a tour through the Reichstag. Later the group met with Karl-Theodor Freiherr zu Guttenberg, the newly-appointed German Economy Minister. Other high-level meetings on the last day of the forum included: Wolfgang Schäuble, Minister of Interior; Rolf Nikel, Deputy Foreign Policy Advisor Federal Chancellery; and Reinhard Silberberg, State Secretary Federal Foreign Office. In the evening GMF and the Bosch Foundation hosted a farewell dinner with keynote speaker Dr. Werner Schnappauf, Director General of the Federation of German Industries (BDI). Mr. Schnappauf, applying the idea of self-fulfilling prophecies, suggested that positive thinking can help combat the growing financial and economic crisis.