talkpolitics | Entries tagged with germany

Who is Magdeburg market attack suspect Taleb al-Abdulmohsen?

A Saudi immigrant to Germany.
Who is am Islamophobe.
And is a sympathizer to a far-right party.
Commits a terrorist attack.
Against a crowd at a Christmas market.
In Germany.

Let all that sink in.

Then please stop this planet, I want to get off.

kiaa

Well, it finally happened. Germany is out of the nuclear power game...and since it can't yet fill the gap with renewable energy, it went right back to gas and even coal. Coal! Predictably, the pro-fossil fuel, pro-pollution, pro-climate change Green Party activists are taking a victory lap. Because in Germany (and much of Europe), being "green" isn't about environmentalism as much as it's about luddism.

https://edition.cnn.com/2023/04/15/europe/germany-nuclear-phase-out-climate-intl/index.html

From the outside in, support for nuclear is how I test for whether people are serious when they claim to believe in some form of climate-driven catastrophism. If they mean what they say, then THEY should be nuclear's biggest cheerleaders.

kiaa

This seems to be big. The plan had been in the making for more than a year, and the crackdown on this conspiracy has been well planned and massive:

Germany arrests 25 suspected far-right extremists for plotting to overthrow government

One thing I don't get, though.

How is it even possible for someone to contemplate implementing such a plan? I mean, is it possible in today's world in a functioning democracy to overthrow a government and establish a new regime by storming the parliament?

Okay, you'd get some hostages from amongst the MPs. Okay, maybe you'd cause a stir and some chaos and place some demands. But how would you expect the whole state apparatus, along with all state institutions, all services (police, intelligence, military) to play along? They'd somehow suddenly all agree to obey you!? Come on!

How would 25-odd people expect that tens of millions of citizens would somehow suddenly start praising your pipe-dream of a Fourth Reich?

What planet are these guys living on?

Also, why am I not surprised that it's the Far Right doing all this?

kiaa

Germany's new chancellor was elected with 395 of a total of 707 votes cast in the Bundestag. 303 MPs votedagainst Olaf Scholz's candidacy, 6 abstained. 369 votes were needed to confirm him for the post.

The three parties in the ruling coalition - the Social Democrats, the Greens and the Free Liberals - have a 416-seat majority in parliament. Scholz was the only candidate for chancellor.

( Read more... )

kiaa

Germany voted in parliamentary elections yesterday, but still doesn't know who'll succeed Chancellor Merkel or what the next government will be like. And these questions are likely to go unanswered for a long time to come. But that shouldn't be worrying anybody, because Germany is used to this sort of thing. In fact, post-war Germany has always been run by coalition governments, and they've always been stable. Because the German political class have, well, class.

The final election results show that the German Social Democratic Party (GSDP) has won 25.7% of the vote, giving it a minimal lead over Merkel's Christian Democratic Union (CDU) and their Bavarian partner, the Christian Social Union (CSU), which received 24.1%. This sort of photo finish leaves Social Democrat Chancellor candidates Olaf Scholz and Conservative candidate Armin Laschet in a deadlock in the battle for Merkel's spot. And the only thing that's certain is that lengthy and complex negotiations are at hand, and a lot of effort will be required to form a government. And this government is likely to include three parties (at least).

( Read more... )

asthfghl

Hungary: Viktor Orban's Fidesz to quit Europe's centre-right EPP

Victor Orban has no friends left around the top floors in Europe. His decision to withdraw his ruling party from the larger European People's Party marks an end of his traditional alliance with the more traditionalist segments of European politics.

Orban's further swing towards the radical is no surprise, of course. But the act is symptomatic of a broader alienation of the East European member countries from the mainstream EU line, spanning an arc from Slovenia to Poland that's been following a line that Orban once dubbed "non-liberal democracy".

While four years ago it seemed like populist forces across the Old World were gaining momentum, now Joe Biden's win in the US, and his vow to put an end to the America First doctrine, means the clouds will be gathering more over leaders such as Orban who were openly worshiping Donald Trump. Couple that with Angela Merkel's planned withdrawal from active politics come fall, and you'd see how politicians of the Orban type will be losing the last major leader who at least heeded their interests, albeit reluctantly. All their channels for dialogue with the EU might come to a close pretty soon.

( Read more... )

fridi

"This informant portal is definitely illegal and should be shut down", deputy Bundestag chairman Wolfgang Kubicki wrote in his FB; he was supported by Greens IT export Dieter Janecek: "The administration shouldn't be publishing guidelines that encourage citizens to report their fellow citizens - this causes discord in society".

What's this all about, you might wonder? Well, it recently surfaced in Germany that the local authorities in the city of Essen had published an online platform where they were urging people to report about violations of the Covid social distancing measures. Users were supposed to enter the place, date and hour of the violation, for example failure to carry a face mask in the designated places, or organizing unauthorized mass gatherings. People could also upload relevant photos to prove the violation. They could also opt to remain anonymous, or disclose their personal data.

Kubicki, deputy parliamentary chairman from the Liberals is adamant that this shouldn't be happening, and it's more fitting for a society like China than Germany. It also reminds of older, darker epochs in Germany, especially if you look closer at the official calls upon the citizens to snitch on each other, even publish pics of others' wrongdoings. This ought to cause quite some fear and distrust. "What's left", he adds, "is for the local informant to start getting a share of the resulting fines". He's obviously hinting about the old practice in the former DDR.

Yet, the Essen authorities insist that the platform is useful, and should stay. They believe it helps "channel the information that is already arriving at the Public Safety agency in Essen", and "the municipal authorities are in no way attempting to encourage snitching, but when citizens need to notify the municipality about certain violations of public order, we are obligated to provide the necessary structure, and legal security for that".

kiaa

https://www.nationalgeographic.com/history/2020/04/coronavirus-death-toll-vietnam-war-cvd/

As the US coronavirus death toll has now surpassed that of the Vietnam War, one opposite example sticks out, Germany. You must have noticed by now that Germany is extremely well prepared for the pandemic, with a noticeably lower death rate than most countries. Of course there are many factors for this, from a highly developed health care system, to cultural traits such as the famous German diligence and discipline.

Sure, though, there are many who are opposed to the strict prevention measures, the mass quarantine, the shutting down of many industries, etc. It's hurting people and the economy. The German Covid task force chief has received probably just as many complaints, questions, and yes, death threats, as any of his international counterparts.

( Which brings me to the paradox )

kiaa

The daily Coronavirus update by country:

Notice something? Out of 35K+ total cases in Germany, just below 200 deaths. A stunning difference from the other countries. So what's Germany doing so right? Why are so few people dying in Germany compared to Italy, Spain, etc? It's not like there aren't old people there too, right? Well, the answer might be a bit complicated. As you might suspect, it's a combination of factors.

When the epidemic broke out, there were many cases of infected people returning from skiing vacations in the Alps and elsewhere. Those were mostly people under 80 years of age, and in a generally good health condition. Naturally, the risk of a fatal end is relatively smaller in that group.

( Read more... )

kiaa

Germany lines up $600 billion virus aid as EU backs stimulus

They do it because they can. And some are unhappy because they can't afford to do it themselves. Oh, and because EU state aid rules suddenly seem not to apply for Germany.* You know, because it's... well, GERMANY.

If anything, this vindicates Germany’s policy of balanced budgets. If it had run permanent Italian-style deficits in the vain hope of a trickle-down effect (something which has been discredited elsewhere in economics) to the Mediterranean, it would not be able to raise the sorts of funds it now needs without sending alarm signals through bond and currency markets.

Strong tax surpluses for years as well. Not like the deficit fueled Tory nonsense over here.

* Actually I'm just trolling you. EU state aid rules explicitly allow state aid for countering serious disturbances to the economy, Article 107, paragraph 3 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the EU. What it doesn't allow is to throw taxpayer money at the failing businesses of buddies of the government, which is why the UK for example refuses to abide by them anymore.

kiaa

This year may mark the moment when Germany, the biggest European economy finally recognizes its own shortcomings. There's a sense that Germany is living through the last days of an old era and it needs change. Sure, the country remains politically stable. But there's a feeling that Germans are not particularly interested about the challenges to their long-term prosperity.

The waning of Merkel's power is at the center of all this. She led Germany through a series of global crises, from the 2008 downfall, to the Greek default, to the immigrant wave, and the various threats to the euro. She was an advocate for austerity, and still the German juggernaut kept going, and sustaining the stability of the whole continent. Her successor Karenbauer is still an enigma. Her biggest achievement so far has been to block an anti-Merkel candidate from taking over the HDU.

( Read more... )

airiefairie

Trump Should Stop Before He Loses Germany
Punitive tariffs on German cars would be a hostile act – and could well force a recession.

If president Trump acts on the likely conclusion of a report by Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross - that German car imports are a threat to national security - he could bring the US-German relationship to a post-World War II nadir. Presumably, for Trump, that would be less of a security threat than Mercedes-Benzes and BMWs.The content of the report hasn’t yet been made public. But Trump has previously threatened to impose a 25 percent tariff on foreign-made cars, and Ross’s report may offer him a justification.

A bit older of an article, but it raises the question; if a country that pays twice what we pay in salary and benefits, builds twice the number of cars, and has full health care for all, is a threat to us, then maybe YOU are the ones doing something wrong.

How Germany Builds Twice As Many Cars As The U.S. While Paying Its Workers Twice As Much

kiaa

Factbox: German cities ban older diesel cars

IMO it's wrong to ban older diesels. Especially overnight. Some officials sat on their fat asses and suddenly came up with the idea that effective from tomorrow, all older diesel cars are banned. The fact that small businesses cannot afford to buy electric right now, immediately, not without taking a huge loan that'll severely cripple their well-being, notwithstanding.

It's like telling people: "Sorry, we sold you a bunch of crap and now we are going to ban you from using it. You have one day to comply, or else". It won't go down well. Ban the sale of new ones instead, give them a grace period and that's it. The old ones will disappear eventually, just like ICE in general.

( Read more... )

kiaa

Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer takes over the CDU leadership

That was probably Merkel's last political victory, although a bittersweet one, as she's going out soon. Her preferred candidate won the leadership in the CDU - and that shows Frau Merkel shouldn't be written out just yet. Although she's weakened, evidently she's still Germany's (and Europe's) most influential politician. Now she'll get a chance to calmly finish her term in 2021, and have the comfort to prepare her successor and preserve her legacy, rather than spend her last months in politics fighting both at home and abroad.

AKK's election for CDU leader means one thing: more of the same stuff. In other words, the party will keep the moderate, centrist course. It's also encouraging for Germany's partners in the EU. Just like Merkel, AKK has often said that the European agenda is at the core of her party. She has called for more cooperation within the EU, including on the issue of a European military, an idea that she shares with Macron. Although there's no guarantee that she'd be bolder than her predecessor on the economic front, or in her attempts to strengthen the eurozone. For instance, she wrote in her blog that she sees no upside in having a separate budget for the eurozone.

( Read more... )

mahnmut

"RESPECT! - German supermarket EDEKA makes a powerful statement about racism and diversity" (Watch on YouTube)

One of the most popular German supermarkets "EDEKA" temporarily cleared its shelves off by removing all the non-German products in a stunt move to make a powerful statement against racism and to show the importance of diversity. Although there clearly is a difference between imported goods and diversity?, this was just an analogy to help understand the importance of diversity in a society, which contributes more than it takes away from said society.?

There is an opposing view to this, of course. It is that simply comparing goods with human beings is not a good idea. One could argue that in the same way that foreign goods have taken the place of local goods on the shelves in the supermarket, foreign populations could take the place of locals. In the same way that foreign products have ruined local businesses because of their cheap price, immigrants could take the jobs of local people because they accept lower wages and to work more hours.

It's a long and complicated discussion with no clear answers. Which view do you tend to gravitate towards?

johnny9fingers

So today the Grauniad ran this byeline:

www.theguardian.com/world/2018/aug/29/arrest-warrant-leak-fuels-suspicions-of-far-right-links-with-german-police

Wherein we find that the German authorities suspect the German police may have links to far-right organisations. It's a bit of a laugh, ain't it? I mean to say it's almost as if far right groups, having thoroughly infiltrated the police and army, have moved on to the civil service and the media.

Talk about shutting the stable door after it has bolted.

In the UK the far-right expanded their targets to put in place folk sympathetic to their cause, from the police and army, to the Home Office and the Beeb. I suppose, thinking strategically, some co-ordination will be required for transport networks as well. Ergo I will expect Dept of Transport to be a place to put people too.

It's like the folk in our various administrations, or in the security services, can't really think properly any more. Strategy and tactics 101. It's not as if the security services don't have folk in place in these far-right organisations, after all. Maybe our chaps have gone native. Some folk in the security services do have a tendency to be a bit right-wing themselves - it goes with the turf.

Now the big question. If members of the panel have a discredited political position to foist upon the electorate, where would you place your chaps to provide the perfect fait accompli?

In the UK I'd put my minions in the Forces (especially the Special Forces) the police, the Home Office, The Beeb, and Transport. I'd try to get chaps into the Treasury too.

Where would folk put their placement in their own nations? Just as a theoretical exercise, obvs.

fridi

You may've heard of this already. German chancellor Angela Markel is facing the worst domestic political crisis in her entire career. Almost two months after the parliamentary elections in Germany, the negotiations for forming a ruling coalition have failed. Last week the Free Democrats leader Christian Lindner declared that the talks with Merkel's conservative block and the Greens had come to a halt, and failed to provide results. He said it was better for his party not to rule rather than ruling badly.

The situation seemed bad from the start, granted. The results of the election and the exit of Merkel's main partner in the coalition, the Social Democrats, were the two events that forced the Chancellor to look for allies in two parties that are traditionally opposed to each other. Their ideological differences became clear right from the onset, and it was obvious there could be no easy and quick resolution of the standoff. The most problematic parts were the migrant issue, the environment, and digitalization.

( Read more... )

kiaa

Merkel has won the German parliamentary election, but her positions are weakened. The conclusion from the results is that things can't go on like they used to. Also, there are two clear losers from the election: the Social Democrats, and Merkel herself.

The Social Democrats have suffered a historic blow, their lowest score in decades (20.8%), while Merkel's Christian Democrats have lost 8%. It's a major tremor on the political landscape, and in other circumstances it might have even prompted resignations. But these are not normal times for Germany - the rise of Alternative for Germany, the right-wing radicals, only confirms this. 13% of the seats in the Bundestag! This has never happened since the inception of the Federal Republic, a right-wing party being represented in the federal parliament.

( Read more... )

halialkers

When Germans collectively believed because Trotsky, Luxemburg, and Eisner showed a 'Judaeo-Bolshevik' conspiracy of all Jews being collaborators with the murderous Soviet Union of Lenin and Stalin, this is what that 'traditional retaliation' became:

( cut for picture of genocide )

( Cut for length )
Should we condemn growing beyond the savage and gruesome methods our ancestors took for granted and that lead people who've lost their homes to a civil war where the very states that condemn them (looking hard at YOU MY OWN COUNTRY AND FRANCE) bomb them and then wonder why they're fleeing in the first place?

I say not. Europeans evolved, Europeans learned. The Russians haven't, because their society is an army with a country, and the USA forgot that it once hated soldiers to cheer every time a multi-million dollar bomb blows up a shepherd and his wives. I don't want the last, best hope of Western civilization to wither on the vine when it has the chance to remain the redemption of the good within the Western bloodbath and to keep the ideals alive. The world without them has all the same problems but is starker and crueler and colder in ways to meet them.

Mood: melancholy

kiaa

A secret automobile cartel between Volkswagen, Audi, Porsche, BMW and Daimler has been alleged by a recent report that's threatening to engulf these companies in a huge scandal. The German car manufacturers conspired for two decades to have a unified policy in all areas of future development: from their diesel and gas engines, to brake systems, to the gear-box, etc. It is alleged that they secretly coordinated between themselves about which suppliers they would use, what the price of the car parts they produced would be, the way they would process the waste gases from the diesel engines, and the prices of their new car models.

The scandal could possibly turn out to be related to the earlier one about the diesel engines, if the investigation finds out that there were also secret agreements about using too small AdBlue carbamide tanks. The substance has the capability to extract nitrate oxides from waste gases. If all allegations are proven right, that would mean there was indeed a cartel agreement that helped these corporations artificially maintain high prices for the customers, and low prices for their sub-contractors.

( Read more... )

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Entries tagged with germany

What the actual crap

That is so dumb I have no words for it

The Fourth Reich!?

Meet Olaf

German democracy is fascinating

Bad times for Eastern Europe

Covid, and snitching

The good preparedness paradox

What's Germany doing so right?

The German fiat bazooka

Germany needs a change

Shoot your other leg now, why don't you

That's fine and all, but...

Germany: Change of the guard

Friday offtopic. That diversity ad

It is not as if folk haven't been told....

Merkel's woes

After the German election

Well if people want to talk traditional European retaliation methods:

The auto mafia

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May 2025

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