Baerbock (Greens) more and more in trouble ...
https://www.derbund.ch/auf-einmal-macht-baerbock-fehler-258960547400
Problems with properly declaring 30.000€ in bonus payments, questions about her Masters degree without acquiring a Bachelor degree, a nasty jab at Habeck (her co-party leader) whom she criticized as a „farmer“, while she’s an „expert in international law“ (well, without the Bachelor of course) ... Habeck has far more experience than her btw and has written 16 books and has a doctorate.
It's a very curious thing though... for about three years there has been no significant scandal involving either Baerbock or the Greens. But now, a new scandal seems to surface every four days or so, while the CDU looks squeaky clean.
Well, maybe it's not that curious. Since 2009 this is the fourth Bundestag election in a row where I happen to work for or with the Greens in some capacity and by now I'm recognizing the patterns that have been repeating themselves every single time. As soon as the election campaign starts, BILD and FOCUS are packing out the big guns. And even if some of the "scandals" have basis they seem to have been collected over the past couple years with the apparent intention of a timed release during the election year.
But let's gets through the media-type events that Tender has mentioned above.
- Failing to declare 30.000€ 25.000 € in (primarily Christmas) bonus payments. This one is the objectively worst of the accusations and probably the first one where I would concede that it has some grounds to be concerned, outraged or whatever. While not a total career-ending catastrophe, it is certainly led to Baerbock's worst week since she became Chancellor-candidate (and maybe party chair as well). Normally I would be a lot more outraged about it myself, but since it is obviously part of a coordinated media campaign which also happens to contain a lot of bullsh**t stories it sort of gets cancelled out by the noise where your humble narrator is concerned.
- "Questions about her master's degree without acquiring a bachelor's degree":
Nothingburger artificially inflated by the aforementioned media. She obtained a Vordiplom in Germany to get a master's degree in England, because at that time bachelor's degree were still uncommon in our country. Completely standard procedure back then to count a German Vordiplom as a substitute for a bachelor. If there have ever been any "questions" about it, there are obviosuly by now resolved... a week later.
- "A nasty jab at Habeck (her co-party leader) whom she criticized as a „farmer“, while she’s an „expert in international law“ (well, without the Bachelor of course)":
I'd rather call it a lame joke. More importantly, the video of that joint interview is already a couple of years old. I wonder why it happens to penetrate the Internet now... and to carry on from the paragraph above, Baerbock holds a Master of Laws in Public International Law from the London School of Economics, so trying to continue to ride that horse borders on deliberately spreading misinformation IMO.
- "Habeck has far more experience than her btw and has written 16 books and has a doctorate.":
But have you forgotten already that Habeck literally wrote in a book once that Germany makes him puke ?? (at least that would be one of the main stories right now had he become the Greens' Chancellor-candidate)
The following blog has a good (albeit German-language) editorial on the new "Baerbock is a corrupt, Stalinist devil" phenomenon. It starts out as a satire of the BILD's (and CDU/CSU's) discrediting strategies before turning to a more serious analysis of recent events. Notably it also goes out of its way in pointing out that Baerbock has been treated rather fairly by the FDP so far - primarily it's the CSU and to a lesser extent the CDU which generously picks up any fake (or half-fake) news and runs with it:
https://www.volksverpetzer.de/satire/baerbock-muesli/
Personally, I'm counting the days until Baerbock is finally accused of running a child slavery ring out of a pizzeria in Berlin or something.
If you are a die-hard green supporter, these points may seem negligible. And true, maybe if you are a student at university or have a typical white-collar job, virtue signalling a "racism problem" certainly is a main concern and important issue.
Elsewhere, the economic downturn, loss of jobs and bankrupcy wave of small retailers and small business owners are much more urgent questions.
To those voters which are at least in their mid-20s, Mrs. Baerbock's "negligible blemishs" resemble the media hype of Mr. Schulz four years ago.
- She forgot the bonus payments to report THREE years in a row. And she got a "Corona Bonus Payment" too, while workers are getting laid off, or have reduced wages. Not to mention the intensive care nurses and medical staff which had real hardships with Corona without any bonus payments, but unpaid extra work. She only came out as a free lance journalist who had a story on her wanted it to sell it to our "beloved" public broadcast service turned it down and warned her.
- The interview excerpt in which she rudely disqualifies her Co-Chairman Habeck can be seen here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nOMW8Kn4OLwShe berates him first with his "chicken, swines and what'cha have, cow milking, I stem from international law". Well, as if she had a JD, not a Masters in public administration.
- The Diploma degree(usually at least 4.5 years of studying , not a Credit Point System for individual courses but integrated minimum learning time including a thesis) was accepted only as undergraduate studies in the UK. The Pre-diploma (a small exam after 2 years) was not an accepted academic title at home or abroad. Except for some extremely privileged children of some bigwigs, like children of CEOs. There it was magically possible. Let's sum this up: After 2+1 years instead of 4.5 years of studying obtaining academic title in this time is not something according to most Diploma degree regulations.
By the way, I have a Diploma degree myself and was a student member of the curriculum commission. I do not knwo the exact cirumstances and regulations of the political faculty at the University of Hamburg at which she obtained the title, and why she did not complete the diploma afterwards, thus I cannot say if there were circumstances in which 3 years without Master thesis were acceptable instead of 4.5 years of studying inlcuding a Diploma thesis.
In my case experience, we had to judge a student's academic curriculum, and abbreviating a study with a Masters degree this way was usually seen as not acceptable to obtain the Diploma degree.
By the way, the missing Masters thesis of Mrs Baerbock has a striking resemblance of the missing Doctorate thesis of the person whose office she wants to inherit...
Well, the satire page might be funny. Reminds me of the puppy ad of "radical liberal Raphael Warnock" ;-)
The whole scrutiny is valid to me, as long as is kept objective. The "Diploma question" must be evaluated, maybe this is indeed too critical, but maybe she should be held accountable on sincerity as all politicians with academic titles. After all, we need a person with a sound judgement as next chancellor, not a secretary for agit-prop.
Last but not least 2 sources for the confusing claim Mrs. Baerbock being a "International Law" whatever:
https://juergenfritz.com/2021/05/21/annalena-baerbock-keine-juristin-aber-voelkerrechtlerin/https://juergenfritz.com/2021/05/22/baerbock-brach-promotion-2015-ab-gab-sich-bis-2021-ohne-zeitliche-angabe-als-doktorandin-aus/
