Germany megathread

[President Johnson]

Scholz approves the sale of almost 25% in the Port of Hamburg and also is planning to approve the sale of a German microchip manufacturer to the Swedish subsidiary of a Chinese company.

This is, again, despite the advice of the Bundesverfassungsschutz and many, many others, including those in his own party.

Genuinely at a loss...

I'm really mad at Scholz over this. And if not for other SPD members, the Greens and FDP, it would have been worse. It's not only extremely dangerous and sends a terrible signal, it also hurts our alliances in the Western world. Nobody really gets this how you can be this stubborn and - quite frankly - stupid. Especially after Nordstream 2.

The CDU, however, is the wrong party to criticize this after Merkel approved Nordstream 2 in the first place and was utterly delusional about Putin (as was the SPD, and parts still are). And then you wonder why government's approval rating is in the tank and the sh**bags better known as AfD are on the rise...

[MaxQue]

Scholz approves the sale of almost 25% in the Port of Hamburg and also is planning to approve the sale of a German microchip manufacturer to the Swedish subsidiary of a Chinese company.

This is, again, despite the advice of the Bundesverfassungsschutz and many, many others, including those in his own party.

Genuinely at a loss...

I'm really mad at Scholz over this. And if not for other SPD members, the Greens and FDP, it would have been worse. It's not only extremely dangerous and sends a terrible signal, it also hurts our alliances in the Western world. Nobody really gets this how you can be this stubborn and - quite frankly - stupid. Especially after Nordstream 2.

The CDU, however, is the wrong party to criticize this after Merkel approved Nordstream 2 in the first place and was utterly delusional about Putin (as was the SPD, and parts still are). And then you wonder why government's approval rating is in the tank and the sh**bags better known as AfD are on the rise...

Is there is any possibility that the SPD get rid of him or can the FDP/Greens force him out?

[Estrella]

Maybe simping for every dictatorship under the sun as long as it's sufficiently anti-American is not just a Scholz problem or an SPD problem: it's a Germany problem.

The China trap: survey shows surprising assessment of German company bosses

39% consider China's economic policies to be good or very good, another 37% consider them satisfactory – numbers much higher than for the US. You know, the one-party dictatorship with a heavily state-directed economy where businessmen who fall foul of the government regurarly get disappeared.

[Good Habit]

Maybe simping for every dictatorship under the sun as long as it's sufficiently anti-American is not just a Scholz problem or an SPD problem: it's a Germany problem.

The China trap: survey shows surprising assessment of German company bosses

39% consider China's economic policies to be good or very good, another 37% consider them satisfactory – numbers much higher than for the US. You know, the one-party dictatorship with a heavily state-directed economy where businessmen who fall foul of the government regurarly get disappeared.

Well, may be you noted that the survey was taken in May 2019!! (started wondering when it talked about a "possible Brexit"..) - So - just may be - actual numbers could be quite different.... like that COVID-restrictions would have reduced the easyness to do business in China... - or other things...

[Middle-aged Europe]

Scholz approves the sale of almost 25% in the Port of Hamburg and also is planning to approve the sale of a German microchip manufacturer to the Swedish subsidiary of a Chinese company.

This is, again, despite the advice of the Bundesverfassungsschutz and many, many others, including those in his own party.

Genuinely at a loss...

The sale of the microchip manufacturer has just been terminated by the federal government. While economics minister Habeck had led it slide in the case of the Hamburg port, he apparently insisted on a federal intervention this time around.

[Middle-aged Europe]

Former East German dissident leader and retired Green MP Werner Schulz died of a heart attack during a Kristallnacht/Fall of Berlin Wall commemorative event (happened on the same day in '38/'89) at the German president's official residence yesterday. The also attending President of the Central Council of Jews in Germany, who happens to be a medical doctor, attempted to resuscitate him, but was ultimately unsuccessful.



In other November 9 news, Kentucky Fried Chicken urged German customers to commemorate the anniversary of the Kristallnacht... with some tasty chicken!

The fast food chain sent an app alert on Wednesday, saying: "It's memorial day for Kristallnacht! Treat yourself with more tender cheese on your crispy chicken. Now at KFCheese!"

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-63499057



Pretty crazy day.

[CumbrianLefty]

That faux pas by KFC is classic "algorithms gonna algorithm"

[President Johnson]

Former East German dissident leader and retired Green MP Werner Schulz died of a heart attack during a Kristallnacht/Fall of Berlin Wall commemorative event (happened on the same day in '38/'89) at the German president's official residence yesterday. The also attending President of the Central Council of Jews in Germany, who happens to be a medical doctor, attempted to resuscitate him, but was ultimately unsuccessful.



In other November 9 news, Kentucky Fried Chicken urged German customers to commemorate the anniversary of the Kristallnacht... with some tasty chicken!

The fast food chain sent an app alert on Wednesday, saying: "It's memorial day for Kristallnacht! Treat yourself with more tender cheese on your crispy chicken. Now at KFCheese!"

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-63499057



Pretty crazy day.

RIP.

I only knew him from his strong opposition to Gerhard Schröder's intentionally lost no confidence vote in 2005 to trigger a snap election. He and a few other MPs challenged before the Constitutional Court in Karlsruhe, but it was dismissed.

[Estrella]

I realize I might come off as a bit of a monomaniac with all these posts, but I will never stop being fascinated by how weird German left is.

It's not surprising to see certain types of leftists all over the world take Russia's side in the war, motivated by the delusion they're still living in the Cold War. It also isn't strange to see the far-right take Russia's side: why shouldn't authoritarian nationalists support authoritarian nationalists? But there is a rare combination of the two: the way the foreign policy of parts of German left is in effect just mid-20th century German nationalism packaged in pseudo-respectable Lumpenpazifismus. It's even more interesting when they don't bother with that cover and come up with articles like this:

The 78-year old Oskar Lafontaine, SPD's candidate for Chancellor in 1990, founder of the left-wing splinter WASG and former co-chairman of Die Linke has regrettably decided to share his thoughts on the war. Just so you know, he opposed the reunification of Germany and quit Die Linke earlier this year due to them not being sufficiently anti-Ukrainian for his tastes.

Most recently, with the Maidan coup in 2014, the USA showed that they were not willing to take Russia's security interests into account. They installed a US puppet government and did all they could to integrate Ukraine's armed forces into NATO structures. Joint maneuvers were held and the Russian government's constant objections were ignored.

In this context, the mendacious argument is used that every state has the right to freely choose its alliance. But no state should set up rockets from a rival power on the border of a nuclear power without warning and justify this naively with the free choice of alliance.

... or like this: a rant against unpatriotic, backstabbing Ukrainian puppets, published in the left-wing weekly der Freitag. It's an ostensibly moderate and respectable newspaper rather than some obscure tankie rag (they literally publish translated articles from The Guardian).

Terrorist list of Ukraine: You leave [SPD caucus chairman] Rolf Mützenich out in the cold

At the end of July, the list, which was published on a Ukrainian official website on July 14, was also making waves in the German media, but hardly any journalists are upset that a prominent German social democrat has appeared on a state blacklist and is being publicly denounced and pilloried. This is scandal number one. In other words, the faction leader of Germany's largest governing party is being flagged as an enemy by a state agency in Ukraine, while his government is delivering equipment, money and weapons to Ukraine and caring for a million Ukrainian refugees in Germany.

Scandal number two: nobody in political Berlin is protesting against this monstrosity either. Instead, awkward silence. Only the former president of the Berlin Academy of Arts, Klaus Staeck, who has a keen sense of the intimidating nature of such methods, is outraged in the Frankfurter Rundschau. No federal chancellor, no federal president, no party grandee stands behind Mützenich, even his own party leadership leaves him out in the cold.

Rolf Mützenich, one of the politicians with the highest integrity in the Federal Republic, is once again left out in the rain. Not a well-known social democrat anywhere to protect him and talk straight, no public protest note, no solidarity from the democrats. It's also difficult, since it is now known that the US ally, of all people, is co-financing the Ukrainian authority that Rolf Mützenich is openly slandering.

It's perfect. The only thing missing is some kind of antisemitic caricature... oh wait.

You know, maybe Anti-Germans, the other side of German lefty weirdness, have a point.

[President Johnson]

Bürgergeld gets the green light after some compromises with the CDU. From January 1st, the Hartz IV regime will be abolished. Details forthcoming

Here's more on that:

https://twitter.com/dwnews/status/1595098282707062790

I actually can live with that; sanctions for unemployed who refuse to show up or look for work are overall approriate, though we really need to move away from the general assumption all umemployed are just lazy. That's indeed just a minority, which was proven in several studies.

[palandio]

I don't know. To me this seems for the most part like an unholy compromise between the right-wing ideology that inspired Hartz IV and the modern left-wing ideology that work (or at least work that someone is actually willing to pay for) is overrated anyways.

- For recipients of Hartz IV this is probably an improvement.

- For low-to-middle income families and single parents there is no coherent idea how work is supposed to pay off financially. Right-wingers like to use this as an argument to cut social benefits, but instead you could also ask why people shouldn't keep part of every additional Euro they are earning.

- Sanctions are seen as the main incentive for starting to work or continuing to work, particularly by the right. On the other hand anyone who talks about monetary incentives from the comparison between benefits and wages is accused by the left of having a questionable idea of humanity. UBI, negative income tax, etc. are not even discussed.

- The Bedarfsgemeinschaften idea (household members contributing to one common income) was attenuated for young people in apprenticeships and student jobs who still live with their Hartz IV-receiving families. They are now allowed to keep part of their earnings which is definitely an improvement in my opinion. But the general idea remains in place although the same arguments that can be applied to youths could applied to other household members, too.

- Asset limits were raised but they are still in a region where they discourage any meaningful saving.

Altogether this won't help the acceptance of the welfare system since it continues to separate a small class of unenviable welfare recipients for whom work doesn't make sense from the population majority.

[Clarko95 📚💰📈]

Now the CDU turns its ire to the proposed citizenship modernization law proposed by the Traffic Light Coalition.

The government wants to reduce the number of years of permanent residency required to qualify for citizenship from 8 years to 5 years. They also want to allow children born to permanent residents to receive citizenship upon birth, and allow dual citizenship up to the third generation (currently, only EU citizens and people from a handful of other countries are allowed to have dual citizenship).

The CDU is saying that this "cheapens" the German passport and reduces the incentives to integrate. This is despite the fact that the citizenship and language tests will still remain, which just shows the pre-2005 cheap populism that Merz is trying to mimic again.

[Clarko95 📚💰📈]

BTW the Bundestag and Bundesrat have both approved the compromise solution to the Bürgergeld reform just now, so it will come into effect on January 1st.

[Anzeigenhauptmeister]

The CDU is saying that this "cheapens" the German passport and reduces the incentives to integrate. This is despite the fact that the citizenship and language tests will still remain, which just shows the pre-2005 cheap populism that Merz is trying to mimic again.

I just wanted to point put that I wrote something similar in the past, thereby triggering Atlas' favorite German member, far-left-far-right Green terrorist PUTP to stir up hatred against me, claiming hat the CDU and their voters had always been a pro-migration, pro-foreign, pro-Islam party. Just sayin...

BTW the Bundestag and Bundesrat have both approved the compromise solution to the Bürgergeld reform just now, so it will come into effect on January 1st.

The AfD was the only party to vote no to the bill.

[NewYorkExpress]

The Bundestag is planning to pass a resolution declaring the starvation of Ukranians under Stalin a genocide.

Germany’s Bundestag is planning to pass a resolution declaring the starvation of millions of Ukrainians under Joseph Stalin a genocide, a move that parliamentarians hope will serve as a “warning” to Moscow as Ukraine faces a potential hunger crisis this winter.

The resolution, which will be jointly brought to the vote next week by the three governing parties and conservative opposition leaders, will describe the 1932-33 Holodomor as part of “a list of inhuman crimes by totalitarian systems that extinguished millions of human lives in Europe in the first half of the 20th century”.

“People across Ukraine, not just in grain-producing regions, were affected by hunger and repression”, the resolution will say. “This meets the historical-political definition from today’s perspective for genocide.”

The victims of the Holodomor – Ukrainian for “death by starvation” – are traditionally commemorated in Ukraine on the last Saturday of November.

Kyiv regards the historical event as part of a deliberate campaign by Stalin’s regime to collectivise agriculture and root out Ukraine’s fledging nationalist movement. Historians estimate between 4 million and 7.5 million people were killed in the human-made disaster.

Moscow has rejected Kyiv’s version of history, placing the deaths in the broader context of famines that devastated regions of Central Asia and Russia.

“Putin is part of Stalin’s cruel and criminal tradition,” said Robin Wagener, the German Green party MP who initiated the resolution. “Today Russian terror is once again haunting Ukraine. Once again the plan is to use violence and terror to deprive Ukraine of livelihood, to subdue an entire country,” he told newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung.

[Torrain]

The Bundestag is planning to pass a resolution declaring the starvation of Ukranians under Stalin a genocide.

That feels pretty significant. Apologies for focusing on a petty political point - but given the turmoil within the party over Russo-German relations, what is Die Linke expected to do in the vote?

United for/against, or a round of recriminations that leaves the party split over whether such a resolution is "necessary" or "too broad"/"too antagonistic"/some other form of Soviet apologism?

[President Johnson]

Now the CDU turns its ire to the proposed citizenship modernization law proposed by the Traffic Light Coalition.

The government wants to reduce the number of years of permanent residency required to qualify for citizenship from 8 years to 5 years. They also want to allow children born to permanent residents to receive citizenship upon birth, and allow dual citizenship up to the third generation (currently, only EU citizens and people from a handful of other countries are allowed to have dual citizenship).

The CDU is saying that this "cheapens" the German passport and reduces the incentives to integrate. This is despite the fact that the citizenship and language tests will still remain, which just shows the pre-2005 cheap populism that Merz is trying to mimic again.

Parts of the FDP are also starting to torpedo items of the proposed reforms. Their General Secretary Bijan Djir-Sarai said it was "not the time for simplification of citizenship rights." While Lindner and Wissing have been relatively quiet and team players, Djir-Sarai and Kubicki are really annoying with the constant criticism of SPD and Greens. It's just bad style in my opinion, though the former is knows for "Black-Yellow-affinity".

Anyway, I think some reform is definitely going to pass since the coalition agreement contains such a provision.

[President Johnson]

A good opinion piece after one year of the traffic-light government:

https://twitter.com/dwnews/status/1600575620710285327

[Estrella]

Number of people killed by nuclear accidents in Germany: 0
Number of people killed by pollution in Germany: 29,000 every year
The Greens: Nuclear energy kills (an actual slogan), let's mine more coal instead!

Lützerath: How Germany's energy crisis reignited coal

Lützerath has been occupied by protesters since 2020, when plans emerged to demolish the village and dig up the brown coal — or lignite — beneath it. Since the end of World War II, around 300 towns in Germany have been demolished for lignite mining, causing more than 120,000 people to be resettled.

But attempts to save Lützerath got more complicated after Russia's invasion of Ukraine triggered an energy crisis in Europe. Cut off from Russian natural gas, Germany has scrambled to secure an alternative energy supply. That included crawling back to its homegrown coal industry. This year, the government has moved to bring around a dozen plants back on the grid, and extended the lifespan of several that were meant to be shuttered.

To compensate for the unexpected increase in coal production, the government cut a deal with energy company RWE to move the coal phaseout deadline in NRW, a major coal-producing region, to 2030. Their arguments and protests have not convinced the courts or politicians. In December, it was announced that the activists will be cleared from Lützerath in January and that the demolition of the village will begin.

Lignite village of Lützerath: Waiting for "Day X"

Four years ago, the Greens fought side by side with the climate activists against the clearing of the Hambach Forest. The North Rhine-Westphalian state association organized a party conference at the demolition edge. Now the Düsseldorf climate minister Mona Neubaur (Greens) says: "The eviction is a painful, but unfortunately necessary step." She wishes that "everyone involved can do it as non-violently as possible".

For reference, the same Mona Neubaur:
Keeping nuclear power permanently is not a solution
Green Minister Neubaur insists on nuclear phase-out in April

[Kahane's Grave Is A Gender-Neutral Bathroom]

The Bundestag is planning to pass a resolution declaring the starvation of Ukranians under Stalin a genocide.

Germany’s Bundestag is planning to pass a resolution declaring the starvation of millions of Ukrainians under Joseph Stalin a genocide, a move that parliamentarians hope will serve as a “warning” to Moscow as Ukraine faces a potential hunger crisis this winter.

The resolution, which will be jointly brought to the vote next week by the three governing parties and conservative opposition leaders, will describe the 1932-33 Holodomor as part of “a list of inhuman crimes by totalitarian systems that extinguished millions of human lives in Europe in the first half of the 20th century”.

“People across Ukraine, not just in grain-producing regions, were affected by hunger and repression”, the resolution will say. “This meets the historical-political definition from today’s perspective for genocide.”

The victims of the Holodomor – Ukrainian for “death by starvation” – are traditionally commemorated in Ukraine on the last Saturday of November.

Kyiv regards the historical event as part of a deliberate campaign by Stalin’s regime to collectivise agriculture and root out Ukraine’s fledging nationalist movement. Historians estimate between 4 million and 7.5 million people were killed in the human-made disaster.

Moscow has rejected Kyiv’s version of history, placing the deaths in the broader context of famines that devastated regions of Central Asia and Russia.

“Putin is part of Stalin’s cruel and criminal tradition,” said Robin Wagener, the German Green party MP who initiated the resolution. “Today Russian terror is once again haunting Ukraine. Once again the plan is to use violence and terror to deprive Ukraine of livelihood, to subdue an entire country,” he told newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung.

Oh boy I can't wait to see what reason the pro-China clowns on the German left find to oppose this!

I don't really understand why plenty of normal leftists in Germany (the SDP is otherwise a sensible social democratic party, after all) have tankie-esque takes on these kinds of things, even if they (like Olaf Scholz) actually have decent relations with the US. Is it some kind of 'both sides' thing?

[CumbrianLefty]

The Bundestag is planning to pass a resolution declaring the starvation of Ukranians under Stalin a genocide.

Germany’s Bundestag is planning to pass a resolution declaring the starvation of millions of Ukrainians under Joseph Stalin a genocide, a move that parliamentarians hope will serve as a “warning” to Moscow as Ukraine faces a potential hunger crisis this winter.

The resolution, which will be jointly brought to the vote next week by the three governing parties and conservative opposition leaders, will describe the 1932-33 Holodomor as part of “a list of inhuman crimes by totalitarian systems that extinguished millions of human lives in Europe in the first half of the 20th century”.

“People across Ukraine, not just in grain-producing regions, were affected by hunger and repression”, the resolution will say. “This meets the historical-political definition from today’s perspective for genocide.”

The victims of the Holodomor – Ukrainian for “death by starvation” – are traditionally commemorated in Ukraine on the last Saturday of November.

Kyiv regards the historical event as part of a deliberate campaign by Stalin’s regime to collectivise agriculture and root out Ukraine’s fledging nationalist movement. Historians estimate between 4 million and 7.5 million people were killed in the human-made disaster.

Moscow has rejected Kyiv’s version of history, placing the deaths in the broader context of famines that devastated regions of Central Asia and Russia.

“Putin is part of Stalin’s cruel and criminal tradition,” said Robin Wagener, the German Green party MP who initiated the resolution. “Today Russian terror is once again haunting Ukraine. Once again the plan is to use violence and terror to deprive Ukraine of livelihood, to subdue an entire country,” he told newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung.

Oh boy I can't wait to see what reason the pro-China clowns on the German left find to oppose this!

I don't really understand why plenty of normal leftists in Germany (the SDP is otherwise a sensible social democratic party, after all) have tankie-esque takes on these kinds of things, even if they (like Olaf Scholz) actually have decent relations with the US. Is it some kind of 'both sides' thing?

To a degree, yes.

Plus for fairly obvious historical reasons, even much of the German centre-left is pretty pacifistic.

[President Johnson]

Lambrecht should resign or Scholz fire her. Not just that this new year's video was tasteless, she's also incompetent and seems overwhelmed with the job. As were all of her CDU predecessors.

At this point, I think we should have a indepdendent/non-partisan Defense Minister from the outside who's a proven manager of large and complex organisations. In this time, this position isn't a job for a partisan hack. It requires someone with effective managing qualities, knowledge of defense issues and leadership qualities.

https://twitter.com/dwnews/status/1609956411391328258

[Kahane's Grave Is A Gender-Neutral Bathroom]

The fact that a country that committed genocide and invaded other countries less than a lifetime ago and has otherwise been quite good about grappling with it is now defending Russia is disgraceful.

[OSR stands with Israel]

The fact that a country that committed genocide and invaded other countries less than a lifetime ago and has otherwise been quite good about grappling with it is now defending Russia is disgraceful.

Remember they did this last January : https://news.yahoo.com/germany-blocks-nato-ally-estonia-223242052.html

Germany is preventing fellow NATO member Estonia from providing Ukraine with military support by declining to offer export permits for weapons of German origin, The Wall Street Journal reported on Friday.

But the German government has opposed sending weapons to Ukraine to avoid provoking Russia, while also citing Germany's own history of atrocities in the region under the Nazis during World War II.

"Our restrictive position is well known and is rooted in history," Germany's foreign minister, Annalena Baerbock, said while visiting Kyiv this week.

[Middle-aged Europe]

The fact that a country that committed genocide and invaded other countries less than a lifetime ago and has otherwise been quite good about grappling with it is now defending Russia is disgraceful.

Remember they did this last January : https://news.yahoo.com/germany-blocks-nato-ally-estonia-223242052.html

Germany is preventing fellow NATO member Estonia from providing Ukraine with military support by declining to offer export permits for weapons of German origin, The Wall Street Journal reported on Friday.

But the German government has opposed sending weapons to Ukraine to avoid provoking Russia, while also citing Germany's own history of atrocities in the region under the Nazis during World War II.

"Our restrictive position is well known and is rooted in history," Germany's foreign minister, Annalena Baerbock, said while visiting Kyiv this week.

It was - with a hindsight - a bad call.

But quite frankly, I didn't see anything wrong with that position last January myself. Sometime between February 24 and, um, February 26 I guess, I did a complete u-turn though, like a lot of other people around here.

Historical events are a bitch.