Category Archives: Habitudes

Bundeswehr Protesting Koran Burning Now, Too

February 24, 2012 By in Habitudes, Helplessness, Hysteria Tags: , , , , , , , , Leave a comment

In a sharp response to the pure unadulterated fear caused them by the deadly protests now taking place in Afghanistan after the inadvertent burning of copies of the Koran by a US soldier…

The German military has decided to join in the protests itself by rapidly deploying the closure of one of their bases in the north of the country and having their soldiers hightail it in the opposite direction really schnell like where they can run around in sheer panic and large concentric circles not knowing what to do next while screaming oh my God we are all going to die or something to that effect. The few, the proud, the Bundeswehr.

The base would have been shuttered in March, but officials worried its security could not be maintained in the face of the demonstrations.

Endless War And Violence?

February 23, 2012 By in Habitudes, Hard Facts, Helplessness, History, Hypochondria, Hysteria Tags: , , , , , , , , 4 Comments

And it’s the worse that it’s ever been. And it’s only getting worse, right?

And if you ask this Heidelberg research group who just put out their “Conflict Barometer,” they will tell you that more wars took place worldwide in 2011 than at any time since 1945 (and 2012 doesn’t look all too promising, either).

But what does that mean?

If you really want to put our dreadful, horrible and unspeakably violent age into true historical perspective, do yourself a favor and take a look at what this guy has to say about it.

Thanks for the letting me stumble on to/over this, ¡No Pasarán!

In ihrem “Konflikt-Barometer” zählen Heidelberger Forscher so viele Kriege wie seit 1945 nicht mehr.

Now This Is A Show That I Could Watch

February 21, 2012 By in Habitudes, Helplessness, High Art Tags: , , , , , , , , , Leave a comment

Germans can’t seem to get enough of watching Promis on TV (German TV Promis are second-rate celebrities, usually of the third- or fourth-rate kind).

They drop them off in the jungle and let them scratch and bite for Promi fame there, they make them prepare awful Promi dinners at home for their unwelcome Promi guests, there was even one show where I saw some Promis going on a freakin’ Promi pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela in Spain.

But now they’ve finally developed a concept that will open up that prominent Promi TV world for the rest of us out there. They’re going to put them in a boxing ring and let them beat the Promi crap out of each other.

Großes Promiboxen mit Dschungel-Prominenz

“We don’t like your profligate spending,”

February 20, 2012 By in Habitudes, Heconomy, Hi-tech, Hypocrisy Tags: , , , , , , , , , Leave a comment

Germans are always lecturing the Greeks. “Except when it comes to buying our ridiculously expensive weapons systems,” they maybe ought to add.

Over much of the past decade, Greece – which has a population of 11 million – has been one of the top five arms importers in the world.

Most of the vastly expensive weapons, including submarines, tanks and combat aircraft, were made in Germany, France and the United States.

The arms purchases were beyond Greece’s capacity to absorb, even before the financial crisis struck in 2009. Several hundred Leopard battle tanks were bought from Germany, but there was no money to pay for ammunition for their guns. Even in 2010, when the extent of the financial disaster was apparent, Greece bought 223 howitzers and a submarine from Germany at a cost of €403 million.

Film Critics And Other Smart People Disappointed

February 19, 2012 By in Habitudes, Helplessness, High Art, Home Cooking, Hypocrisy Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , 1 Comment

This year’s winner of the Golden Bear for best film at the Berlinale was actually a real dog, German film critics and other intellectual thinking folks and artist types everywhere are saying.

It’s not that the Italian film “Caesar Must Die” was bad in a cinematic sense or anything. It just didn’t meet the standards that modern film-makers and their kind aspire to, that’s all.

It was, in other words, too “humanist,” not at all a “strong, political film from young, engaged film-makers” (the film-makers who made this non-political film are old, engaged film-makers) and, worst of all, “it was a very conservative selection.” Pfui (yuck)!

Geez. If they had wanted to watch human, uplifting drama they would have gone to some other film festival. I don’t know which one that would be, of course, but it certainly wouldn’t/shouldn’t be the Berlinale.

“The jury shunned almost all the contemporary films that were admired or hotly debated at an otherwise pretty remarkable festival.”

Unterdeckungen

February 16, 2012 By in Habitudes, Hard Facts, Heconomy, Helections, Helplessness, Hi-tech, Home Cooking, Hysteria Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , 4 Comments

That’s German for deficient coverage. And German readers might be reading that word a lot in the weeks to come, at least when it comes to the electricity supply in Germany.

„We have been observing for weeks now that something with the system just doesn’t seem to be right,” one market expert said.

And in a letter from Germany’s Federal Network Agency to the power traders it deals with, it makes clear its concern about the rather volitile situation going on at the moment and has even warned of the collapse of the German power network. It almost happened on Febuary 6, already, they wrote, as “substantial undercoverage continuing over several hours” nearly brought the system to its knees.

Hmmm. Last year at this time, during one of the coldest winters ever, there wasn’t any problem with the German electricity supply at all. What on earth could have possibly happened since then and now to have caused this disturbing situation?

Nach dem Reuters vorliegenden Schreiben stand das Stromnetz in den vergangenen Tagen mehrfach vor dem Kollaps.

Not One, Not Two…

February 15, 2012 By in Habitudes, Helections, Helplessness, Hi-tech, Hypochondria, Hypocrisy, Hysteria Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , 2 Comments

But three films about Fukushima are being shown this year at the Berlinale.

That was to be expected, I guess. Especially now since Fukushima hysteria has all but disappeared from the Bildfläche (screen), even here in Germany.

It’s hard to keep people scared for months on end, now matter how important you think your agenda is. They just get tired and want to move on with their lives. The latest media stunt I just barely heard about had a lot of potential, for a few minutes, but then it rolled over and died, too.

I am looking forward to the big one-year anniversary media terror show bombardment to be held here in Germany next month, of course. But what are they going to be able to scare us with then? The German nation threatening to shut down all it’s nuclear power plants? Been there, done that. It makes you wonder sometimes why they even take the trouble to keep on agitating at us like they do. Now that the war is over and all, I mean. There’s just no place else to agitate at the moment, I guess (thanks for nothing, “Occupy Movement”). It must be hard being progressive sometimes. Much less all the time.

The 11-day film festival, which prides itself on its generally edgier and more politically-overt line-up over other film showcases, was perhaps a fitting backdrop for the documentaries.

Berlinale Predictably Boring

February 11, 2012 By in Habitudes, Heconomy, High Art, Home Cooking, Hotness, Hypocrisy Tags: , , , , , , , , , , 1 Comment

As usual. But at least we get to look at Angelina Jolie for awhile this year.

She and her husband what’s-his-name have been here for days now and refuse to go home, giving the notoriously anti-Hollywood Berlin Film Festival that all important Hollywood touch.

But as for the movies, the only Lichtblick (bright spot) I have heard about so far is a film called Barbara, “a harrowing reminder of what life was like two decades earlier behind the Iron Curtain and Berlin Wall that stood just a few meters to the east of theatres where the Berlinale is based.” You know, it’s a film about how suffocatingly horrible communist East Germany was. But who wants to see that? Here in Berlin of all places, I mean.

That and that flick about the Nazis on the dark side of the moon, of course.

“It’s not a film about East Germany, it’s a film about how people survive in a country that was on its way out.” – Hmm. Sounds like a film about Syria.

Speaking Of The Dark Side

February 8, 2012 By in Habitudes, Hard Facts, Heconomy, Helplessness, Home Cooking, Hypocrisy Tags: , , , , , , , , , , Leave a comment

Here’s a little tidbit about the dark side of “Germany’s jobs miracle.”

“BEST LOW WAGE SECTOR IN EUROPE”

Job growth in Germany has been especially strong for low wage and temporary agency employment because of deregulation and the promotion of flexible, low-income, state-subsidised so-called “mini-jobs”.

The number of full-time workers on low wages – sometimes defined as less than two thirds of middle income – rose by 13.5 percent to 4.3 million between 2005 and 2010, three times faster than other employment, according to the Labour Office.

Germany can only hope that other European countries do not emulate its own wage deflationary policies too closely, as demand will dry up: “If everyone is doing same thing, there won’t be anyone left to export to.”

PS: Like I noted on a post the other day, the USA and Germany have more in common than they think. Now the Greeks are burning German flags, too.