Latest Cultural Exchange Takes Place

This time at Berlin’s Carneval of Cultures. Like, duh. Where else?

Culture

Police have detained three suspects after two teens were groped and robbed by a group of young men during Berlin’s “Karneval der Kulturen” festival. The assault was reminiscent of the New Year’s Eve attacks in Cologne.

Germans everywhere immediately began apologizing for not having first properly explained to these young men how sexual harassment, rape and robbery are not generally viewed as being socially acceptable in their country and then immediately sought to make amends for their shameful oversight by referring them to the German government’s latest $136,000 porn site specially designed for sex-starved refugees like themselves who are desperately trying to integrate with German women or anything else out there that moves.

Sex

Hmmm. They could have at least explained to that guy (I’m assuming here he’s the asylum-seeker) that the two of them are going to have to take the rest of their clothes off first.

The site is adorned with cartoon illustrations of various sex acts that are equally graphic and clinical. (Imagine the stick-figure man and woman on a public restroom sign pictured in virtually every conceivable sexual position.)

What Part Of Last Place Don’t You Understand?

I think I’m beginning to detect a pattern here. Didn’t Germany get last place at the Eurovision freak show last year, too?

Eurovision

And it’s not like the voting is ever politically motivated or anything, you guys. It’s strictly about the music. And that’s what makes this happening so, well, I dunno. Creepy?

But instead of seeing this last place as a badge of honor, it looks as though the Germans have hurt feelings about the results, yet again. So, in the end, I guess everybody wins after all, right?

Um das neue Punktesystem vollends zu begreifen, muss man vermutlich noch mindestens zwei Semester ESC-Wissenschaft studieren.

States Getting Safer All The Time

At least as far as Germany is concerned. Algeria, Morocco and Tunisia just got a whole lot safer than they were yesterday, for example.

Safe

How did this happen, you ask? It’s kind of like magic, I guess, but “safe countries of origin,” you see, are countries where asylum-seekers seeking asylum in Germany can be sent back to safely, in a safe manner. And this safes, I mean saves, Germany the trouble of having to deal with them.

The problem here being (and don’t tell anybody I told you this – it’s top secret or something) that most of the asylum seekers coming to Germany from these countries aren’t in need of asylum at all.

“A large number of people from the Maghreb states come to Germany for reasons that are not connected to asylum. The stay of such people must be ended quickly.”

Renewable Energy Actually Works In Germany

But only if it stays REALLY sunny and REALLY windy ALL the time. Like even at night.

Renewable

For those of us who live here, well… Let’s just say that they’re still working on that part.

Germany hit an incredible new high in renewable energy generation at the weekend – pushing power prices into the negative and allowing consumers to get paid to consume electricity.

At one point, the sunny and windy day weather propelling its solar plants and wind turbines supplied 87 percent of the power being consumed.

Meanwhile… Solarworld verdoppelt Verluste.

We Are Also The Two-Thirds Percent

OK, two-thirds isn’t a percent per se, but still.

Merkel

Germans don’t want Angela Merkel to run for a fourth term, it seems. They just want her to run.

A poll published on Tuesday shows that just under two-thirds of Germans do not want Chancellor Angela Merkel to run for office again in elections next year.

The poll conducted by INSA for Cicero magazine asked people if they thought Merkel should run for a fourth term and 64 percent responded that she should not.

Other polling figures show that if an election were held now, Germany’s two main political parties would barely scrape together 50 percent of the vote between them.

“Wenn die Flüchtlingsthematik in die aus Merkels Sicht richtigen Bahnen gelenkt und aus der öffentlichen Aufmerksamkeit verschwunden ist, wäre ihre letzte große Aufgabe erfüllt.”

We Are The One Percent

Whereas in 1990 there were 585,000 soldiers in the German army, this number has now dropped to 177,000. The military budget, meanwhile, currently stands at a little over 1 percent of GDP.

That’s GDP for Got no Dinero, Partner.

Bundeswehr

But now Germany is going to change all of that or something and like totally increase its military spending by, I dunno, way lots. Or at least that is how we are supposed to see it. Flinten-Uschi (Ursula von der Leyen) has taken control and isn’t going to take it anymore – and is also shooting for a raise and a new job at the Chancellery one day, by the way.

Nonetheless, the new commitment still keeps Germany way below its NATO commitment to invest two percent of GDP in its military. For that it would have needed to raise the budget to €60 billion instead of €39.2 billion

Ständig kommen neue Auslandseinsätze auf die Bundeswehr zu, aber ihre Ausrüstung ist veraltet oder technisch anfällig. Die Aufstockung der Truppe löst die Probleme nicht.

German Of The Day: Mittelschicht

That means middle class.

And here you thought that your middle class was shrinking. And it is, of course. But the German middle class is shrinking, too. And “it’s shrinking as quickly as the middle class in the U.S.” It’s down to 54 percent of the population, from 60 percent 20 years ago.

Der Anteil der Mittelschicht an der Bevölkerung ist in Deutschland in den vergangenen Jahrzehnten auf zuletzt 54 Prozent geschrumpft. Rund 20 Jahre zuvor lag er noch bei 60 Prozent. Vergleicht man die Entwicklung von 1991 bis 2013, schrumpfte die Mittelschicht in Deutschland genauso stark wie in den USA.

Germans Outraged Again Sort Of

In a way. Stunned at Austria’s latest plan to put up another yucky border (the Italian one this time) to keep refugees from entering Austria (and thus Germany), German Chancellor Angela Merkel has decried the awful plan, calling it “mistaken” and “anachronistic.”

Merkel

And you can hardly even tell that she is secretly thrilled to death about the Austrians saving her political behind once again, thus allowing her preach from the moral high ground way up north in Berlin another day.

The narrow Brenner Pass has become a point of contention between Italy and Austria, as Rome has long complained that parts of northern Europe were allowing southern European nations to bear the brunt of sheltering and taking care of asylum-seekers.

German Of The Day: Bollerwagen

That means handcarts. Handcarts filled with beer.

Booze

And if a handcart isn’t available on German Father’s Day (Ascension Day) then you can always use a baby buggy or a shopping cart to put your booze in.

Es ist kompliziert. Warum aus Christi Himmelfahrt auch der Vater- und Herrentag geworden ist, lässt sich nicht mehr so recht nachvollziehen. Es wird spekuliert, dass die Prozession der Jünger Jesu zu einem Berg als Vorbild für die Männer mit Bollerwagen dienten.

Secret European Army Being Planned By The Same Folks Who Brought Us The Euro And Refugee Crises

So like what force in the universe could possibly stand in its way? Or even want to. Honey, where’s our white flag?

Army

British Brexit campaigners have been boosted with news from Berlin that Germany is once more pushing for an EU army encompassing all 28 member states with a joint HQ and shared military planning.

Along with judicial, tax and immigration issues, a Euro army has for long been one of the main irritants of anti-EU campaigners.  

“German security policy has relevance — also for beyond our country. Germany is willing to join early, decisively and substantially as a driving force in international debates … to take responsibility and assume leadership.”