A government with Net Zero Honesty? Good luck with that.
The truth hurts too much.
Germany Faces the Green Fiscal Truth – The constitutional court rules Berlin will have to fund net zero honestly.
Things have gone from bad to worse in Germany this week after a court ruling that’s forcing the government to do something truly shocking: level with voters about how much the net-zero energy transition will cost. Please pass the smelling salts.
Actually, that’s Italian. Meaning Schadenfreude, which is German. Meaning schadenfreude in English. Meaning malicious glee, of course. It’s complicated.
Meloni’s Italy Tastes Schadenfreude Over German Fiscal Fiasco – Stable ratings for Rome contrast with Germany’s fiscal pickle.
“Germans make mistakes too,” says professor at Bocconi.
Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni could be forgiven for feeling any schadenfreude this week while looking on at Germany’s unfolding budget debacle.
A string of fiscal wins for Rome has just coincided with a crisis rocking Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s coalition in Berlin after a calamitous court judgment cast doubt on its financing plans.
That means loser. It also means losers (in plural).
US and Germany risk owning Ukraine’s stalling war effort – The onus is on European allies to step up support and chart a path for Kyiv towards Nato and EU membership.
More than 50 countries are supporting Ukraine in its defence against Russia’s full-scale invasion. Yet Ukraine’s existential struggle in Europe’s largest war since 1945 currently hinges mainly on two countries. US leadership, as well as financial and material support for Kyiv, have been essential to Ukraine’s survival. Germany is its second largest supplier of weapons and money, far ahead of the rest of the field.
Let’s watch them squirm.
We… must… spend… more… money we don’t have! There just has to be a way around this debt brake!
Germany freezes spending as budget crisis deepens – As Germany’s financial woes grow more acute, there are growing calls to suspend the country’s damned debt brake.
Germany’s finance ministry has imposed a spending freeze on all federal ministries, deepening a budget crisis that has rocked the ruling coalition since a bombshell ruling by the country’s top court last week.
The finance ministry decision, which halts most new spending authorizations, followed a ruling by the constitutional court last week that blew a €60 billion hole in the government’s coffers.
So where’s the Taliban ban?
Outrage after Taliban member speaks at German mosque – German politicians have demanded answers after the head of Afghanistan’s food and drug body spoke at a mosque in Cologne. Abdul Bari Omar was previously in the Netherlands for a World Health Organization event.
Videos shared on social media show Abdul Bari Omar, the director of Afghanistan’s food and drug authority, speaking at the mosque on Thursday.
It’s just not our thing. In Turkey.
Germany has ‘psychology of guilt’ when it comes to Holocaust, Israel, Erdoğan says – German Chancellor Olaf Scholz acknowledged the two countries’ very different perspectives on the Israel-Hamas war.
“Since we’re in a kind of psychology of guilt here, you can’t judge it that way, but we have no debt to Israel. If that were the case, then perhaps we wouldn’t be able to talk so easily. Nor have we gone through the history of the Holocaust,” the Turkish president said via an official German translator.
So it didn’t. Even though it did. And does. And even is, happening as we speak.
Pay close attention: This report will be diligently ignored by the powers that be.
BKA Report: Sharp Uptick in Violent Crime Committed by Migrants Against Germans – New figures from Germany’s Federal Criminal Police Office (BKA) that detail the demographic makeup of serious violent crime suspects in 2022 have been called “frightening” by the chief of the Federal Police Union, who urged both state and federal authorities to take swift action to put an end to the problem.
The BKA’s 2022 “Federal situation report on crime in the context of immigration” revealed that 47,923 German citizens fell victim to violent crimes carried out by immigrants—defined by the office as foreigners who came to the country as refugees or asylum seekers—last year, up 18% from 2021, BILD reports.
“What many have always suspected is now proven.”
That face you make when you can’t spend as much of other people’s money as you’d planned.
German court deals 60 billion euro budget blow to Scholz government – The German government froze major spending pledges focused on green initiatives and industry support on Wednesday after a constitutional court ruling on unused pandemic emergency funds blew a 60 billion euro ($65 billion) hole in its finances.
The decision threw into disarray budget negotiations taking place this week within Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s three-way ruling coalition, whose popularity has slumped as Europe’s biggest economy teeters close to another recession.
About getting serious?
Don’t take that nonsense seriously, folks. I’m serious.
Wind of change: Germany gets serious about plans to make military ‘fit for war’ – The return of full-scale armed conflict to Europe has Germany dramatically reframing its security policy.
With Russia and Ukraine still locked in combat after nearly two years and a major Israeli-Palestinian conflict underway, the European Union and NATO are feeling their way into a chaotic new world security order – and Europe’s largest economy is shaking up decades-old ideas on what its military is actually for.
OK then. How about twenty bucks?
Germany: 4.6 million adults addicted to gambling or at risk – After a new report revealed the extent of gambling addiction in Germany, a government minister has called for measures including a ban on sports betting advertising on television before 11pm.
Approximately 1.3 million adults in Germany suffer from a gambling disorder and a further 3.3 million show initial signs of gambling addiction, according to a new report presented by the country’s Federal Drugs Commissioner Burkhard Blienert on Monday.
According to “The Gambling Atlas,” which draws on data compiled in 2021, 30% of German adults gamble. The figure represents a reduction on the 55% calculated in 2007, but the report nevertheless found that 7.7% of adults suffer financial, social or health problems associated with addition.
Observing Hermann 