This Was Not Planned So It Cannot Be Happening

April 25, 2013 By Hermann Observer in Habeas Corpus, Habitudes, Hard Facts, Heconomy, Helplessness, Hideology, High Art, Home Cooking, Humor, Hurt Feelings, Hypocrisy, Hysteria Tags: Berlin, Energy, Energy Turnaround, Environment, Fracking, Gas, German, Germans, Germany, Green Shirts, Greens, Shale Gas, Technology Leave a comment

Or will not be happening, I should say.

As you know, Germany is green. And Germans are greener than green. Why, Germans are so green that Jamaicans want to roll them up and smoke them.

And Germans also like sticking to “the plan,” too (think Stalingrad). So they do not, I repeat do not appreciate it when, as in this case, their ambitious environmental plans get disturbed by unforseen technological developments that were not considered in the original plan and therefore start turning the whole Schlamassel (mess) into a really, really big and annoying, well, Schlamassel (think Stalingrad again).

It goes like this: “Ambitious environmental goals are far less meaningful if the economy withers in achieving them.” So when something really tempting comes along like shale gas drilling (hydraulic fracturing or “fracking”), a technology that could give Germany access to enough reserves to feed natural gas demand for 20 years, then that gets not-so-thoroughly-green people (yes, there still are a few specimens left) to thinking, plan or not.

So there we have it. And that’s the end of it (ask any German Green Shirt). Fracking can’t happen here. It is ideologically inadmissable. Fracking is something that those crazy Americans and their evil multi-national oil companies do, not us (multi-national oil companies are always American, by the way – don’t ask). Nope, fracking can never happen here. Never in a million years. Not this year anyway.

“We are sitting on Swiss cheese. The risks are just too high.”

Germany Honestly Not Seeking Hegemony In Europe I Swear

April 22, 2013 By Hermann Observer in Habitudes, Hard Facts, Heconomy, Helplessness, High Art, History, Home Cooking, Humor, Hurt Feelings, Hypocrisy, Hysteria Tags: Atavism, Economics, EU, Euro, Euro Crisis, Euro Zone, German, Germans, Germany, Hegemony, Humor, Satire, World Domination Leave a comment

German Chancellor Angela Merkel rejected again today claims that her country was seeking hegemony in the European Union.

“We already are the largest economy in Europe,” she might have said. “Like, by a long shot. So why on earth would we want to do that? All we want to do is just keep exercising our predominant influence over all those other namby-pamby nations around us and with time, through peaceful terms and non-aggression, achieve world, I mean, total European domination.”

“Germany has a sometimes complicated role,” she actually said. “Because we are the largest economy – we are not the richest, but we are the largest. Therefore Germany will only act together with the others – hegemony is totally foreign to me.”

Quatsch

April 14, 2013 By Hermann Observer in Hard Facts, Heconomy, Helections, Helplessness, Home Cooking, Hurt Feelings, Hypochondria, Hypocrisy Tags: Berlin, Corruption, Failure, German, Germans, Germany, Humor, Klaus Wowereit, Mayors, Megalomania, Politics, Rumors, Satire, SPD Leave a comment

Nonsense, Berliner SPD politicians insist, when it comes to the persistent rumor around town these days that Klaus Wowereit has finally had enough and is willing to make everybody happy and resign already for cryin’ out load.

I would accept this explanation if it weren’t for the fact that they are also saying things like „absoluter Quatsch,“ „eine Quatsch-Debatte,“ „wirklich Quatsch“ and „auch das ist Quatsch,“ too.

Ja, eine „Quatsch-Debatte“ sei das, dass der Regierende Bürgermeister, wie es in der Boulevardzeitung BZ zu lesen war, keine Lust mehr aufs Regieren habe und angesichts mieser Umfragen und ebensolcher Aussichten plane, noch vor der Sommerpause seinen Rücktritt bekannt zu geben.

Gold-obsessed German Smuggler Drops Plans To Rob Fort Knox

April 13, 2013 By Hermann Observer in Heconomy, Helplessness, High Art, Home Cooking, Humor, Hurt Feelings, Hypocrisy Tags: 007, Bailouts, Berlin, Euro Crisis, Euro Zone, Films, German, Germans, Germany, Gold, Goldfinger, Greece, Humor, Satire, Tax evasion 2 Comments

But gets caught at Athens International Airport attempting to smuggle half a ton of gold and silver out of Greece to Germany instead.

Wait a second. Aren’t the Germans the ones who are supposed to be smuggling their gold (as in Geld) into Greece these days?

The man was trying to board a Lufthansa flight back to Germany when the airline uncovered nearly 1,000 lbs. of what the BBC calls silver “tablets” in a cargo container.

Germans Tired Of Being Cast As The Euro Zone’s Scapegoats

April 11, 2013 By Hermann Observer in Habitudes, Hate, Heconomy, Helplessness, High Art, History, Home Cooking, Humor, Hurt Feelings, Hypocrisy, Hysteria Tags: Berlin, Cyprus, Euro Crisis, Euro Zone, German, Germans, Germany, Greece, Hitler, Humor, Leadership, Merkel, Nazis, Power, Satire, Scapegoats 1 Comment

But once they take a nap and rest a little bit, they won’t be so tired anymore.

Sometimes Germany was too weak, sometimes too strong. Or, as Henry Kissinger, a former American secretary of state, put it, referring to Germany just after unification in 1871, it was “too big for Europe, but too small for the world”. Today, Mr Simms (Cambridge University) argues, “it sits uneasily at the heart of an EU that was conceived largely to constrain German power but which has served instead to increase it, and whose design flaws have unintentionally deprived many other Europeans of sovereignty.”

The question is whether Germany can use its power by unapologetically leading. Given Germany’s past, its political culture militates against even trying.

“It’s nice to go to a conference of ‘young leaders’, but you don’t want a conference of ‘junge Führer’.”

Rich Germans Actually The Euro Zone Po Folks

April 9, 2013 By Hermann Observer in Hard Facts, Heconomy, Helplessness, Higher Education, Home Cooking, Humor, Hurt Feelings, Hypochondria, Hypocrisy, Hysteria Tags: Bailouts, Berlin, Cyprus, Economy, EU, Euro Crisis, Euro Zone, European Union, German, Germans, Germany, Humor, Satire, Savings, Wealth 2 Comments

As recently reported, rich Germans have suddenly and inexplicably become the poor men of Europe, relatively speaking.

According to the latest ECB Vermögensstudie (wealth study), the Cypriots, of all people, are among the richest citizens in the euro zone. Germans, on the other hand, have come in at last place.

Wait a second. Wasn’t there something recently about Cyprus striking a 10-billion euro bailout deal with the European Union? I must have got that wrong (or the Cypriots certainly got that right).

Ausgerechnet die Zyprer gehören zu den reichsten Bürgern der Euro-Zone, Deutschland steht am Ende der Rangliste.

Berlin Brandenburg Airport Finished After All

April 7, 2013 By Hermann Observer in Heconomy, Helections, Helplessness, High Art, Humor, Hurt Feelings, Hypocrisy, Hysteria Tags: Airports, Berlin, Berlin Brandenburg International, German, Germans, Germany, Humor, Klaus Wowereit, LEGO, Politicians, Politics, Project Management, Satire, SPD, Willy Brandt International Airport Leave a comment

And in a record time of six months, too!

Now located at the city’s LEGOLAND Discovery Center, Berlin’s stunning new Willy Brandt International Airport is said to be made up of some 100,000 bricks.

Critics say that that the difficulties with handling today’s complex technology have been compounded by hasty, negligent work due to the intense time pressures. Underlying these problems appears to be a culture of political dishonesty. “Many politicians want prestigious large-scale projects to be inseparably connected with their names.”

Europe’s Largest And Most Prosperous Nation Shocked About Being Treated Unfairly

March 29, 2013 By Hermann Observer in Hard Facts, Hate, Heconomy, Helplessness, Hideology, High Art, Humor, Hurt Feelings, Hypocrisy, Hysteria Tags: Anti-Americanism, Bailouts, Berlin, Cyprus, Euro Zone, Fairness, German, Germanophobia, Germans, Germany, Hitler, Humor, Satire 4 Comments

The intense negative reactions to the Cyprus bailout program, including the constant comparisons made to Germany’s Nazi past, appear to have taken many Germans by complete surprise. Most simply cannot understand why people do not like them just because they are big and strong.

Germany has contributed more than 220 billion euros, or $280 billion, pledged through loans and financial support packages for Greece, Ireland, Portugal and Spain, all negotiated with those countries’ euro zone partners, for instance. And yet unfair allegations continue to be made.

Nor were Germans alone in insisting on reforms from those European partners seeking financial assistance. The Netherlands, Finland and Austria are frequently mentioned as countries that hold a similar position, yet Germany always ends up being the target of anger.

“We just don’t get it,” one German politician was quoted as saying. “It’s as if they don’t like us just because we are big and strong, because of our affluence and our power. It’s as if they resent our very existence because of this and because of the new soft hegemony we are now practising in Europe. They feel that we are materialistic, hedonistic, egotistical and shallow. I don’t know, in the end they’re just envious and jealous.”

“I mean,” he then continued. “It’s not is if we were some sinister dominating powerhouse like the USA or anything, spreading its corruptive capitalistic influence too widely around the globe the way it does, smothering the rest of us with it’s commercial and materialistic view of life and the world. We’re just well-intentioned Germans, remember?”

“Germany acts in solidarity so that crisis countries will have a perspective in the future. I wish that those people at the top — the president of the E.U. Commission and the E.U. president — would defend Germans against unfair allegations.”

Springtime For Merkel And Germany

March 25, 2013 By Hermann Observer in Habitudes, Hard Facts, Heconomy, Helplessness, Home Cooking, Humor, Hurt Feelings, Hypocrisy, Hysteria Tags: Austerity, Bailouts, Berlin, Cyprus, EU, Euro, Eurozone, German, Germanophobia, Germans, Germany, Humor, Satire Leave a comment

In the end, the Cypriots swallowed the bitter medicine. Facing national humiliation and a bleak future many complain their small nation has been forced to succumb to the will of a larger, merciless power – Germany.

And the Germans also have a clear and consistent analysis of the problem. They believe that fiscal profligacy or faulty business models lie at the heart of the crisis – and the solution is austerity, allied to structural reform. There are many who argue that this prescription is dangerous. But the anti-austerians have failed to come up with a set of alternative policies that is coherent enough to turn the intellectual tide.

…This Germanophobia is unfair. Behind all the shouting and the wrangling, German taxpayers will once again be funding the biggest single share of yet another eurozone bailout.

We’re Not Doing Anything Wrong

March 24, 2013 By Hermann Observer in Habitudes, Hard Facts, Heconomy, Hi-tech, Hypocrisy Tags: Arms Sales, Berlin, Exports, German, Germans, Germany, Profit, Saying No, Weapons, Weapons Exports 3 Comments

The following was taken from the aricle “Wir tun doch nix…” in this week’s Die Zeit.

Germany is neither this consistently pacifist country (described beforehand in the article) nor this worldly-wise state dealing in power politics, rather a bad mix of both: A country that strictly refuses to participate in military interventions but makes every effort to export its weapons instead, gladly to dictatoships in crises regions; a country that is very guarded when it comes to criticism concerning human rights issues in China and Russia, a country that has even begun to wonder if democracy itself is always the best answer; and all of this while acting as if it were the world champion of morality at the same time.

No, nobody would want to live in a country like that. Not even the Germans themselves.

Profitieren statt intervenieren. In einem solchen Land möchte man tatsächlich nicht leben.

Observing Hermann

“Was interessiert mich mein Geschwätz von gestern?”

Category Archives: Heconomy