German Of The Day: German Mut

Nope, that doesn’t mean German pooch or mongrel. That means German courage.

German Mut

And it takes quite a bit of German courage for a German political party to come out in support of economic-liberal policies and free choice in a country like Germany these days (in the end, most Germans want everything regulated for them and prefer equality and conformity to free choice). But that is what the FDP (FDP 2.0?) is trying to do. They’re still on the outside looking in after their ousting in 2013 but appear to be bouncing back, at least for the moment.

They are currently so courageous, in fact, that they must be high. Not only are the Free Democrats now proposing that marijuana be legalized, which isn’t all that original these days, they also think it’s time for Germany to introduce a flat tax. Good luck on that. That’ll be a real hard one to sell here, as elsewhere. Who’s going to “eat the rich” then?

“Die erste Reform, die wir unserem Land empfehlen, ist eine Reform der Mentalität.”

As If German Women Talking During Sex Wasn’t Bad Enough Already

Now they’re talking about it again. Like afterwards even.

Sex

Must be a slow news day. This is clearly a re-run of a re-run that’s already done run. Not just the talking part, I mean. These clips, too.

But at least it’s in German. German women speaking German are pretty sexy, I find.

Frauen sprechen über Sex: Das erste und das letzte Mal

This Gives “Please Keep Off The Grass” A Whole New Meaning

More budding crime in Kreuzberg. I bet the Greens planted this stuff. Or maybe some other dope. What a bunch of crackpots.

Pot

Kreuzberg is a really seedy district, you know. And these weren’t even potted plants. They just found this stuff among the weeds.  I tell you, this town is really going to pot…

I got a million of ’em, folks!

Dass in Berlin-Kreuzberg öffentlich ein Joint geraucht wird, ist nichts Besonderes. Aber bei mehreren hundert Cannabis-Pflanzen auf einer öffentlichen Grünanlage wird dann selbst in Berlin die Polizei aktiv.

German Spies Spying For American Spies Shocked To Discover That American Spies Were Actually Of The Spy Variety

After years of close cooperation with the NSA, Germany’s BND has now suddenly reduced this cooperation upon finding out that the information they had been furnishing the NSA with was being used for espionage purposes.

Spies

“Who would have thought that?” asked one high-ranking German spy official with a paper bag on his head. “We all figured that that  list of 40,000 selectors (IP addresses, search terms and names) we at the BND used on behalf of the NSA had some other justification. I dunno. I personally assumed they wanted to order pizza or something. But to go and spy on other folks like that? No way. We don’t want anything to do with that kind of Scheiße.”

It still remains to be seen whether this list can be released, as that depends on what arrangements were made with the US by the then government [of Gerhard Schröder] after the dramatic events of September 11.

German Of The Day: Heimatfilme

Heimatfilm (German pronunciation: [ˈhaɪmatˌfɪlm], German for “homeland-film“; German plural: Heimatfilme) is the name given to a film genre that was popular in Germany, Switzerland, and Austria from the late 1940s to the early 1970s. They were usually shot in the Alps, the Black Forest, or the Lüneburg Heath and always involved the outdoors. These films were noted for their rural settings, sentimental tone and simplistic morality, and centered on love, friendship, family and non-urban life. Also, the polarity between old and young, tradition and progress, and rural and urban life was articulated. The typical plot structure involved both a “good” and “bad” guy wanting a girl, conflict ensuing, and the “good” guy ultimately triumphing to win the girl to the happiness of everyone and the children.

Heimatfilme

Well that’s cool and all but I guess they’ve tweaked the genre around a bit because they’re going to film the next bunch of “homeland-films” with lots of guns and blood and terror and stuff right here in not so non-urban Berlin itself. But still.

The fifth series will pick up two-and-a-half years after the previous one ended, with main character Carrie Mathison out of the Middle East and in self-imposed exile in the German Capital.

German Border Guards To Keep Wolves Out

About 150 years have passed since German hunters eradicated wolves from the nation’s woodlands. But the animal’s threatening aura has persisted through folk tales, including those by German writers Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm.

Wolves

So when wolf packs began reappearing in Germany late in the 20th century, thanks to the efforts of conservationists, the animals faced a public-relations challenge.

Meanwhile… Even though members of the “Night Wolves” may already have visas for Germany, they will be revoked at the border if members of the group, blacklisted in the United States for their participation in Russia’s annexation of Crimea, try to enter.

German Intelligence Insults German Intelligence

When the NSA asks for INFO from the BND they get it ASAP. Or at least they used to.

Intelligence

Germany’s intelligence service, the Bundesnachrichtendienst (BND), has been helping the NSA spy on European politicians and companies for years, according to the German news magazine Der Spiegel. The NSA has been sending lists of “selectors”—identifying telephone numbers, e-mail and IP addresses—to the BND, which then provides related information that it holds in its surveillance databases…

Investigators found that the BND had provided information on around 2,000 selectors that were clearly against European and German interests. Not only were European businesses such as the giant aerospace and defense company EADS, best-known as the manufacturer of the Airbus planes, targeted, so were European politicians—including German ones.

I still can’t figure out where the intelligence part comes in here.

Barbarian Hordes From The Steppes Threatening Berlin Again

Only this time they’re coming on motorcycles. And they don’t even belong to the Hells Angels. Like, how indecorous is that?

Bikers

Politicians and activists in the European Union’s ex-communist east are outraged over a plan by the Night Wolves to commemorate the Soviet victory in World War II by tracing the Red Army’s path to Berlin.

At least 20 riders will cruise from Moscow through Belarus, according to the Night Wolves’ website. From Poland, they’ll pass through the capitals of Slovakia to Austria before continuing to Prague and ending in Berlin on May 9, the 70th anniversary of Nazi Germany’s capitulation to the Soviet Union.

Hey Johnny, what are you rebelling against?

This Just In: Germany Suddenly Owes Greece $305 Billion For World War II

Or at least that’s what the Greek parliament just figured out.

Reparations

However, Italy also suddenly owes Greece $216 billion for its invasion in 1940, too, they said.

After that you’ve got the Ottoman Empire owing the Greeks $197 billion for, well, for being Turks.

Then the Roman Empire will also still need to shell out an additional $116 billion for those nasty Macedonian wars.

And then, of course, Iran will have to step up and pay Greece $97 billion for the ugly Persian Invasion back in 484 BC.

This will still leave Greece with a humungous debt, of course, the parliamentarians noted, but nothing that another little loan from their friends in the European Union won’t fix.

This Is News?

Germans found to be Europe’s most aggressive drivers

Driving

Tailgating, shouting insults – nowhere in Europe do drivers react as intensely as they do in Germany, a recent study shows.

Two out of three (67%) admitted to using offensive gestures, and verbal abuse, to insult other drivers.

More than one-third (34%) said they purposefully follow close behind, or otherwise annoy drivers, in order to intimidate them.

PS: Oddity 125. Fun German Games you didn’t know you were participating in: Tailgate Tag. Germans love to drive up to within just a few inches behind the slower moving cars on the left lane of the autobahn and bully them over to the right.