Let’s Pretend It’s Not

Let’s pretend it’s not what everyone else immediately knows it is. Until we’re forced to admit what it is a few days later, officially. It’s some bizarre new game of hide and seek government officials are playing all across Europe these days.

Terror

Similar to the way French officials behaved after last week’s knifing “incident” in Paris, German officials too now bend over backwards seeking any explanation they can find to explain Monday’s truck “incident” in Limburg – other than the most obvious one. Why is it so hard to admit that you have just witnessed yet another terror attack from someone Angela Merkel inexplicably invited to the country in 2015? Could it be that these authorities have a guilty conscience? Better late than never, I guess.

German authorities are investigating a man who drove a stolen lorry into a line of cars in Limburg in the western state of Hesse, injuring eight people.

The 32-year-old had pulled the driver of the vehicle from his cabin at a red light before using the lorry to plough into eight cars waiting at a light near the town’s central railway station at about 5.20pm (1620 BST) on Monday.

The man, a Syrian national named as Omar AI by the national broadcaster ARD, was arrested at the scene.

“My thoughts are with the injured victims of the accident and their families.”

Berlin’s Extinction Rebellion Already Extinct After About Forty Minutes

They were just dying to die-in, I guess.

Extinction

Literally dozens of members of the interplanetary environmentalist movement Extinction Rebellion beamed down to Berlin today to “swarm public squares only to collapse to the ground, symbolizing the death humanity faces if politicians don’t act against climate change” before being beamed back up to the mother ship again (or moth-er ship for that guy up there, maybe). Their message: If nobody “fixes” the climate pronto-like like yesterday already we may come back again before we all die anyway. And you don’t want that.

We’re showing that it’s not just about schoolchildren taking to the streets,” said Jojo, 29, a climate activist who ditched work to attend today’s rally.

Brewing Has Always Been Big In Germany

An Industrial Crisis Is Brewing in Germany – The country’s position as the “engine of Europe” is under genuine threat.

Germany’s industrial sector contributes more than one-fifth of GDP and is usually a huge asset. Right now this export engine is pulling the economy down. Signs of distress are everywhere. German manufacturing activity is at a decade low, according to IHS Markit’s purchasing manager’s index. The Ifo Institute estimates that more than 5% of manufacturing companies have cut working hours and about 12% expect to do so during the next three months. German machinery orders declined 9% in the first six months of the year, according to the VDMA association, which represents the country’s engineers. In chemicals and pharmaceuticals, domestic production fell 6.5% in the first half of the year, while domestic car output has fallen 12% this year. Auto exports have dropped 14%.

It’s Called Paranoia

Why is Germany a blank spot on Google’s Street View? See above.

Paranoia

There are good historical reasons why Germans are suspicious of surveillance — but is Google as bad as Gestapo or Stasi?

It’s to do with Germans’ curious sense of privacy: they’d rather flaunt their private parts than their personal data…

While public nudity is a big no-no in the United States for example, Germany has a long tradition with what is known as FKK – short for Freikörperkultur, or “Free Body Culture.” Certain beaches and areas of city parks are dedicated to nude sunbathing, and even Nacktwanderung (“nude rambling”) is a thing.

On the other hand, Germans are extremely possessive of their personal data — and are shocked by the readiness with which Americans (and others) share their names, addresses, friends’ lists, and purchase histories online.

According to research presented in the Harvard Business Review, the average German is willing to pay as much as $184 to protect their personal health data. For the average Brit, the privacy of that information is only worth $59. For Americans and Chinese, that value declines to single-digit figures.

Save Planet Earth’s Climate?

Hell yes! Count me in.

Climate 1

Climate 2

Clean up my own neighborhood? Nah, I think I’ll pass on that one.

A “Fridays for Future” demonstration will get 40,000 German environmental activists out on the street in no time. A call to clean up the local neighborhood on “World Cleanup Day” might get about 100 to 150 out of bed (here Frankfurt).

These World Cleanup Folks clearly don’t get the deal. Abstract heroics is were the money is – I mean, people are.

Nur rund 1000 kamen zum großen Aufräumen, sammelten vier Tonnen Müll. Am Main, in Sichtweite des Camps der „Fridays for Future“-Macher, verschlug es gerade mal 150 Freiwillige.

How Will Germany Pay?

Like, duh. The same way Germany pays for its Syrian migrants (three out of four live off the German welfare system). The captive taxpayer audience will pay. Always has, always will. Gladly, even.

Climate

How Will Germany Pay For Its €50bn Climate Plan? After months of intense negotiations between the governing parties in Berlin, Germany on Friday announced a €50 billion package of measures designed to help the country meet its 2030 emissions reduction goals.

Just so you know: Citizens in ridiculously expensive Switzerland already pay half of what the Germans pay for their energy now. And in France, the people take to the streets to protest rising energy costs (gilets jaunes). In Germany, the people take to the streets to protest the latest planned energy price increases not being high enough. German voters want this, in other words. It’s psycho here, folks. I keep telling myself “it’s only a movie, it’s only a movie…” but, sadly, I know it’s real life. As real life as German reality can get.

Strompreise steigen auf Rekordhöhe – auch Gas ist teurer.

No Contradiction Here

No more than anywhere else in Germany, I mean.

Contradiction

Everything contradicts itself here. Otherwise they wouldn’t call this place Germany. It’s einfach kompliziert (simply complicated) in this country. Germans don’t like or want electric cars, for example, but are obsessed with “saving the climate.”

With the contradiction between Germans’ climate anxiety and their love of huge SUVs, it’s no surprise that carmakers are struggling – Amid trade wars and plunging China sales, the number of cars rolling off Germany’s production lines has dropped by 12% this year and exports by 14%. European auto sales fell 3% in the first eight months of 2019. 1 With demand expected to remain weak for a couple of years, the German parts supplier Continental AG isn’t ruling out cuts to working hours and jobs.

Meanwhile… Riding a bike and car-sharing have become a genuine alternative in cities such as Berlin.

The Only Country To Let In More Migrants Than Germany Is Germany

Just kidding. It’s US-Amerika. But still.

Migrants

The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) on Wednesday said Germany is the second-largest destination for migrants.

“Since 2015, European OECD countries have collectively received more permanent migrants that the United States,” said the organization in a report. “Nevertheless, the United States remains the largest single destination country for migrants, followed by Germany.”

At the height of the European migration crisis in 2015, nearly 900,000 migrants entered Germany under Chancellor Angela Merkel’s open-door policy, many of them seeking asylum.

The numbers were and are higher, of course. But who’s counting?

These Old Germans Are Doing It All Wrong

The number of people relying on food donations has increased to 1.65 million in the past year, a 10% increase overall, and 20% increase among people 65 and older.

Food

They need to approach this problem differently.

1) Go to Austria.

2) Throw away your passport.

3) Enter the country as a refugee from, well, it doesn’t really matter where you’re from as long as you call yourself a refugee.

You’ll get free room and board for as long as you want

“This development is alarming — old-age poverty will overrun us in the coming years.”