Putin Clearly Shocked By EU Sanctions

March 6, 2014 By Hermann Observer in Habitudes, Hard Facts, Heconomy, Helplessness, Home Cooking, Hurt Feelings, Hypocrisy Tags: Aggression, Crimea, EU, Germans, Germany, Humor, Merkel, Putin, Russia, Sanctions, Satire, Ukraine 1 Comment

The European Union’s daring suspension of talks with Russia on something or other after Russia’s military incursion into Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula has shocked Russian president Vlad Putin so thoroughly that he has just been sighted wandering around in a shirtless daze on his shirtless horse somewhere near what is still the Ukrainian border but probably won’t be for very much longer.

Thank goodness he has not yet found out that the EU is also threatening even “tougher sanctions” unless Moscow swiftly defuses the crisis and Putin puts his shirt back on.

Meanwhile, Angela Merkel is still doing her damndest to put on the sanction brakes but has now announced that she is at least prepared to cast dirty looks at Putin, if he and his horse can be located. And if all else fails, of course.

Die Staats- und Regierungschefs der EU haben sich auf kleine Sanktionen gegen Russland verständigt.

Germany Still Exporting Too Much Stuff

March 5, 2014 By Hermann Observer in Habitudes, Hard Facts, Heconomy, Home Cooking, Hurt Feelings, Hypocrisy Tags: EU, Exports, German, Germans, Germany, Humor, Putin, Russia, Satire, Trade, Ukraine Leave a comment

The German export surplus is still threatening the rest of Europe, the European Commission says.

Berlin disagrees, of course, pointing out that it imports tons of stuff, too.

Germany imports 24 percent of Russia’s natural gas exports, for instance, more than any other European country. It also has an 8.7 percent share of Russia’s foreign trade. Germany is also Russia’s biggest oil market, taking almost 700,000 barrels a day back in 2012. No dependency here. So quit the moaning already, Brussels, and let us get back to work.

“Der Handlungsbedarf ist erheblich angesichts der Größe der deutschen Wirtschaft.”

Where’s Gazprom-Gerd When You Need Him?

March 4, 2014 By Hermann Observer in Habitudes, Heconomy, Helplessness, High Art, Home Cooking, Hurt Feelings, Hypocrisy Tags: Diplomacy, Foreign Policy, Gerhard Schröder, German, Germans, Germany, Politics, Putin, Russia, Ukraine Leave a comment

Probably taking tea at the “dyed-in-the-wool democrat’s” dacha.

When it comes to Russia’s unsolicited visit to Ukraine, German officials go out of their way to say that gas, money or jobs play absolutely no role in Berlin’s predictably soft-spoken, low-keyed, muffled, namby-pamby, wussy, pantywaisted and yellow bellied response to said unfortunate visit.

So now we all know of course that gas, money and jobs are probably playing the biggest role in Berlin’s said sad response to said event.

“Imposing sanctions on Russia because of Ukraine would put German jobs in danger.”

Colombia

March 3, 2014 By Hermann Observer in Habitudes, Heconomy, Helplessness, Home Cooking, Hurt Feelings, Hypocrisy Tags: Exports, German, Germans, Germany, Pacifism, Profit, Weapons, Weapons Exports 1 Comment

Beautiful German weapon sale of the week.

Because somebody has to admire them.

PS: But don’t sweat about this one, folks. This sale is illegal, too (thank goodness).

Germany Still Threatened By Fukushima

March 2, 2014 By Hermann Observer in Habitudes, Helplessness, High Art, History, Home Cooking, Hypochondria, Hysteria Tags: Atomic power, Disasters, Earthquakes, Fukushima, German, Germans, Germany, Humor, Natural Catastrophes, Nuclear power, Satire 3 Comments

Or by the ghost of Fukushima, I should say.

Danger! Danger! More “experts” issuing expert warnings here again: Nearly three years have passed since the Fukushima disaster in Japan and Germany is still not adequately prepared for a nuclear incident, the Süddeutsche Zeitung reports.

I can only assume that they mean being not adequately prepared for a nuclear incident caused by a magnitude 9.0 undersea megathrust earthquake hitting somewhere off the coast of Bremerhaven in a region of the world that doesn’t “do” earthquakes and causing a massive tsunami that could wipe out one of Germany’s coastal power plants, or maybe even one in Bavaria, provided, of course, that said tsunami could still find a German nuclear power plant that was still in operation, which is very doubtful indeed, but still.

Nope. You can never be prepared enough when it comes to preparing for one of those worst conceivable and most completely unpredictable natural disasters like-in-recorded-history-type-disasters that has already happened somewhere else, I guess.

Deutschland ist nicht ausreichend auf einen nuklearen Störfall vorbereitet.

Forbidding Stuff Makes It Go Away

March 1, 2014 By Hermann Observer in Habeas Corpus, Hard Facts, Helplessness, Higher Education, History, Hurt Feelings Tags: Bans, Censorship, Films, German, Germans, Germany, Nazis, Propaganda, YouTube Leave a comment

Right? In Germany it does. Or it’s supposed to, at least. But it doesn’t work here either, of course.

Take old Nazi films apparently easily available on YouTube, for instance. “Experts” are now shocked to find that it is possible to view them on the Internet, even though such films were placed “on the index” in Germany long ago. Reminds us of the Mein Kampf–Krampf (convulsion), doesn’t it?

Let’s face it, if we really want to forbid something it ought to be stupidity. Before that works, forbidding films is a questionable undertaking at best. I think the Libertarians sum that up nicely: “If there is no good reason to forbid something (a good reason being that it violates the rights of others), it should be allowed.”

Or do these films, as sad and stupid as they are, violate your rights?

Müssen Filme überhaupt verboten werden?

Meret B.

March 1, 2014 By Hermann Observer in Hotness Tags: Meret Becker Leave a comment

Beautiful German of the week.

Because somebody has to admire them.

An Anti-Semitic Caricature?

February 26, 2014 By Hermann Observer in Hard Facts, Helplessness, Hideology, History, Home Cooking, Hurt Feelings Tags: Anti-Semitism, Caricatures, Facebook, Jews, Journalism, Mark Zuckerberg, Nazis, Newspapers, Technophobia 3 Comments

In Germany? Today? No way.

Or way?

Hard to say.

Uh. German anti-Facebook technophobia is one thing, but like what on earth were they thinking (or drinking?) over there at the Süddeutsche Zeitung when they put out this one?

“If anyone has any doubts about the anti-Semitic dimension of the cartoon, we can point to Mark Zuckerberg’s very prominent nose, which is not the case in real life.”

I CAN Stop Watching It

February 25, 2014 By Hermann Observer in Heconomy, High Art, Home Cooking, Hotness, Humor Tags: Advertising, Aging, Commercials, Friedrich Liechtenstein, German, Germans, Germany, Humor, Satire, Supergeil, Supermarkets, Videos 3 Comments

But it does kind of rock. I guess.

The dude you can find anywhere. But the women that work in my supermarket just don’t look like that. Well that one does…

Judging from this commercial, German supermakets are much more fun—or at least more bizarre—than their American counterparts.

Germans Bugging Americans About Bugging Germans Again

February 24, 2014 By Hermann Observer in Habitudes, Helplessness, Hi-tech, Hurt Feelings, Hypocrisy, Hysteria Tags: Berlin, Eavesdropping, Edward Snowden, German, Germans, Germany, Humor, Merkel, NSA, Obama, Satire, Spying, Surveillance, Thomas de Maizière Leave a comment

Well they’re sure bugging me.

I mean, the Pres already told the NSA to stop listening in on Angela Merkel, right? So like are they now supposed to stop listening in on everybody else out there, too? Why that’s, I dunno, unrealistic or something. Damned if you do. Damned if you still do.

The National Security Agency (NSA) has stepped up its surveillance of senior German government officials since being ordered by Barack Obama to halt its spying on Chancellor Angela Merkel, Bild am Sonntag paper reported on Sunday.

“Was soll ich denken?”

PS: Looking at that picture up there makes me think that I could work for the NSA, too. I bet I could have cracked that password eventually myself.

Observing Hermann

“Was interessiert mich mein Geschwätz von gestern?”