All German Opel plants, all the time

Soon Chancellor-not-to-be and current Vice-Chancellor and part-time Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier (so like how many hyphens was that?) is mad as hell and isn’t going to take it anymore. Not during election time at least.

He has cast doubt on Fiat’s proposed plan to take over Opel if consolidation includes closing any of Opel’s four production plants. Italians can’t vote here, you see. And they wouldn’t vote for him if they could, so there.

By the way, you mayboe ought to know what some Germans say Fiat stands for: Fauler Italianer aus Turin (lazy Italian from Turin).

„Für Wahlkampfzwecke missbraucht?“

Fragen kann man

May 4, 2009 By Hermann Observer in Hypocrisy 1 Comment

You can always ask. And ask we did.

The United States has made a formal request to Germany to take in some prisoners held at its military prison in Guantanamo Bay, a spokesman for Interior Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble said on Sunday.

Too bad they have already said no before ever being asked, à la Gerhard Schroeder, so don’t hold your breath or anything. It’s not like the Germans ever held their breath when it came to their outrage about Gitmo, of course. But now that they have the golden opportunity to right some of those dreadful, horrible wrongs, well, they’ve gotten quite quiet about the matter.

“The United States bears the primary responsibility here.”

Tradition

May 3, 2009 By Hermann Observer in Habitudes Tags: Rioting Leave a comment

Stephanie zu G.

May 2, 2009 By Hermann Observer in Hotness Tags: Stephanie zu Guttenberg 1 Comment

Beautiful German of the week.

Because somebody has to admire them.

It’s all over but the cryin’, I mean the two tiers

May 1, 2009 By Hermann Observer in Hypocrisy Leave a comment

Full support? As in the full metal jacket kind?

“The Taliban fighters know that military engagement in Afghanistan is especially controversial in Germany. They also know that the political leadership in Berlin has done little to prepare its own country for an ugly mission with more injuries and deaths. German politicians, to speak in general terms, are afraid of Afghanistan — and of (this fall’s) German election. Taliban fighters know all this, which makes Germany a ripe target. Now the government’s insistence on a two-tiered Afghan mission has come back to haunt it. There are no two tiers in Afghanistan — no safe, good-hearted mission in the north as opposed to the mean mission in the south. The German military is in Afghanistan to secure the country. To achieve this goal it will need the full support of Germany’s politicians.”

Where are all the nervous Germans when you need them?

April 30, 2009 By Hermann Observer in Heconomy Tags: GDP 2 Comments

What’s a 6 percent contraction in the economy, anyway? We’ve seen worse.

Well no, actually we haven’t. But we’re not worried. Not us. Not yet anyway. We’re calm, perhaps too calm, but calm all the same.

“One reason that we are only seeing small protests is that politicians will not reveal the true cost of the crisis until after the parliamentary elections… Perhaps there will be a new wave of cost-cutting welfare reforms, like those which spawned the unpopular Hartz IV scheme.”

“Three months ago, the German government was forecasting that G.D.P. would contract by 2.25 percent in 2009. But since then, Berlin has suffered from plummeting demand for its products as its foreign customers rein in spending.”

PS: Why do I get the feeling that everybody in Berlin is about to RUN INTO A WALL again?

Gitmo folks in Germany? Nein, danke!

April 29, 2009 By Hermann Observer in Hypocrisy Tags: Guantanamo 1 Comment

“Several European nations, including Portugal and Lithuania, have said they will consider taking such detainees.”

“Some nations, such as Germany, are more divided on the issue.”

“The Obama administration is trying to overcome the “not in my backyard” sentiment that exists on both sides of the Atlantic.”

No financial crisis here

April 28, 2009 By Hermann Observer in Hypocrisy Tags: Arms exports Leave a comment

Cool weapons, don’t you think?

Too bad we (as in we Germans) can’t use them, or won’t. We’ll sell the hell out of them, though, despite our well-known pacifist sensibilities. Our sales have gone up some 70 percent over the past five years, as a matter of fact. But nobody talks about that here because, well, nobody talks about that here.

Germans only get enraged about their dead militaristic past. That’s easy. The clear and present (and present) militaristic one is taboo. That’s easy, too, see? Sure, you get the obligatory newspaper report like this one from time to time, but any of you living here long enough (more than three or four weeks) must have noticed by now that an “issue” like this probably won’t even make it to the Tagesschau (the nightly state-run news). And even if it does, it’ll only be one of those one night stand, low priority billig (el cheapo) stories, because, well, it is.

Nope, no outrage and Entrüstung (outcry) about the Aufrüstung (arms build-up) here. Not a single political party here will pursue it and make it an issue, not even the Left party. If these were American parties it would be because they’ve been bought. Nope, nobody here wants to address the sad fact that the only reason you (as in you Germans) have a Bundeswehr is so it can serve as an alibi to allow you to sell your incredibly lucrative weapons – third largest exporter in the world, by the way. That would be an inconvenient truth, you see. So I understand, sort of.

Hello? Bitte kommen (do you read me)? I know you’re out there Germany, I can hear you breathing. Whatever. See you around the next time the next report comes out, for a minute or two.

„Deutsche Rüstungsexporte legen um 70 Prozent zu“

Nix religion here!

April 27, 2009 By Hermann Observer in Habitudes Tags: Religion 1 Comment

Just like we knew they would, voters in the capital of atheism (and apathy) have pulled through again and voted against allowing secondary school children the choice of taking religion instead of ethics.

And a whopping 29.2 percent of Berlin’s voters actually turned out to vote too, even though the sun was shining yesterday. Well, 29.2 percent is a whopping amount of voters over here. When the sun is shining and the discussion turns to religion, I mean.

It’s strange, really. There was a lot of heated debate about this so-called issue beforehand but in the end everybody already knew that nobody really would really care. Germans have trouble voting yes for things like free choice, you see (whether the sun is shining or not), but voting no here is always a no-brainer, regardless of the turnout, which in this case is a no vote, too.

“The opposing side scored 48.5 percent but even if it had inched ahead and won, turnout was too low for the referendum to have been valid with only 14.2 percent of Berliner’s 2.4 million voters ticking the “yes” box.”