Tag Archives: German

Here people work until they are 67?

March 5, 2010 By in Heconomy Tags: , , , , , , Leave a comment

You know how it is, the best thing to do with good advice is to pass it on.

And that’s just what Germany’s Bild newspaper did during a lecturing session to Greece the other day. The newspaper basically called on the Greeks to adopt something they called “a more Germanic work ethic” in an open letter to Greek prime minister Papandreou.

What a joke. This is hilarious. This is hilarious because the Germanic work ethic is a hilarious myth.

My favorite lecture claim here? The one about Germans working until they’re 67. Ha, ha, ha. Every German knows that this is a big fat lie. But hey, if it makes you feel good to believe in such Märchen (fairy tales), whatever.

Anyway, you go Greece. Actually what I mean is that you’d better get going while the going’s good.

Germans tell Greeks to rise earlier and work harder to avoid financial crisis

What’s that guy with the knife want?

March 4, 2010 By in Hard Facts, Helplessness Tags: , , , , , , , , 1 Comment

Talk about your cruelty to animals.

First  rejected by his mother, then seperated from his ersatz father-keeper at a tender age while getting gawked at by quadrillions of annoying zoo visitors (he was even forced at gunpoint once to take a Vanity Fair cover shot with Leonardo DiCaprio), then turning from a cute and cuddly baby to a grungy teen right there where everybody could watch, then forced to marry a blood relative who doesn’t even speak proper German (they call her Giovanna).

So now? Poor Knut, Berlin’s own. Now German animal rights activists want to cut off his family jewels. Word is that “if they (he and Giovanna) were allowed to breed, the offspring would be prone to genetic abnormalities and liable to illness.”

I’m sure that Knut is wondering now if they couldn’t just be good friends. Unfortunately, he can’t talk.

“A long-term cohabitation between Giovanna and Knut is only feasible if Knut is castrated.”

Are you sure you want to delete these files y/n?

March 3, 2010 By in Habeas Corpus, Hi-tech, Hysteria Tags: , , , , , , , , Leave a comment

Sicher ist sicher (better safe than sorry). At least when it comes to deleting data saved in Germany to combat terrorism and serious crime. Delete the stuff, in other words – can we delete the Street View stuff while we’re at it?

Germany’s highest court overturned a law that let anti-terror authorities save data on telephone calls and e-mails for a limited time. Now the big delete button has to get pressed – or maybe just the regular delete button, but lots and lots and lots of times.

This law is a “grave intrusion” into personal privacy rights or something and must be revised. Most likely because grave terrorism and serious crime never take place here, right? It’s nice living in Wunderland.

The ruling did not overturn the European Union anti-terrorism directive on which the law is based, but may lead to its reassessment later this year.

No scary Google-mobiles here, please

March 2, 2010 By in Hi-tech, Hysteria Tags: , , , , , , , Leave a comment

Despite a recent high-level compromise, the German Street View saga continues.

A new report, and there’s always a new report if you want one, confirms that Google’s Street View is pretty much pure evil and they (whoever they are) have to be stopped at all costs. Stay tuned.

Die Auflagen, für die sich Rechtsprofessor Thomas Dreier und Professorin Indra Spiecker stark machen, gehen teils weit über die bestehenden Absprachen zwischen Google Deutschland und der zuständigen Datenschutzaufsichtsbehörde in Hamburg hinaus.

She swims faster than we skate?

March 1, 2010 By in Hard Facts, High Art Tags: , , , , , , , 1 Comment

On the ice, I mean.

And then they go on for the gold, yet again. Damn. I think this was another sinister German conspiracy again, although I haven’t quite figured out how it works yet.

Somehow she had crossed the finish line 0.23 seconds before the last American, Nancy Swider Peltz Jr.

PS: And nice hockey match there last night Canada. Not. Doch.

Greeks to boycott German products they can’t afford to pay for right now anyway

February 28, 2010 By in Heconomy Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , 4 Comments

Pissed off about a Focus magazine cover depicting Venus de Milo (some old Greek actress or something) flipping off the rest of Europe (meaning Germany) and carrying the title “Crooks in the Euro Family”, the Greek Consumer Association has called for the boycott of German goods which nobody in Greece can afford to buy right now anyway.

The Greeks are a little touchy these days because their government/state/civilization is on the verge of bankruptcy or something (like join the club already). The Germans are a little touchy these days because the Germans are always a little touchy.

Die Verfälschung einer Statue der griechischen Geschichte, Schönheit und Zivilisation, die aus einer Zeit stammt, wo sie (die Deutschen) Bananen auf Bäumen gegessen haben, ist unverzeihlich und nicht hinnehmbar.”

Another coalition of the willing (not)?

February 26, 2010 By in Habitudes Tags: , , , , , , , , Leave a comment

Or does it just stay business as usual?

“The responsibility for stopping the Iranian bomb thus rests with a coalition of the willing. The attitude of Germany—Iran’s most important Western trading partner—will be critical to the success of such a coalition. But while the recent announcement by Siemens and Munich Re to exit the Iranian market have garnered headlines, hundreds of German manufacturers remain determined to continue doing business as usual with Tehran.”

Much of that business goes undetected via Dubai.

A language of ideas?

February 25, 2010 By in High Art, History Tags: , , , , , , Leave a comment

German? Whose idea was that? Keine Ahnung. A language of ideas maybe, but not of very much action.

Anyways, according to man-spricht-Deutsch-Guido Westerwelle, German “is the key to more than 350 German universities and colleges, to Europe’s largest economy. It grants access to German literature, music, philosophy, and science, to the wealth of great European cultural traditions and, not least, it is the key to realizing one’s own goals and ideas.”

That’s true, I guess. Sort of. But let’s be honest, Guido. German is also the key to more than 350 German universities and colleges that nobody wants to attend, it grants access to German literature that nobody wants to read anymore, to German music that, well OK (the old stuff was pretty good) and to German philosophy that’s not much more than high speed mysticism if you ask me (which you’re not). I don’t know what German science is so I’ll just assume that it’s really cool. And if you have to learn German just to know what your own goals and ideas are, then they’re probably not worth knowing in the first place. But maybe that’s just me.

“In Deutschland ist es üblich, dass man Deutsch spricht.”

I`m 18 (not) and just don`t know what I want

February 22, 2010 By in Heconomy, Hi-tech, Humor Tags: , , , , , , , Leave a comment

“That’s right, and the sexagenarian shock rocker’s got a hammer. He calmly smashes out the Plexiglas face part of the spaceman’s helmet. Fruit juice drains out, problem solved.”

Mr. Cooper’s success as a pitchman is doubly surprising because the stringy-haired 62-year-old takes over as Saturn spokesman from a sexy female cyborg who looked like the kind of adolescent-boy fantasy who turns up so often in Mr. Cooper’s songs.