“Spying Among Friends Is Never Acceptable”

Go ask Angela Merkel, she’ll tell you.

Austria

Certain countries are above all that. Being located on the moral high ground like they are, you know.

Vienna has demanded an explanation from Berlin over reports that Germany’s BND agency spied on nearly 2,000 targets in Austria between 1999 and 2006. Austrian media said embassies were among the targets.

Top Austrian officials have called on Germany to clarify reports that its BND spy agency snooped on high-profile targets including embassies, international organizations, Austrian ministers and banks based in the Austrian capital…

Following revelations by NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden in 2013, German Chancellor Angela Merkel slammed the US for its extensive spying on targets in Germany. “Spying among friends is not at all acceptable,” she famously said in the wake of the scandal.

Crisis? What Crisis?

It’s not like the migrant crisis I singlehandedly caused is a crisis or anything. They just call it that.

Ricin

Or that this so-called migrant crisis I unleashed also caused the surge in populism that is currently surging in Germany. Or that any of these so-called migrants are endangering the German public. They’re not. It’s those yuicky terrorists that came into the country illegally with them. When they came into the country illegally, I mean. What, me worry?

Not Angela Merkel. She’s the Blob. Changes form at will. And nobody can lift her up out of that chair. Right?

Not even 100 days after she negotiated her way to a fourth term as German leader, Angela Merkel is mired in a political crisis that underscores Europe’s divisions over immigration amid a surge in populism.

Das in Köln sichergestellte Rizin hätte für Hunderte toxische Dosen gereicht. Verfassungsschutzpräsident Maaßen nimmt an, dass mit dem Gift ein Anschlag geplant war.

That’s Not Fair

Why couldn’t German tanks take part in the competition?

Oh, I forgot. They’re all broken.

The idea of green U.S. Army M1 Abrams tanks with big white stars on their sides, huge American flags flying on top, and art on the hull depicting a turtle wearing a World War II-era tanker uniform, running over a pile of cars sounds like something straight out of a 1980s arcade game. But its actually a real scene from the annual Strong Europe Tank Challenge at the service’s 7th Army Training Command’s Grafenwoehr Training Area in Germany.

A Little Bit Of Ricin Isn’t Going To Hurt Anybody

Not after an even smaller bit of ricin already killed everybody off first.

Ricin

The next Syrian refugee (this time a Tunisian Syrian refugee from Tunisia) has been caught misbehaving again. German police are questioning the 29-year-old after having stormed his apartment in Cologne and finding this interesting substance, should these reports be of substance.

Daily newspaper Express and local daily Kölner Stadt-Anzeiger reported that police had found ricin, a substance that can be highly toxic in small amounts. Authorities have not confirmed the reports…

Elite SEK police commandos and specialized chemical units from the police and fire departments were at the scene of the 18-story apartment block in Cologne’s northern Chorweiler district late on Tuesday. A mobile laboratory was set up in the entrance area of the apartment to analyze any dangerous substance.

German public broadcaster, WDR, quoted the attorney general as saying that there were indications that the person arrested may have planned an attack with the substances.

EXPRESS und „Kölner Stadt-Anzeiger“ erfuhren aus Ermittlerkreisen, um was für eine Substanz es sich handeln soll, die bei dem SEK-Großeinsatz am Dienstagabend in der Wohnung des Tatverdächtigen aufgefunden wurde: Rizin ist der drittgiftigste Stoff der Welt – 25.000-mal tödlicher als Strychnin.

PS: Just in case you were wondering (see yesterday’s post), North Korea won!

German State TV Has Questions

When it comes to today’s Trump-Kim event. And the answers are already written between the lines – by the fact that these particular questions were even asked in the first place.

Trump

Was the Trump-Kim meeting successful?

Is the closing statement really such a breakthrough?

Who benefits from the agreement?

Why wasn’t denuclearization made contractual?

Are there also losers?

Damn right there are losers. Anybody who voluntarily watches German state TV, for instance.

“Großartig“ und “historisch”. Doch die kamen vor allem vom US-Präsidenten selbst. Ein wichtiges Ziel des Gipfels wurde nicht konkret vereinbart.

German Of The Day: Geschröpft

That means fleeced. Or clobbered, if you prefer.

Trump

As in… We protect Europe (which is good) at great financial loss, and then get unfairly clobbered on trade.

„Deutschland zahlt ein Prozent des Bruttoinlandsproduktes (langsam) in Richtung Nato, während wir vier Prozent von einer weit größeren Bruttoinlandsprodukt zahlen. Glaubt irgendjemand, dass das Sinn macht?“

I Don’t Speak Your Body Language

Or, better yet, German of the day: Über den Tisch ziehen.

G7

That means “pull over the table,” as in to get pulled over the barrel or bamboozled.

Body Language 2

Recall back in 2015, almost three years ago to the day, when Merkel, with outstretched arms, stood before President Obama, seated on a bench at that year’s Group of 7 summit.

Sein Verhältnis zur deutschen Bundeskanzlerin beschrieb Donald Trump mit dem Vokabular des Preisrichters bei einem Schönheitswettbewerb: Auf einer Punkteskala von 1 bis 10 gebe er der Beziehung zu “Angela und Emmanuel und Justin” die Bestnote, sagte der US-Präsident am Samstag vor seiner Abreise vom G7-Gipfel in La Malbaie mit Blick auf Merkel und ihre französischen und kanadischen Amtskollegen Macron und Trudeau.

German Of The Day: Weltfremd

That means “not of this world,” as in alien to it, unrealistic, naively innocent, quixotic.

Weltfremd

And now we’re making progress, folks. How progressive indeed. Now, even the leftest of the leftist left in Germany are announcing that committing to open borders is about as weltfremd as it gets.

The Left party’s Rosa Luxumburg clone herself, Sahra Wagenknecht, fighting to dominate those opponents within the party who are for open borders, has just taken a stance that anybody over at the right populist AfD would openly support: “It’s weltfremd to think that anyone can come to Germany and have a claim to the social benefits here.”

Wagenknecht sagte, es sei „weltfremd“, dass jeder nach Deutschland kommen und Anspruch auf die hier üblichen Sozialleistungen haben könne.

Yet Another Multicultural Exchange

After the rejection of his asylum application. Just chillin’, while appealing. That’s how this works in Merkel’s Germany.

Exchange

German authorities said Thursday they are seeking a fugitive Iraqi asylum-seeker and have arrested a Turkish citizen over the rape and murder of a 14-year-old girl who went missing more than two weeks ago…

Police said the Iraqi man, whom they identified as Ali Basar, appears to have left abruptly with his family last week, flying to Iraq via Istanbul. He was a suspect in a string of previous offenses in the area, including a robbery at knifepoint.

He is believed to have arrived in Germany in October 2015, at the height of the migrant influx to Germany, and was appealing against the rejection of his asylum application.

Eine DNA-Analyse habe ergeben, dass es sich “zweifelsfrei” um Susanna handle, sagte der Leiter der Staatsanwaltschaft Wiesbaden, Achim Thoma. Sie sei durch “Gewalteinwirkung auf den Hals” getötet worden.

Germany Preparing Itself To Lose The Next “Illegal” War

A Vicious Cycle – Berlin Worried about Losing Trump’s Trade War.

War

The U.S. has followed through with its threat to impose punitive tariffs on European steel and aluminum and the signs are pointing to a global trade war. The German government is doing what it can to prevent harm to its automobile industry.

… The German automotive industry would also be hard hit by a possible trade war with the U.S., where the most cars are sold in the world after China. German carmakers export around a half-million vehicles to the U.S. each year — particularly the kinds of expensive sedans that have been a thorn in Trump’s side for decades. If punitive tariffs are imposed, carmakers would likely have no choice but to react with higher prices and thus risk a decline in sales. VW subsidiary Porsche is especially at risk. Although the company sells almost a quarter of its vehicles in the country, it does not operate any factories of its own in the U.S.

“Germany stands to lose most.”