Like Rats Leaving A Sinking Ship

March 20, 2019 By Hermann Observer in Habitudes, Hard Facts, Helections, Hideology, Humor, Hurt Feelings, Hypocrisy, Hysteria Tags: German, Germans, Germany, Greed, Hypocrisy, Losers, Political Parties, Politicians, Social Democracy, Socialists, SPD, Thorsten Schäfer-Gümbel 1 Comment

Only the ship already sank and the rats are all wet. In more ways than one.

Sometimes you’ve got to lose in life to get ahead. Like three times in a row. As did the SPD‘s top candidate for the elections in Hesse, Thorsten Schäfer-Gümbel, before landing this way cool cushy job as Personalvorstand bei der staatseigenen Gesellschaft für internationale Zusammenarbeit (GiZ) – the Human Resources Director at the State-Owned Company for International Cooperation – yesterday. For 200,000 euros a year.

Now that’s the kind of Social Democracy I can live with, pal. And hey; without losers, where would the winners be?

KÜNFTIG RUND 200 000 EURO JAHRESGEHALT FÜR PARTEI-VIZE SCHÄFER-GÜMBEL. Spitzenjob als Belohnung für SPD-Wahlverlierer!

Reality Can Be A Bitch Like That

March 19, 2019 By Hermann Observer in Habitudes, Hard Facts, Heconomy, Helplessness, Hideology, Hurt Feelings, Hysteria Tags: Climate, Climate Change, CO2, CO2 Emissions, Coal Energy, German, Germans, Germany, Green energy, Nuclear energy, Renewable energy Leave a comment

After Missing Emissions Targets, Germany Creates Climate Watchdog.

Brilliant, really. First you shut down all your nuclear power plants, build more coal-firing power plants to compensate for them (renewable energy isn’t enough here for some odd reason) and then fail to meet the ridiculously ambitious emissions reduction goals you have set.

Then, once you’ve finally come clean about not being able to come clean, you “set up a ‘climate cabinet’ to coordinate emissions reduction efforts and ensure politicians (you, that is) keep their promises.”

I thought Kafka was dead. Come on, now. Did he write this?

Environment minister Svenja Schulze (SPD) detailed the plan to create a ministerial group to German newspaper Tageszeitung on Saturday, saying it would ensure that ideas to lower the country’s emissions don’t slip through the cracks.

On Course, Of Course

March 18, 2019 By Hermann Observer in Habitudes, Hard Facts, Heconomy, Helplessness, Hideology, Home Cooking, Hurt Feelings, Hypocrisy Tags: Armies, Bundeswehr, Defense, Defense Spending, German, Germans, Germany, NATO Leave a comment

Don’t anyone ever tell you that Germans aren’t reliable.

As noted yesterday, the equipment used by the German army is still as inadequate as ever, despite repeated promises by the German defense minister to make improvements.

And now, despite claims by the German government to one day reach the official NATO target of 2 per cent GDP on defense spending it agreed to years ago, it won’t even be able to make the 1.5 percent it set for itself by 2024. This is “round,” as the Germans say. It all fits like a glove.

Germany is on course to miss its self-declared target for defence spending in a development that threatens to trigger a new row with the US and raises further questions over Berlin’s military contribution to Nato.

The government of Angela Merkel agreed last year to raise the German military budget to 1.5 per cent of gross domestic product by 2024 — a marked increase but still short of the official Nato target of 2 per cent.

But the 1.5 per cent target is now under threat after Olaf Scholz, the Social Democrat (SPD) finance minister, rebuffed plans for an ambitious increase in military spending in the years ahead, citing a worsening economic outlook.

Secret Report Not Much Of A Secret

March 17, 2019 By Hermann Observer in Habitudes, Hard Facts, Helplessness, Home Cooking, Hurt Feelings, Hypocrisy Tags: Bundeswehr, Defense, Defense Spending, German, Germans, Germany, NATO, Politics, Sexism, Women Leave a comment

It was just leaked, as secret reports so often are, and now it’s come out that – get this – the Bundeswehr’s equipment is still inadequate.

Yawn. Been there, done that. Top inadequacies this time? Of the Bundeswehr’s 53 Tiger combat helicopters only 11.6 of them are operational (they would never get me in that .6 one). With the NH90 transport helicopter it’s 17.5 from 71 and only 15.9 of the 71 CH-53 transport helicopters are ready for combat.

But not to worry (as if anybody is). German Defense Minister Ursula von der Leyen promised a “turnaround” in the Bundeswehr’s equipment department – a year or two or three ago. Other defense menisters would have been fired for this long ago, of course, but 1) she’s a girl and 2) she’s one of Angie Merkel’s bosom buddies.

Die Ausstattung der Bundeswehr ist laut einem Zeitungsbericht weiterhin mangelhaft. Das zeige der neueste, als geheim eingestufte “Bericht zur Materiallage der Hauptwaffensysteme der Bundeswehr”, schreibt die “Welt am Sonntag”.

Gimme An E! Gimme A U!

March 15, 2019 By Hermann Observer in Hard Facts, Heconomy, Helplessness, Hideology, Home Cooking, Hypocrisy Tags: Brexit, EU, France, German, Germans, Germany, Paul Lever Leave a comment

What’s that spell? Germany!

‘The EU is Germany writ large’

If you look at the actual structures of the EU, there’s the Commission, the European Parliament, the Council of Ministers and the European Court. That is exactly the same way that Germany is governed. The Bundesregierung, or federal government, is like the Commission, the Bundestag, or German parliament, is like the European Parliament, and the Bundesrat, the council of the German Länder (the federal states), is like the Council of Ministers, and both the EU and Germany have very powerful constitutional courts, too. So for a German politician moving into the EU, it’s a very familiar world, which is precisely why the Germans find it so easy to operate in Europe…

In the past, the Brits used to complain that the EU or EEC was all run by the French – and certainly French was the working language – but actually it’s run on a German paradigm. The EU is Germany writ large. And this is how it has been from the beginning. It is not some recent German plot to subvert the EU – it is how it was set up…

Germany has been a huge beneficiary from the euro. A study was published recently by the Centre for European Policy Studies in Germany, which estimated that Germany had earned €1.9 trillion from adopting the euro in its first 20 years. But it had cost France €3.6 trillion and Italy €4.3 trillion. German politicians don’t like to admit this.

A German Aircraft Carrier Makes Sense To Me

March 14, 2019 By Hermann Observer in Helplessness, Hideology, Home Cooking, Humor, Hysteria Tags: Aircraft Carriers, Bundeswehr, Defense, EU, Europe, German, Germans, Germany, Joint European Aircraft Carrier 1 Comment

It’s not like the Bundeswehr‘s aircraft can fly anywhere now. This way they can at least ship them from A to B.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel is endorsing the idea of developing a joint European aircraft carrier, as suggested by her party’s leader. Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer, who succeeded Merkel in December as leader of the Christian Democratic Union, made the proposal in a weekend response to French President Emmanuel Macron’s proposals for European Union reform. She noted that Germany and France are already working together on a future European combat aircraft.

Uhm, have they maxed out on her medication? I guess it really is time for her to leave.

Mit Merkel ist die Fantasie durchgegangen.

Political Paralysis?

March 13, 2019 By Hermann Observer in Hard Facts, Heconomy, Helplessness, Home Cooking, Hurt Feelings Tags: Angela Merkel, Automobiles, China, Defense, Donald Trump, Exports, German, Germans, Germany, Tariffs, Trade, Trade Wars, USA Leave a comment

That’s my thing now. That’s what I do.

On the one hand, I could screw it up with this side. On the other hand, I could screw this up over here first. Decisions, decisions…

The global order that underpins German prosperity is unraveling, and Angela Merkel doesn’t know what to do. President Donald Trump’s America First policy is forcing Germany to make an impossible choice between the U.S. and China — pitting the force behind the country’s modern economic success against the key to its future growth…

For decades, the country profited from an international trading system run by the West and backed up by the military might of the U.S. The government just got out of the way and watched exports roll. Those days are over…

“Germany is caught up in a dilemma of changing trade patterns and doesn’t know how to react.”

Trump hin oder her – die USA bleiben Deutschlands wichtigster Absatzmarkt.

Ali B. Vs. Susanna F.

March 12, 2019 By Hermann Observer in Habeas Corpus, Habitudes, Hard Facts, Helplessness, Home Cooking, Hurt Feelings, Hypocrisy Tags: Angela Merkel, Asylum Seekers, Crime, German, Germans, Germany, Migrants, Murder, Rape, Refugees, Trials, Wiesbaden Leave a comment

Susanna F already lost before the trial began.

An Iraqi man went on trial in Germany on Tuesday (Mar 12) accused of the rape and murder of a teenage girl that inflamed anti-immigrant tensions amid a mass influx of asylum seekers.

The accused, Ali Bashar, 22, left Germany for northern Iraq shortly after the May 2018 crime but was arrested and brought back in a mission joined personally by Germany’s federal police chief.

“Everything just went black,” he says. Yes, it did. Right around 2015. This is all so unnecessary. Shouldn’t Angela Merkel be called to the witness stand for more clarification?

Ali B. gesteht Tötung von Susanna F.

Number Four Has Issues

March 11, 2019 By Hermann Observer in Habitudes, Hard Facts, Helplessness, Home Cooking, Hypocrisy Tags: Aircraft, Arms exports, Bundeswehr, Defense, Defense Spending, Exports, German, Germans, Germany, Pacifism, Profit, Submarines 1 Comment

But it doesn’t really make much sense, does it?

How can the world’s fourth largest exporter of arms (don’t worry, they’ll be back up at third place again in no time) have “issues with readiness of submarines, aircraft” for its own army? Year in and year out, I mean. One could almost think it’s intentional.

The readiness of Germany’s weapons systems stood at about 70 percent in 2018 overall, but its submarines, heavy-lift helicopters and Tornado fighter jets faced continued challenges, the German Defence Ministry told lawmakers on Monday.

Germany is the fourth largest arms exporter in the world, according to a report released by the Stockholm Peace Research Institute on Monday.

German Of The Day: Unsinn

March 10, 2019 By Hermann Observer in Hard Facts, Helplessness, Hideology, Higher Education, Hurt Feelings, Hypocrisy, Hysteria Tags: Academia, Academics, Gender, Gender-Neutral, German, Germans, Germany, Language, Political correctness, Thought Control, Universities Leave a comment

That means nonsense.

German academics and authors call for end to ‘gender nonsense‘ – .Open letter hits back at demand for more gender-neutral nouns.

A group of German authors, comedians and academics have added fuel to the flames of an increasingly bad-tempered culture war over language bias by calling for a fightback against “ridiculous linguistic constructions” designed to make German more gender-neutral.

“And no one has been bothered by the fact that everything feminine has for 1,000 years been based on the [neuter] word das Weib.”

Observing Hermann

“Was interessiert mich mein Geschwätz von gestern?”

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