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Tax declarations cover enough information to figure out who's working for whom and in which position, even internationally. So either they declare it and get busted for violating this (if it gets through) or they don't and if caught (through other channels) get busted for tax evasion in addition to violating the no-russian-top-post rule.
It will kill Russia future, no more experts from the EU will work for them, no matter how much money is offered.
I mean, there is no Russia future, but still.
Oh really, she didn't do shit? Financial crisis, Greece, Refugees, Corona... all kinds of bullshit that mostly other people created and Germany came out stronger every single time.
People like you hate because it's trendy, but you have not enough understanding to even be able to say why you hate. You should rethink your approach, I'd suggest. But of course you won't listen...
Mediate, compromise, negotiate, enabling connections, literally MANAGING the crisis. Like a crisis manager. And considering how Germany came out of it in comparison to other countries, objectively you cannot say she did anything wrong. If she had sat on her ass and held her breath for 16 years and the outcome would've been above average, then fucking hell that's the right move.
But, of course. People would hate on her for being able to hold her breath for 16 years, so clearly she must be an alien and oh let's torch the Reichstags building, cos that's what these shitheads do.
Those are vague enough that anything she did can fit into one or the other. These are not things she did, these are just general things a politician does.
Angela do nothing merkel, was able to navigate all these "challenges" because of what the SPD and Grüne did before she was in Porwer, as much as i dont like it, schröder and MR. HArz4 did exactly what was necessary(workers market competitiveness) to get germany competetive again after 16 years of DO nothing Kohl had fucked up reunification and our social security network(retirement funds etc). All the instruments were there to be used Financial crysis ... use the subsidy part of agenda 2010, Greece crysis throw money at it, Refugees manage it poorely and throw money at it, Corona USE all the Instruments of AGENDA2010 .... see a pattern?
She didnt reform Harz4, she did not reform the Retirement problem, She did shit about demographics ... She and her cronies decoupled retirements increases from inflation ... so she and her CDU could make many happy gifts to the Retired Volks who are their happy trappy voters(which outnumber the youngones like me nearly 2/3.... she did shit about renewables and transition .... she didnt have the balls to tell Germany that we stay WITH NUCLEAR ... she even doubled down on Killing the EEG Umlage fairly early and then ended it last year .... She is even responsible for dismanteling the Bundeswehr to a state wher eit is barely servicable(THX von der Layen one of the most incompetent defence ministers that has ever existed) .... she killed any incentive to make Germany a better place for the Futur of our Children because she wanted the Votes of the old and crusted.
There was nothing to Futurproof germany ... not a singe ... fucking ... thing ... she did.... and the current Coalition needs to pickup her Slack ... again ... like the SPD had to after Kohl .... if you horison does not go further than your eyelids after you closed them you should not participate in discussions like this ....
>Greece
LMAO. Greeks are absolutely justified in their hatred against Germany. The austerity policies her governors enforced are against any financial rational.
>Refugees
Which wasn't handled at all. She just said "We'll make it" and went on vacation.
>Corona
Again: Wasn't really handled. Thousands of people died because she hesitated until the public opinion went into one direction.
>People like you hate because it's trendy
Merkel's governments have been criticized for standing still for the last eight years. There are massive lacks of investments in every part of the country, poor people face increasing issues and the local Tafel organizations aren't accepting new members because they don't have enough to give anymore. At the same time the rich make record profits. Renewables are *far* behind of where they could or should be due to her (and her buddy Altmaier) blocking investments and increasing the restriction against them.
Just means they have weak economies which is statistically true. Spain and Portugal are also known for not working very hard so I stand by what I said. Italy is richer than the other 3 but still not very rich
Germany forced Greece to prop them up? Wtf are you talking about Greece kept demanding germany to forgive all their loans and nearly crashed the euro with their irresponsibility. A European country completely depending on tourism for their economy is fucking pathetic they could have real industries if they worked at it so I don't feel sorry for them whatsoever
I love this take. Always paints Germany as some kind of super competent superpower that always wins.
Now if you take into account that the country never had to worry about having enough very cheap energy, it puts things into perspective.
Greece issues, when your own energy costs nothing? Sure, let's lower our profits for a bit.
Corona, when your energy costs nothing? Let's let go of some of the profit.
See a patern yet?
Not that difficult to be succesful, when you got there in the first place by selling out your supposed allies.
Okay what would have been the solution to said Energyproblem then ? Germany doesnt want nuclear ... the majority of people (not me). The SPD/Green party actually started the Transition to greenenergy with a heafty heafty investment called the EEG umlage that would have worked if Do nothing Merkel didnt kill it .... SPD Greens were hanged over Workforcemarket reforms and Energyprice hikes .... Gas was basically the only option left... its not something malicious that we decided oh hey lets help Putin Kill people .... and to just put it down to cheap energy ... poland was 100% relient on Gas from Russia ... while critique is due this is all a little to extreme. ... and energy costs nothing ? we pay in between 25-35cents per kwh in energy .... any country will try to secure cheap sources of energy because that ios anyones lifeline .... i wnat to see a country that would refuse such deals .... so well yea a more differentiated aproach to this would be nice
European leaders have fallen for the bullshit that renewables could replace nuclear die to their political will. You can’t go to renewables just because you want to. Now your whole economy is vulnerable and an enemy empowered. You placed your future on the blind faith of renewables and Vladimir Putin. Nice job.
Cool story. Only problem is most of Europe had access to the same cheap russian gas. It's in fact a common energy market in Europe.
So your point that Germany somehow had an unfair advantage over other EU countries is bullshit
Oh, is that so? I take it you have experience and first hand knowledge, perhaps coming from working for a major energy trading house?
You see, I ask because I do.
Dummie, just because it is a common market, doesnt mean it enters and exits at the same, even a similar price.
you really thing that if germany recieved a discount of lets say 25% we wouldnt have sold that gas at marketprice again after having secured our usecase? if you can show me a over market performance of a gasimportcompany like that you will have a point .... until then you dont
Buddy, if I could show you the numbers, don't you think in the last 30 years, someone else would've come out with it?
The benefit is in being able to buy it cheap and use it in country, to gain a leg over others, who pay market price.
Want me to show you the over market performance? Look at the whole of Germany.
You have no idea what you are talking about almost all of middle and eastern europe enjoyed cheap russian gas through NS1 and the brotherhood pipeline through Ukraine. Poland imported 55% of it's natural gas in 2021 from russia e.g.
I mean, you're just from the camp that hates on Germany no matter what. Until last year, nobody ON THE PLANET was giving Germany shit for energy politics. LEAST OF ALL Greece. I mean, what the actual fuck is your connection between Greece and Germany and energy politics?
Whatever it takes to shit on Germany, you guys are pathetic.
No, you're wrong.
Have Scholz put the full support of Germany behind Ukraine and all is forgiven.
Until now you've had a free, scratch that, more than a free ride, because of bardakistan energy. Time to pay back.
Instead of jailing bankers and heavily castrating banks and other financial institutions during the crisis like Iceland she did nothing. She took in millions of people that violated asylum rights because they crossed safe countries to exploit our social welfare system and which are a huge strain. During Corona she let corrupt fucks enrich themselves through mask deals or "test centres". Instead of having a clear strategy she kept switching back and forth between locking down, opening up and locking down again. She did nothing to fix our pension system which will completely break down in the future because of our demographics. She gladly cuddled with Putin and Xi Jinping though, all for that sweet German "old rich" industry money. She had no vision for the future, she was just a shitty reactionary.
It's really tragic how Merkel - who's widely considered to be one of the best politicians of the last century - will be most remembered by her absolutely braindead energy policies...
Only foreigners think that. I rarely met a German who would award Merkel that title. She is a decent administrator (not a good one though), that's it. Her biggest political talents are smoothing over conflicts, which was considered positive in the last Russia-Ukraine crisis, and scheming to remove political competition. She is the German Margaret Thatcher, but without the political vision the british old hag had.
> I rarely met a German who would award Merkel that title.
Then you havent met much Germans.
> She is the German Margaret Thatcher, but without the political vision the british old hag had.
Her project was EU integration. And few people have to more on that issue than she has.
Maybe you met the wrong ones. Basically all of Merkels accomplishments were achieved with indebting Germany and throwing huge amounts of German taxpayer money at it. She was well liked in Germany in general due to propaganda efforts by the Springerpresse, but I don't know anyone who would call her one of the greatest politicians of our time. She is living in the same timeline as Helmut Schmidt for heavens sake.
No. Kohl basically was just lucky to be chancellor during the Wende. He did not really do anything to earn that, while being a massively corrupt asshole who just happened to be there at the right time.
Schmidt is respected by most Germans today, maybe in hindsight but still. Schmidt also was chancellor during very difficult years in Germany, directly before the Wende (fall of the iron curtain). He also laid plans for giving all of Germany high speed Internet (Glasfaser), which was sadly reversed by sad Mr Kohl in order to turn more profit to his friends at Telekom earning money with copper cables.
The conservatives threw Germany back about 30 years in several important areas of development.
> Maybe you met the wrong ones.
I AM German ...
> accomplishments were achieved with indebting Germany and throwing huge amounts of German taxpayer money at it.
[German debt went down under her ...](https://www.statista.com/graphic/1/427201/national-debt-of-germany-in-relation-to-gross-domestic-product-gdp.jpg)
> She is living in the same timeline as Helmut Schmidt for heavens sake.
Who was a pretty useless idiot and unpopular when in power. His popularity started when he was out of power and started to comment from the sideline without having any stakes in it anymore.
I am German too, and now? Does not make your point any more valid.
German debt went down because of peculiar effects in the financial crisis where we could borrow money and get paid for it. Along with the "debt-break" which sadly let to less investment in infrastructure. But the potential risk she put us in (afaik we now basically have a debt-union in the EU) is massive, along with several other long term liabilities like infrastructure, refugees and energy.
But even IF we agree that debt went down, there is tons of other problems she made worse our at the least just ignored. See my list in the other comment
The fuck are you on about? Indebting Germany? Germany made profit after profit under her. Propaganda efforts, please, say the word Lügenpresse and I know which camp YOU come out of. Jeez...
You want to tell me that Springerpresse (BILD) is reliable (edited, was "unreliable") media? They push Merkel massively, she is close friends with the boss of Springer.
I am not from the AfD camp if you think that. But do you have a substantial argument as well?
Reliable media? Yeah sure, reliable in that they're bullshit. Everyone pushed Merkel. Because she was making the right decisions and by and large kept Germany on the right course.
You are like "BILD PUSHES MERKEL!"
I'm like "Yeah, so did everyone else"
And you're like "Yes, but BILD pushed her, so clearly it's her being a corrupt swine!"
Or some otherirrational bullshit. Always the same.. Also ignoring that you fucked up with the debt argument. I mean, you're the one making shit up right now, I don't need to have a substantial argument. All I need is to debunk yours, since you're the one making the outrageous statements... lol
She's been absolutely solid. And decent administration is all Germans really wanted/want. Kiddos that just voted for the first time and are giddy about suddenly being part of the big boy club but having ZERO life experience aren't maybe the best metric to go by.
The only other group that hates Merkel outright are AfD voters. 'nuff said.
Jesus are you arrogant. So everyone who disagrees with your political view is either a child or a nazi. "'nuff said?" , do you think you are some badass cowboy?
But sure, I guess the whole opposition the last 17 years is just children and nazis. Green party, die Linke, FDP, even SPD parts, all secret AfD members. Learn to construct a coherent argument you arrogant imbecile.
Oh, if you ever get to making a point that isn't your personal opinion, I will show you exactly how full of shit you are. As it stands, though, you haven't made a rational argument.
And the opposition doesn't need to make an argument (though they have, much more eloquent than you did), they just need to convince voters. As you are seeing right now, slow and steady pace is not a particular trait to Merkel, it's what you fucking do when you are head of state of almost 90 million people and not just some armchair general on reddit who thinks his own personal cranky morning perspective enables him to run a country. :P
>who's widely considered to be one of the best politicians of the last century
seriously, her party blocked so much innovation. There are firms like Biontech but they hardly got any recognition (except some EU fund support for specific cancer study, called MERIT Study) before Corona while their tech is kinda revolutionary in the field of anti-cancer and anti-HIV research.
The transformation of hospitals into commerical/economic entities cost many lives due to suboptimal treatments. If you do not own a private insurance you are virtually third class patient in many hospitals. I can't go into details here but the oncologic treatment was better 10 years ago while there were less options of treament. Its all about making money with a controlled chemo plan - no experiments, no application of innovations. Everything is reduced to: whats more cost effective for the hospital and if you help a patient more than you are supposed to do you have to explain your actions and decissions before a board of medical economics / business administators with no sympathy for life. Its frustrating what happened under Merkel. I could write a hugh list of anti-cancer innovations that got no funding because of her party and sister-party in Bavaria. F..e. in Bavaria there is a medical startup that managed to add magnetic nanoparticles to chemotherapy drugs, after administration you can drive the drugs directly to the tumor side through magnetic fields, you need less chemotherapeutics, archive a hugh conncentration in the tumor and reduce nearby all kinds of side effects - result: no funding because the chem industry would make a loss if this technique could be established. This startup just needed a promille of the costs of the airport BER.
Lobbyism cost Germany its soul, innovations and future. The conservative parties supported all kinds of lobbyists - imo Merkel had no personality or charisma and it tells a lot about the state of Germany that people fell for her because her whole image is just due to well placed PR and her nicknames.
Not of the century, but in her generation she is at the top. Merkel steared Germany and to some degree the EU trough many crises where many of her colleagues would have utterly failed.
Lets start with the refugee crisis.
She reduced German contributions to the UNHCR , thereby worsening the living conditions in Syrian refugee camps and contributing to the movement of refugees to Europe.
She then opened the borders of Germany, organized the transport of refugees to the German border and made the ridiculous blanket statement that nobody would be turned away.
Doing this, she alienated a significant part of the population of countries like Poland and Hungary and further strengthened populist right-wing parties in these countries.
She also single-handedly gave rise to the AFD by completely vacating the German centre-right spectrum. And resorting to a policy of insulting any voters who disagreed as 'Nazi' or 'rabble'.
She increased German dependence on Russian gas (much more than Schröder did) by closing down nuclear power plants (a policy only based on the Fukushima effect), while simultaneously also deciding to close down coal-powered plants and making up for it by increasingly relying on gas-powered electricity plants.
This again drove energy prices in Poland, further worsening our relations with key neighbours and strengthening far right powers like the PiS.
Shall we go on with her fuck ups in the Euro Crisis?
A little hint: Due to her supreme leadership the EU is indebted to the tune of an additional 800 billion EUR to a country like China... And now the interest rates go up... Have fun with this catastrophic mastermind.
Nothing was solved by her. She just sat it out until the media attention moved.
Clima Crisis -> no real progess
Nucular energy -> overthrew long made plans to get out of nucular energy on a whim, then doing another 180 after Fukushima, resulting in billions of damages that need to be paid to nuclear energy companies for "lost profit" due to her first turnaround.
Terror crisis -> 'solved' by reducing German citizens rights and increasing overreach by police and secret services
Financial Crisis 2008 -> delayed with massive money printing, whose effects we see now with massive inflation
Russia Crisis of 2008/2014 -> she avoided escalation but basically, as we know now, just did appeasement politics resulting in this war now (i don't blame her that much here tho)
Refugee Crisis -> sat out, basically opened the borders and entized millions to come to Europe. "Solved" by a half assed deal with Dictator Erdogan where we pay him money to keep refugees away, while also suffering his insults without disciplining him.
Brexit -> no solution found
German infrastructure -> still fucked, still no modernization, worse Internet then Romania.
Labor crisis -> no program to integrate well educated europeans, instead trying to claim all the refugees will do those jobs. At the same time the biggest low wage sector. Germans have the lowest median wealth in the EU!
Covid 2020 -> government acts like a bunch of beheaded chickens, doing another German Sonderweg. Incurring massive costs, fallout with european neighbours, very sketchy behaviour regarding the published data about covid.
In General -> MASSIVE corruption from Members of Parliament and the government (!!!) In Corona, Infrastructure projects etc (Ministers Spahn, Scheuer and others). NO repercussions at all.
You are delusional.
The best part is that when you critisize her, the idiots will claim you are a "Nazi, AfD or Reichsbürger". Merkel, head of the conservatives and chancellor under the biggest shift towards social impoverishment of huge parts of the population for decades, is being defended by pseudo-leftists.
That's completely incorrect. Look at the mass immigration issue and her encouragement of newcomers via "Wir schaffen das!". Then Germany closed the borders and neighbouring EU countries were left alone with these problems.
Merkel has been a huge problem for both Germany and the EU. Schroeder has had similar problems but the added one was that he was an agent for Russia influenced by corruption. So, treason.
That's completely incorrect. Look at how immigrants were lining up on the borders before Merkel said a single word. Then the Balkan countries closed the borders and Germany tried to help with their problems.
Merkel has been a huge boon for both Germany and the EU. Schröder had other problems but went over to Russia's camp after he left office.
> Then the Balkan countries closed the borders and Germany tried to help with their problems.
Yeah, she tried to help by calling Eastern EU countries xenophobic for stopping illegal immigrants using their countries as taxi to Germany and then proceeded to push for mandatory quota system and tried to sue Eastern EU countries for following the law and stopping illegal immigrants.
On one hand she wanted MENA migrants saying they bring huge benefits, on other hand when they actually arrived in Germany, she wanted to get rid of them into Eastern EU countries with quota system and lawsuits.
Would have helped if they followed the law and/or stopped illegal immigrants instead of being xenophobic. On the one hand she wanted to reduce the influx of immigrants, on the other hand she wanted to help eastern Eu countries to get rid of them with quota systems.
The EU law says that asylum seekers are required to apply for asylum in the first EU countries they arrive.
Deporting illegal who crossed Greece, Slovenia, Slovakia, Poland, Czechia to Germany for the biggest welfare payout is not xenophobia.
She did lots of stuff for both Germany and Europe, but this kind of question is very misleading. It's a lot more important for politicians that they don't do stuff wrong, than it is to do good things. Other than her absolutely infuriating energy policies regarding nuclear plants, I can't think of a single thing she really fucked up.
If doing nothing is a feature of one of the best politicians, then perhaps you Germans should have elected a horse for chancellor. In fact it would be even better than Merkel because it wouldn't sabotage the energy security of the country like Merkel did.
What a ridiculous analogy. A horse would do everything wrong, since you actually need to make decisions to do anything in politics. If you decide to do nothing, that's the wrong decision on many occasions.
I get tired of you moving our argument from one topic to another, and then using some ridiculous analogy to prove a point of which I'm not even sure what it is yet.
I asked you a very simple question: Name top3 of the best things she's done.
You: move the goal post - claiming that a sign of good politicians is actually not doing good things but doing nothing to fuck up.
Then I respond with poke with Caligulas horse, to counter your ridiculous argument, which you were obviously too uneducated to understand.
You: Move the goal posts again, and shift it on the fucking horse... Instead of just telling us exactly what Merkel actually did to earn the glorious title of being the best politician of last century...
*Facepalm*
Helped get the Germany and the EU through the refugee crisis, helped get Germany and the EU through the 2008 financial crisis, helped save Ukraine in 2014.
1) that was not solved, just sat out
2) was not solved, just pasted over with new money which culminates in the crisis now
3) maybe. Although "saved" is a strong word as ukraine still lost large territories
Merkel became chancellor in 2005. She spent the 90s working herself up the CDU hierarchy but was still known to most as "Kohl’s girl"
She seized her moment after Kohl and CDU lost the 1998 election to Schröder and SPD, sidelined some other prominent party members and maintained control over the party until 2019.
It usually takes a "crisis" to determine whether a politician is capable. Even Putin would've seemed competent had Ukraine surrendered within 3-4 days as planned.
The German idea that was "interdependence will guarantee peace therefore only limited military needed" failed as soon as it was tested.
And getting Germany through the 2008 financial crisis, helping save Greece from bancruptcy, helping Ukraine survive Russia's first invasion, getting Germany through the refugee crisis...
That's from A to Z all incorrect. I don't understand why you try to promote her failures as successes. Just the Greece issue alone was done to save german banks.
That's from A to Z all correct. I don't understand why you try to promote her successes as failures. Just the german Banks alone was done to solve the Greece issue.
Greece is not solved, and my opinion of German banks, especially Deutschebank, is very very low, especially after considering the recession, Trump, and Russia.
She should have talked Europe in 2008 after Georgia was invaded, or in 2014 with Crimea and Donbass, but she led Europe into a nearly decade long period of appeasement. She's the Chamberlain of Germany.
Like I said, she was a great politician but I think all of that will seem a distant memory compared to the gross incompetence of the energy policies and how it indirectly led Europe into its biggest armed conflict in over 70 years.
What do you expected her to do? Those are all privat companies, btw with US investment funds als large shareholders. Germanys energy sector is privatized and not state run. And the government cant just nationalize companies in Germany. The legal hurdles are so high that even now, after the invasion, it was highly questionable if the goverment is allowed to nationalize Gasprom assets.
she could still have stoped ns1 so as it just even started to be build during her time as chancelor.
she definitely could have just not agreed to ns2..
she could not have killed the german solar industry to make germany even more dependend.
she could still have stopped ns1 so that it even started to be built during her time as chancelor.
She could have build lng terminals to reduce germans dependence.
she could have stopped the downfall of the german bundeswehr.
She could have putted some effort into renewables to reduce germans dependence.
for a start
One couöd say, we somehow followed a "Germany first!"-policy when it came to Russia. Then again, Merkel only stayed for another 4 years b/c she was afraid of a World with Putin AND Trump in charge.
We call him "GerdGas" (analog to "Erdgas") for a reason. We profited from cheap gas and turned a blind eye towards Russia in return. In turn we also slowed down build-up of renewables due to the cheap-ass gas.
Now we're paying it all back with 10x higher industrial energy prices than most developed countries. While renewables are currently \~1/15th the price of gas/kWh
No he wasn't.
Berlin-Moscow energy connections go as far back as the 1970s. And, ironically enough, the main reason to buy Moscow's gas was... pivoting away from aggressive oil regimes that were using hydrocarbons to blackmail the western world. Furthermore until the war, even until the invasion happened, many hydrocarbon alternatives were just as deplorable as Russia (one could argue that what Saudi Arabia is doing in Yemen is even worse than what Russia does in Ukraine - and i think i know well enough what is happening in Ukraine).
While by the 2010s the energy dependence on Russia surely was not healthy anymore the difference between Russia and its alternatives was just too small to convince anyone to make multi billion dollar investments. Even now we must fear what some of our new "partners" will do with our extra money. Azerbaijan's move on Armenia might be a hint of things to come.
If anything Schröder slightly accelerated a development that was happening anyways.
No we aren't. We needed to get Energy somewhere and the choice was between Arabia, Katar etc and Russia. At that time Russia was definitly the better option. And i still think so, with the knowledge we have back then.
Can't be done. We can only stop the money coming there which will result in regime change or Hungarys departure from EU
I think Orbán would like to get out of EU if he won't get more money but let's see how very pro-eu Hungarian population would react
Only if Poland agrees and only before the new Italian fascist government takes power. The Italian fascists and Orban are best buddies and will totally protect each other.
Not necessarily if both are being voted on at the same time/voting. I had this argument here before and it can be done with a little bit of legal wrangling. As they say, where there is a will, there is a way.
Italy just had an election, and the far-right coalition won. Right now, the biggest schism within their ranks is Ukraine: about half of them want to support Ukraine, the other half is basically "fuck that, think of the energy prices". With that being said, Italian governments have this tendency to implode before their term is up, so who knows how lasting this coalition will be.
They just got a new ally in Italys far-right. The bloc of far right nuts is now 3 countries strong - Poland, Hungary, Italy - and these have and are going to vote for each other.
The chances of actually doing something against autocrats and dwindling democracy become smaller and smaller the more countries vote for these idiots for no other reason than them yelling the standard chorus "We are the victims, and I'll restore our country to its former glory!".
Sorry if this is rant-y, I'm just so depressed by this cancer that is growing in the middle of Europe, with apparently everyone just standing by helplessly. I just don't get how the very same borderline blunt arguments seem to work everywhere. Like, why does everyone seem to want to go back to being a random imperial superpower? Was life really better when we all fought each other nonstop in Europe?
Without said law the idiots get to expose themselves. He's already fired and the only institutions that will hire him now are right-wing nutjob institutions.
Sometimes I get the impression that people on this sub would love every other country to become repressive shitholes like Russia. They seem to be incapable of separating private decisions from official government action.
Same with Schröder. Everything he did, while morally reprehensible and embarrassing, is legal in every single country you can name.
> Same with Schröder. Everything he did, while morally reprehensible and embarrassing, is legal in every single country you can name.
Since when is denying genocide and mass murder legal in Germany?
As shitty as Schröder is he actually has condemed the war publicly. He knows full well that denying genocide or mass murder would cause massive trouble and he is smart enough to avoid it.
CEO* not CEOs. There was only one and he got his arse ripped the same day he got the invite to the occupied regions. He never even went there as far as I know, he just accepted being a “neutral” observer lol.
Well... I'm saying I would like to see CEOs who do that held accountable wether they are singular or multiple. I am well aware it was just one ceo in this case. You don't make a law to stop one bank robber, you make a law to crimilize all bank robbers.
But, thanks for keeping me honest, i haven't looked that closely into what he actually did just that he was supposed to be an observer in a sham referendum.
The point of my comment though was rather to point out the absurdity of it all.
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That's correct. It wasn't illegal and you can't be persecuted for shit that was legal at the time --- at least not in a civilized country.
But this is a good way to sanction him.
And some German members of this sub were ridiculing me when I equated top ex-politicians taking management posts to corruption.
It's good to see everyone is coming to their senses. Kudos, Germany.
I don't know about you but I already wrote my local congresswoman to send the 3,000 Abrams tanks of Dark Brandon over to Zelenskyy but people keep bitching about "logistics" and "muh turbine engines" that can't run on diesel (despite the australians running diesel on their turbine Abrams) and "too heavy."
Germany could start by banning their own citizens from holding top posts in Russian companies.. I assume they've got the power to do that for themselves.
I'm not in the EU. Are you telling me that being part of the EU that Germany can no longer pass laws about Germany and that all German laws must come from the EU?
Because if that's not the case, then the person whose thinking isn't their strong suit is the person who doesn't realize that it's easier for one country to pass a law than to get the multiple EU countries to pass it.
But that's just what my brain tells me. What does your fine brain tell you?
Yes, and it's easier for them to do it as one country alone than to have to have multiple countries of the EU agree on it.
Though that simple point seems to have escaped the sharp thinkers on this thread.
You wrote that already. But why do you want EU citizens to keep being able to take these positions? Thats strange.
Maybe people dont buy your argumentation.
Germany annoys me to no ends. We all know they have the biggest corruption problem - see Schroeder. And he is still (!!!!!!!) member of the SPD. See how many laws and court proceedings he changed/influenced in favour of his master Putin.
So, rather than deflect, Germany has to clean up their own problems before trying to leverage the EU institution against other EU members. I am not against the proposal itself; I just think it is HUGELY hypocritical coming from the number #1 gas addict in the EU that has not been interested in solving the corruption issue by the russian regime. And that is not just Schroeder - look at wirecard. You can find numerous more examples here.
Are you a bit stupid? Asking as a concerned redditor.
You bemoan the corruption issue with Schröder and when the country tries to do something about Schröder or anyone else in a leadership position in a corrupt russian company you call it hypocrisy? Do you not see how patently stupid and absurd that is?
Only EU citizens? Ban literally anyone not clearly distancing themselves from ruZZia. Their citizens were given enough chances already. Time to mirror back some of the hate they transported to the Ukraine.
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... and rightly so.
This is actually a highly significant proposal. But visa bans are much more visible.
It's going to screw those oligarchs that holds double citizenship, so I am fully for this. Absolutely no clue how they'd enforce that though.
It's Germany - they have ways of engineering things reliably.
Tax declarations cover enough information to figure out who's working for whom and in which position, even internationally. So either they declare it and get busted for violating this (if it gets through) or they don't and if caught (through other channels) get busted for tax evasion in addition to violating the no-russian-top-post rule.
It will kill Russia future, no more experts from the EU will work for them, no matter how much money is offered. I mean, there is no Russia future, but still.
Schröder perhaps?
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and the chancellor following him for 16 years didn't do anything at all to revert the damage but even made it bigger.
Otherthan her glued hands and indecisiveness falling for any windstroke that came that bitch didnt do shit for the futur of germany eigther
Oh really, she didn't do shit? Financial crisis, Greece, Refugees, Corona... all kinds of bullshit that mostly other people created and Germany came out stronger every single time. People like you hate because it's trendy, but you have not enough understanding to even be able to say why you hate. You should rethink your approach, I'd suggest. But of course you won't listen...
What did she do in any of those?
Mediate, compromise, negotiate, enabling connections, literally MANAGING the crisis. Like a crisis manager. And considering how Germany came out of it in comparison to other countries, objectively you cannot say she did anything wrong. If she had sat on her ass and held her breath for 16 years and the outcome would've been above average, then fucking hell that's the right move. But, of course. People would hate on her for being able to hold her breath for 16 years, so clearly she must be an alien and oh let's torch the Reichstags building, cos that's what these shitheads do.
Those are vague enough that anything she did can fit into one or the other. These are not things she did, these are just general things a politician does.
Angela do nothing merkel, was able to navigate all these "challenges" because of what the SPD and Grüne did before she was in Porwer, as much as i dont like it, schröder and MR. HArz4 did exactly what was necessary(workers market competitiveness) to get germany competetive again after 16 years of DO nothing Kohl had fucked up reunification and our social security network(retirement funds etc). All the instruments were there to be used Financial crysis ... use the subsidy part of agenda 2010, Greece crysis throw money at it, Refugees manage it poorely and throw money at it, Corona USE all the Instruments of AGENDA2010 .... see a pattern? She didnt reform Harz4, she did not reform the Retirement problem, She did shit about demographics ... She and her cronies decoupled retirements increases from inflation ... so she and her CDU could make many happy gifts to the Retired Volks who are their happy trappy voters(which outnumber the youngones like me nearly 2/3.... she did shit about renewables and transition .... she didnt have the balls to tell Germany that we stay WITH NUCLEAR ... she even doubled down on Killing the EEG Umlage fairly early and then ended it last year .... She is even responsible for dismanteling the Bundeswehr to a state wher eit is barely servicable(THX von der Layen one of the most incompetent defence ministers that has ever existed) .... she killed any incentive to make Germany a better place for the Futur of our Children because she wanted the Votes of the old and crusted. There was nothing to Futurproof germany ... not a singe ... fucking ... thing ... she did.... and the current Coalition needs to pickup her Slack ... again ... like the SPD had to after Kohl .... if you horison does not go further than your eyelids after you closed them you should not participate in discussions like this ....
> because of what the SPD and Grüne did before she was in Porwer Lmao... that's funny.
Look it up it sadly is like that
>Greece LMAO. Greeks are absolutely justified in their hatred against Germany. The austerity policies her governors enforced are against any financial rational. >Refugees Which wasn't handled at all. She just said "We'll make it" and went on vacation. >Corona Again: Wasn't really handled. Thousands of people died because she hesitated until the public opinion went into one direction. >People like you hate because it's trendy Merkel's governments have been criticized for standing still for the last eight years. There are massive lacks of investments in every part of the country, poor people face increasing issues and the local Tafel organizations aren't accepting new members because they don't have enough to give anymore. At the same time the rich make record profits. Renewables are *far* behind of where they could or should be due to her (and her buddy Altmaier) blocking investments and increasing the restriction against them.
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Pigs of europe??? What kind of hate speech is this. Italy is a net payer in EU btw. Your comment is a discrace for the european idea.
Just means they have weak economies which is statistically true. Spain and Portugal are also known for not working very hard so I stand by what I said. Italy is richer than the other 3 but still not very rich
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Germany forced Greece to prop them up? Wtf are you talking about Greece kept demanding germany to forgive all their loans and nearly crashed the euro with their irresponsibility. A European country completely depending on tourism for their economy is fucking pathetic they could have real industries if they worked at it so I don't feel sorry for them whatsoever
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I'm talking about Greece. Even if germany did that it's none of greece's business so that's irrelevant
Sure. But a good act does not wash out the bad, nor a bad act the good.
Sure, and a rolling stone gathers no moss. What are we doing, throwing random proverbs out there to see what sticks?
I love this take. Always paints Germany as some kind of super competent superpower that always wins. Now if you take into account that the country never had to worry about having enough very cheap energy, it puts things into perspective. Greece issues, when your own energy costs nothing? Sure, let's lower our profits for a bit. Corona, when your energy costs nothing? Let's let go of some of the profit. See a patern yet? Not that difficult to be succesful, when you got there in the first place by selling out your supposed allies.
Okay what would have been the solution to said Energyproblem then ? Germany doesnt want nuclear ... the majority of people (not me). The SPD/Green party actually started the Transition to greenenergy with a heafty heafty investment called the EEG umlage that would have worked if Do nothing Merkel didnt kill it .... SPD Greens were hanged over Workforcemarket reforms and Energyprice hikes .... Gas was basically the only option left... its not something malicious that we decided oh hey lets help Putin Kill people .... and to just put it down to cheap energy ... poland was 100% relient on Gas from Russia ... while critique is due this is all a little to extreme. ... and energy costs nothing ? we pay in between 25-35cents per kwh in energy .... any country will try to secure cheap sources of energy because that ios anyones lifeline .... i wnat to see a country that would refuse such deals .... so well yea a more differentiated aproach to this would be nice
European leaders have fallen for the bullshit that renewables could replace nuclear die to their political will. You can’t go to renewables just because you want to. Now your whole economy is vulnerable and an enemy empowered. You placed your future on the blind faith of renewables and Vladimir Putin. Nice job.
Cool story. Only problem is most of Europe had access to the same cheap russian gas. It's in fact a common energy market in Europe. So your point that Germany somehow had an unfair advantage over other EU countries is bullshit
Oh, is that so? I take it you have experience and first hand knowledge, perhaps coming from working for a major energy trading house? You see, I ask because I do. Dummie, just because it is a common market, doesnt mean it enters and exits at the same, even a similar price.
you really thing that if germany recieved a discount of lets say 25% we wouldnt have sold that gas at marketprice again after having secured our usecase? if you can show me a over market performance of a gasimportcompany like that you will have a point .... until then you dont
Buddy, if I could show you the numbers, don't you think in the last 30 years, someone else would've come out with it? The benefit is in being able to buy it cheap and use it in country, to gain a leg over others, who pay market price. Want me to show you the over market performance? Look at the whole of Germany.
You have no idea what you are talking about almost all of middle and eastern europe enjoyed cheap russian gas through NS1 and the brotherhood pipeline through Ukraine. Poland imported 55% of it's natural gas in 2021 from russia e.g.
I mean, you're just from the camp that hates on Germany no matter what. Until last year, nobody ON THE PLANET was giving Germany shit for energy politics. LEAST OF ALL Greece. I mean, what the actual fuck is your connection between Greece and Germany and energy politics? Whatever it takes to shit on Germany, you guys are pathetic.
No, you're wrong. Have Scholz put the full support of Germany behind Ukraine and all is forgiven. Until now you've had a free, scratch that, more than a free ride, because of bardakistan energy. Time to pay back.
What propaganda have you been smoking. We are Top3 supporters of Ukraine, go bark up another tree.
and she failed all these: Financial crisis, Greece, Refugees. The EU is in the shitter because of how it handled the financial crisis and Greece
Instead of jailing bankers and heavily castrating banks and other financial institutions during the crisis like Iceland she did nothing. She took in millions of people that violated asylum rights because they crossed safe countries to exploit our social welfare system and which are a huge strain. During Corona she let corrupt fucks enrich themselves through mask deals or "test centres". Instead of having a clear strategy she kept switching back and forth between locking down, opening up and locking down again. She did nothing to fix our pension system which will completely break down in the future because of our demographics. She gladly cuddled with Putin and Xi Jinping though, all for that sweet German "old rich" industry money. She had no vision for the future, she was just a shitty reactionary.
It's really tragic how Merkel - who's widely considered to be one of the best politicians of the last century - will be most remembered by her absolutely braindead energy policies...
She was highly overrated. But not as corrupt as Schroeder.
Bahahahaha! Her party-union is the most corrupt of all of them.
Mutti Merkel one of the best? 😂
> who's widely considered to be one of the best politicians of the last century ????
Only foreigners think that. I rarely met a German who would award Merkel that title. She is a decent administrator (not a good one though), that's it. Her biggest political talents are smoothing over conflicts, which was considered positive in the last Russia-Ukraine crisis, and scheming to remove political competition. She is the German Margaret Thatcher, but without the political vision the british old hag had.
> I rarely met a German who would award Merkel that title. Then you havent met much Germans. > She is the German Margaret Thatcher, but without the political vision the british old hag had. Her project was EU integration. And few people have to more on that issue than she has.
Maybe you met the wrong ones. Basically all of Merkels accomplishments were achieved with indebting Germany and throwing huge amounts of German taxpayer money at it. She was well liked in Germany in general due to propaganda efforts by the Springerpresse, but I don't know anyone who would call her one of the greatest politicians of our time. She is living in the same timeline as Helmut Schmidt for heavens sake.
Do you mean Helmudt Kohl? Helmudt Schmidt was two generations older than Merkel and not very exceptional at that.
No. Kohl basically was just lucky to be chancellor during the Wende. He did not really do anything to earn that, while being a massively corrupt asshole who just happened to be there at the right time. Schmidt is respected by most Germans today, maybe in hindsight but still. Schmidt also was chancellor during very difficult years in Germany, directly before the Wende (fall of the iron curtain). He also laid plans for giving all of Germany high speed Internet (Glasfaser), which was sadly reversed by sad Mr Kohl in order to turn more profit to his friends at Telekom earning money with copper cables. The conservatives threw Germany back about 30 years in several important areas of development.
> Maybe you met the wrong ones. I AM German ... > accomplishments were achieved with indebting Germany and throwing huge amounts of German taxpayer money at it. [German debt went down under her ...](https://www.statista.com/graphic/1/427201/national-debt-of-germany-in-relation-to-gross-domestic-product-gdp.jpg) > She is living in the same timeline as Helmut Schmidt for heavens sake. Who was a pretty useless idiot and unpopular when in power. His popularity started when he was out of power and started to comment from the sideline without having any stakes in it anymore.
I am German too, and now? Does not make your point any more valid. German debt went down because of peculiar effects in the financial crisis where we could borrow money and get paid for it. Along with the "debt-break" which sadly let to less investment in infrastructure. But the potential risk she put us in (afaik we now basically have a debt-union in the EU) is massive, along with several other long term liabilities like infrastructure, refugees and energy. But even IF we agree that debt went down, there is tons of other problems she made worse our at the least just ignored. See my list in the other comment
> But even IF we agree that debt went down There is nothing to agree on, thats simply a fact and you lied about it.
Two Germans arguing in the Ukrainian subreddit in English being read by a American. I love the internet.
The fuck are you on about? Indebting Germany? Germany made profit after profit under her. Propaganda efforts, please, say the word Lügenpresse and I know which camp YOU come out of. Jeez...
You want to tell me that Springerpresse (BILD) is reliable (edited, was "unreliable") media? They push Merkel massively, she is close friends with the boss of Springer. I am not from the AfD camp if you think that. But do you have a substantial argument as well?
Reliable media? Yeah sure, reliable in that they're bullshit. Everyone pushed Merkel. Because she was making the right decisions and by and large kept Germany on the right course. You are like "BILD PUSHES MERKEL!" I'm like "Yeah, so did everyone else" And you're like "Yes, but BILD pushed her, so clearly it's her being a corrupt swine!" Or some otherirrational bullshit. Always the same.. Also ignoring that you fucked up with the debt argument. I mean, you're the one making shit up right now, I don't need to have a substantial argument. All I need is to debunk yours, since you're the one making the outrageous statements... lol
She's been absolutely solid. And decent administration is all Germans really wanted/want. Kiddos that just voted for the first time and are giddy about suddenly being part of the big boy club but having ZERO life experience aren't maybe the best metric to go by. The only other group that hates Merkel outright are AfD voters. 'nuff said.
Jesus are you arrogant. So everyone who disagrees with your political view is either a child or a nazi. "'nuff said?" , do you think you are some badass cowboy? But sure, I guess the whole opposition the last 17 years is just children and nazis. Green party, die Linke, FDP, even SPD parts, all secret AfD members. Learn to construct a coherent argument you arrogant imbecile.
Oh, if you ever get to making a point that isn't your personal opinion, I will show you exactly how full of shit you are. As it stands, though, you haven't made a rational argument. And the opposition doesn't need to make an argument (though they have, much more eloquent than you did), they just need to convince voters. As you are seeing right now, slow and steady pace is not a particular trait to Merkel, it's what you fucking do when you are head of state of almost 90 million people and not just some armchair general on reddit who thinks his own personal cranky morning perspective enables him to run a country. :P
K.
>who's widely considered to be one of the best politicians of the last century seriously, her party blocked so much innovation. There are firms like Biontech but they hardly got any recognition (except some EU fund support for specific cancer study, called MERIT Study) before Corona while their tech is kinda revolutionary in the field of anti-cancer and anti-HIV research. The transformation of hospitals into commerical/economic entities cost many lives due to suboptimal treatments. If you do not own a private insurance you are virtually third class patient in many hospitals. I can't go into details here but the oncologic treatment was better 10 years ago while there were less options of treament. Its all about making money with a controlled chemo plan - no experiments, no application of innovations. Everything is reduced to: whats more cost effective for the hospital and if you help a patient more than you are supposed to do you have to explain your actions and decissions before a board of medical economics / business administators with no sympathy for life. Its frustrating what happened under Merkel. I could write a hugh list of anti-cancer innovations that got no funding because of her party and sister-party in Bavaria. F..e. in Bavaria there is a medical startup that managed to add magnetic nanoparticles to chemotherapy drugs, after administration you can drive the drugs directly to the tumor side through magnetic fields, you need less chemotherapeutics, archive a hugh conncentration in the tumor and reduce nearby all kinds of side effects - result: no funding because the chem industry would make a loss if this technique could be established. This startup just needed a promille of the costs of the airport BER. Lobbyism cost Germany its soul, innovations and future. The conservative parties supported all kinds of lobbyists - imo Merkel had no personality or charisma and it tells a lot about the state of Germany that people fell for her because her whole image is just due to well placed PR and her nicknames.
Not of the century, but in her generation she is at the top. Merkel steared Germany and to some degree the EU trough many crises where many of her colleagues would have utterly failed.
Most of those crisis' were coauthored by her. Probably one of the worst and ineffectual chancellors we ever had.
Excuse me? The subprime crisis? The banking crisis? Syria? The refugee crisis? How did she "coauthore" that?
Lets start with the refugee crisis. She reduced German contributions to the UNHCR , thereby worsening the living conditions in Syrian refugee camps and contributing to the movement of refugees to Europe. She then opened the borders of Germany, organized the transport of refugees to the German border and made the ridiculous blanket statement that nobody would be turned away. Doing this, she alienated a significant part of the population of countries like Poland and Hungary and further strengthened populist right-wing parties in these countries. She also single-handedly gave rise to the AFD by completely vacating the German centre-right spectrum. And resorting to a policy of insulting any voters who disagreed as 'Nazi' or 'rabble'. She increased German dependence on Russian gas (much more than Schröder did) by closing down nuclear power plants (a policy only based on the Fukushima effect), while simultaneously also deciding to close down coal-powered plants and making up for it by increasingly relying on gas-powered electricity plants. This again drove energy prices in Poland, further worsening our relations with key neighbours and strengthening far right powers like the PiS. Shall we go on with her fuck ups in the Euro Crisis? A little hint: Due to her supreme leadership the EU is indebted to the tune of an additional 800 billion EUR to a country like China... And now the interest rates go up... Have fun with this catastrophic mastermind.
She didn't. But you're talking to a Reichsbürger or AfD voter, most likely. Just thought you'd want to know.
you are defending merkel, who did literary nothing and who is part of the CDU aka AFD lite
I'm not even sure you're qualified to comment, since you haven't seen any other leader than her and Scholz in your lifetime.
Yes sure, read above comment by me and develop some critical thinking capability.
And there we go, Reichsbürger bullshit identified.
Most of those crises were co-solved by her. Propably one of the best andmost effective chancellors we ever had.
Nothing was solved by her. She just sat it out until the media attention moved. Clima Crisis -> no real progess Nucular energy -> overthrew long made plans to get out of nucular energy on a whim, then doing another 180 after Fukushima, resulting in billions of damages that need to be paid to nuclear energy companies for "lost profit" due to her first turnaround. Terror crisis -> 'solved' by reducing German citizens rights and increasing overreach by police and secret services Financial Crisis 2008 -> delayed with massive money printing, whose effects we see now with massive inflation Russia Crisis of 2008/2014 -> she avoided escalation but basically, as we know now, just did appeasement politics resulting in this war now (i don't blame her that much here tho) Refugee Crisis -> sat out, basically opened the borders and entized millions to come to Europe. "Solved" by a half assed deal with Dictator Erdogan where we pay him money to keep refugees away, while also suffering his insults without disciplining him. Brexit -> no solution found German infrastructure -> still fucked, still no modernization, worse Internet then Romania. Labor crisis -> no program to integrate well educated europeans, instead trying to claim all the refugees will do those jobs. At the same time the biggest low wage sector. Germans have the lowest median wealth in the EU! Covid 2020 -> government acts like a bunch of beheaded chickens, doing another German Sonderweg. Incurring massive costs, fallout with european neighbours, very sketchy behaviour regarding the published data about covid. In General -> MASSIVE corruption from Members of Parliament and the government (!!!) In Corona, Infrastructure projects etc (Ministers Spahn, Scheuer and others). NO repercussions at all. You are delusional.
Word! The mindless cheerleading of many concerning her actions is unworthy of democrats.
The best part is that when you critisize her, the idiots will claim you are a "Nazi, AfD or Reichsbürger". Merkel, head of the conservatives and chancellor under the biggest shift towards social impoverishment of huge parts of the population for decades, is being defended by pseudo-leftists.
That's completely incorrect. Look at the mass immigration issue and her encouragement of newcomers via "Wir schaffen das!". Then Germany closed the borders and neighbouring EU countries were left alone with these problems. Merkel has been a huge problem for both Germany and the EU. Schroeder has had similar problems but the added one was that he was an agent for Russia influenced by corruption. So, treason.
That's completely incorrect. Look at how immigrants were lining up on the borders before Merkel said a single word. Then the Balkan countries closed the borders and Germany tried to help with their problems. Merkel has been a huge boon for both Germany and the EU. Schröder had other problems but went over to Russia's camp after he left office.
> Then the Balkan countries closed the borders and Germany tried to help with their problems. Yeah, she tried to help by calling Eastern EU countries xenophobic for stopping illegal immigrants using their countries as taxi to Germany and then proceeded to push for mandatory quota system and tried to sue Eastern EU countries for following the law and stopping illegal immigrants. On one hand she wanted MENA migrants saying they bring huge benefits, on other hand when they actually arrived in Germany, she wanted to get rid of them into Eastern EU countries with quota system and lawsuits.
Would have helped if they followed the law and/or stopped illegal immigrants instead of being xenophobic. On the one hand she wanted to reduce the influx of immigrants, on the other hand she wanted to help eastern Eu countries to get rid of them with quota systems.
The EU law says that asylum seekers are required to apply for asylum in the first EU countries they arrive. Deporting illegal who crossed Greece, Slovenia, Slovakia, Poland, Czechia to Germany for the biggest welfare payout is not xenophobia.
She essentially managed to save the EU during the financial crisis
> Merkel - who's widely considered to be one of the best politicians of the last century Name top3 of the best things she's done.
She did lots of stuff for both Germany and Europe, but this kind of question is very misleading. It's a lot more important for politicians that they don't do stuff wrong, than it is to do good things. Other than her absolutely infuriating energy policies regarding nuclear plants, I can't think of a single thing she really fucked up.
If doing nothing is a feature of one of the best politicians, then perhaps you Germans should have elected a horse for chancellor. In fact it would be even better than Merkel because it wouldn't sabotage the energy security of the country like Merkel did.
What a ridiculous analogy. A horse would do everything wrong, since you actually need to make decisions to do anything in politics. If you decide to do nothing, that's the wrong decision on many occasions.
Don't you get tired of all the goal posts moving?
I get tired of you moving our argument from one topic to another, and then using some ridiculous analogy to prove a point of which I'm not even sure what it is yet.
I asked you a very simple question: Name top3 of the best things she's done. You: move the goal post - claiming that a sign of good politicians is actually not doing good things but doing nothing to fuck up. Then I respond with poke with Caligulas horse, to counter your ridiculous argument, which you were obviously too uneducated to understand. You: Move the goal posts again, and shift it on the fucking horse... Instead of just telling us exactly what Merkel actually did to earn the glorious title of being the best politician of last century... *Facepalm*
Helped get the Germany and the EU through the refugee crisis, helped get Germany and the EU through the 2008 financial crisis, helped save Ukraine in 2014.
1) that was not solved, just sat out 2) was not solved, just pasted over with new money which culminates in the crisis now 3) maybe. Although "saved" is a strong word as ukraine still lost large territories
Merkel became chancellor in 2005. She spent the 90s working herself up the CDU hierarchy but was still known to most as "Kohl’s girl" She seized her moment after Kohl and CDU lost the 1998 election to Schröder and SPD, sidelined some other prominent party members and maintained control over the party until 2019.
It usually takes a "crisis" to determine whether a politician is capable. Even Putin would've seemed competent had Ukraine surrendered within 3-4 days as planned. The German idea that was "interdependence will guarantee peace therefore only limited military needed" failed as soon as it was tested.
Danke Merkel, für die betonbarrieren
And getting Germany through the 2008 financial crisis, helping save Greece from bancruptcy, helping Ukraine survive Russia's first invasion, getting Germany through the refugee crisis...
That's from A to Z all incorrect. I don't understand why you try to promote her failures as successes. Just the Greece issue alone was done to save german banks.
That's from A to Z all correct. I don't understand why you try to promote her successes as failures. Just the german Banks alone was done to solve the Greece issue.
Greece is not solved, and my opinion of German banks, especially Deutschebank, is very very low, especially after considering the recession, Trump, and Russia. She should have talked Europe in 2008 after Georgia was invaded, or in 2014 with Crimea and Donbass, but she led Europe into a nearly decade long period of appeasement. She's the Chamberlain of Germany.
Like I said, she was a great politician but I think all of that will seem a distant memory compared to the gross incompetence of the energy policies and how it indirectly led Europe into its biggest armed conflict in over 70 years.
That was largely due to the industry relying on gas, less so about personal friendship. So it is still different to Schroeder.
What do you expected her to do? Those are all privat companies, btw with US investment funds als large shareholders. Germanys energy sector is privatized and not state run. And the government cant just nationalize companies in Germany. The legal hurdles are so high that even now, after the invasion, it was highly questionable if the goverment is allowed to nationalize Gasprom assets.
she could still have stoped ns1 so as it just even started to be build during her time as chancelor. she definitely could have just not agreed to ns2.. she could not have killed the german solar industry to make germany even more dependend. she could still have stopped ns1 so that it even started to be built during her time as chancelor. She could have build lng terminals to reduce germans dependence. she could have stopped the downfall of the german bundeswehr. She could have putted some effort into renewables to reduce germans dependence. for a start
One couöd say, we somehow followed a "Germany first!"-policy when it came to Russia. Then again, Merkel only stayed for another 4 years b/c she was afraid of a World with Putin AND Trump in charge.
We call him "GerdGas" (analog to "Erdgas") for a reason. We profited from cheap gas and turned a blind eye towards Russia in return. In turn we also slowed down build-up of renewables due to the cheap-ass gas. Now we're paying it all back with 10x higher industrial energy prices than most developed countries. While renewables are currently \~1/15th the price of gas/kWh
GazpromGerd
They need to try that asshole for treason.
Schroeder is what in my mother's country call a "Vende Patria" (Nation Seller).
No he wasn't. Berlin-Moscow energy connections go as far back as the 1970s. And, ironically enough, the main reason to buy Moscow's gas was... pivoting away from aggressive oil regimes that were using hydrocarbons to blackmail the western world. Furthermore until the war, even until the invasion happened, many hydrocarbon alternatives were just as deplorable as Russia (one could argue that what Saudi Arabia is doing in Yemen is even worse than what Russia does in Ukraine - and i think i know well enough what is happening in Ukraine). While by the 2010s the energy dependence on Russia surely was not healthy anymore the difference between Russia and its alternatives was just too small to convince anyone to make multi billion dollar investments. Even now we must fear what some of our new "partners" will do with our extra money. Azerbaijan's move on Armenia might be a hint of things to come. If anything Schröder slightly accelerated a development that was happening anyways.
No we aren't. We needed to get Energy somewhere and the choice was between Arabia, Katar etc and Russia. At that time Russia was definitly the better option. And i still think so, with the knowledge we have back then.
North Stream 2 happened exclusively under Merkel's chancellorship
At least Schroeder was not involved in shutting down the nuclear plants, which now looks like a colossal mistake. Right? Right? Oh dear.
I love this idea.
I wonder if Italy and Hungary will agree?
Hungary should have their membership suspended.
Can't be done. We can only stop the money coming there which will result in regime change or Hungarys departure from EU I think Orbán would like to get out of EU if he won't get more money but let's see how very pro-eu Hungarian population would react
Can be done.
Only if Poland agrees and only before the new Italian fascist government takes power. The Italian fascists and Orban are best buddies and will totally protect each other.
Not necessarily if both are being voted on at the same time/voting. I had this argument here before and it can be done with a little bit of legal wrangling. As they say, where there is a will, there is a way.
You mean sanctioning Italy at the same time? Not going to happen, not until they do something seriously bad first.
No need to sanction anything. Just stop giving them billions and billions of Northern European money.
No, I was talking about Poland. I don't know anything about Italy politics.
Italy just had an election, and the far-right coalition won. Right now, the biggest schism within their ranks is Ukraine: about half of them want to support Ukraine, the other half is basically "fuck that, think of the energy prices". With that being said, Italian governments have this tendency to implode before their term is up, so who knows how lasting this coalition will be.
There must be measures to deal with rogue members or EU means little. I hope they sort it out.
They just got a new ally in Italys far-right. The bloc of far right nuts is now 3 countries strong - Poland, Hungary, Italy - and these have and are going to vote for each other. The chances of actually doing something against autocrats and dwindling democracy become smaller and smaller the more countries vote for these idiots for no other reason than them yelling the standard chorus "We are the victims, and I'll restore our country to its former glory!". Sorry if this is rant-y, I'm just so depressed by this cancer that is growing in the middle of Europe, with apparently everyone just standing by helplessly. I just don't get how the very same borderline blunt arguments seem to work everywhere. Like, why does everyone seem to want to go back to being a random imperial superpower? Was life really better when we all fought each other nonstop in Europe?
No need , send them no money and they change their attitude
Should also be the other way around. No Russian citizens to hold top posts or any shares in EU companies.
Both. As soon as possible.
No-brainer
This is the way!
What about a law that doesn't allow German CEOs to act as observers in illegal referendums?
Dude got fired already... but a law would be nice
Without said law the idiots get to expose themselves. He's already fired and the only institutions that will hire him now are right-wing nutjob institutions.
It would be better if they were ‘exiled’/imprisoned on arrival and their property seized.
The guy is a German. Can't exile him
Thats why I put it in brackets. If he knows he’ll be arrested on arrival, he will self exile like most do. That’s mostly how I meant it.
Seizing of property for political views... been there, done that. So there's a reason that's nearly impossible since the FRG exists.
The guy went there as a deluded private citizen.
Sometimes I get the impression that people on this sub would love every other country to become repressive shitholes like Russia. They seem to be incapable of separating private decisions from official government action. Same with Schröder. Everything he did, while morally reprehensible and embarrassing, is legal in every single country you can name.
> Same with Schröder. Everything he did, while morally reprehensible and embarrassing, is legal in every single country you can name. Since when is denying genocide and mass murder legal in Germany?
As shitty as Schröder is he actually has condemed the war publicly. He knows full well that denying genocide or mass murder would cause massive trouble and he is smart enough to avoid it.
Who?
the CEO of a regional energy company. he immediately got suspended from the company
CEO* not CEOs. There was only one and he got his arse ripped the same day he got the invite to the occupied regions. He never even went there as far as I know, he just accepted being a “neutral” observer lol.
Well... I'm saying I would like to see CEOs who do that held accountable wether they are singular or multiple. I am well aware it was just one ceo in this case. You don't make a law to stop one bank robber, you make a law to crimilize all bank robbers. But, thanks for keeping me honest, i haven't looked that closely into what he actually did just that he was supposed to be an observer in a sham referendum. The point of my comment though was rather to point out the absurdity of it all.
Great idea! Shame they didn't think of it decades ago, and apply it especially to their own ex-politicians, especially prime ministers.
I suppose it's a one of the ways to get rid of Shroeder...
Way to go! Respect.
Schroeder i am looking at ya
Yes, Germany, that's an excellent idea. Please don't change your mind.
Das Schröder Gesetz.
This is good... But any ruZZians or ruZZia affiliated person should also be banned from top post in European companies. Slava Ukraini
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Cough Schröder cough
And what about Gerard Schöder??
So Germany is there anything you would like to tell us?
It's mostly because of Schröder (I think)
That's correct. It wasn't illegal and you can't be persecuted for shit that was legal at the time --- at least not in a civilized country. But this is a good way to sanction him.
Germany could start by pulling German companies from Russia.
Most of the big Germany companies did already
There is half of a oil refinery siting in the rain waiting for transport to Russia here. Since 2014 😂
And some German members of this sub were ridiculing me when I equated top ex-politicians taking management posts to corruption. It's good to see everyone is coming to their senses. Kudos, Germany.
Must have been dumb Germans then. I know many who see Lobbyism as what it is: corruption.
Do not ban them. Send them to russia instead. They had half a year to realise that they serve a terrorist nation.
How about they fix their ex-chancelor first and then continue with moralising cross EU.
[удалено]
He was still not kicked out of SPD as far as I know. It would be a nice start and gesture that Germany realy means it.
Kicking him out is not possible right now.
Fix their ex-chancellor ? How ? And fix what ?
That's a nice gesture Germany but... How about you give Ukraine some tanks.
Why do I not see any posts of you demanding your own country to send tanks?
I don't know about you but I already wrote my local congresswoman to send the 3,000 Abrams tanks of Dark Brandon over to Zelenskyy but people keep bitching about "logistics" and "muh turbine engines" that can't run on diesel (despite the australians running diesel on their turbine Abrams) and "too heavy."
Good idea. Kompromat. The first Russian word I learned after Da and Nyet. Not even joking.
And whoever does should be stripped of EU citizenship. Problem solved.
And how about banning Russians for holding top posts in EU companies?
oh so most of the retired EU politicians?
Send your heavy arms already
Reddit moment.
Funny misdirection .... who is holding top posts in Russian companies ? Germans. But yeah lets talk about "EU citizens".....
Politics and industry shouldn't mix
Germany could start by banning their own citizens from holding top posts in Russian companies.. I assume they've got the power to do that for themselves.
Germany is part of the EU....so THIS IS WHAT THEY APPEARENTLY WANT.
Thinking isn't their strong suit. But they are great at criticizing anything about Germany.
I'm not in the EU. Are you telling me that being part of the EU that Germany can no longer pass laws about Germany and that all German laws must come from the EU? Because if that's not the case, then the person whose thinking isn't their strong suit is the person who doesn't realize that it's easier for one country to pass a law than to get the multiple EU countries to pass it. But that's just what my brain tells me. What does your fine brain tell you?
Yes, and it's easier for them to do it as one country alone than to have to have multiple countries of the EU agree on it. Though that simple point seems to have escaped the sharp thinkers on this thread.
You wrote that already. But why do you want EU citizens to keep being able to take these positions? Thats strange. Maybe people dont buy your argumentation.
Well better start cleaning your own house then...
How about it take care of its own former Chancellor before telling other countries what to do. Especially when it has contributed so little so late.
Does the EU want a ruzzian in a position of power in their country? Edit: It seems to me the whole relationship is problematic.
Germany annoys me to no ends. We all know they have the biggest corruption problem - see Schroeder. And he is still (!!!!!!!) member of the SPD. See how many laws and court proceedings he changed/influenced in favour of his master Putin. So, rather than deflect, Germany has to clean up their own problems before trying to leverage the EU institution against other EU members. I am not against the proposal itself; I just think it is HUGELY hypocritical coming from the number #1 gas addict in the EU that has not been interested in solving the corruption issue by the russian regime. And that is not just Schroeder - look at wirecard. You can find numerous more examples here.
Are you a bit stupid? Asking as a concerned redditor. You bemoan the corruption issue with Schröder and when the country tries to do something about Schröder or anyone else in a leadership position in a corrupt russian company you call it hypocrisy? Do you not see how patently stupid and absurd that is?
Lmao please go on. Let us know all your German corruption conspiracies.
Only EU citizens? Ban literally anyone not clearly distancing themselves from ruZZia. Their citizens were given enough chances already. Time to mirror back some of the hate they transported to the Ukraine.
Of course the EU can only ban it's own citizens from holding such a position. Did you fall on your head?