Greece is a hot topic in Germany's election campaign, as the two main parties argue over another bailout for Athens. Greek MEP Dimitrios Droutsas told DW that these decisions shouldn't be made during an election.

DW: Mr. Droutsas, Greece is once again the subject of much discussion in Germany. There's talk of a new aid package, or even another debt cut. What do you think about this, from a European perspective?

Dimitrios Droutsas: I think one should never pay any attention to election dates and election campaigns when important decisions are involved. I know that, especially to German ears, it doesn't sound very good and it's not very popular, but I still believe that if we want to find a permanent solution, not only for the crisis in Greece but for the euro crisis as a whole, we have to be open and tell the truth, even if it's sometimes bitter.

If we really want to find a solution, it won't be possible, in my opinion, without a second debt cut for Greece. And Greece will probably need more financial assistance to get through the next few years. That doesn't sound good, but it's the truth, and we have to face these truths.

It's actually been obvious for months that there has to be another debt cut, and further assistance, too. Economic experts in Germany are saying the same, and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) is saying it in its reports. Are you surprised that it's become a big topic of discussion all of a sudden?

http://www.dw.de/droutsas-greece-could-be-a-victim-of-german-election/a-17054985

In Germany, the press is not dominated by a shitty press baron... The press is far truer to reality and is not trying to be controversial with stories that have no credibility. 

Unfortunately in Australia, the press has been working its butt off to undermine the good work of a good government... The media has basically spread porkies designed to capture the mind of the gullible and force feed the crap from the conservatives... Under the leadership of this rubbish of a man, Uncle Rupe, the press has constantly denigrated the country's performance — while the country performed well in a difficult international situation. Most of this over-influential stand of the press has been designed to give the rein of this fair country back into the hands of ruthless robbers, mad people and tax avoiders and religious bigots. Tony Abbott encompass all four categories:

He robs the government of entitlements when performing "charitable" acts.

I believe Tony is mad most of the times, though he tries to appear sane. Actually the smart man in the street called the libs (conservatives) COMPLETELY INSANE..

I suspect Tony, or some of his mates, tried to avoid some tax when he formed the "Australian for Honest Politics" "trust", a trust mostly designed to shaft another right wing political party and this is why they never released the names of who was part of this very "borderline" political trust. As well, Tony does not want to pay "the Carbon Tax" which so far is the only realistic positive action taken by Australia to combat global warming.Tony has a completely insane replacement for this efficient tax, with no other conviction than "global warming is crap"...

And of course, we all know that Tony Abbott sits to the right of George Pell and is most likely sponsored by Opus Dei. The launch of the libs (conservatives) education policy in a highly bigoted religious private school shows how far he hates public education.

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Under the guidance of the Merde-och press, the mass media of Australia has told fibs after porkies after lies about the Labor party performance and has promoted Tony Abbott to the level of a god-like god... Tony is the devil in the non-details of his 5-pillar policies which are a straight borrowing from religious concepts: the five pillars of Christianity and the five pillars of Islam...

 

This level of press manipulation could not happen in France, not in Germany, not even in Russia. The press in Russia is far more equitable and cultured than the press in this county of merde-och fed chooks, Australia...

 

SO PLEASE, DO NOT VOTE FOR MURDOCH AT THE NEXT ELECTION ON SEPTEMBER 7 2013... Kick Abbott in the budgies.

Just weeks after the German election, Angela Merkel's conservatives received donations totalling 690,000 euros from the family that owns almost half of BMW. The payment coincides with Berlin's forceful intervention to halt tough new CO2 curbs for carmakers in the EU.

 

Chancellor Angela Merkel's Christian Democratic Union (CDU) received a hefty donation from major shareholders of BMW last week. That in itself isn't unusual. The Quandt/Klatten family, which owns 46.7 percent of the Munich-based premium automaker, has traditionally been among the party's most faithful donors. On Oct. 9, the family transferred a total of €690,000 ($935,000) to the CDU, according to the parliament's administrative body which published the payment on its website. But this time, the cash injection coincided with a government decision that helps automakers like BMW.

 

On Monday, European Union environment ministers gave in to German demands to scrap an agreement to cap EU car emissions. Berlin had argued the limits would cost jobs and hurt Germany's car industry.

After months of forceful lobbying from Germany, the ministers from the 28 EU member states agreed to reopen a deal sealed in June. German carmakers Daimler and BMW produce heavier vehicles that consume more fuel than vehicles made by firms such as Italy's Fiat. That means they would find it harder to meet a proposed EU cap on carbon emissions of 95 grams per kilometer for all new cars from 2020, analysts say.

 

 

http://www.spiegel.de/international/europe/cdu-gets-donation-from-bmw-owners-during-co2-talks-a-927954.html

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German policymakers are striking back at the United States, after a US Treasury report blasted the country's massive trade surplus. Sensitivities in Berlin are still high over US spying on Chancellor Angela Merkel.

A day after a US Treasury Department report bluntly denounced Germany's economic model, accusing it of hampering the euro zone recovery and hurting global growth, Germany called the conclusions "incomprehensible" and challenged the US to "analyze its own economic situation."

The Treasury's semiannual currency report criticized Germany's overreliance on exports, a high current-account surplus and weak domestic demand. These factors "have hampered rebalancing at a time when many other euro-area countries have been under severe pressure," the report concluded, citing budget tightening in the euro periphery. "The net result has been a deflationary bias for the euro area, as well as for the world economy."The German Economics Ministry responded in a statement with equally harsh words, saying that Germany's surplus is "a sign of the competitiveness of the German economy and global demand for quality products from Germany."

Germany to Blame?

The report -- traditionally a forum for ridiculing alleged Chinese currency manipulation -- noted that Germany's nominal current account surplus for 2012 was greater than that of China. Germany's surplus rose to $238.5 billion in 2012, compared to China's $193.1 billion, according to the World Bank.

http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/germany-defends-trade-surplus-after-critical-us-treasury-report-a-931126.html

It was also a coincidence that when Chancellor Angela Merkel met the Chinese premier with military honors, the Nobel Committee was announcing the winners of this year's Peace Prize. The coincidence made it hard not to think of China's two past winners of the Nobel Prize. One of them, Liu Xiaobo, has been in prison since 2009 and isn't scheduled to be released until 2020. The other, the Dalai Lama, was forced to leave more than half a century ago and has been fighting ever since for the rights of minorities in his homeland.

The German-Chinese government consultations were carried out with a routine order - differing views on demonstrations in Hong Kong and irritation over the arrest of a German journalist in Beijing were only minor issues in the discussions. The result is also impressive: business contracts worth billions and ten government agreements. The so-called investment partnership was spelled out in a 35-page report. China will also be the partner country for next year's Cebit, the annual electronics exhibition held in Hanover.

A new strategic dialogue in foreign and security policy will add to the already manifold avenues for discussion, there will also be room for financial dialogue involving central bankers from both countries. Hardly anything in the world can get done without China. When it comes to the Ukraine crisis, for example, the German government hopes for cautionary words from Li Keqiang when he leaves Berlin for Moscow. All in all, a look at German-Chinese relations brings to mind a phrase often used in business partnerships between the two countries: "sleeping in the same bed but dreaming different dreams."

read more http://www.dw.de/opinion-different-dreams-in-a-shared-bed/a-17987637

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In recent weeks, von der Leyen has made it clear that Germany also has an obligation to intervene militarily if the threat of genocide exists somewhere. "Germany is even damned to take accept greater responsibility," she said, alluding to the country's difficult history. Von der Leyen wants to transform the Bundeswehr, the country's armed forces, into an intervention army capable of mastering deployments like those in Kosovo or Afghanistan. But the idea of deterrence based on powerful combat units and heavy weapons has also gained currency as a result of the crisis in Ukraine.

Little to Offer in Berlin

Against that backdrop and pressure from the international community, the ramshackle state of the Bundeswehr is no laughing matter in Berlin. At the moment, if Germany's allies were to ask it to step up its participation in deployments in the Baltic states or Iraq, for example, Chancellor Merkel would likely have to politely pass, creating a highly embarrassing situation for the country. For the moment, though, most pressure related to the Bundeswehr's ailments has been directed at von der Leyen. Her critics argue that she has pursued a foreign and security policy vision that goes beyond the Bundeswehr's actual capabilities. Now she faces additional criticism that she tried to play down the military's problems to members of parliament even though senior officials in her ministry were well aware of major shortcomings in the armed forces.

"Contrary to her own list of needed equipment, she created the impression in parliament that anything that could drive, fly or float was capable of full deployment," said Rainer Arnold, the defense policy spokesman for the center-left Social Democrats (SPD). "But we members of parliament will not be taken for idiots."

read more: http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/ramshackle-army-at-odds-with-berlin-s-global-aspirations-a-994607.html

 

Hummm....

 

 

U.S. President Donald Trump voiced significant displeasure over Germany's trade surplus on Thursday during a meeting with European Union leaders in Brussels. "The Germans are bad, very bad," Trump said, according to meeting participants.

The participants told DER SPIEGEL that Trump went on to say: "See the millions of cars they are selling to the U.S. Terrible. We will stop this."

European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker showed solidarity with the Germans at the meeting and contradicted Trump's rebuke. Free trade benefits everybody, Juncker said. Participants at the meeting who spoke with DER SPIEGEL said that Juncker tried to maintain a collegial tone, but remained uncompromising on that point.

During the roughly one-hour meeting, Trump met initially with European Council President Donald Tusk and Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker. After about 45 minutes, they were joined by others, including European Parliament President Antonio Tajani and the EU's chief diplomat, Federica Mogherini.

According to a report in the German daily Süddeutsche Zeitung, many EU officials were appalled by how little the Americans appeared to know about trade policy. The guests from Washington seemed not to be aware that EU member states only negotiate trade treaties as a bloc. According to the paper, Trump's chief economic advisor, Gary Cohn, claimed during meetings, for example, that different customs tariffs are in place between the U.S. and Germany than between the U.S. and Belgium.

'Not Gonna Happen'

For years, Germany has exported more than it imports and Trump has criticized the country's trade surplus before - in an interview with the German tabloid Bild prior to his inauguration, for example. In that interview, too, he voiced particular frustration at the number of German cars he sees on the streets of New York. "I would tell BMW if they think they're gonna build a plant in Mexico and sell cars into the U.S. without a 35 percent tax, it's not gonna happen. It's not gonna happen." It was a clear threat to slap punitive tariffs on German automobiles.

The new U.S. president finds Germany's surpluses unfair because they necessarily mean that its trading partners have a trade deficit, the U.S. in this case. But the German government has also been criticized within the EU for its trade surplus. In a recent interview with SPIEGEL, German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schäuble also said that the surplus was too large.

Still, after numerous meetings between European leaders and Trump along with several attempts to explain international trade policy, the EU thought that progress had been made. As Trump made clear on Thursday, however, that hope was in vain.

 

read more:

http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/trump-in-brussels-the-germans-...

 

Anyone with a brain, which Donald hasn't, would know that the Germans are clever people. They invent things that are very precise and well-thought out, including philosophy. Nothing is perfect though. But the USA? The difference is between a freshly-caught trout, deep fried to perfection with the best potatoes wedges and a fresh garden salad -- and McDonald's. The difference is between a BMW -- and a 1970s Cadillac. That is why the President in on a diet of Doritos and Bacon, and lives in a huge mansion with five cooks -- while Merkel lives in modest apartment near a railway bridge under which you can buy Berliner Currywurst... from a mobile caravan...

Yes we know that the President resents that most of the wind turbines, the best ones, are made in Germany... This could be why he does not "believe" in global warming...