Dialog International

Welcome to Germany!

 A busload of women and children refugees receive a völkisch welcome from the "concerned citizens" ("besorgete Bürger") of Clausnitz. 

The chant is "Wir sind das Volk!"  ("We are the Volk!!) which is the traditional greeting in Saxony to all new arrivals to the Volksgemeinschaft.

 

See also What's the matter with Saxony?

Xavier Naidoo - The Truther Troubadour

How tone deaf were the officials at public broadcaster ARD to choose Xavier Naidoo to represent Germany in the 2016 Eurovision song contest?

Xavier Naidoo, a singer of Indian and African heritage whose albums have sold millions, was selected as Germany's candidate by public broadcaster ARD on Thursday, but the uproar in newspapers and social media prompted a swift change of heart.The Eurovision Song Contest started on May 24, 1956 as a television show and has been continuing since the date as an international contests,

But even after Naidoo was forced to withdraw, the ARD officials were in denial:

"Xavier Naidoo is an outstanding singer, who is neither a racist nor homophobic, in my opinion," said Thomas Schreiber, entertainment coordinator of Germany's public broadcaster ARD, of which NDR is a part, on Saturday. "It was obvious that he is a person who polarizes, but the vehemence of the reactions surprised us. We have misjudged the issue."

Xavier Naidoo's worldview is encapsulated in one of his better-known songs: Goldwaagen/Goldwagen

"Fast die gesamte deutsche presse ist bild und taub
Hat die atlantik-brücke euch wirklich alle gekauft
Sowie die basf…helmut kohl
Das die mauer bald fallen würde, wussten sie schon
Leuna, schwarzgeld, elf aquitaine
Meine damen und herren, ich sage bitte schön
Der sumpf ist tief, doch wir packen das schon
Schließlich sind wir nicht irgendeine nazi-john, gladio
Gladio hey
Und wenn den-haag keine täuschung ist
Dann bringen wir euch alle vor dieses gericht
9/11, london und madrid…jeder weiß
Dass al qaida nur die cia ist
World trade center nr. 7
Warum ist von dem gebäude nichts mehr übrig geblieben
Eric-m.-warburg-preis entgegennehm
Heißt: du bist gekauft, angie" ...

Du solltest dich schämen

Hey, it's all here right in front of you, Herr Schreiber.  Anti-American conspiracy ("entire German press bought and sold by the Atlantik-Bruecke"), 9/11 Truther gospel ("9/11/ London/ Madrid - everybody knows that al Qaida is really the CIA") and anti-Semitism (Angela Merkel receives the Warburg Prize "you should be ashamed"). The Eric M.Warburg Award is presented to individuals who have contributed to Germany's place in the Atlantic alliance. Past recipients included Helmut Kohl and the late Richard von Weizsäcker. Angela Merkel "should be ashamed" to be in such company?

Of course, for the large conspiracy theory community in Germany, Eric Warburg, along with the House of Rothschild, is a central figure in the circle of Jewish Bankers who control the US Federal Reserve Bank and  launched World War I, World War II and even funded the Holocaust: 

Das Ziel des Warburg-Plans der nunmehr FED-geleiteten USA war es vor allem, Europa, mit der Zentralmacht Deutschland zu vernichten, indem man es finanziell vollständig ausplünderte … und man muss die Möglichkeiten dieser Ausplünderung unter dem Aspekt von Profiteuren betrachten:

Naidoo's 2009 rap song "Raus aus dem Reichstag" has the following lyrics:

„Ihr wart sehr, sehr böse, steht bepisst in euren Socken. Baron Tothschild gibt den Ton an und er scheißt auf euch Gockel. Der Schmock is’n Fuchs und ihr seid nur Trottel“

This caught the attention of another Eurovision contestant country: Israel. From the Jerusalem Post:

"Singer whose lyrics deride Jews, gays, to sing for Germany at Eurovision -In a song released after the 2008 financial crisis, Naidoo referred to the German-Jewish Rothschild banking family as "Baron Deadschild."

Question for Thomas Schreiber and the ARD team:  Did you really believe the rest of the international community would not take notice?

German grandmother sentenced to prison for Holocaust denial

This is ridiculous:

"A German grandmother aged 87 has been sentenced to ten months in jail for denying the Holocaust and saying Auschwitz was 'just a labour camp'.  

Ursula Haverbeck, who is a friend of Gudrun Burwitz - elderly daughter of Nazi S.S. chief Heinrich Himmler - was sentenced in a court in Hamburg for sedition over an interview she gave to a TV station denying that Jews were murdered in extermination camps.

In the interview with the ARD network she claimed the death camp of Auschwitz in Nazi occupied Poland, where at least 1.1 million people were murdered, was 'nothing more than a labour camp.'"

Maybe I'm a First Amendment absolutist but I value freedom of speech above all other civil rights - even the freedom to speak nonsense - even to deny the Holocaust.  What good does it do to lock up Ursula Haverbeck and make her a martyr to all of her neo-Nazi fans? 

In Die Zeit, Thomas Fischer makes an elegant argument for criminalizing Holocaust denial:

Deshalb ist es richtig, die "Auschwitzlüge" zu bestrafen. Man sollte den Tatbestand in der Wirklichkeit auch tatsächlich anwenden und sich auf das übliche Gerede der Täter nicht einlassen. Und wenn ein liberaler Strafrechtler behauptet, da werde mit dem Strafrecht ein "Tabu" geschützt: Ja, stimmt. Das Grundrecht der Meinungsfreiheit steht dem nicht entgegen. Niemand hat ein aus dem Mensch-Sein entspringendes "Grundrecht", Mord und Völkermord gutzuheißen. Denn das "Leugnen" ist hier ja viel mehr als ein vergangenheitsbezogenes Bestreiten einer behaupteten Wahrheit. Die es öffentlich tun, meinen damit immer auch die Gegenwart und ihre düsteren Träume von einer Zukunft. 

Of course, advocating violence against a group or an individual does not fall under protected speech, even in the United States. 

Very lively and interesting comments in the readers' forum to Fischer's essay.  This one, I think, hits the target:

Aus US-Amerikanischer Sicht ist die deutsche Meinungsfreiheit ein Witz, weil sie nur so lange gilt, so lange man keine allzu unbequeme Meinung hat. Es handelt sich also um eine Schönwetter-Meinungsfreiheit. Schönwetter und/oder Mainstream Meinungen bedürfen aber keines besonderen Abwehrrechtes gegenüber dem Staat.

(From an American standpoint German freedom of expression is a joke, since only applies to inoffensive opinions.  It is a "fair weather" freedom of expression. But fair-weather or consensus opinions don't require any special protections from the state.")

Anyone interested can also check out Ursula Haverbeck's Web site where she is already positioning herself as a martyr. 

Halcyon Days in Austria for Glock Ges.m.b.H.

The champagne is flowing in Deutsch-Wagram, Austria for Gaston Glock and his employees. The Glock semi-automatic pistols are now the WEAPONS OF CHOICE for young, male mass murderers in the United States. 

You just cannot buy publicity like this:

• Christopher Harper-Mercer, 26, killed nine people at Umpqua Community College in Oregon, where he was a student. He was armed with six guns, including a Glock pistol.
• Vester Lee Flanagan II, 41, shot and killed a Roanoke, Va., television reporter and a cameraman with a Glock handgun while they were reporting a story on live TV.
• Dylann Roof, 21, killed nine people with a .45-caliber Glock pistol at a historic black church in Charleston, S.C
• James E. Holmes, 24, killed 12 people and wounded 70 at a theater in Aurora, Colo., using a Smith & Wesson semiautomatic rifle, a Remington shotgun and a Glock .40-caliber semiautomatic pistol.
• Jared L. Loughner, 22, killed six people with a Glock handgun in a supermarket parking lot in Tucson, Ariz., at an event for Gabrielle Giffords, who was a Democratic representative from Arizona.

25 Years of German Unity - Lenin Lives!

Today marks 25 years of German unity, and Germans are rightly proud to look back on the peaceful reunification (Wiedervereinigung) of East and West Germany. Germany is economically and politically the strongest power in Europe, yet internally there is still a divide between east and west.  Productivity in the east is only 1/3 that of the western German states - after transfer payments of over one trillion euros since 1990.  Writing in the FAZ, Holger Steltzner sees the subsidies as a historical blunder since organic growth in the east was inhibited and the people who stayed behind remain dependent on the welfare.  Many today still reject free market capitalism and disparage democratic institutions: 

Die Transfers wird es noch lange geben, der Westen wächst stärker als der Osten, und die Wirtschaftsleistung je Einwohner auf dem Gebiet der ehemaligen DDR erreicht nur zwei Drittel des Westniveaus. Weil Politiker wirtschaftlich nicht hielten, was sie versprachen, herrscht im Osten eine antikapitalistische Grundhaltung. Obwohl die Marktwirtschaft ihre Überlegenheit bewies, wurde die Mangelerfahrung des Sozialismus vergessen, sagt Schroeder. Heute setzen acht von zehn Ostdeutschen die Marktwirtschaft mit Ausbeutung gleich. Und jeder Zweite verbindet die Planwirtschaft mit Sicherheit. Wie konnte das passieren?

("We will have transfer payments for a long time to come.  The west grows stronger than the east, and the economic productivity per resident in the territory of the former GDR achieves only one third of the level in the west. Because the politicians did not live up to their promises there is a profound anti-capitalist attitude in the east. Even though the free market economy has proven its superiority the deficits of socialism have been forgotten... Today 8 out of 10 east Germans equate free market capitalism with exploitation. And half associate the planned economy with security.  How could that happen?")

Let us not forget that many in the former West Germany (BRD) were opposed to reunification.  Especially many on the left - most notably Oskar ('the Clown") Lafontaine, who was then the leader of the SPD - were vocal critics of Helmut Kohl's reunification strategy.  Today Oskar is a leader of the Left Party ( Die Linke), which still today mourns the demise of the Arbeiter- und Bauernstaat.

The Web site Lenin-is still-around (www.leninisstillaround.com ) seeks out and photographs the remaining statues of Lenin in eastern Germany, as well as reliefs, and stained glass windows.  I personally believe these should be maintained - as historical artifacts, but also as a warning to future generations. Unfortunately, in the eastern states, images of Vladimir Iliych Lenin remain an inspiration for many.

 

Chemtrails and other conspiracy theories

Die Zeit has a good piece (english, deutsch) on the growing phenomenon of conspiracy theories and the threat that they pose to our open liberal democracy: 

Never before has so much information been available, and never before could so many people state freely what they believe to be true. Everyone can construct their own reality that can shake up the power structure. This is actually good news, because it is dangerous for dictators and despots. But on the other hand, never before has it been so difficult to attain a clear picture out of the flood of contradictory information. Anyone can find confirmation for their own truth and perspective. Rumors and conspiracy theories spread rampantly. We are experiencing an unleashing of thought fueled by conviction, a new kind of culture war.

The absurd "chemtrails" conspiracy is stupid, but relatively harmless.  But not all conspiracy theories are so benign.  The authors discuss the Kopp Verlag and its star (fake) journalist Udo Ulfkotte, about whom I have written extensively.  Ulfkotte and his colleagues at Kopp relentlessly attempt to discredit the mainstream media in Germany as totally controlled by outside forces - the CIA, the Federal Reserve, Jewish bankers, etc. - poisoning the public debate, while getting quite rich in the process.  The result is the Pegida movement, which is now morphing into violence against asylum seekers in Germany: 

What is dangerous in all this is not only the hate that divides society. Danger arises when a conspiracy theory becomes a justification for engaging in violence — when the conspiracy theorist believes that he must use other means to finally open the eyes of everyone else. And when a conspiracy theorist believes that he is not only being persecuted by the "power structure," but will also be eliminated at some point, will he not then attempt to preempt his opponents — and eliminate them first? "In the parallel universe of their forums and hate-filled books, the prophets of the great media conspiracy already now are constructing a wartime situation that leaves no time for thinking in alternatives," says the media scientist Mr. Pörksen. That is ultimately the manner of thinking of suicide bombers.

The Zeit authors are right to point out that conspiracy theories are not just a threat to Germany, but also to the United States:

America is the land of the free, but it is also the land of the apocalypse. Here distrust of authority is a basic institutional orientation. Americans have organized their country so that the individual states have power, and not the elite in Washington. The opinions of individuals are traditionally given just as much weight as the majority opinion. But the rejection of scientific results has another basis. It is the fear of losing control — not only over the world, but also over one's own life.

The presidential campaign of Donald Trump can be seen as a triumph of conspiracy theories.  Trump has been the biggest proponent of the "Birther" theory that President Obama was actually born in Kenya, and therefore not eligible for the office of president.  Now he is winning huge support by stating - without a shred of evidence - that the Mexican government is sending rapists and murders over the border to the US as illegal immigrants.  Fortunately, no demagogues like Trump have emerged (so far) in Germany, but the violence against asylum seekers from Kosovo, Africa and the Middle East - especially in eastern Germany, is very disturbing. 

Werner Rügemer on the evils of the United States

I had never heard of Werner Rügemer, but evidently the author and former DKP man is an expert on America and the history of the United States. Werner Rügemer was the keynote speaker at Albrecht Müller's recent anti-American hatefest in Pleisweiler-Oberhofen.

Herr Rügemer spoke about 100 years of American evil-doing in Germany and how the United States has done everything it can to subjugate Germany - turning it into a virtual US colony.  In his speech he presented a long list of damning evidence - including transcripts of private conversations between former president Richard Nixon and Henry Kissinger where they said nasty things about then-chancellor WIlly Brandt. But there is much more: American  agencies such as Moody's and Standard & Poor's have forced investors in Germany to accept their ratings, American tax advisers such as Deloitte have helped German multinational corporations shelter their taxes in Luxembourg, and the evil American fund manager Blackrock has taken over Deutsche Bank.  Another key clue to American dominance: the American Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland said famously : "F*ck the EU!".

In the follow-up Questions and Answer session Herr Rügemer explained how the Marshall Plan was a diabolical plot to weaken Germany and impose American dominance over Western Europe.  He also revealed that German car companies Daimler, VW and BMW investing $billions in America to manufacture cars was really a US effort to weaken German labor unions.

These are just a few of the nuggets of wisdom I learned from Werner Rügemer's presentation.

 Herr Rügemer has been sounding the alarm about the evils of America for some time.  In 1986 he published  Der Kranke Weltpolizist: Das Innenleben der USA als Gefahr für den „Rest der Welt“.  Werner Rügemer is evidently also an expert on Israel.  Last year he appeared at an "Anti-Zionist" forum together with the conspiracy theorist Ken Jebsen and told the audience that Israel is a „Versuchslabor für Überwachungs- und Tötungstechnologie“ ("An experimental lab for surveillance and killing technology").  

Anti-American Forum May 2, 2015 in Pleisweiler-Oberhofen

The influential anti-American Web site NachDenkSeiten is inviting its readers to a forum on the United States and its pernicious influence on Germany and Europe: "Europa im Visier der Supermacht USA“ ("Europe in the Cross-Hairs of Superpower USA").  You can access the invitation here.

Albrecht Müller, editor of the NachDenkSeiten, exhorts his faithful readers to attend this forum, since it deals with "the central issue of our time" ("ein zentrales Problem unserer Zeit").

Da geht es um TTIP und die politisch erleichterte Übernahme hiesiger Betriebe im Zuge der sogenannten Auflösung der Deutschland AG, um die einflussreiche US-Lobby in Brüssel, um den Geleitzug von EU- und NATO-Osterweiterung und um den Ukraine-Konflikt

The point about Americans "taking over" German businesses ("Übernahme hiesiger Betriebe") is especially silly when one considers that far more German groups are buying up American companies (see my blog post:"German companies on a US shopping spree" ) in view of the favorable economic growth outlook for the US economy.  Yet I am not aware of any anti-German conferences planned anywhere in the United States. 

At the May 2 forum, Herr Muller wants to discuss a several items, including a recent speech made by the playwright Rolf Hochhuth about how the United States is doing everything it can to provoke World War III with Russia, which will result in a nuclear annihilation of Germany. His evidence?  US troops were involved in a Nato maneuver in Estonia, close to the Russian border. No mention of Russian provocation in sending troops and weapons into eastern Ukraine - nor, of course, of the military Anschluss of Crimea.  You can read Hochhuth's bizarre speech here.

Another important document Muller wants to discuss is a letter from Lt.Colonel Marek Obrtel,M.D, a reservist in the Czech army.  The letter is basically a rant against the United States and against NATO, which Dr. Obrtel calls a "criminal organization" : (note, grammatical  errors contained in the translation)

Though when I found about about the true purpose of NATO and how it serves the USA, how it is used to enforce their own power concerns, how much innocent blood NATO has on their hands I decided to sacrifice my own promising military career and left the army. When (again) purposely ignited conflict in Ukraine [...] escalated I decided to return all my NATO medals and called this organization criminal.

Yes, this is indeed a letter that demands serious attention. 

The forum will conclude with a breakout session concerning the glorious cultural and economic blossoming of Crimea since its liberation by Russia and its brilliant leader - Vladimir Putin. (/snark)

German Wings Tragedy: Let the Conspiracy Theories Begin

 It wasn't long after the German Wings airliner crashed into the side of a mountain in France before theories of the "real"cause of the tragedy began to circulate on the Web. The reports that the co-pilot Andreas Lubitz deliberately crashed the plane were dismissed by many on the Left and Right in Germany as another fabrication of the (CIA-controlled) Lügenpresse. Rather, attention turned to the "evidence" that the entire catastrophe was orchestrated by - you guessed it - the United States.  After all, the US has great experience with "False Flag" operations, from the Charlie Hebo terrorist attacks to the assassination of Boris Nemtsov in Moscow.  In particular, for German conspiracy fans, the US excels in shooting down or disappearing airliners, such as Malaysian Airlines MH17 in eastern Ukraine, or MH370, which vanished in the Indian Ocean (where the US acted at the behest of the "Jewish Banker" Jacob Rothschild).

The left-wing @Internetz-Zeitung writes about the mysterious circumstances surrounding the data recorder at the crash site.

 Allerdings sei der Datenrekorder manipuliert vorgefunden worden und die Speicherkarte sei ( womöglich über Nacht) aus dem Datenrekorder bzw Datenschreiber herausgerissen worden. Sie sei jedenfalls demnach von Unbekannten nach dem Absturz entnommen und entfernt worden.

(The data recorder had been tampered with and the memory chip removed (possible overnight). According to unnamed sources it had been removed after the crash.)

Who removed the memory chip?

Es ist möglich, dass eine Eingreiftruppe der USA oder Frankreichs in Kooperation mit dem CIA der USA oder dem französischen Geheimdienst diese Speicherkarte über Nacht im Gelände aus dem Flugschreiber entfernte. Ähnlich der Aktion der damals angeblichen Tötung von Osama bin Laden im pakistanischen Abottabat könnte hier über Nacht eine gezielte Militäroperation der Nato im Rahmen einer False Flag-Aktion stattgefunden haben, wenn die Angaben der New York Times stimmen.

(It is possible that special forces from the US or France in cooperation with the CIA or French secret service entered the crash site overnight and removed the memory chip from the data recorder.  Just like the operation in connection with the alleged killing of Osama bin Laden in Abottabat, Pakistan, NATO could well have conducted a secret military operation as part of a False Flag action, if the information provided by the New YorkTimes is accurate.)

 Fake journalist Udo Ulfkotte also suspects that the Americans are hiding information from the German people:

Erste Frage: Warum erfahren nicht unsere deutschen, französischen oder spanischen, sondern US- und britische Medien von den französischen Ermittlern zuerst, was die Black Box festgehalten hat: {...}Warum müssen deutsche Journalisten das aus der New York Times abschreiben? Warum lassen sie sich wie Marionetten herumführen und recherchieren nicht selbst? Warum tun die französischen Ermittler so, als ob sie die Ergebnisse ihrer Untersuchungen noch nicht ausgewertet hätten? Warum wussten die Amerikaner schon, was auf den Aufzeichnungen zu hören ist? Hier sollte die Bevölkerung offenkundig nebulös in die Irre geführt werden, warum nur?

(First question: why is that instead of our German, French or Spanish media it was rather the US and British media outlets who first reported what was on the voice recorder?  Why were German journalist forced to write what they learned from the NY Times? Why are the French investigators acting as though they haven't completed their evaluation of the results.  Why did the Americans already know what was on the recordings.  Obviously they were seeking to mislead the people, but why?)

Ulfkotte's colleague, Gerhard Wisnewski, has a slightly different take on the events.  Wisnewski finds it suspicious that the crash occurred in French airspace. 

Europa und insbesondere der französische Präsident können diese zweite große Krise nach den Anschlägen auf Charlie Hebdo gut gebrauchen. Nur zwei Tage vor dem Crash erlitten seine Sozialisten bei den Regionalwahlen in Frankreich vom 22. März 2015 eine krachende Niederlage und kamen nur auf rund 20 Prozent der Stimmen. Schon seit geraumer Zeit verliert François Hollande an Sympathien und gilt als der unbeliebteste Präsident in der Geschichte Frankreichs. Durch den Absturz von Flug 4U 9525 wurde die verheerende Wahlschlappe übertönt und François Hollande vom Verlierer zum Staatsmann.

(Europe and especially the French president really needed this second great crises coming after Charlie Hebdo. Just two days before the crash his Socialists suffered a serious setback in the regional elections, receiving only 20% of the votes. For some time Francois Hollande had been losing sympathy and is seen as the least popular president in French history.  The crash of Flight 4U 9525 puts the election loss in the past and Francois Hollande is seen as a statesman instead of a loser.)

To my mind the most imaginative theory is put forward by whoever created this video.  He points out that the group who profited most from the German Wings tragedy is the airline's competitor - the discount airline Air Berlin. That is certainly one way to instantly boost market share: shoot your competition out of the sky!

Angela Merkel - a Neville Chamberlain for our time?

A smiling Vladimir Putin was triumphant in Minsk as he announced to the world the "peace agreement" he had negotiated with Angela Merkel and her colleagues from France and the Ukraine.  Long forgotten are the victims of MH17 and Putin could boast about a Russian-made "Peace For Our Time", while Merkel gibt den Chamberlain:

Früher hieß es einmal, dass unsere Freiheit auch am Hindukusch verteidigt werde. Deutsche Soldaten wurden weit hinter die Berge abkommandiert und haben dafür ihr Leben gelassen. Nun, da die Bedrohung sehr viel näher gerückt ist, soll von einer derartigen Verteidigungsbereitschaft nicht mehr gesprochen werden. Lieber möchte man den Angreifer mit Gebietsgewinnen, die uns selbst nichts kosten, abfinden.

Das mag kurzsichtig brachtet vernünftig sein, es ist aber auch schamlos. Wer sich dazu versteht, wer dazu die Hand reicht, sollte sich nicht länger auf die europäischen Werte berufen. Heuchelei löst keine Probleme. So wird der Konflikt nicht beigelegt. Er schwelt weiter. Merkel und ihre Truppe tanzen auf ein Pulverfass, dessen Lunte Putin in der Hand hält.

("The government used to tell us it was defending our freedom in Afghanistan. German soldiers were deployed beyond the mountains there and lost their lives. However now that the threat has moved a lot closer to home, there is to be no talk of this kind of defensive readiness. It seems it's far preferable to appease the aggressor with territorial gains that don't cost us a thing. This may be a sensible approach in the short term, but it is also shameless. Those who use it, who reach out their hand, should stop citing European values in doing so. Hypocrisy doesn't solve any problems. This is no way to resolve the conflict - it will keep growing. Merkel and her team are dancing on a powder keg, and Putin is holding the fuse.")