German business and politics

Goodbye to Berlin

Business bosses are growing impatient with a drifting government

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Readers' comments



"What other monetary tools do we have? Well, open market operations, or quantitative easing, appears to be moving into a direction funded by taxpayers, not merely printing more money to boost the money supply, further increasing fiscal deficits."

This sounds good . . . in theory. - In reality quantitative easing has to be followed by a period of Quantitative Tightening.

Do you really believe governments being hooked to the Overborrowing Syndrome will ever get off the needle?


Germany has not had a conservative party for almost a century. Even "nazi" was merely an abbreviation for national socialist. Present-day parties are all socialist: liberal socialists, Christian socialists, social democrats, and outright communists (now called "Linke"), a party that is still run by former East German communist leaders.

Yankee Kid

If you think my invention is too good to be true, and if it is true why have I not gotten it done here? The main problem is I am too old to travel and my friends who could help me are all dead. So why isn't anyone in the US interested? The main reason is that they can make more money making nuclear power plants. It is also difficult to contact the people in today's world who make decisions even with help. Mrs. Merkel stands out. She asked for help and has the courage to put down the money people and give people with ideas a chance to do what I am trying to do. Get her attention if you can as I can't do anything with out help.

Yankee Kid

Will one of you in Germany, please contact Mrs. Merkel, and ask her why she, or some one she can deligate, has not replied to my offer of my invention made purposely for the deletion of nuclear power. because my invention can be built in a very short time, at a very low price, using very cheap explosive power, based upon things that I have already done. I have the proof that she has received this. I can't spell but I am a rambling wreck from Ga. Tech and a hell of a good engineer with a lot of experiece in Germany a long time ago.


nuclear cost effective - well tepco should know or? Of course the other way of seeing it is - lobby as hell and state will pay in case things go wrong. I wonder by the way whether nuclear energy won economist polling few months back because of legitimate voting or companies like tepco, rwe etc paid some poor souls to get the voting right. Just wonder - the sways one way and the other were a bit odd.
As for Euro - for a change I agree with so called bosses - the Euro is worth saving but not in this way and possibly the price tag is already too high (especially for measures that are most likely ineffective).


"Many Germans see the purchases as a dangerous deviation from orthodox monetary policy."

Unfortunately 'orthodox monetary policy' appears to failing us at the time we need it most. Raising interest-rates destroys real wealth and contribution inflation, while at the same time weakening the Euro - reducing rates has the opposite effect.


Monetarists can also impact reserve-requirements, but such are standardized in an economy and it is a dangerous game to manipulate to match current economic trends.

Lastly, the ECB can slash the 'discount rate' to boost the creation of credit, but such creates too much liquidity in the market and is arguably responsible for the economic mess that the 2008 crisis created.

All of this is why I believe that orthodox monetary policies should be abandoned right now, because their outcomes are predictable and, in fact, useless.


la.výritý wrote:

"If Merkel makes an open-end commitment today concerning the euro, then all following German governments – left or right – would feel obliged to hold on to it - no matter what. Thus she has to make a decision now which concerns all future German generations . . . without getting a similar "iron promise" in return from the counties in trouble. This is the dilemma any German government would be in, not only Merkel."

Although my background is very different, I agree.

My father taught me long before there were stateswomen like Angela Merkel: "The difference between a politician and a statesman? A politician thinks only of the next election. A statesman thinks of the next generation."

Is some such proverb current on both sides of the Atlantic?

My German-English Dictionary was too old and limited to have entries for treue let alone, "They call this "foolishness" Nibelungen Treue (Nibelung loyalty)." so I googled the following:

Hoping this helps,
A. Non-Imus


la pravda

"This will only bring up hatred as Mary Fraud and her old president Mitterrand were and are expressing about Germany"

boff, you're the boushitter and the hater, while not even being a German !


yeah, read in your toilet papers LMAO


La Pravda


some other papers said that that was rather Thatcher's words !

hmm, found that in a GERMAN MEDIA:

"In a telegram found in the French archives and dated March 13, 1990, Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher is quoted by the French ambassador in London describing Chancellor Helmut Kohl as being "capable of anything. He has become a different man. He does not know who he is anymore. He sees himself as the master and is starting to act like it."

"In a more sober moment, Thatcher told Mikhail Gorbachev, "Britain and western Europe are not interested in the unification of Germany. The words written in the NATO communiqué may sound different, but disregard them. We do not want the unification of Germany."

"Thatcher had two main fears that were feeding each other in the fraught year between the fall of the Berlin Wall and reunification - a united Germany would be able to strengthen the European Community, and a stronger EC would in turn increase Germany's power. Thatcher's position was in fact not far from the more hysterical right-wing body of opinion in Britain, expressed by backbench MPs, that Germany planned to use the European Community to dominate the continent.",,4861759,00.html

uh are the eastern Germans happy of this de facto annexion of their country to FDR ? hmmm, it just prevent DDR to become a competitive country like Poland, and it kept eastern germans unemployed, the girls fleeing to the west, the boys getting drunk and empathied with neo-nazi propaganda


LEADERSDHIP comes from those countries who can run an economy successfully like GERMANY. The FRENCH CANT EXPECT THE REST OF EUROPE TO PAY FOR THE FRENCH MIDDLE CLASSES or the GREEKS. FRANCE has allowed a system like BRITAIN that is unsustainable with fat pensions at 60.
THE GOOD OLD DAYS ARE that REAL economic growth is impossible in EUROPE TODAY....OR AMERICA with their self-imposed depressed currency.


The FRENCH wanted the EURO not GERMANY as the French price for German unification. The constant revaluation of the D-MARK gave Germany real advantages....with a diminishing French Franc languishing into obscurity with INFLATION. A strong currency reflects strength and success. Look at Britain with the sinking POUND collecting a massive trade deficit every the USA.

Even Switzerland and Japan are adjusting their economy to offset the impact on their exporters. Germany transferred much production to Hungary and the Czech Republic for that reason. FRANCE and BRITAIN dont fear Germany TODAY because they all have other enemies waiting like speculators based offshore.


muggeridge: "Germany needs to act as the new leader of EUROPE...however reluctant."

Who in Europe elected Germany to be the leader??

Nobody did.

The EU has a population of 500 million. How can a country of 80 million "lead" a majority of 420 million - that don't want to be lead "by the Germanz". Lol.

The European parliament and the citizens of Europe should vote Germany democratically into the Leader's seat. As long as this doesn't happen, NO GERMAN has any business to "lead" the Europeans against their will! This will only bring up hatred as Mary Fraud and her old president Mitterrand were and are expressing about Germany.

Read: "Mr Mitterrand said at one point that if Helmut Kohl, the Chancellor of West Germany at the time, were to get his way, a unified Germany could win more ground than Hitler ever did".


Mitterrand pretended to be Kohl's friend . . . but the art of deception is is taught at the French diplomatic 'haute école'.

The Times Sept 10 2009:



"President Mitterrand of France warned Margaret Thatcher privately that a reunited Germany might “make even more ground than Hitler had” only a few weeks after the fall of the Berlin Wall, newly declassified documents reveal. In papers due to be published by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office tomorrow, after a year of deliberation by Whitehall officials, the scale of French fears on German reunification is laid bare. At a lunch at the Élysée Palace on January 20, 1990, Charles, now Lord, Powell, the then foreign affairs adviser to Mrs Thatcher reports in a memo that Mr Mitterrand talked about how reunification would cause the re-emergence of the “bad” Germans who dominated Europe". - And that this must be prevented at any price.

"According to the memo, Mr Mitterrand said at one point that if Helmut Kohl, the Chancellor of West Germany at the time, were to get his way, a unified Germany could win more ground than Hitler ever did and that Europe would have to bear the consequences."

This is also the explanation where Mary Fraud got her jealousy and German-hatred from.


Germany and France want to see action by GREECE to stick with the program to get themselves in the land of the living; not the living dead. ITALY will also need to reduce their debt mountain. Countries are reluctant to take their medicine. Hedge funds reach for their computer programs to set in motion their deadly game of destruction of the EURO. From New York this is a field sport to see Europe stumble and talk talk talk....meanwhile the markets take aim at a row of quacking ducks. Germany needs to act as the new leader of EUROPE...however reluctant.


La pravda

ah, the Tabloid Mail is a trusful source fer ya LMAO !

but "Kohl rechigne à donner son feu vert définitif, à lâcher le deutschemark à quelques mois d’élections législatives très difficiles" Bizarre this elections impact on the German leaders !

"Comment ? Trois jours plus tard, les responsables européens reconnaissent le droit à l’« autodétermination du peuple allemand ». Est-ce là un troc≈: l’euro contre un nihil obstat à la réunification ? « Formellement, il n’y pas eu de “marchandage”, dit l’historien Frédéric Bozo, auteur d’un monumental ouvrage sur la période (3), mais, de fait, le donnant-donnant entre Kohl et Mitterrand, quoique implicite, était évident. »

"Il y en aura un autre. Fin janvier, les choses se sont accélérées. L’Etat est-allemand s’effondre. Des dizaines de milliers de réfugiés quittent le pays. Kohl ne parle plus d’une confédération allemande dans quelques années, mais d’une absorption pure et simple de la RDA par la RFA – très vite. Le chancelier demande que la nouvelle Allemagne soit intégrée telle que dans la Communauté. En échange, il propose une relance de la construction européenne. Mitterrand est estomaqué, déstabilisé. Il hésite."

Oolala, it's Kohl that reverted his position, and bluffed Mitterrand !

you should really read this article:


Merkel is right in ignoring the bosses.

Twice she was listening to business, twice it ended in tears.

Firstly: she lowered the taxes for the Hotel-lobby/business (on FDP and CSU insistence). Later it was revealed that the FDP received huge donations from the Hotel-business. It was a public-relations nightmare since it was proven that FDP politicians are corrupt.

The second major disaster was the abandoning of the abandoning of nuclear energy. Again on the insistence of FDP and business.

Both examples show the incapability of the government to make politics for the people.

I think Merkel learnt her lesson: "never again listen to FDP or business".


la pravda

"Its about the strain on individual taxpayers . . . not on the country. That's why only per capita payloads count here in this debate."

bff, of course it's per capita, but the Nederlands don't have such expenses to entertain infrastructures like France, Itay, Spain or Germany have... nor a Defense !


"With a summit coming up in Strasbourg in 1990, Mitterand warned: " 'The Germans are facing a very important choice.'Genscher felt he had no choice but to fulfill the wishes of the Socialist French leader and at Strasbourg, the euro was adopted by Germany."

- And at the same summit, the green light was given for the reunification of that country divided since the end of WW2 !



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