Promises And Reality

After the election for the German federal parliament on September 27th 2009 three parties started negotiations to form a new government. Mrs. Merkels Christian Democratic Union (CDU), the Christian Social Union (CSU) and the Free Democratic Party (FDP).

[CDU and CSU are the so called Schwesterparteien (='sister parties'). Together they are the Union, CDU is a party in 15 of 16 German states (without Bavaria), CSU is a party only in Bavaria. In the federal parliament both parties are in one parliamentary group.]

In the campaign the FDP (and also the CSU) had promised a tax reduction. But there’s a problem to keep this promise. The problem is called economic crisis. The financial situation of the Federal Republic doesn’t allow a tax reduction during this crisis. It would ruin our state finances. But Mrs.Merkel didn’t want her partner from the FDP start in the new government as a liar. So what should they do? They found a trick. 50 billion € of new credits shouldn’t appear in the federal budget. They should be declarated as a ‘Sondervermoegen’ which means special funds. It’s tricky, isn’t it. But as I overlook the comments in the papers nearly no one was convinced by this trick. The parties that negotiate about the new government were struck by a wave of critique. And today there was the final shot for their plans. Experts from the government said that the special funds would violate our constitution.

What’s a way out? I think: forget tax reduction. That is a problem for the FDP. But that doesn’t matter. They promised a tax reduction before the election and could know that it couldn’t be paid. But they wanted votes and promised things some people wanted to hear. If they loose credibility by their irresponsible promises they receive their just deserts.

On Censorship in Germany

Our government planned a law to fight child pornography. But what came out wasn’t a measure against this despicable crime. It looks more like a step to establish censorship in Germany.

Read more in this article:

Germany to build the Internet Berlin Wall, Cory Doctorow on boingboing, June 16, 2009

A strange thing from Germany

There’s a Wikipedia in German. You can reach with two URLs: wikipedia.de and de.wikipedia.org. The second address is the direct way to it. The first address is owned by Wikimedia Germany, which is an assossiation that promotes free knowledge and forwards directly to the German version of Wikipedia. So there are two ways to go to the free online dictionary in German language.

But last week Lutz Heilmann a member of the German federal parliament stopped the access of Wikipedia under the address wikipedia.de by legal action [in German: Einstweilige Verfuegung which means something like restraining order]. The reason: he said that there are wrong facts in a Wikipedia article about him. There was written something about his role in the former German Democratic Republic. Mr Heilmann said he wanted to save his reputation. His legal action caused a big number of blog postings and newspaper articles. No one agreed with Mr Heilmann to stop access to Wikipedia via wikipedia.de as far as I have read many of those articles. It was regarded as a danger for freedom of speech in Germany. He could have sued people directly when they wrote something wrong about him, many writers admitted. But stopping an important way to Wikipedia for everyone was something no one agreed with.

Today Mr Heilmann announced that he would stop legal action. Maybe the flood of critique in blogs and papers has impressed him. Maybe the people in his party ‘The Left’ have convinced him that he was doing wrong. So in a few days the German speaking world will have full access to the German Wikipedia again. This attack on freedom of speech has been fought back successfully.

Sources (German):

Wikipedia-Sperre: Bundestagsabgeordneter Heilmann kapituliert, Heise Online, Nov. 16 2008
(Wikipedia Blockade: Member of Federal Parliament Heilmann Capitulates)

Bundestagsabgeordneter lässt wikipedia.de sperren [Update], Heise Online, Nov. 15 2008
(Member of Federal Parliament Lets Blockade wikipedia.de [Update])

The Buddenbrooks effect

Thomas Mann wrote ‘The Buddenbroks’, a novel of the decline of a family. The first three generations are doing business in a way, that let them sleep well at night. In generation four Thomas Buddenbrook begins with speculation. He buys corn for the half price long before the harvest is done. Hail destroys the corn. The Buddenbrooks have a big loss. The decline begins. In generation five the principal heir suffers from various deseases and dies at seventeen.

This story is a model for Germany’s society of today, says sociologist Christoph Deutschmann from the Max Planck Institute for Reasearch of Society in Cologne, Germany. And there’s an explanation in it for the crisis of the financial markets today.

After decades of the ‘Wirtschaftswunder’, the German economic growth after World War II, there are more and more people with much money. The rich who invest money have to find someone who needs it for his undertaking. Someone has to work for them to get a profit. The problem in a rich society is that there are not enough people who work hard for their own and for the profits of the investors. So the money is invested in the financial markets and speculation grows. That means trying to make money with money.

That just failed. The financial markets collapsed. Compared to the Buddenbrooks we are in a situation like the generations four and five of the novel. How will it end? Further decline and more poverty or a recovery after the recession?

For Germany I’m optimistic. Our economy has a strong industrial base. For the US things will be tougher. After years of double dept the way back to recovery will be very difficult.

Source (German):

Die Buddenbrooks – das sind wir, Handelsblatt, Nov. 12. 2008, author: Ferdinand Knauss