Friday, April 5, 2024

5 April 2024: Six German News Stories

 1.  WELT piece, several German state Interior Ministeries are reviewing right-wing police members.  The general accusation?  At least 400 police are under some review for being 'extremist'.  What WELT goes on to suggest....the real number might be way more than that.

2.  Bavarian state police are complaining over the lack of uniform pieces....saying the state mechanism is having trouble procuring the uniforms. Problem goes to Ukraine, where they seem to have a higher priority in getting uniforms.

3.  Kinda funny....the Berlin immigration office has a shortage of personnel....so in return, if you make appointments with them....it could take two to four months to see an actual immigration official.

So some group (commercial operation) figured this out and started to make bulk appointments.  Then the group markets these appointments for 50 Euro each.  So if you were desperate and really need a quick appointment in the next week or two....you'd pay the 50 Euro.

Yeah, the immigration folks are peeved about this but have limited actions they can take.  Nothing illegal.

4.  Some kind of fuss brewing with the FC Bayern soccer club on their budget.  Apparently, it's reached a point where they agree.....they will discard of several high-profile players once the season ends.  They kinda agree....they can't maintain this top-player status in Germany with the present business profile.

5.  There's been an odd story developing in Kaufbeuren, Germany (about an hour west of Munich).  

This is small town (43k) that has a young guy who is enthusiastic about enforcing traffic laws and parking situations.  In recent months, he branched out and has done other cities as well.  

To be honest, he has attracted negative attention and some folks have reached a level of frustration.

So in Kaufbeuren, as this guy attempted to write down the license plate number of a illegal parking situation (getting to to a complaint), an argument started up with a passer-by (not the owner of the car).

This young gal tried to stop the guy.  So she's reaching for his cellphone, and the 18-year old guy falls in a fashion on the ground.  At this moment....the guy and his bike fall into the street and scratch up some guy's car.  

We then get a dose of 'he-said-she-said'.....with cops called.  He says she pushed him.....she said 'no, I was just grabbing your cellphone'.

As you might imagine....ambulance crew were called over his injury.

Oddly enough....this all happens within 50 meters of some local police station. Nutcase?  Well.....his mama has openly admitted that her son has made this into some life-mission of reporting illegal parking, and it's probably something that draws a fair amount of public anger.

6.  A fair amount of discussion has started up over public TV in Germany (ARD/ZDF) and the demand for reform has reached a level where it's probably going to be openly discussed in the political campaign in the summer of 2025.

There's been roughly 30 years of fake-reform chatter where the public TV folks will some minor change and hope that people just drop the subject.

What I anticipate?  Someone will drag out the basic charter which says they are supposed to exist to provide culture, knowledge, information and public forums.  So the question will be....why all this money spent on sport shows, TV movies, game-shows, etc?

I expect that the news operations on both ARD and ZDF will be brought into one single group, with 50-percent of the journalists laid off. 

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