1. Sweden note: investigation into the Nord Stream episode....the Swedish public prosecutor's office says they can't ID any particular suspects. Case closed.
2. This Sunday (the 11th) will be the repeat election in Berlin, for the crapped-up 2021 federal election. Anyone's guess how many people will show up. Epic saga.....how they screwed up and spent two years arguing to just 'let-it-go'.
3. 450 flights cancelled Wed in Frankfurt over strike action.
4. This idea in Hessen of changing the no-Sunday-shopping law with zero-manned shops....is dragging out in the state assembly. Problem centers on Tegut-grocery operations where a mini-store is operating, without any clerks or employees (you swipe your credit card to enter). Comical side of this....both the FDP and Greens are fired-up to dump the Sunday law....while the CDU and SPD (controlling the coalition) wants a long lengthy discussion.
Selling point by the grocery folks (Tegut) is that no deliveries occur on Sunday, and no personnel are required in the shop for the entire day.....yeah, just customer entry.
5. "Intensiv-Straftäter"? It's an interesting German term and I had to look it up.
Basically, it'd translate to mean a 'intensive-offender' or a guy/gal who repeats crimes.
It came up when looking at a story out of Regensburg (town in Bavaria, about an hour north of Munich, 152k population).
So the town has a group of repeat criminals who mostly hang out at the train station. Thirty-four of them.....30 of which are Tunisian, The other four? One each from Czech, Iraq, Syria and Algeria.
What the city says (at least BILD reports it this way)....none of the 34 can be deported yet....because of a lack of documentation. The way they say this....it appears their citizenship can't be confirmed, so you can't proceed yet on deportation.
Petty crimes? Yeah....that would be the angle of the story.
All of this requiring more police around the train station? Well....yeah.
I would imagine in the 1970s/1980s....some local city judge would have just said you need to leave the city limits. Then the group would move hopped on some train and gone to Munich or Frankfurt and been a burden on their city.
It is one of those odd stories that you notice from the 1980s. You could have walked around the Mainz, Wiesbaden or Darmstadt train stations in that era, and maybe seen one single two-cop patrol in peak operating hours, or Saturday evening. Today, they all have a police 'office' in each station, and there's always patrol walking around. In Frankfurt? There's probably two or three patrols constantly roaming around the station and underground.
6. Focus went a step further in Regensburg....asking people their opinion of the local scene.
What the locals say....there's always been a drug scene going on there (mostly around the train station), but it's branched out to the downtown area. With it....comes minor crime as people need ways to pay for their drugs.
I'll just say that in most cities of Germany...if you stood around either the train stations or central town bus stations....there's drug trafficking going on. I can say that for Wiesbaden and Frankfurt....you just need to sit on a park bench and make observations.
7. WELT piece: January 2024.....26,000 asylum applications....more than in December.
8. Serious WELT piece from yesterday....written by Ulf Poschardt....discussing the idea that the FDP Party needs to exit the coalition ASAP (triggering a new election) in order to save itself from massive collapse in the fall of 2025.
Odds of this happening? Well.....the SPD and Greens are at the weakest point in the past decade. If you held an election....the combined percentage of the two would likely not exceed 32-percent.
The CDU-CSU Party would likely win under this scenario, with the AfD locked into 2nd place but blocked from participating in the new coalition. I'm not saying this is a big win....you might even see both the Linke Party and FDP Party not meeting the 5-percent rule (thus getting no seats).
Present date for the federal election? September 2025.
Note, even with the CDU anticipated win....they have to partner with a minimum of 1 party....maybe 2. Don't go anticipating a strong CDU government.
9. A new tax is being discussed....on German-produced meat....which would create a subsidy to German farmers....to make their operation more animal-friendly. You'd have to show some plan....to get your chunk of the subsidy. This lessening your meat consumption? I doubt it....course, if this were 1 Euro per kilo....that would upset folks.
10. EU talking on next regulation. If you were banned in one country of the EU (loss of driving license)....they want all members of the EU to exclude you. This being acceptable? Well....lot of chatter that various EU members are asking questions.
This being a 'problem'? I have no idea. No one can really cite Germans (or French or Italians) having multiple licenses. I would imagine some folks have this, but you can't prove any serious data.
The only way I could see this working....is one single EU license, period.
11. German Justice Minister is working on an odd project. He wants to create a category of a relationship.....where it's NOT marriage, but on paper....you would be taking responsibility of your 'partner'.
Some of this goes toward gay/lesbian relationships, but since gay/lesbian marriages are legal in Germany.....it doesn't really lay out the path on how this would work.
I will admit....you find a lot of German couples who've been together 10 to 20 years, and they have zero interest in getting married.
I would imagine some new term (short of marriage) will have to be invented.
12. “As soon as one country leaves, the other countries have easier termination conditions." Quote from Thuringia's AfD Party boss (Höcke). Concerns moving public TV (ARD/ZDF) into a forced 'change'.
Curious that they would pick this as a battle. I suspect if you asked working-class Germans....at least one-third think the current TV/Media tax is extremely high, and they want some type of 'cut'. In the Thuringia state? It might go as high as 50-percent of people wanting a cut on the tax.
On public TV fighting this type of situation? Oh, you'd find them using every avenue possible to keep the current package intact.
13. Miele, the German company who makes freezers, washers, dryers, etc? They announced yesterday that they will move production out of Germany....to Poland....to be competitive. That will be discussed a good bit.
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