SPD Party Strategy Paper?

 It got brought up via Focus today.....the SPD Party is having a discussion with the Linke Party....finding  path to merge.

If you went down the top forty points of the SPD....there's probably 20 points where they could merge.  The problem is....probably half of the SPD voters (the older crowd)...wouldn't be that thrilled.

Where both are in national polls?  SPD around 14-percent....Linke folks around 11-to-12 percent.  

Just a humble guess.....10-percent of SPD wouldn't support this idea.  Not sure about the Linke voters.

Why make this move?  I'd suspect that if you gathered up SPD voters who were 40 or older....most aren't really hyped-up for the party, and it's been trending that way since Merkel.

Younger voters from the left?  They might see a reason to exit from Green Party numbers....maybe over a year or two....perhaps taking 25-percent of the Green vote.....getting the SPD/Linke 'creature' up to around 30-percent.

I'm not saying this is a done deal....just that some talks will take place.

My View On This Hyped-Up German Chatter for Air Conditioning

 First, once you got up to 35 C (PLUS)....for about 10 days in a row (meaning 95 F)....yeah, you had to take drastic measures.  

Shutters got closed at 11 AM....brought the AC unit up from the basement and ran for 10 hours per day....sipped through 4 lemonades in the afternoon....stayed mostly in the shade.

Then the heat wave ended.....getting back to 25 to 30 C for two weeks.

Yesterday ended the 2nd heat wave (going to 34 C for three days).  Cooling trend now for 10 days.

There's probably one more heat wave by the end of August.

Biggest negative?  I have to listen daily to the German wife talk about climate change, American SUVs, the great evil triggered by Trump, and mankind's spiral.

You can assume that about 25-percent of German society is opening up a discussion about buying a 3,000 Euro AC unit.  Half of them will buy the unit by March of 2027.....then discover that 2027 only brings four days of HOT weather for the upcoming year, and the AC  unit was a total waste.

These France Fires

 French police now say.....they've arrested around 400 individuals (at least up to last night)....for starting fires.  

Reasoning?  None given. 

Ethnic status?  So far....none given.

5 Aug 2026: Germany: 9 Stories

 1.  2nd heat wave in effect.....yesterday was  35 C day (95 F).  Today will max at 31 C.  Yeah, I've been running the portable AC unit a bit.

Thursday is supposed to return to the 27-to-30 C temps for a week.  

2.  Crazy police crash in Frankfurt last night.  From the report....cops were bringing two 'guests' back to the squad area....crashing into another vehicle.....both vehicles totaled. 

3.  ZDF (public TV, Channel 2) ran another 45-min Bahn (railway) critical report last night.  

The general problem (if you review the facts)....the Bahn is in the middle of a long era (over 10 years) of upgrades/renovation.  Anyone expecting the top efficiency BS....is kidding themselves.  If you are on a wild 500 km trip via the Bahn....yeah, you need to be open to the idea of delays or cancellations.  

4.  20 Sep Berlin-City election approaching.  Linke Party in the lead: 21-percent.  CDU at 19-percent  SPD at 12-percent.  AfD at 18-percent.  Greens at 17-percent.  Everyone else at 4-percent or less.

CDU currently runs the council......so the Linke is posed to lead. 

Based on reporting....a large segment of the youth vote is Linke at this point.

5.  EU has started to talk 'tough' on border control, and people-smuggling.  Whether or not it's true....unknown.

6.  Hotel Adion in Berlin to be sold.  Highest rated hotel in Germany....was actually owned by a syndicate group.....around 4,000.  Most were in a age-group aimed for retirement and wanted to 'dump' their shares.  About a 3-min walk from the US embassy.  

7.  The 'Abdul-terrorist' event in Berlin...isn't really concluded (the guy is dead).

Questions continue to arise.  One of the key ones.....police had identified him as a 'threat'.....yet he was on bail.  How this was possible....no one can readily explain.

8.  Oddly, several cities that hosted World Cup soccer games....are waiting to be paid by FIFA for 'services'.  

9.  Ladies Tour de France.....investigations?  Well....there's inspections going on....some type of special bra being used....for aero-dynamic purposes (illegal apparently).  My view....if you are a big-boob gal and Tour-rider.....this improves airflow around the boobs.  How they tested this and proved the point....unknown.

4 August 2026: Germany: 3Things

 1.  Ceuta, Spain.  Just odd speculation brewing.....a belief that 10,000 'invaders'....are hiding out in Ceuta somewhere.  Locals say this....some police agree.  

2.  Nuremberg Airport....last Friday....fight developed at the terminal.  Eleven guys waiting to board for Izmir, Turkey.  Cops were called....took a fair number to halt the fight.  In the end....airport authorities told the 'boys'.....boarding was not possible.

What the fight was about?  Unknown.  Bunch of drunks?  I wonder about that.

Oddly, Saturday morning....in Nuremberg City....near the train-station....cops were called....naked-gal was in a violent mindset.  Drugged-up apparently.  Took several cops to take her down.

3.  33-year old druggie...Langen clinic (Frankfurt area)....cops were called.  Some patient going crazy....fighting staff folks.  Two cops did finally establish authority....both wounded in the brawl.

This German View of Mayonnaise

 My wife (German in nature) tried years ago to bring me over to the 'dark-side'....to use mayonnaise on French Fries/pommes.  That effort....failed.

I went grocery shopping with her last Friday.  About ten minutes into the journey...I got to the retiree 'bench' that the store maintains....so older guys didn't have to walk aisle by aisle....wasting an entire hour.  

So the bench in this store.....is across the way from the mayonnaise aisle.  I had the full view....all 15 brands, and probably around 100 variations of mayonnaise.  There's plain regular....there's kitchen-blended-in....there's hot-pepper mayonnaise....there's mustard-blended-in....and on, and on.

The general use of mayonnaise?  It still goes on, but I suspect that 75-percent of mayonnaise is bought for fries/pommes.

Where this started?  I've asked this question, but there's no history to draw upon.  

Just A Odd Statistic

The state of NRW was forced into a inquiry by the AfD Party.... over drug trafficking at the Düsseldorf Central Station.

The question was....the 2025 nationality of identified drug suspects.  

Suspects with German nationality: 6  

Suspects with foreign nationality: 104  

Of the 6 German suspects, five had an additional nationality. 1 x Greece, 1 x Iran, 1 x Turkey, 2 x Morocco.  

Of the 104 foreign suspects, 80 individuals are immigrants, i.e., asylum seekers and refugees. 

You would take from the data....most all engaged in drug sales....are non-Germans. It begs the question.....if you asked over the top twenty stations in Germany....would they all go the same way?

1 Aug 2026: Germany: 4 Stories

 1.  All this hyped-up mess with the FIFA folks and World Cup?

Well....after the Asian league said 'no'....it appears this $20-billion sell-off concept...is 'dead'.  It also appears that the leadership of FIFA....is probably going to be forced out.

2.  At least four countries are talking up the idea of border controls....after the mess in Spain.

Curiously, most of the 40k occupants (Moroccan) have departed Ceuta.

3.  All this cabinet shuffling-around business with Chancellor Merz....appears to have NO bounce on polling....which means...it was a worthless act.  Kinda funny....but demonstrates how screwed-up things are.

4.  From the ten-odd storm fronts that came through my valley this past seven days....none produced more than a sprinkle.  Five-star drought status.  If you walk by corn fields...nothing is growing much.