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Looks like I've been had, gently caress me.
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Mar 1, 2012 22:27
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I'm watching Wulff's little (heh!) farewell-shindig at the moment and there's a good chance I'll suffer from a facial seizure before long.  Having had a friend in the Wachbataillon a couple of years back, I feel so very bad for those guys.
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Mar 8, 2012 18:46
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Not to derail with ponychat, but I have read that Piraten insists on "Pony Time"(consisting of watching an episode of MLP) in the midst of sessions of the Berlin State Parliament. Is this at all true? If so, they're even more horrible than I realized.
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Mar 8, 2012 21:30
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I just got back from germany and I didn't quite understand this thread title. Now I do. Holy poo poo I've never seen a country just shut down on sundays. Is there some strict law that businesses can't operate on sundays or is it just a tradition? In a small town I can see shops and things being closed on a sunday, but to walk down the biggest shopping streets in berlin and see the area totally dead and not a single thing open... it's very very weird!
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Mar 9, 2012 00:02
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^^ It's actually a law that you can't open your shop during sundays since we are a god fearing country, our lord's day of rest is important to us. (we are not a really religious country so nobody actually believes that but nobody wants a 7-day working week either so that's what we stand by). Bakeries and the like (read: everyone that runs their shop a certain way or needs to stay open during weekends) can open on sundays but most have to remain closed, except on exceptional days of business like the weeks leading up to christmas/easter/winter/spring/summer/whatever ,it's called "verkaufsoffene Sonntag(e)". The number you can get away with depends on the state, if you live in a religious state you'll have less, if you live in an area that isn't Bavaria you are going to have more. Ultimately it's a practice that's going to go away.Condiv posted:Not to derail with ponychat, but I have read that Piraten insists on "Pony Time"(consisting of watching an episode of MLP) in the midst of sessions of the Berlin State Parliament. Is this at all true? If so, they're even more horrible than I realized. Sort of, apparently they didn't watch it during an actual session of the "Landtag" but in a "Fraktionssitzung" (internal party session). I have no problem with them watching MLP during the time they are supposed to do actual work, since they have yet to come forward with something that is based on german politics and doesn't result from an american-alternative media focussed point of view. What I find pretty disturbing is that they probably used equipment and locations that were payed for by the taxpayer to (probably) violate copyright law. As far as I'm aware MLP isn't made available in a legal german version on Youttube. http://www.dradio.de/dlf/sendungen/dlfmagazin/1630017/ <- german Before I get bum rushed by Piraten-supporters: While streaming of copyrighted content is sort of a gray area, it's highly probable that it's going to be ruled illegal on a regular basis. It doesn't even matter if they were in breach of copyright law or not, what matters is that we should hold our representatives to high standards, if we can push our president out of office for things that probably aren't illegal but immoral, we can say no to representatives that make a point of demonstrating their contempt for the basis of intellectual property (in regard to patent law, that's the thing we actually want to push forward since it's what runs our economy). Wall of hate for the Piraten ahead: Since some are going to be angry about the "american-alternative media focussed point of view"; have a look at their program. They focus on a couple of issues, those issues are not based on specific german politics, they are purely focused on the problems that are discussed on SA, 4Chan and Reddit (read: mainly american user base). They are against a "War on Drugs" that simply isn't happening in Germany (google Freimenge and be amazed with what doesn't get persecuted). They'd like more democracy, but if we look at switzerland as a much more direct democracy we find a whole different set of issues which the Piraten don't adress at all. They focus on "free internet", in the sense of literally free internet that can be used free of charge by everybody which is fiscally stupid (being fiscally stupid is a theme with this party). They'd like the internet to be free of government which seems like a good idea but they still have to acknowledge that the independent internet that is supposedly not available to us is what enabled one of their politicians to download child porn (low hanging fruits, I know, but they have yet to adress the issue with real workable solutions. Instead of coming forward with a system that can hinder undesirable niches, they just want to weaken control, without focussing it on things that are universally viewed as undesirable.). And they focus on freedom, I don't know what they mean with that since they don't bother to tell me but I guess that's good. I'd like to go into more detail but they simply don't offer real solutions that could be discussed. From the top of my head the only two real things they had to offer in the last state elections were: 1. Free public transport for everyone in a city that is broke with a transport system that barely can turn a profit as it is. 2. Free government controlled internet for everybody (seems to me like that would be against what they are about but sure whatever) and a massive funding boost for "Freifunk" (a non-commercial project where you open up your bandwidth for people that can use it; basically an open w-lan for the whole region). tl;dr: gently caress Piraten! hankor fucked around with this message at 05:22 on Mar 10, 2012 |
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Mar 9, 2012 03:03
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hankor posted:
Let them come and I will stand before you. The pirateparty in most people's minds *should* have been an anti establishment party for nerds, but they turned out they're nerds, of the pathetic kind, that have no platform outside of "don't touch my computer or internet" and, well, gently caress all besides wasting air and ink.
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Mar 10, 2012 19:25
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az posted:Let them come and I will stand before you. As soon as they notice that things have to get paid for and you can't just wish for nice things to come true, they'll have to compromise and come up with financially feasible solutions. And then they'll notice that they actually are nothing but an MLP-watching Green Party. So I guess you could just keep voting for those. DominoDancing fucked around with this message at 12:01 on Mar 11, 2012 |
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Mar 11, 2012 11:52
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Scanned the first six pages for any mention on utilities and didn't find any, so I'll recount my tale of the horrors of German utility companies. Hi! I'm a stupid American living in Germany. I lived on the local economy in a cute little villiage for 1 year before moving on our Air Base. The utilities in Germany are done quite differently than anything I've ever known. Our local electric company was Pfalzwerke, gas was ProGas, phone/internet was Telekom. The internet/phone company ranked 2nd in worst experience in my life. Our villiage only had infrastructure to support DSL internet, and when I found out that DSL more than less became obsolete in the States in the late 90s early 2000s when broadband was introduced, I audibly groaned. The performance wasn't too bad and I could play games with reliable speed. The worst part is if you miss a payment they shut you down in short order, and it takes the better part of a week for your payment to go through. You can go into a Telekom shop and pay them, but the shop can't do anything. The main center has to turn your service back on. Pfalzwerke is 3rd, as they were the least problematic. Electric utilities are paid based on what they estimate you will use. When we moved into our house we paid a bill based on what the previous tenents paid. The previous family was 5 strong and used a lot more electricty than my family of 3. We paid about 180 euro a month for six months until the company came out and read our meter. They adjusted our monthly bill accordingly and cut us a check for the difference. This would happen every six months. If you use less than they estimate you get paid the difference, if you use more you owe them. ProGas was the worst I've ever dealt with. Since our house was out in the sticks, the whole villiage used propane tanks outside their houses to heat water and air. Every year the gas company does an estimation on how much gas you will use, and they will also charge you based on how many times they come out to fill up your tank. We suffered a particularly harsh winter our first year and we had a 10 month old to keep warm. We had to have our tank filled once during the winter which tacked another 800 euro onto our bill, on top of our 300 euro monthly estimate. All this money you pay goes into a pot they use for your account, and when it comes time to pay you either get money or owe money. Well, since we had to have our tank filled up we owed money. Big time. 1600 euro or 2200 USD. I'll never live off base again, or in Germany if I can help it. Potential expats beware.
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Mar 11, 2012 13:44
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The pirate party is pretty much the worst of reddit these days, you'll find an arbeitskreis for every subreddit from mensrights to gun rights. Aziraphale, do you get gas/oil/whatever for free in the US? Please enlighten me how utilities are handled in some rural village in the middle of nowhere in the US?
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Mar 11, 2012 15:36
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dreamin' posted:The pirate party is pretty much the worst of reddit these days, you'll find an arbeitskreis for every subreddit from mensrights to gun rights. To be fair to him dealing with internet providers is pretty terrible here. They're notorious for picky appointments, throttling and massive delays in getting stuff going. Die Piraten: Yeah, these guys are a loving joke. It would be really nice to have a left wing party made of younger people combining tech knowledge with the better platform pieces of SPD, die Grünen and die Linke, but I don't see that happening anytime soon. I think with all the shenanigans that the pirates are pulling in Berlin though they probably won't see the same success again unless they really get on their game and strategize instead of acting like kids from ~the internet~.
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Mar 11, 2012 16:10
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dreamin' posted:The pirate party is pretty much the worst of reddit these days, you'll find an arbeitskreis for every subreddit from mensrights to gun rights. You pay for what you use based on monthly usage. You would never ever pay an 'estimate' of utilities. Heres another question: why does Telekom throttle my cell phone usage? I pay for unlimited access, but I always get a message telling me I've gone over my limit and now my nuts are cut off. lite_sleepr fucked around with this message at 16:42 on Mar 11, 2012 |
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Mar 11, 2012 16:40
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Telekom is the physical embodiment of evil. That should answer all your questions.
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Mar 11, 2012 17:09
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Aziraphale posted:Heres another question: why does Telekom throttle my cell phone usage? I pay for unlimited access, but I always get a message telling me I've gone over my limit and now my nuts are cut off. If you're talking about data, you don't have unlimited access. Well, you do but not really. You get 1GB or 5GB or what ever in UMTS/3G and if you go over the limit they throttle you to GPRS. Still better than the old days where they would charge ridiculous prizes once you went over your limit.
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Mar 11, 2012 17:19
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Aziraphale posted:
Just as a disclaimer, I'm sorry you had such a bad experience and I'm not going to say companies like Telekom can't be a bitch to deal with, but that last line of yours is what really annoys the gently caress right outta me, because as a senior enlisted or officer (which I'm guessing here), you should be mature enough to allow for the possibility that, while your particular experience was bad, it doesn't necessarily reflect the general experience one should anticipate here. I've lived in the states and had my share of lovely deals over there, but it never crossed my mind to tell anyone here anything as broad as "poo poo happened to me, poo poo will probably happen to you if you live off base in the US." (you know, one of the countless german bases we have there...well, I guess the comparison doesn't work as well, but you catch my drift) Now for the more constructive part of this post. Your experience shouldn't have been as bad as it was, for multiple reasons. I know of these reasons because I've been "coaching" my american friends and any soldiers/DoD-employees they sponsored in most matters concerning housing, social, legal and other everyday issues. 1. Internet Ascertaining what options for phone/tv/internet services are available in a place should be on the top 5 of your "questions for the landlord" list. Should the landlord not have any answer because he's old and/or an idiot (I've seen my share of those), then housing would usually be able to advise you on how to check availability via websites of the leading companies. And even if everyone in housing is a complete loving moron, there is not a single USAREUR base in this country where you can't swing a goddamn cat and hit SOMEONE that can point you in the right direction for your questions. Now our phone companies can indeed be a bitch to deal with, but once again, housing and legal are supposed to give you pointers on how to handle them. A chill, laissez-faire approach like it works in the US doesn't really work as well here (and, like in any other country, it can leave you vulnerable when you don't have all your paperwork in good order when it should come to the point of showing them why they, in fact, hosed up and not you) Shutting off service immediately for a missed payment is VERY unusual. What normally happens is you get a couple of letters of admonition for the late payments, after the second one usually connected to late fees. Depending on the company, they'll send a couple more of those, piling onto the original late fees, before handing the matter off to a debt collection agency. In any case, the problem you described with the Telekom isn't even close to some of the asshattery I've heard of (just their scheduling of technicians...I mean...holy poo poo, they are literally the devil), but as to the origin of your problem..."missing a payment" should be fairly unusual on your end as well, just saying. 2. Electric Utilities Partial payments are fairly common over here for ongoing services provided, the extent of which cannot remotely be monitored or is monitored in regular intervals. There's a reason companies do this and while a full understanding of the reason eludes me, it's one of those "that's how it is, deal with it" things. Bottom line, you're paying exactly what you owe, not more, not less. If a previous tenant had 30 water cookers running 24/7 and you end up with a disproportionately high monthly rate, you call/write the service provider and request a reassessment based on the changed tenancy agreement that is closer to what a 3-strong family would use. This is, again, something a guy at housing or anyone else with some basic living experience as a serviceman in germany could have told you and something you could have asked them about if it annoyed you so much. I've done this exact thing for myself and for 2 american buddies that were single soldiers in 97sqm apartments previously occupied by regular-sized families. The companies usually don't give too much of a poo poo either way. In one case, they just had a reading done after a month to verify if the new rate was accurate and in the other case, they just had the guy send in the reading himself via some form on their website. And they don't care because if the rate is too low, you STILL end up paying them what you owe. 3. Gas Almost the same deal as with electricity. The intervals at which you're being charged may seem weird or, in your case with the refill, irregular, but you pay exactly what you owe. The main difference is the delivery. If your deal with the company is payment in installments, then yes, they assess your consumption, fill you up (or, specifically, up to 85% of what your tank can hold) and you pay your monthly installments. Should you notice that your consumption is higher than what they projected and you could be running low at some point, you notify them in a timely fashion and the next time they have one of their trucks in the area, it swings by, tops you off and you either pay for the amount refuelled or it's added to your total amount payable and your monthly installments are adjusted/you end up paying at the end of the year. In any case, you only end up paying for the gas you use. Payments for the actual ProGas hardware (tank, boiler, etc) are the responsibility of the building owner/landlord and he in turn can relay a certain amount of the costs to you, but this would be covered in your monthly rent. If folks end up running low (or, heck, OUT) of liquid gas and request a delivery where ProGas (or the contractors they usually have for delivery) needs to send a truck outside their schedule, then they incur the cost of the extraordinary delivery. But having dealt with gas and, more often, oil heating, I've made the experience that running low or out of gas surprisingly is literally impossible unless someone is grossly negligent...in which case they don't really have grounds to complain anyway. I'm not sure this is what happened in your case, I just felt like adding it for the sake of completeness. So, in conclusion, sorry for your other-than-enjoyable experience, but a fair deal of the reasons for it seem to be based on the fault of people failing to inform you and, subsequently with regard to issues you were concerned about, on your own fault for not informing yourself.
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Mar 11, 2012 18:43
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about why you should never live in Germany because of utility companies.
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What up, german goons? The MLP party gets more votes than the greens in Saarland, and nobody even cares to post about it? For shame. ZDF-Interview  : Können Sie überhaupt Politik machen? : Joah.
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Mar 26, 2012 17:24
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I'm mostly giddy about the turnout for the FDP and if the pony party is what it takes then i'll accept that. Seriously, the FDP dropped below both the Family Party and the Nazis.
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Mar 26, 2012 17:56
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A brony party and the nazis got more votes than the FDP...you're kidding, right?
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Mar 26, 2012 18:01
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Duzzy Funlop posted:A brony party and the nazis got more votes than the FDP...you're kidding, right? Of cours they are kidding, that would be stupid. While the FDP clearly lost to the family party and the Crash Override party, they managed to beat the nazis with an astonishing 267 voters (out of 500.000). http://www.statistikextern.saarland.de/wahlen/wahlen/2012/internet_saar/LT_SL_12/landesergebnisse/
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Mar 26, 2012 18:13
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Ah, my bad i still worked from some preliminary results which had the FDP pegged at 1.1 percent and the Nazis at 1.2
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Mar 26, 2012 18:22
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I believe that at least a quarter of NDP votes are trolling to show discontent with the other parties, I know people who've done this.
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Mar 27, 2012 05:57
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az posted:I believe that at least a quarter of NDP votes are trolling to show discontent with the other parties, I know people who've done this. That's like being dissatisfied with the food at a restaurant and going to the toilet to eat poo poo from the bowl instead.
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Mar 27, 2012 14:19
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Let's not pretend as if the NPD would ever be going anywhere.
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Mar 27, 2012 18:04
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Let's not pretend as if the NSDAP would ever be going anywhere.
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Mar 27, 2012 18:34
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niethan posted:Let's not pretend as if the NSDAP would ever be going anywhere. Yes, we are all so close to be overcome by our genetic naziness. Once someone calls himself Führer, we Germans simply can't not vote for him! that is what makes the NPD so dangerous! Every second Apfel could make a televised speech calling himself the f-word, and before you know it, we will have invaded France. Again. Call me back when the NPD reliably gets double digit results in federal elections.
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Mar 27, 2012 18:39
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az posted:Let's not pretend as if the NPD would ever be going anywhere. Still, with the Parteienfinanzierung every single vote gets them money once they're over 1,0% at an election at state level (Landtag) or 0,5% at the elections for the Bundestag / European parliament. And with what the investigation has shown basically every single vote is at least partially financing
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Mar 27, 2012 18:43
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ArchangeI posted:Yes, we are all so close to be overcome by our genetic naziness. Once someone calls himself Führer, we Germans simply can't not vote for him! that is what makes the NPD so dangerous! Every second Apfel could make a televised speech calling himself the f-word, and before you know it, we will have invaded France. Again. Sorry I don't understand this argument of yours.
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Mar 27, 2012 18:48
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ArchangeI posted:Yes, we are all so close to be overcome by our genetic naziness. Once someone calls himself Führer, we Germans simply can't not vote for him! that is what makes the NPD so dangerous! Every second Apfel could make a televised speech calling himself the f-word, and before you know it, we will have invaded France. Again. Hey, you shouldn't be sarcastic about such a serious matter. I hear the US are rapidly moving towards fascism and pretty much every other initiative is somehow tied to the brownshirts. poo poo is no laughing matter, yo. On a non-related matter, even without paying too much attention to the TV, I was bombarded with every little shard of Wulffiness, yet the election and inauguration of Gauck almost passes me by? Are they trying to keep the guy low-key this time around or what's the deal there? Outside of what I've heard about Gauck in the media, I don't know too much about him, but I kinda like the man.
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Mar 27, 2012 18:51
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ArchangeI posted:Call me back when the NPD reliably gets double digit results in federal elections. NSDAP had 2.6% of the vote in 1928. Things can change very very rapidly. All that was needed back then was a global economic meltdown. How's the Eurozone doing again? Oh...
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Mar 27, 2012 19:26
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Orange Devil posted:NSDAP had 2.6% of the vote in 1928. Things can change very very rapidly. All that was needed back then was a global economic meltdown. How's the Eurozone doing again? Stop translating Tea Party talking points verbatim, tia.
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Mar 27, 2012 19:42
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Duzzy Funlop posted:Stop translating Tea Party talking points verbatim, tia. Please elaborate on this comment.
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Mar 27, 2012 19:45
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Orange Devil posted:How's the Eurozone doing again? Its doing fine, thanks for asking.
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Mar 27, 2012 20:29
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Orange Devil posted:NSDAP had 2.6% of the vote in 1928. Things can change very very rapidly. All that was needed back then was a global economic meltdown. How's the Eurozone doing again? To say that the Great Depression was the one and only reason for the rise of Hitler is incredibly stupid. It was a reason. Others include (from the top of my head): - Being forced to pay crippling reparations for losing a war - believing that said war was not really lost on the battlefield and also not our fault in the first place - the formerly widely respected military being neutered and humiliated by peace treaty - the Kaiser abdicating just in time to place this mess solely in the hands of the new republic - a constitution that placed too much power in the hands of the executive, which was run mostly by bureaucrats taken over from the old imperial bureaucracy - every major political party (notable exceptions being the SPD and the DDP) continuing the system from the Empire where parties represented particular groups and only looked out for their interest rather than govern the country, leading to coalitions breaking apart over the smallest things - except for the parties named, every other party did not support the constitution and/or wanted some form of (counter-)revolutionary change - an active and sizable communist party, which launched several uprisings And guess what? None of those are present now. The chance of a Nazi resurgence in the present political climate are as close to zero as anything can ever be in human society. To claim that the NPD presents a clear and present threat to the survival of democratic society in Germany is the same as saying that Iran is about to land on the US East Coast. Hence my comment about us all being unknowing sleeper agents for the Nazis, because that is literally the only way the NPD is going to get to power.
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Mar 27, 2012 20:52
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I guess as long as they aren't a "clear end present danger" to german democracy it's no big deal that they kill turks.
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Mar 27, 2012 20:55
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niethan posted:I guess as long as they aren't a "clear end present danger" to german democracy it's no big deal that they kill turks. Point to the post where someone said that. This used to be about how stupid saying "Economy tanking => Nazis everywhere soon" is. niethan posted:Please elaborate on this comment. The same exact polemic was (and I'm guessing still is) used by the Tea Party to validate (through some literally retarded logic) their claim that Obama is purposely scuttling the economy because that would be the best way for him to solidify his takeover. You know, because he is Hitler reborn. Duzzy Funlop fucked around with this message at 21:05 on Mar 27, 2012 |
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Mar 27, 2012 21:01
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niethan posted:I guess as long as they aren't a "clear end present danger" to german democracy it's no big deal that they kill turks. Whose mouth are you trying to put those words in, exactly?
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Mar 27, 2012 21:01
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Jesus christ what have I done, whiny poo poo central.
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Mar 27, 2012 21:02
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Ententod posted:Whose mouth are you trying to put those words in, exactly? That dude that was like "NPD is no big deal". This dude ^^^^^^
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Mar 27, 2012 21:03
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You're talking poo poo mate.
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Mar 27, 2012 21:04
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There was an article linked here to me before that I can't seem to find that is about how Germany's strong union presence and workers coops helped keep Germany's manufacturing sector strong while it atrophied nearly everywhere else. A friend of mine is insisting otherwise, that it is anti union laws keeping German industrial growth going. Can anyone relink this to me? I will greatly appreciate it.
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Mar 31, 2012 01:35
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edit: Whoops, that was supposed to go into the language thread.
lllllllllllllllllll fucked around with this message at 18:57 on Apr 2, 2012 |
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Apr 2, 2012 14:25
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