Changing The World

When a politician sets out on their career, they often dream of becoming a national or even international figure of influence. In their wilder flights of fancy they often hope to change the course of history for their country or even, dare to hope that they can set the agenda for a continent. An example of this is the ephemeral vision of 'Middle East Peace', which occasionally grips US Presidents. Although it has to be said not by many other world leaders, who are often more pragmatically trying simply to stop Armageddon breaking out there.

Merkel Divides People ......

So most of the would be world changers fail to even make the top ranks at home, and settle for a mediocre career, warming a seat somewhere, and making up the numbers in the party machines votes. However there are some who rise to the very top, and Mrs Merkel has to be counted as one of those. She became the undisputed leader of Germany and the must turn to European leader for US Presidents and Russian leaders alike ..... but most of all she bestrides the European Union. Her opinions on all things Fiscal or Social, are those that hold sway. So on Greek debt its Germany's views that set the rules.

Similarly on mass immigration from Middle Eastern war zones, its Mrs Merkel's opinions that initially set the European agenda, before some countries panicked and closed their borders, as millions of young and aggressive men, with a very non-European view of the world flooded the continent. But as well as setting much of the agenda in Western Europe, back home in Germany, Mrs Merkel is still the dominant force, and in fact she has created her own version of Germany .... however perhaps not with the outcomes she expected.

• Thomas Salbey, the 57 German man who yelled and threw bottles at the Munich mass killer Ali Sonboly during his attack, is being investigated by the German police and may face charges for insulting him.

• A gang of Muslim men were reported as having threatened to 'exterminate' a group of nudists in Germany. The men barged into the naturist complex near the Dutch border shouting 'Allahu Akbar', before threatening the naturist's. One woman said that "They insulted us. They even spat on us. We women were called sluts. They said that they would exterminate us all" .... German police were said to be investigating .... no early arrests were expected.

• Migrants will get lessons in 'flirting' to help them settle in Mrs Merkel's Germany. Teaching new arrivals in Essen how to fall in love is important for integration said course coach Horst Wenzel. I guess this would have helped the grammar on the text messages they showed women before sexually assaulting them in Munich.

• Seven Muslim men who formed a Sharia street patrol in 2014 did not break laws against political uniforms. The group sparked outrage in the western city of Wuppertal, when they approached people in orange vests bearing the words "Sharia Police". They demanded that locals stop gambling, listening to music, and drinking alcohol. This apparently is legal in the New Germany if their uniforms were not deemed "suggestively militant or intimidating", a court spokesman said .... so 'Sharia Police' in the centre of Wuppertal, is not "suggestively militant or intimidating". Ah well, the green light for those other "Sharia patrols" by ultra-conservative Muslim men in in other European cities, including London, Copenhagen and Hamburg, where they already happen.

German Integrationist's Showing How They Have Embraced German Culture ....

• Safia S, described in court as a German Moroccan, and who was 15 at the time, stabbed and seriously wounded a police officer in the neck at the central station in Hanover. This was believed to be the country's first attack by a sympathiser of jihadist group Islamic State (IS). She was jailed by a German court for six years.

Mrs Merkel has even intervened directly herself .... she called for 'migrants' to be more tolerant of Germans eating pork. This came after it was reported that many German schools are no longer serving pork for fear of offending migrants children's religious views. "Whilst we must respect people who have other habits it should not lead to a shrinking of diversity in the offer of foods that we are used to, including pork meat." The average German used to eat about 90lb of pork products each year (mainly in the form of Bratwurst sausages or Schweinshaxe - roast knuckle), but if its no longer served where it may offend, then this figure will drop.

Schweinshaxe plus Bratwurst Sausage plus Sauerkraut plus Sour Cabbage
plus Kartoffelklöße (Potato Dumpling) Equals German Meal

• In a similar vein, but across the border in Douai France, a couple of Muslim men got sentenced to six months jail after attacking a couple who were eating a 'Blasphemous' ham pizza.

• Finally, in a story that tells you a great deal, a German court has upheld its ban on a satirical poem by German comic Jan Boehmermann that mocked Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. The court gave the reason as "Satire that is secured under artistic freedom, could be forbidden when it touches on the core area of personal freedom." ..... free speech in the West apparently doesn't enter in to the equation anymore.

This vision of Germany is not everyone's idea of a multicultural heaven, but apparently its is Mrs Merkel's, and that's all that counts in the New Germany.