14
JUL
2025
Day 128 and the weekly report
Look who i have found on my walk today. And no, I haven´t touched the little mouse.
As you can see down below I´m still struggling throttling myself.
Day 221 and the weekly report
In this week I haven´t manage to throttle my sporting activities enough. I cracked my 100 k goal. I also reached the minimal goal of doing 10.000 steps per day, by reaching the double amount in average.
Active kilocalories
And with nearly 2200 kcal I again reached a rather unhealthy goal.
Time of working out
No comment.
06/30/2025
Day 215 and the monthly report
As I wrote yesterday. This month is hard to top and I think it might be healthier just to throttle down a bit.
29/06/2025
Day 214 and the weekly stats
As you can see, I keep going and it was a very sporty week as was this month. I will post the monthly stats tomorrow. But I think that I will have to drop my sportivity a bit. Over 2000 active kcal per day shouldn´t be the average.
06/22/2025
06/22/
2025
Day 207 and weekly report
It´s 5.00 in the afternoon, I´ve walked 12972 steps for 10.26 K and burned 2390 active kcal so far in 156 minutes.
The weekly stats are great, more than 100.000 steps, more than 100 K, more than 2000 kcal burned each day. Nearly 200 active minutes per day, but I have trouble loading up the pictures, hope I can post them tomorrow.
Day 206 and reflection part III
It´s saturday morning 11.15 and I´ve walked 13562 steps for 11.54 K so far and burned 1430 active kcal in 147 minutes.
Why I started the project? Well actually it´s the fault of Trump winning his second presidency. And I cannot finish it because he is still there. I think that I have to do something. So I walked and worked out and I think that the energy can change something. Perhaps it draws from Trump´s energy because he is always asking for time, two weeks before the tariffs set in or two weeks before he decides to bomb the Iran and then.... nothing happens. The energy is gone. So I will go on with my project, but I will reduce my writing to a weekly report. Starting tomorrow and I will show the weekly stats.
06/21/
2025
06/20/
2025
Day 205 and refection part II
It´s 7.28 in the evening and the goals of the day are reached: 14256 steps, 12,93 K, 2390 active kcal, 188 minutes.
Another very positive developement of the last 200 days is, that we have a strong government in Germany and I´m sure that it will last for 4 years and that we don´t have to vote earlier again. The government can spend a lot of money. Of course that raises the deficit, but I think the positive effects are more important than our debts.
Day 204
It´s 12.50 in the afternoon. The goals of the day are reached: 13551 steps for 11,84 Kilometers and 1832 kcal burned in 160 Minutes.
In over 200 days a lot has happened. One of the most interesting developement is that of the "Die Linken", of the left party. Abandoned by Sahra Wagenknecht, stripped by their position as a fraction of the Bundestag, loosing a lot of money and finally making a triumphant return in the last Bundestag election and the party of Sahra Wagenknecht finishing beyond 5 % and thus without representation in the Bundestag.
06/19/
2025
Day 203 and the shoe report
It´s 01.50 in the afternoon and I reached my goals. 14425 steps for 11.06 K, 1010 active kcal and 110 minutes of workout.
And this is the requiem to the PUMA R-SX, the most comfortable shoe I´ve ever worn. But after using it after the winter for nearly half a year it showed signs of being worn out. So I buried the pair of shoes today. But I will get some new ones. They are quite heavy but that doesn´t matter to me, because I use them for power-walking and not jogging.
Right shoe
During my project I not only destroyed the third pair of shoes but also a lot of socks but I cut the nails regularly. It´s not the nails but rather the kilometers.
Left shoe
And I think that this proofs it, that it´s not the nails, because then the shoe would be very ofersized. I hightly recommend this shoe.
Day 202, summary 2
Today I also reached my goals: 13.079 steps, 10,93 K, 1791 kcal, 178 Min.
And here are my activity statistics:
Month Days active kcal active minutes
Nov. 18 20321 1827
Dez 31 40527 5129
Jan 31 33771 4105
Feb. 28 23662 3195
Mar 28 34253 4990
Apri 24 40990 3434
May 31 65076 5485
June 17 42264 4183
Sum 208 300.864 32.346
Average 1.446,46 155,51
This statistic shows, that I burned over 1.400 active kcal per day in around 155 minutes. And it shows, what this whole project has got to do with addiction, because over the project the time spent actively working out and burning active kcal mounted slowly.
I didn´t loose any body weight, but I feel fitter and more muscular than ever before in my life.
06/17/
2025
06/16/
2025
Day 201, summary
Today I also reached my goals: 15,731 steps, 16,84 K, 2084 kcal, 186 Min.
And in total I walked this:
Month Days Steps Kilometers
Nov. 18 244748 168,89
Dez 31 630050 457,7
Jan 31 522947 364,68
Feb. 28 439807 299,08
Mar 28 626174 449,7
Apri 24 364084 259,89
May 31 556130 462,93
June 16 412004 346,35
Sum 207 3.795.944 2809,22
Average 18.337,89 13,57
I listed some more days because I started the counting a couple of days before the project and there were some days due to losing a cable and stuff, that didn´t count the whole day, but as you can see, although there were some days of insufficiant counting, I reached much more than 10.000 steps a day and more than 10 K per day.
Day 200 end of project
As you can see above, since it´s 08.30 in the morning, I will also reach my goals on the last day of the project.
I think I can end the project, since my efforts have become a habit that I will keep.
Distance this week
In the last week of the project, I could reach the goal of more than 10.000 steps each day and even more than 10 K.
Active Calories burned this week
And I even burned more than 2000 Kilocalories this week.
Day 199
It´s 10.10 in the morning and I´ve walked 13771 steps for 12.26 Kilometers and burned 1013 active kilocalories in 108 minutes.
NBCworld writes: Live updates: Iran launches attack on Israel after airstrikes kill senior leaders
I fear, that although there wasn´t much reaction of Iran after the attacks on their air-defense, there has to be a stronger reaction now, because the current political system doesn´t want to be seen as weak.
06/14/
2025
06/13/
2025
Day 198
It´s 11.10 in the morning and I´ve got 18086 steps for 14.8 Kilometers and burned 2060 active kilocalories in 241 minutes.
Israel attacked Iran. NBC writes: Live updates: Israel strikes Iranian nuclear facilities as fears of war mount
I don´t think, that to fight on so many fronts is of any good, even though I understand the fear of Iran delevoping nukes.
Day 197
It´s 01:40 in the afternoon and I´ve made 27655 steps for 27.47K and burned 3198 active kcal in 315 minutes. And the explenation for that is, that I had a flat tire in Burscheid, had to walk back and then I had to walk to a store where I could by some tires for my bike. So I had to walk more could bike less than planned today.
It seems that the police in LA gets the situation under control. Due to curfew-violation there were some arrests. USA today writes on MSN:
Hundreds arrested in LA protests as Hegseth hints at more deployments: Updates
But Hegseth wants more troops? And the costs are horrendous. And I´m with the mayor of LA. It seems to be a test. Trump just wants to see, wether it´s possible to use the troops inland.
06/12/
2025
06/11/
2025
Day 196 and my 100 K Bike-tour
It´s 01.45 in the afternoon and I´ve walked 14211 steps for 13.76 K and burned definitely more than 3479 kcal in 344 minutes of movement.
And here is the story. Currently I´m using two trackers, because I track also track my bike-tours with Stadtradeln (town-biking, which is a project of the city to get people to use their bikes more often, and I´m in a group of my older daughter´s school). I tracked the whole tour with Stadtradeln and with the Xiaomi-app I wanted the pauses not to be tracked and forgot to end one pause, and so the route from Dormagen to Düsseldorf was not tracked, where I had my second pause of two pauses. And so I only have the Stadtradeln picture on the left as the proof, that today in six hours I could cover the whole distance of 100 Kilometers on my bike.
Day 195
It´s 7.40 in the morning. I´ve walked 14023 steps for 15.34 K and burned 890 active kcal in 112 minutes of movement.
And what does Trump do, after sending not only the national guard but also the marines to LA? Politico writes:
Donald Trump on arresting Gavin Newsom: 'I’d do it.' - POLITICO
Well, that is what we call "leeres Gewäsch" (empty washing) in German, when someone says something without any meaning. You would call it a blind threat. But what Newsom should really do, is do sue.
mar
2020
06/09/
2025
Day 194
Yesterday it got a little bit later than usual. And after 3.5 hours of sleep it´s already 10.30 in the morning, but I´ve nearly reached the daily goals. I´ve walked 14.136 steps for 10.98 K and burned 948 active kcal in 109 minutes.
Axios writes: LA protests: Newsom demands Trump pull National Guard
And of course the lines are drawn. The democrates, like Harris and Bernie Sanders show, that Trump is an audiocratic maniac and the republicans blame Newsom that he is unable to contain the violance. I fear that the national guard cannot contain the violence either. And of course you cannot warn others in other states to keep still, because Trump inforces his unlawful decisions with the national guard.
06/08/2025
Day 193 and the weekly report
It´s 8.15 in the morning and as you can see on the right, I´ve walked 13.289 steps for 12.27 K(you can guess that from below) and burned the nearly 1000 active kcal in 106 minutes of movement.
The stats below show, that this was a good week. I will reach the 180 walking-K this week. I´ve burned more than 2500 active Kcal per day and I will reach more than 2000 active minutes this week.
Yikes protests in LA and the national guard deployed. Not good. BBC writes: Los Angeles protests: Trump orders National Guard be deployed after clashes over immigration raids - BBC News
It´s never good to do that because there are not only immigrants protesting but citizens of the US.
06/07/
2025
Day 192
It´s 8.00 in the morning and I´ve walked 14.432 steps for 11.17K and burned 986 active kcal in 114 minutes so far.
Here is an analysis of the relationship of Trump and Musk written about by the british Indipendent:
Musk and Trump relationship breakdown: A psychologist’s take | The Independent
And here are some live-updates by CBS:
Trump-Musk feud simmers, DOJ charges Abrego Garcia, more updates
Day 191
It´s 9.00 in the morning and so far I´ve walked 15.031 steps for 13.95 K and burned 1069 active kcal in 118 minutes.
It´s not that easy because more blisters, one beneath my right foot, popped up and because my feet show some stress-syndromes, but once I´m rolling, I still walk the kilometer under 9 minutes, more tempo since I don´t need to walk a high distance.
I fear, that Musk went too far and that he knows it and he regrets it. Like children Trump and Musk fired each other up, until Musk dropped the Epstein-Bomb. USA today writes:
Elon Musk turns on Trump: 'Time to drop the really big bomb'
And I think Musk regrets it, because after that he sent a signal of defeat, saying he takes back the anouncement, that he will not offer his dragon-ships for cargo-routes. Well, never trust a good friend with your darkest secrets...
And of course this Feud covers up the meeting of Trump and Merz, which went astonishingly well, showing that a good preperation can have good effects on relationships and not uncontrollable bantering. But of course you cannot change Trump after one meeting. Politico writes:
Merz avoids a blowup in the Oval, but Trump goes his own way on Russia - POLITICO
06/06/
2025
06/05/
2025
Day 190
It´s 11.00 in the morning and I´ve walked 12863 steps for 9.79 K and burned 2226 Kcal in 176 minutes (did some more biking today).
After leaving his job for Trump Musk rampages about the big beautiful bill. Politico writes:
‘Disgusting abomination’: Musk goes nuclear on Trump’s ‘big beautiful bill’ - POLITICO
Day 189
Since I had my long walk yesterday, I wanted to do a little less today. It´s 12.15 at noon and I´ve walked 17.978 steps for 13.3 K, so when adding it to yesterday that would make 100 K, yes I know 101, and burned 1140 Kilocalories in 158 minutes of walking, and I would still be under 24 hours when adding it to yesterdays walking-minutes. I have some blisters but can ignore them by walking.
In Poland Tusk is going to ask the government for it´s trust and there is chance of a new election as it is in the Netherlands. DW writes on MSN:
Dutch PM calls election after coalition collapse
That is not good, because in the Netherlands it was hard to form a government. And if we look at the trend in Europe, there might be a farhter more to the right.
06/04/
2025
06/03/
2025
Day 188 the 87 K-Walk
As you can see on the left, I walked nearly 88 Kilometers. I wanted to walk 100 in less than 24 hours and as you can see there was a lot of time left, but since I planned the day better than my first 100 K-Walk, I took the right route and found out, that it wasn´t 100 K long.
I started my walk at 3.00 in the morning and I changed my shoes so that I have less blisters than on my first walk three years ago. I paused in some discounters so I wasn´t as packed as on my first walk. I could use the toilets for example in a mall in Dormagen. I also visited McDonald´s to drink two Milk-Shakes and had a lot of brain-freezes, but just couldn´t stop drinking. There was a lot of sun and I should have worn sun-protection but I just have some burned parts on the back of my upper arms. Weather was ideal, not too hot. And since I started my walk early at night, I had a lot of light on my walk and could keep up my walking-pace of about 6 K per hour.
Day 187
It´s 3.15 in the afternoon. Today I rode some bike, so I walked 16.198 steps for 12.82 Kilometers but burned 2670 active Kilocalories in 231 minutes.
A lot of things happened.
There are some explenations for why Trump is attacking Harvard. The Washington Post writes on MSN:
Why is Trump going after Harvard? Here’s how the attacks have escalated.
Then, there was an election in Poland and the right-wing PIS-party candidate won, not so good for the current government:
DW writes on MSN:
Presidential election outcome a blow to Poland's government
And there was a very intelligent Ukrainian drone-attack targeting russion avial bombers. The BBC writes:
Ukraine's audacious drone attack sends critical message to Russia - and the West
But the question is, if that has an effect on the peace talks. I fear it has no effect on them. Putin cannot show, how much that hurt Russia
06/02/
2025
06/01/2025
Day 186 and weekly report
As you can see on the left at 08:15 in the morning I´ve reached 12074 steps for 10.66 Kilometers (you can guess that from the stats below) and already burned more than a 1000 active kilocalories in more than a 100 minutes of workout and walking.
And as you can see below, the last weeks mirrors the monthly achievement. In average, I will crack the 19 kilometers per day today, perhaps even the 20, burned more than 2000 active kilocalories in average per day, and moved over 3 hours per day.
I have to confess that I didn´t watch the whole Champions League´s final, after PSG lead with two goals, so I didn´t watch the goals 3-5.
One Football writes:
🚨 Historic result: PSG thrash Inter in the Champions League final | OneFootball
And that after Mbappé leaving PSG to win the Champions League with Real Madrid. Finally all the billions invested by Katar lead to the win.
05/31/
2025
Day 185 and monthly report
It´s saturday and it´s 7.30 in the morning. I´ve just finished my walk and my workout in the Bayer-04-open-air-workout-area and I´ve reached my daily goals as you can see on the right. I´ve walked 10.13 kilometers.
And below you can see the statistics of May. In average I´ve walked 14.63 Kilometers per day burning more than 2000 active Kilocalories and being active nearly for 3 hours.
And what happened to Elon Musk. The independent wrote:
There is a German saying: To get away with a blue eye. Saying that a person retreated before getting seariously hurt. Another saying is: The rats are leaving the sinking ship. I think both sayings are apt, but that the Muskito got a lot more hurt than just a blue eye.
05/30/
2025
Day 184
It´s 9.15 in the morning and I´ve reached the daily goals. I´ve walked 11725 steps for 13.89 Kilometers and burned 1537 active Kilocalories in 139 Minutes.
Hmmh, against my prediction yesterday the appeal court ruled that the tariffs stay active for now. ABC news writes:
Appeals court reinstates Trump's tariffs for now after ruling blocking them - ABC News
Well, here we go again. Time for Trump to do as he wants.
Day 183
It´s 7.15 in the morning and I´ve nearly reached my daily goals. I walked 12579 stepsfor 9.68 Kilometers and burned 991 active Kilocalories in 103 minutes of action.
What a glorous father´s day it is, when it starts with such wonderful news. Euronews writes:
Markets jump after court rules against Donald Trump's sweeping tariffs
Of course Trump tries to change the ruling, but I think that he will fail trying. And he should aknowedge the valor of these 5 firms who went to court. Good job.
Today on father´s day of course I will get some presents, although there is not as much space in the advertisements as on mother´s day. Well, rightfully the father´s presents are smaller than the mother´s....
mar
2020
05/28/
2025
Day 182
It´s 2.00 in the afternoon and today I walked a little bit more. I´ve walked 46451 steps for 40.16 Kilometers and burned 3349 active kilocalories in 380 Minutes.
I think of doing a 100 kilometers march before reaching the 200. day of my project.
Tomorrow is Father´s day and on Father´s day some men do long walks and drink beer. I plan to do my 100 K-walk when the discounters are open so that I don´t have to pack anything to drink nor to eat. But currently the weather is a little bit unstable.
Day 181
Today is my birthday. It´s nearly noon and I´ve walked 17564 steps for 13.94 Kilometers and burned 1620 kcal so far in 145 minutes of movement. Pretty good for a birthday.
I received a present early, well yesterday, because Heidenheim won in Elversberg 2:1, shooting the winning gall in additional time of the match, glorious.
And Trump ranted about political opponents and judges on his social platform before giving a speech on Arlington Cemetary. The Time writes:
Trump Honors Troops, Criticizes Rivals on Memorial Day | TIME
Well, what he should have done instead is to postpone memorial day for just one day so that it coincides with my birthday.
05/27/
2025
05/26/2025
Day 180
It´s 01.15 in the afternoon, I got 14058 steps for 12.01 Kilometers and burned 1871 active kcal in 173 minutes of movement so far.
Even Fox-News writes about Trump being annoyed by Putin:
Trump criticizes Putin for killing people in massive Ukraine missile strike | Fox News
But I think he´s just annoyed, that he won´t be able to give an impulse to end the war....
05/25/2025
Day 179 and weekly report
It´s 9.20 in the morning and I could walk 15421 steps for 11.64 Kilometers, burned 1284 active kcal and was active for 125 minutes.
This week I walked more than 100 Kilometers, burned more than 2200 kcal per day and over all was doing sport more than 3 hours per day. Pretty good.
Finally it rained, but sadly at the japanese day. The last two years I couldn´t go there. And of course it changed. Now it seems more like an Anime-Convention, because there are a lot of traders offering japanese food and drinks, which would be okay, but the high amount of traders offered Mangas, anime figurines, cosplay stuff. On one stage the cultural groups presented themselves on another stage music was created, for example by a drums-combo. There was an informational booth of the province of Chabu, which has a connection to Düsseldorf and Fukushima, you could learn ikebana, and participate in a language course. So, although a lot has changed and it became comercially infested, we still enjoyed it, until it became too wet.
05/24/ 2025
Day 178
It´s 8.00 on a saturday morning and my goals were met. 13847 steps for 10.93 kilometers and 1172 active kcal burned in 125 minutes. I think that I will cross the 100 kilometers this week because today we´ll visit the japanese celebration day in Düsseldorf. It´s a day full of Cosplay, Samurai-stuff, japanese music and culture and full of beautiful people. I´m really looking forward to it.
Finally Lavrov talks about the russian terms for peace with the Ukraine and I think that they cannot be met. He wants a pro russian government and by this wants to undermine the democracy in the Ukraine. The Moscow times writes:
Russia Will End Ukraine War Only on Its Terms, Lavrov Says - The Moscow Times
And in Washington DC it will get interesting: AP news writes
Judge blocks Trump decision to bar foreign student enrollment at Harvard | AP News
Hmmh, let´s see how Trump wants to overruel that...
Day 177
It´s 11.00 in the morning, well nearly noon and I´ve walked 12139 steps for 11.66 kilometers and burned 1950 active kilocalories so far in 165 minutes of movement.
I have to read less google-news, because the algorythm sometimes doesn´t show me really important news.
APnews writes:
And this is a planned developement, probably all over the world. I fear that right-wing-activists support teens to get active by burning down immigration-centers because they know the youth hardly can be harmed by the justice-system. Two of the teens arrested were 14 and 15 years old, all were under 18 when founding the group a couple of years back. And of course Tik-Tok is on the radar for publiching shorts of groups like that hightening right-wing ideas in the teens watching them.
And there are so many Trump-news that are so frightening that I cannot keep up. AP writes:
Trump administration bars Harvard from enrolling foreign students | AP News
And he justifies it by saying jewish students are not safe. He doesn´t say that a jewish couple working for the jewish embassy in Washington DC were safe. The Hill reports:
Donald Trump condemns fatal shooting of Israeli embassy staffers in DC
Yes, but if foreign students aren´t safe you should close the Israeli embassy or at least staff it with americans, which would be so MAGA....
Footboom writes about yesterday´s relegational match:
Heidenheim and Elversberg Draw 2-2 in Thrilling Relegation Clash - footboom1.com
Yes and Elversberg lead by 2 goals and Heidenheim, the home-team could draw but now they have to face Elversberg on their home turf for the decision who plays Bundesliga in the next season. By the way, the match is called El Dorfico in german. Dorf meaning village. Because these teams are in citys with really few inhabitants, villages.
05/23/2025
mar
2020
Day 176
It´s 4.20 in the afternoon. So far I´ve walked 16690 steps for 14.16 Kilometers and I could burn 2003 active kcal in 188 minutes of movement.
ABC news wrote on MSN:
Is there a white genocide in South Africa? Examining Trump's Oval Office claim
Again a smoke bomb. Last week I made fun of the immigration of white south-africans in the States and of course Trump wants to justify it.
But what is getting more dangerous is that more courts rule against Trump decisions and Trump says he doesn´t care and will overruel them.
The new republic writes on MSN:
Trump’s Threats to Defy Courts Go Nuclear as MAGA Rages at New Losses | The New Republic
Day 175
It´s 4.40 in the the afternoon and I´ve walked 18711 steps so far for 18.03 Kilometer and burned 2351 active kcal in 187 minutes of movement.
Trump wants to build a golden Dome. Well, he should talk to Stephen King about it.
WION put this on MSN:
05/21/2025
05/20/2025
Day 174
Yikes, today I worked out too much, well more than normally. It´s 5.00 in the afternoon and I´ve walked 19802 steps for 17.4 Kilometers and burned 3116 active kcal in 292 minutes of movement.
But what came out of the phone call of Trump and Putin? That Trump believes Putin wants to end the war? No, he cannot really believe that after one day of the biggest drone strike on the Ukraine ever. Nothing came out. They talked about Melania? What a joke.
This is what Trump said shortly after the call and it was aired by CBS:
Day 173
It´s 4.45 in the afternoon and the Trump-Putin call seems to be still going on.
So far I´ve walked 16317 steps for 13.72 k and burned 2004 kcal in 141 minutes of activity.
Still no news on the call.
Looking for the relegation match of Heidenheim (Bundesliga) vs. Elversberg (2. League) to determine which team will play in the Bundesliga next season. Both teams are very interesting, especially because Elversberg has climbed up two leagues in the last three years. But my heart beats for Heidenheim, because they do such a good job of financing the team.
mar
2020
05/18/2025
Day 172 and weekly summary
As you can see on the right at 3.00 in the afternoon I walked 16.253 steps in 185 minutes and burned 2470 active kcal.
And as you can see in the stats below I walked a total of 103.818 steps this week, burned 12214 active kcal this week, in a total of 996 minutes (and I will reach the 1000 minutes today of course).
Yesterday we watched the European Song contest and it was superb. And I also think that Israel deserved the second place, since it was a song for peace from a woman who survived the slaughter-concert. And the winner is Austria, what a voice...
Thanks to bing, we can watch it here:
Day 171
It´s 7.45 in the morning but I thought of writing now, since the goals of the day have been reached. I walked 10.91 k with 11177 steps and I´ve burned 1061 active kcal in 99 minutes of doing something.
Yes Trump shows the same symptoms of age as Biden. Being tired and eyes falling down and of course a reaction to negative comments by Bruce Springsteen or Taylor Swift by trying to top them. You want my shovel, I give a shovel (hmmh, I don´t like what I did in Kindergarden).
The independent.uk writes:
05/17/2025
05/16/2025
Day 170
It´s 4.00 in the afternoon and the goals are reached. With 20039 steps I walked 17.28 k and I burned 1752 active kcal in 191 minutes of activity.
What an absurd start of the peace talks. First Puting backs out, than Trump and finally Selenskyi. And Trump doesn´t react with more sanctions on Russia, after discussing that last weekend. What a laugh. I think Trump is thinking of backing out totally, because he doesn´t want to admit that he totally failed after saying that he will end the war in the first ten days of his second presidency.
CBS tells us:
Day without data
Of course I´ve stayed in my regime and drove 12 Kilometers by bike walked at least 12 k, but at night I lost my pedometer, well, in sleep the wristband opened up and I couldn´t find it without waking up my wife or kids (I thought I lost it whlle transporting a couch-bed-hybrid into my younger daughter´s room). And so I will resume counting tomorrow and I think that I will reach the week´s goal although one day of data is missing.
05/15/2025
05/14/2025
Day 169
It´s 4.40 in the afternoon, I´ve reached my daily goals with 15294 steps for 12.36 k and 1170 burned active kcal in 96 minutes of movement. But the Pedometer went out at 2.00 in the afternoon and I couldn´t monitor an additional walk and my bike tour back home. But that is not too bad, because my activity is still to much.
Here are some stats, that I just found and since this activity is called 1hundred4peace, I think I can shout out for myself, that in the monitored activities I´ve burned over 100398 active kcal and walked a distance of over 1000 k, in my monitored walks in round about 240 hours.
Trump backing down in his tariffs for China is all known. But now they try to explain it. The daily beast writes on MSN:
‘Trump Was Forced to Back off’: Even Fox News Reporter Thinks President Caved on China Tariffs
Day 168
It´s 4.30 in the afternoon, I´ve walked 14.73 k with 15350 steps and burned 1816 active kcal in 191 minutes of moving/working out. So I´ve reached my daily goals. It seems, I´ve made big steps, because normally the gap between kilometers and and steps is wider.
Did you know that Trump hasn´t raised tariffs on everything coming from South-Africa. Trump imports Afrikaner, claiming they seek refuge. Well, Trump, with 49 white people you cannot raise the white population in the States. Politico writes:
Trump defends move to grant refugee status to Afrikaners - POLITICO
05/13/2025
05/12/2025
Day 167
It´s 5.00 in the afternoon and with 13383 steps for 10.99 k, 114 minutes of movement while working out and stuff and burning 1347 kcal my daily goals have already been reached.
Funny thing happened in Newark, New Jersey, the other day.
ABC published this on MSN:
Newark mayor arrested at ICE facility while joining Democrats to conduct 'oversight'
And they even threatend the three democratic congressmen. Wow, sorry, but this nowadays can only happen in the states. Imagine the threatening of politicians in China. That would never happen. Russian paradoxes in the States...
05/11/2025
Day 166 and weekly summary
It´s 10:45 on sunday morning and I´ve already reached my daily goals: 12466 steps for 12,27k, 1467 kcal burned, 162 minutes of movement.
And I´ve reached my goals in the weekly summary. More than 100.000 steps, nearly 90 km this week (I will get over the 90 but won´t reach the 100), more than 1.800 kcal in average, more than 100 minutes of movement (160 in average) in 15 hours of standing. I slept for 7 hours in average this week.
Trump wants peace in the Ukraine as fast as possible because he has announced it since his election and nothing happened.
The mail online writes:
Of course that is wrong. The Ukraine is ready to accept the status quo for now but cannot accept a Ukraine ground to be russian.
05/10/2025
Day 165
It´s 9.00 in the morning and since it´s saturday I´ve already reached my sportive goals, 12673 steps, 10,1 k in 144 minutes and burning of 1191 kcal (of course with the help of the Bayer 04 open air workout area).
Well and here is the tragedy. We all knew that Xavi Alonso would leave Bayer 04 but now he made it official. And most probably our best player Florian Wirtz is leaving to Bayern Munich (well they sound similar and they play in red, and he will earn a lot more money, so why not). Bayer 04 will get around 15 millions for Xavi Alonso´s leaving within the contract, and I hope for 120 millions for Florian Wirtz + bonus-payments. Bayern should bleed out for this move.
Our old and new defense minister Volker Pistorius fired a two-star-general representing us at the NATO-meetings who said something like: "If you get sexually abused you better freeze and get it over." Well I understand both sides. I think by saying this he wanted to critisize Trump and our current government. Trump for doing what he does and the german government for keeping still. But I can also understand Pistorius for firing him.
Day 164
Is 5.30 in the afternoon and I´ve accumulated 15840 steps (over 10k) and burned 1640 active kcal in 143 minutes of movement.
Hmmh, I wonder how the pope thinks about Trump and whether this was one of the reason, why he was elected. I think that the weight of an American Pope´s words will reasonate in Americans a lot more, even in the hardliners.
05/09/2025
05/08/2025
Day 163
Habemus 18020 steps, 1622 kcal activi, 141 minuti di movere et
Habemus Papam! Pope Leo, the 14th, from Chicago and he whispered fuck the republicans all the time in the pauses.
Day 162
It´s 5.30 in the afternoon and I´ve reached nearly 8.000 steps but burned over 1000 active kcal but I´ve still got some meters to go.
Friedrich Merz is the first chancellor in German history not to be elected in the first round because 18 members of the coalition withheld their votes. I didn´t want this to happen and perhaps the politicians who withheld their votes didn´t think that so many would do so. And funny thing is, that since something like this never happened before there was no plan, what to do next, when to try to do a second vote. And it wouldn´t have been possible without the help of the left party (Die Linke), who gladly help because by this the CDU/CSU couldn´t keep up their agenda not to work together with the left party.
05/07/2025
05/06/2025
Day 161
It´s 2.00 in the afternoon and I´ve reached 9560 steps, but burned 1135 kcal.
And what did the FC Cologne do? They fired the trainer and the sport manager on the second posistion of the second league which would offer the direct access to the Bundesliga. What a mess, because the manager could work in an environment where people he trusted are alreacy installed. And why because they didn´t get many points in the last few matches. But what the...
Day 160
It´s 9.15 in the morning and I´ve walked 6375 steps so far, but reached 1009 burned kcal already, moving 87 minutes.
When your bubble-chatbot also writes the truth something´s wrong in the State of Denmark, ooops, in the World of X. Emerge writes:
'Grok Is Woke!' MAGA Users Furious as Elon Musk's AI Delivers 'Uncomfortable Truths' - Decrypt
And here comes another truth: Newsweek writes on MSN:
05/05/2025
05/04/2025
Day 159 and weekly report
It´s 1.00 in the afternoon and I´ve already reached 9728 steps and I´ve burned 1866 active kcal. This is enough to reach show you that in the last week I walked more than 10 k per day (15162 steps in average) and as you can see below I burned in average more than 2500 active kcal per day, which is a little too much. But I got more than enough sleep (8 hours per day) and moved more than 200 minutes per day. My pedometer doesn´t count indoor biking as movement, since it´s stationary.
05/03/2025
Day 158 and May-stats
Before analyzing last month, here are today´s achievements. It´s 01.30 in the afternoon and I´ve got 10.756 steps so far, was moving for 100 minutes and burned 1442 active kcal. I will try to not do much more sports today, perhaps two light sessions on the indoor-bike, because it´s regeneration day today.
In may a couple of days are missing due to my misplacement of my charging-cable, ordering it and stuff, but I don´t count those days even though I did stay in my regime of movement and sports. But on the left you can see the steps (Schritte I made) and that in average I walked more than 10 k. Down below you see the burned active kcal (more than 1.600 active kcal per day), active minutes per day (more than 100) and that I am standing the whole day, meaning, that I don´t nap. Perhaps I will insert a nap today for my regeneration.
Day 157
Yesterday I burned more than 3700 active kcal due to a bicycle-tour. So today I can go a little more easy on me. It´s 11.30 in the morning, well, near noon and I´ve 10.708 steps so far and I´ve burned 887 kcal. Since there is a lot of time to go, I think that I will get my 10 walking kilometers today and that I will reach around 2000 burned kcal.
Trump blames Biden for a solid economical developement and neglects the effect of his tariffs. USA today writes:
05/02/2025
05/01/2025
Day 156
It´s noon on Labour-day and I´ve gotten 8900 steps and I´ve burned 1380 active kcal so far. My pedometer lost connection to my phone a couple of times today and didn´t monitor my bike courses today. It shows a charge of 60 %, so I don´t have an explanation for that.
The SPD-members showed a big trust in the coalition with the CDU/CSU and voted for it with 85%.
The Local.de writes:
Germany's SPD approves coalition deal for Merz government
Ony 59 % of the members voted. Mhmm. I don´t get it why there were less people involved than on the voting of the new government.
Selensky closed the deal on the rare minerals and hopes to secure the american protection with it. Hmm...
UK´s sun writes:
Day 155
It´s 9.00 in the morning. So far I´ve reached 7138 steps and I´ve burned 1057 active kcal. The last days I reached my goal of walking more than 10 km. Yesterday I burned more than 3.000 active kcal. I will see, whether I can keep this level but don´t think that this should be a new goal, since that would not be healthy on the long run. But I´ve changed my diet. I try to consume more protein and I changed my intake from one meal a day to three meals per day. But I kept the habit to burn around 700 active kcal before my my first meal.
I don´t think that we will ever know the real cause for the power shortage in Spain/Portugal/France. I still fear that it was a cyber attack because a year ago I read a novel (but only the first book) of a story called Blackout, which was about how the european electrical system can be sabotaged and what would be the consequences for the people. And of course we know that if it came out that it was a cyber-attack others would try to top it.
04/30/2025
04/29/2025
Day 154
The weather is too warm for this time of the year. Of course, it´s fun to walk outside and to work out outside, but we don´t have enough rain. But at least we have electric energy. Frightening what happened in Spain, Portugal, France yesterday. They say it´s no cyber-attack, I have my doubts.
It´s noon right now, I have reached my 10.000 steps and I have burned 1578 active kcal so I am optimistic to pass the 2000 today.
Day 153
It´s nearly noon and I´ve reached more than 9.000 steps so far, but already more than 1500 burned active calories, since I still use the indoor-cycle a couple of times per day.
This weekend Bayer 04 Leverkusen won but also did Bayern Munich and it seems to be a season without a title for Bayer 04. But we will end the season at second place in the league, which still is a very good result.
04/28/
2025
04/27/2025
Day 152
I have to excuse myself for a gap of one week. I could say it´s because the death of the pope, but that would not be the truth. Due to me moving around I didn´t find the cable to charge my pedometer and so I cannot proof, that I stayed in my regime, so I stalled the counting and after buying another cable, I can proof again, that I´ve reached more than 18.000 steps and burned more than 2000 active calories today on a sunday and in the aftermath of the communion of my younger daughter.
Day 151
Today is Good Friday, because Jesus died. Yes, but it´s good in the sense of the pious, holy part of the word good. And the sun came through again after the death of Jesus.
I cracked the ten-thousand steps and I´m going to crack 2.000 active kcal today, since I did some biking outside. And yes, I didn´t eat any meat today.
Today in Germany even the discotheques are closed due to the holiday.
04/18/2025
04/17/2025
Day 151
Today I could see an ENT-doctor and he diagnosed what I feared the last two days. The water or liquid produced during the infection couldn´t flow out of the middle ear and the eardrum swell, so that hearing is impaired. And the swelling of the eardrum caused the pain. But the liquid seems to slowly flow out of the middle ear and since all the liquid is not yellow there is no need for antibiotics.
I got more than 11.000 steps today, but I have to gain 150 kcal on the ergometer, to reach my 1000 active kcal.
Bayern Munich is out of the Champions-League, as I´ve foreseen. And now it will be a hard job to motivate that team. I think there still is a chance for Leverkusen to get on 1st place. Yes....
Day 150
I still have do minimum sports, cause my cold infected my right inner ear. So today I will reach 10.000 steps, only 300 to go and I need around two-hundred active kcal. So that means one additional session on the ergometer (indoor bike).
Finally Aston Villa and Dortmund just needed one more goal to go into over-time. But neither team could score enough goals against the "bigger" team.
04/16/2025
04/15/2025
Day 149
Fever is going down, at least I don´t have a headache any more and my breathing gets better and thus the blood-pressure goes down. But I still keep sports on a minimum. 1000 steps to go to reach the 10.000 and 90kcal to burn, to get the 1000 kcal burned. It started raining again and what´s good for nature it´s now raining lightly and permanently better for the ground to absorb the moisture.
Tonight the BVB is most likely going to loose against Barca, and it´s going to be interesting if Emery can close the two-goals-gap with Aston Villa in Paris.
Day 148
It´s noon and I´m struggling even harder today, feeling that the fever isn´t getting better. I´ve reached half of my steps and I´ve burned 750 active calories so far, so I will definitely reach the minimal goal of 10.000 steps and 1000 burned active kcal.
Hmm the young socialist have positioned themselves against the treaty of the coalition. The SPD is going to ask all their members to vote for the coalition and I sure hope that they will do so. The SPD had a lot of influence on that coalition-treaty a lot more than the outcome of the vote might show. So I think that because their role could be seen much clearer in the next government than in the streetlight-coalition.
04/14/2025
04/13/2025
Day 147
Although the week ended in a fever, the stats show that it was a good week. I cracked the 10 km walking goal, will crack the 100.000 steps today, only 900 missing and of course cracked the 10.000 steps goal by 40%.
I´ve burned more than 1.600 active kcal per day, although I had to step back the last two days. Today I walked 14,3 kilometers with 15830 steps and I have burned 1220 active kcal so far.
Bayer ended the match at home with a draw. But Dortmund also reached a draw. Well, that was such a missed opputunity to smaller the gap to first place. Now it´s still 6 points, 5 matches to go. Never in Bundesliga history this gap could be closed.
Day 146
I´ve got a fever and it´s niot the one Pocahontas had and Elvus was súnging about. Still don´t know why it wasn´t on the Soundtrack.
Actually I feel quite well on the bike and walking is alittle bit harder. And the weather should change, because we need a lot of rain, but I fear there will be only light showers. Not good. Natuire is suffering, we haqd a march without rain.
Today 'I got more than 10.000 steps and more than 1000 kcal burned, but due the fever I will call it a day.
Bayer Leverkusen is playing and it looks like a draw. Not good.
04/12/2025
04/11/2025
Day 145
I caught a cold again but this time I can step back a little bit. I´m taking some medicine, Gelomyrtol, to loosen the fluids, when coughing. And today I´m not doing the whole sports-program, although I already have got more than 12000 steps and more than 1500 kcal burned.
Did you know that we have to thank 007 for Trump´s change of mind. Yes, it was James Bonds.
Reuters writes on MSN:
Yellen says bond sell-off raised instability threat, influencing Trump tariff U-turn
Day 144
I substituted my morning walk with an hour on the ergometer (indoor-bike). So I start my day with more than 500 kcal burned. Two sport-sessions, a walk, so that I get my 10.000 steps minimum and I end my sporting activity with another hour on the ergometer. I haven´t started with the last activity but so far I´ve burned 1520 kcal.
And I cannot believe it. Trump flinched. How fast was that. And of course many speakers praise him for causing this share-havoc. And of course he praises himself, that he said, that many people could now enhance their wealth by buying shares. But those people are not the common people, who lost a lot of the money they saved for their live after work.
04/10/2025
04/09/2025
Day 143
I am able to cut down my steps a little bit. I have two activities each day as alternative and I use the ergometer (indoor bike). Today I´ve burned 1684 kcal, although I just got 12358 steps. 7.6 kilometers. Of course the indoor biking can´t cover any kilometers, but I spent two blocks on the ergometer and the ergometer shows that I cover 30 k´s each session.
Today I´ve read an article about a German journalist writing for the Handelsblatt, (commerce-journal), sharing the chinese calmness. He says we shouldn´t retaliate with tariffs. We should just wait, because it´s going to be Trump who flinches.
Day 142
My first day in a safe environment. This morning I spent some time with the tapestry in my younger daughter´s room. Then I took my bike. I got 21124 steps today, covered 16,24 k´s and burned 1770 kcal.
Trump is still going loco, trying to bully China, not a good idea, wanting China to flinch first. Why should they. They´ve got time, while American wealth gets burned by Trump.
04/08/2025
04/07/2025
Day141
Today I spent a lot of time on my bike. And actually I´ve found a fast opportunity to get help, starting tomorrow. I could manage to walk the 10k, 14.323 steps. But since I covered a lot of distance on my bike, I burned over 2000 kcal.
Trump burned a lot of share-value. Explenations for that. He likes to see himself in the news. He likes to bully other people. He really doesn´t care for the American working class.
Day 140
Today I walked to the Bayer 04-open-air-workout-area again, because Bayer 04 won in a match dominated by the adversary in overtime.
I worked in my daughter´s room getting rid of the old wall-tapestry and took my bike to the botanical garden 10 kilometers away. So I will have spent more than 2000 active kcal. today. I will have gotten around 17.500 steps and more than 200 active minutes.
News are still dominated by Trump and how antiquated his trariffs-move is. But we will see. The protests in the States is by far not as numerous as it was in his first presidency.
06/04/2025
05/04/2025
Day 139
Today I spent 6 hours on the road, did some moving of stuff and got my 10.000 steps (11386 at 07:40 at night).
Sorry, that has to be enough for today.
Day 138
Something not so funny happened, changing my life, but still walking is very important for me nearly 30.000 steps today.
Still Trump is all over the media. and no, not in a positive way.
04/04/2025
04/03/2025
Day 137
It´s 6:40 in the morning. Temperatures are positive again, 2 Degrees Celsius in the morning. I skipped my morning workout, didn´t monitor my walk. So far I´ve walked 10754 steps and burned 424 kcal. 150 kcal less than yesterday, when I monitored the walk. I chose to not monitor today to see, what I will reach today, because yesterday I burned 1387 kcal, far more than my normal goal of 1000.
Stuttgart won against Red Bull Leipzig in the other half final of the DFB-Trophy. Interesting because Red Bull has fired the trainer and they will end this season without a trophy and they will probably not qualify for the Champions League, which is a disaster for Red Bull.
I´ve learned a new english word: Tariffs, always thought it was toll. CNN writes:
Trump just massively escalated his trade war. Here’s what he announced | CNN Business
What only 20 % on the EU? Perhaps Trump has already returned his Tesla and wants to buy a Mercedes. And wants to save some money.
Day 136
It feels as if it´s getting colder. My phone shows 1 Degree Celsius, but this morning it was so cold my eyes were watering up. I skipped my workout today because the last two days my phone showed 1470 active kcal burned, which is double of my normal kcal, count. Since weather is fine, I prefer a bike tour after work rather than the workout. It´s 6:45 in the morning and I´ve collected 10.619 steps, walked more than 8 kilometers and have burned 587 active kcal.
Bayer 04 lost against Arminia Bielefeld in the half final of the DFB-Pokal. Arminia Bielefeld plays third league. Normally my heart beats for the underdog. But this lost game hurts, because I was so sure that Bayer would win the DFB-Pokal (trophy).
Marine Le Pen is not allowed for the next election. CNN writes:
Well, of course she has to say that this is the downfall of democracy, but actually she voted for the law that would ban politicians who get sanctioned after committing a crime not allowed to participate in voting for 5 years. And now, in my opinion, she should stand to her decision, her vote and should accept it. But of course this is just a mobilisation of her voters. Thank you, Trump, you did the same thing.
mar
2020
04/01/2025
Day 135
It´s 6:30 in the morning. The temperatures dropped again at night to 0 Degrees Celsius. I walked more than 8 kilometers so far, 11022 steps, 659 active kcal burned.
I think that I´ve passed the critical zone of the summer-time change of an hour already. And I think that I sleep better than before. I get up at 4.00 in the morning and before the time-shift I woke up around 2.30. Now I wake up at 3.30 listen to my favourite political podcast (although it´s to early to get the podcast of the day, so I listen to the one released the day before), do some stretching in bed, get up at 4.00 and start my workout at 4.05.
Myanmar is still taking in a big spot in the news due to all the death following the earthquake. They are dependent on help from outside but probably not willing to change their politics. Actually this might be a chance for peace there, if the nations helping can induce a change of the treatment of the muslimic part of the Myanmar-society.
Right now I listen to a Sci-Fi-novel called "Red Rising" and I´m hooked because it reflects the american socity and the view of the white elite. The actor who reads it has a british accent and sometimes uses an irish intonation (well it´s my opinion or what I think of as Irish) but I have to do some research. Okay the author is not african-american. And he refers to the roman empire falling. But I think that a lot of the views resemble what Trump, Hagseth and the other old white men think of themselves.
Day 134
It´s 7.00 in the morning and we have positive temperatures, so my walk was nice. So far I´ve got 10382 steps and I´ve burned 609 acitve kcal, since I monitor my power-walk from now on. And I´ve got my bicycle with me, so I plan to do to a little bike-tour additionally each day. So that my new goal is, to break the active 1000kcal-border each day, well at least on the days, when I don´t spend 3.5 hours in my car, which is a another activity for itself.
As you can see, there is a change visible in the diagram to the right, for around 200 kcal, just due to monitoring my walk in the morning. The higher kcal counted at the weekend is due to some biking-activities, but also due to some furniture moving. The room of my younger daughter gets renovated. And so some furniture had to be moved. And this activity cannot be monitored. Well I could have monitored it as muscle-training, but that would have been lying.
mar
2020
03/30/2025
Day 133
It´s 05.05 in the morning and I´m preparing for my walk to the Bayer 04-open-air-working area again. The German time was set back for an hour due to Trump, well, just kidding, but it feels so.
It´s summer time, but the Myanmar earthquake, I fear, will reveal a death-toll never heard of. The pictures of towns hit by the earth-quake are so alarming and especially the muslimic people of Myanmar, who were moved to the borders of the country.
The situation in Turkiye is not good either. Erdogan has incarcerated a rival politician and the protests won´t stop. But since the court has already followed Erdogan´s will and corruption of the rival has been hinted at, Erdogan will not free his rival. And the number of protesters is growing.
Day 132
It´s 4.20 in the morning and I prepare my walk to the Bayer-04-open-air-workout-area. And of course my motivation is on it´s peak to go there, because Bayer won 3:1 yesterday against Bochum.
Today nothing speacial is planned. I want to go shopping with my older daughter. And tonight we´re gonna have dinner in our favourite greek restaurant, 300 meters of distance to our door.
And I weighed myself again. And from the beginning of my 1hundred4peace revolution I lost 2.3 kilos. As I said I can explain this by all the muscles I gained. Really, it´s true.
03/29/2025
Day 132
Today we had -1 degrees Celsius outside. And again I monitored my walk. Actually what I´ve been doing all along was power-walking, walking with a velocity more than 6 kilometers an hour. But when I don´t monitor my walk the pedometer just counts the steps and doesn´t recognize it as a power-walk as it doesn´t recognize my workout. Today I did both my walk and my workout with weights.
Wow, I didn´t think that the Atlantic would publish the whole chat. But Cudos to the journalist Jeffrey Goldberg (I think that he might be the wrestler Jeff Goldberg, not) for doing this because what Trump and Hagseth said about him....
03/27/2025
Day 131
It´s 7:40 in the morning. It´s 4 degrees outside and it should get sunnier today. Not good, because the soil needs water. This year so far has been very little rain in western in the mid part of Germany.
Today I made a little experiment. I skipped my workout and walked my regular tour with GPS on, kinda like telling my pedometer this walk is a "workout" so that it measures the heartbeat and GPS. I`ve made 9655 steps so far. The thing is that my Pedometer shows me that I´ve burned 597 active kcal. Which is more than it normally shows when I do my workout and walk the same distance. Around this time it normally shows I´ve burned 430 kcal. I think the difference is due to the fact, that the app doesn´t calculate the heartbeat, unless I tell her so and that it doesn´t calculate the speed that most of the steps are reached in. Since my speed is more than 6 Kilometers an hour (Today I walked a kilometer in 9.12 minutes), I even burn the fat stored in my body.
Day 130
It´s 6.40 in the morning. I made my workout without weights and I´ve got 10165 steps so far. It´s 10 degrees outside. It rained a little bit more last night but there was only mild tiny little raindrops, while I walked, so that I didn´t need a raincoat and my hair-style was only mildly destroyed. Where there is little hair, there is not much destruction. Well of course the Trumpster is an exception.
And Pete Hegeseth. But just in a good republican tradition, what does he do? Newsweek writes:
Pete Hegseth Denies Texting War Plans to Journalist - Newsweek
Yes, of course he didn´t do it. It was his fu**ing thumb, cause I doubt he texts with both hands. And nobody was aware, the Atlantic-journalist was invited to the group. Oh, sorry my mistake. Denial is not a republican tradition. It´s a Hegseth tradition:
npr.org writes:
Pete Hegseth: Police report lays out details, timeline of sexual assault allegation : NPR
mar
2020
03/25/2025
Day 129
It´s 6:30 in the morning and temperatures were up at 10 degrees Celsius. Wow what a change in one week. After a workout without weights, and again I didn´t activate my pedometer to point out I´m doing something, I´ve gathered 10038 steps so far, again cracking my 10.000 steps goal before going to work.
I just read this, although it´s a couple of days old. The morning star wrote:
Well it means that the bank of America expects the shares to to drop further and says that although it showed the biggest march drops you shouldn´t buy yet.
And actually I think that even Musk would tell you not to buy Tesla-shares, because of his autism and because he doesn´t care of any consequences.
I have to post this little picture more often, because it´s frighteningly beautiful.
And something funny happened in my signal chat group. The NYTimes wrote:
Hegseth Disclosed Secret War Plans in Group Chat With Atlantic Journalist - The New York Times
How funny ist this and Trump doesn´t know about anything. I think he just doesn´t understand it.
Day 128
It´s 6.30 in the morning and I got back into my old rhythm. I made my workout with weights and I´ve accumulated 10188 steps so far.
Last night I could sleep better since the muscle-pain got better, perhaps due to a higher intake of protein. And I drank a lot of the spring water that we have here in Bad Wildungen and Reinhardshausen with a high amount of minerals like Calcium.
I´m glad, that I haven´t watched the rematch of the national football equipe against Italy, ending in a draw (3:3) after the German team lead 3:0 at half time.
Elon Musk is an Asperger-Autist. Hmmh, I wasn´t aware of it, but it explains a lot. There is something those people are missing, which is called the "Theory of mind" and that explains that people with autism cannot imagine how other people would think of their actions. For example at a beach a person with autism might step of another person´s blanket, not being aware the other person might be angried....
mar
2020
03/23/2025
Day 127
As I´ve anounced yesterday, 100 kilometers were not in my bones this weekend. But what I´ve reached in two days is okay in my opinion. I´ve accumulated more than 100.000 steps in two days.
Last night was not well. I think that my protein intake yesterday was not enough and so I felt my hamstrings the whole night, so that I woke up a lot. I walked a lot faster today, because I avoided the woods and climbing, resulting in a kcal-difference of 500. Although I walked faster and a little bit more than yesterday I burned less.
As you can see below. I reached more than 200.000 steps this week and walked more than 150 Kilometers. Not too bad either.
Sönke Iwersen published a book called the Tesla Files. I don´t know whether it´s going to be published in the states. I don´t think so.
03/22/2025
Day 126
Today I load up this post a little bit later. It´s 3.20 in the afternoon, because I had a 40k walk. And I´m tired because I packed books some journals about nature and health and something to drink and eat for me and carried about 15 kilogramms with me for the last 10 kilometers. So I won´t be able to hit 100 kilometers this weekend. But I will have another walk tomorrow but not as long as today.
The highlight of my walk can be seen down below. That is a water reservoir, where water is being pumped to the top of the mountain Petersberg, where the green energy is stored used to pump the water up. And the energy can be released when the water goes down again and moves the turbines that create electric energy.
03/21/2025
Day 125
It´s 6:40 in the morning and the temperature reached 0 degrees Celsius. After my workout with weights I´ve accumulated 9897 steps so far.
This weekend I´m going to stay in Bad Wildungen- Reinhardshausen. So I will walk to Bad Wildungen center today to buy something special to eat for the weekend. And I plan to longer nice walks with my favourite places around here. Tomorrow I will visite the Eder-lake and Waldeck, such beautiful places and an sunday Fritzlar and the church there.
The national equipe won against Italy and from what I´ve read they deserved winning.
I didn´t think I would say it, but I think it´s a good idea to give the nuclear plants to american custody.
The New York times writes:
Trump Wants to Take Over Ukraine’s Nuclear Plants. What Would That Mean? - The New York Times
Day 124
It´s 6:30 in the morning, it´s Minus 2 Degrees Celsius outside and so it´s a little bit more agreeable to walk outside. After my workout without weigts I´ve gathered 9731 steps so far.
This weekend the Bundesliga pauses because the national equipe is playing. Today Germany plays against the Netherlands. No, I don´t feel any euphoria. Of course the result interests me but I´m not going to watch the match.
03/20/2025
03/19/2025
Day 123
It´s 6.30 in the morning and after my workout with weights I´ve accumulated 11009 steps so far (448 active calories burned according to my pedometer). It´s still Minus 6 Degrees Celsius outside. So my hands are still frozen typing this but I don´t want to wear other gloves than my leather gloves. If you have to go, go in style.
523 people of that big coalition in the Bundestag voted for the new debts. There were only 7 people of that coalition who did not vote or who voted against it, which is okay in my opinion. Now it has to go through the Bundesrat since there has to be change in our law, in our Grundgesetz to stop the Schuldenbremse, the debt-brake.
Hmmmh, the Trump-Putin phone call. I think that nothing has been achieved, but it´s probably such a beautiful call, the best call I had in a long time, a call that makes Putin great again. The AP-news writes this:
What the White House and Kremlin said about the Trump-Putin call | AP News
Day 122
It´s 6:30 in the morning and it´s started to get light. But it´s Minus 6 Degrees Celsius outside, freezing cold and I still cannot move my hands normally after making 9998 steps after my workout without weights.
After Christian Lindner decided not to lead the FDP any more Christian Dürr tries to become the new leader. What is the difference between Lindner and Dürr? He answers: "The last name." Well, funny but is it really a good sign for the FDP.
Today the Bundestag will make the vote for the new debts-raising for the army and the infrastucture. I actually hope that there is a vote for it, because the alternative could be absolute chaos.
03/18/2025
03/17/2025
Day 121
So far I´ve reached 8937 steps so far after my workout with weights. Last week I reached an average distance of 12 kilometers daily and more than 17.000 steps per day.
I think that I´m going to top that this week, because I will spend the next weekend here and not in Leverkusen. And so I will be a lot more active next weekend.
What a match Bayer 04 had yesterday in Stuttgart. They bet Stuttgart although Stuttgart was leading 3:1. The match ended 3:4. And the winning goal was again shot in overtime. Bayer Leverkusen reduced the distance to leading Bayern Munich to 6 points, because Bayern Munich reached a draw in Berlin (against Union Berlin).
Day 120
What a beautiful day it was yesterday. My younger daughter got the book she wanted and more than two hours long we took part in the preparation of the communion. And now I´m preparing my walk again to the Bayer 04 open-air-workout-area. It´s 4.35 in the morning and I will start my walk at 5.00.
Bayern Munich only reached a draw in Berlin against Union Berlin. But Bayer 04 has a lot of injured players right now and has to play in Stuttgart in the late match 07.30 in the evening. We´ll see...
03/15/2025
03/14/2015
Day 119
It´s 3.50 in the morning and I´m preparing my walk to the Bayer 04 open-air-workout area. I didn´t take my rain-outfit to Leverkusen and I´m glad that there is no rain planned so far. And the forecasted snow did not come yesterday either.
What got my thinking is that yesterday I walked two hundred steps more than on thursday but 400 meters less. Actually I took a lot more staircases than the day before, and I wonder wether my chinese pedometer has a better use of the GPS data than I thought. I thought that I had to activate the GPS tracking seperately, but the difference I talk about could be explained because the Xiaomi Band 9 cannot track the height that I reach when climbing stairs. In GPS-tracking it might look I´m making steps without gaining many meters...
What a move by the German Green party. They will vote for a high debt of the German state for investment in the army and the infa-structure and the cost for that vote is 100 billion euros that will finance the energy and climate transformation of Germany. What a move. I think it´s ingenious and very selfless, because they cannot decide where that money is used. So there will be a green transformation and CDU/CSU and the SPD can write that on their agenda.
Trump and Putin, that is also an interesting story. Trump said he will end the war on day 1 of his presidancy and Putin is not interested in lowering his weapons, since he has not achieved anything in his war yet.
Day 118
This morning I made my steps in Zero Degrees Celsius. It´s 6:30 in the morning and so far I´ve got 10427 steps, after doing my workout with weights. Today I will head home to Leverkusen and because my younger daughter is showing such a great progress in her reading efforts I plan to visit a nice bookstore tomorrow. And I will go to church with her and I will accompany her to the communion-preparation.
This is funny. One day after posing with a Tesla Trump receives a letter from Tesla (not from the Muskito). The business insider writes on msn:
Read the letter Tesla wrote warning the Trump administration about harm from a trade war
But since Trump doesn´t know that his Elon owns Tesla everything is fine, great, because it makes America great again.
03/14/2025
03/13/2025
Day 117
Wow, it got cold again. It´s Minus 4 Degrees Celsius outside and my hands are still frozen while I´m typing at 6.25 in the morning. So far I´ve accumulated 9634 steps after my workout without weights.
Yesterday Dortmund won it´s second match in the Champions-League and now faces Barca. I don´t think that Dortmund will advance further. But Bayern Munich micht beat Inter Milano (I think) and so there will be an attractive semi-final of Bayern Munich against Barca.
And what does Trump do to help his Muskito, he poses with a Tesla. The AP news writes:
Trump selects a new Tesla to show support for Elon Musk | AP News
I´m convinced that this move will make the Tesla-shares rise again, higher than ever before.
Day 116
We are still in the positive Degree Celsius zone with two degrees. Yesterday it started raining and I think that all the plants need this rain. And the moisture in the air smells wonderful. So I´ve got 10472 steps so far ( it´s 6:40 in the morning) after doing my workout with weights and I didn´t forget to activate my pedometer for that.
Bayer 04 Leverkusen lost against Bayern Munich. This hurts a lot because Florian Wirtz got injured last saturday and I fear that without this great player we were missing a lot of creativity in the box (the 16-meter square around the goal). And it doesn´t help that Liverpool lost too, which performed best in the Champions-League and the Premier League so far. It hurts.
03/12/2025
03/11/2025
Day 115
This morning we are in the positive Celsius are (1 Degree) and after my workout without weights (for the third time in my 115 days of 1hundred4peace I forgot to start my pedometer for it to register that I´m doing a workout) I´ve accumulated 9853 steps.
Hmmh. The green party opposes Merz´s plan of massive deficite-spending. Euronews writes on MSN:
Germany's Greens publicly oppose Merz's debt brake reform
And Musk plans to double the DOGE-staff. MSN writes
Musk plans to double DOGE staff amid federal government cuts
So he can give all the people formerly working for US-AID new jobs.
Day 114
Temperatures are getting lower now. I walked in -1 Degrees Celsius this morning after my workout with weights and got 10021 steps so far.
As you can see on the right I walked quite a lot last week. 90 Kilometers, nearly 13 Kilometers and nearly 19.000 steps per day.
I nearly missed this in the Donald´s speech to congress. NDTV world wrote this:
Trump Claims 360-Year-Old Man Is Getting Social Security, Gets Fact Checked
Hilarious.
03/10/2025
03/09/2025
Day 113
Again I´m preparing my walk to the Bayer 04-open-air-workout area. I also plan to go to the cinema with my younger daughter since my older daughter is working with the pathfinders.
There is one of the rare losses of Bayern Munich and Bayer 04 doesn´t capitalize since they loose too against Werder Bremen, 0:2. Not good.
Day 112
I´m in Leverkusen. It´s 5.30 in the morning and I prepare my walk to the Bayer 04 open-air-workout-area. So I did hardly make any steps.
Did I mention that I was digitally fastening for four days because I forgot my mobile phone in Leverkusen on monday? And I thought that I had to end my 1hundred4peace activities because of missing data. But I´m glad that my Xiaomi Band 9 was able to store my steps of the last four days because it was a good week so far. I was able to walk more than 10 kilometers each day.
It´s a little bit warmer outside, 4 Degrees Celsius. And today we are probably going to reach 19 degrees.
Today Bayer Leverkusen will play against Werder Bremen. I think trhey will show a reaction after the loss in Munich in preparation for the rematch. And I don´t think that all is lost for the rematch.
03/08/2024
03/07/2025
Day111
It´s 6.35 in the morning. I´ve reached 9820 steps so far after doing my workout without weights. It´s still quite chilly outside -2 Degrees Celsius.
Today I will drive home to Leverkusen. I think the wheather will stay fine. Temperatures go up to nearly 15 Degrees.
Hmmh, the Donald limiting the Muskito?
Metro News writes:
Donald Trump reveals limits on Elon Musk's power for the first time | News US | Metro News
And the EU also plans to amount a great deal of debts but is not too fond of Germany trying to amass even more.
The business standard writes:
Day 110
It´s 6.50 in the morning and I´ve accumulated 10.646 steps so far. Because I forgot my mobile phone in Leverkusen I have to add digital-fastening to my fastining-list, but I won´t keep that up.
Bayer Leverkusen lost in the Champions-League 3:0 in Munich. I witnessed the defeat in the audiostream and I could not sleep well last night.
But there are other things that don´t let me sleep well. The money that will be invested in the military and the infrastucture will be new debts that the government will have to pay back, well not the government but my children. Actually I don´t think the Debt-brake, the Schuldenbremse should be active all the time. But here we are talking about such a great amount of money and that makes me worry.
The Donald talked about the letter he received from Selenskyi, that Selenskyi thanks the American people for there support and that he wants to work on a peace agreement. And again Trumps get what he wants.
03/06/2025
03/05/2025
Day 109
It´s cold outside. It´s Minus 3 Degrees Celsius but so far (It´s 6:30 in the morning right now) I´ve reached 9957 steps after doing my workout without weights.
Today is Ash Wednesday. I won´t go to church but I will start a period of fasting. My family does that too. Of course my elder daughter can be more strict than my younger daughter.
I don´t fasten meat, because I´m hardly getting enough proteins. I eat a lot of vegetable and I eat yoghurt and quark every day and I eat a little bit of meat (under 50g) every day.
What I´m going to fasten is: sweets (no chocolate, no Haribo, no ice-cream), chips (and no other salty stuff, like saltlets) and alcohol. So during Carnival on the parade on sunday I still had a lot of sweets and alcohol (although I mix my beer with coke zero and some regard this as a sin).
I found this on Wikipedia:
Ash Wednesday is a holy day of prayer and fasting in many Western Christian denominations. It is preceded by Shrove Tuesday and marks the first day of Lent, the six weeks of penitence before Easter.
Ash Wednesday is observed by Catholics, Lutherans, Moravians, Anglicans, and United Protestants, as well as by some churches in the Reformed, (including certain Congregationalist, Continental Reformed, and Presbyterian churches), Baptist, Methodist and Nazarene traditions.
Ash Wednesday is traditionally observed with fasting and abstinence from meat in several Christian denominations. As it is the first day of Lent, many Christians begin Ash Wednesday by marking a Lenten calendar, praying a Lenten daily devotional, and making a Lenten sacrifice that they will not partake of until the arrival of Eastertide.
Many Christians attend special Ash Wednesday church services at which churchgoers receive ash on their foreheads or the top of their heads, as the wearing of ashes was a sign of repentance in biblical times. Ash Wednesday derives its name from this practice, in which the placement of ashes is accompanied by the words, "Repent, and believe in the Gospel" or the dictum "Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return." The ashes are prepared by burning palm leaves from the previous year's Palm Sunday celebrations.
Day 108
Yesterday I walked more than 17.000 steps and today I got 9525 steps so far after doing my workout with weights.
There happens so much in politics right now. I think that the Donald is really going to start with raising 35% on goods coming from Mexico and Canada. Germany is thinking of raising the investments into the army and into the infrastructure by accumulating more debts of 900 million Euros. Everything that happens is just not good. Although the investment in the German infrastructure must be done because the Bundesländer (regional government) and the Bund (the government) did not invest in the infrastructure in the last decades and so a lot of streets and bridges are nearly not usable anymore.
Today is Veilchendienstag. I found this on Wikipedia:
The celebrations become quieter the next day, known as Veilchendienstag ("Violet Tuesday", Shrove Tuesday).
As this is the last day of the Christian liturgical season historically known as Carnival or Shrovetide, before the penitential season of Lent, related popular practices, such as indulging in food that one might give up as their Lenten sacrifice for the upcoming forty days, are associated with Shrove Tuesday celebrations. The term Mardi Gras is French for "Fat Tuesday", referring to the practice of the last night of eating richer, fatty foods before the ritual fasting of the Lenten season, which begins on Ash Wednesday. Many Christian congregations thus observe the day through eating pancakes or, more specifically, the holding of pancake breakfasts, as well as the ringing of church bells to remind people to repent of their sins before the start of Lent. On Shrove Tuesday, churches also burn the palms distributed during the previous year's Palm Sunday liturgies to make the ashes used during the services held on the very next day, Ash Wednesday.
03/04/2025
03/03/2025
Day 107
As you can see I reached a week with more than a 100.000 steps and more than 10 kilometers per day. Yesterday my ladies had a lot of fun throwing sweets in the neighbourhood and today I don´t work so that I can spend a relaxing day with my ladies after their efforts yesterday.
I´m preparing my walk to the Bayer04-open-air-workout-area and my heartrate is still changing from day to day showing that the infection is not over yet. But I still define the infection as over and define today as a very good start into the week.
Now it´s nine in the morning and I´ve reached more than 12.000 steps. I did my workout thanks to Bayer 04, bought some Brötchen for my ladies and 6 Special Berliner.
Today is rose-monday. I found this on wikipedia:
Rosenmontag (German: [ˌʁoːznˈ̩moːntaːk] ⓘ, English: Rose-Monday) is the highlight of the German Karneval (carnival), and takes place on the Shrove Monday before Ash Wednesday, the beginning of Lent. Mardi Gras, though celebrated on Fat Tuesday, is a similar event. Rosenmontag is celebrated in German-speaking countries, including Germany, Austria, Switzerland and Belgium (Eupen, Kelmis), but most heavily in the carnival strongholds which include the Rhineland, especially in Cologne,] Bonn, Düsseldorf, Aachen and Mainz. In contrast to Germany, in Austria, the highlight of the carnival is not Rosenmontag, but Shrove Tuesday.
The name for the carnival comes from the German dialect word roose meaning "frolic" and Montag meaning Monday.
Celebrations usually include dressing up in fancy costumes, dancing, parades, heavy drinking and general public displays with floats. Every town in the Karneval areas boasts at least one parade with floats making fun of the themes of the day. Usually sweets (Kamelle) are thrown into the crowds lining the streets among cries of Helau or Alaaf, whereby the cry Kölle Alaaf is only applied in the Cologne Carnival and Oche Alaaf is only applied in Aachen Carnival– Alaaf stems from or Alle af, Ripuarian for "all [others] away". Sweets and tulips are thrown into the crowd.
03/02/2025
Day 106 the shoe-report
Today I had to bury the pair of shoes that I´ve used most in 1hundred4peace. I bought 3 pairs of shoes at the beginning of winter. One pair was soft-shell and I used them on the days when I walked through deep snow. The second pair was a pair of winter-jogging shoes, with mild water-resistant features. And the third pair was a pair of winter hiking boots with a low shaft. I used those the most. And as you can see on the picture on the right pastic parts are already coming through and that totally destroyed the inlay I used (see the third picture down on the right). And as you can see on the other two pictures below this text. The sole of the shoe is worn off a lot. But the shoe still has water-resistant property and it was only 16.99 Euros. So this shoe was a very good invest for my 1hundred4peace.
03/02/2025
Day 106
Yesterday I reached more than 17.000 steps and I work on a week with more than 100.000 steps.
I´m preparing for my walk to the Bayer04-open-air-workout-area and do that in pride because yesterday Bayer04 won against Frankfurt, the third in the Bundesliga 4:1.
It´s still quite cold around -1 Degree Celsius, but it´s going to be a sunny day today. Today is tulip sunday. It´s 50 days from now on to Eastern. The carnival days are connected to flowers. The most famous connection is that of rose-monday. And today on tulip-sunday the most famous parade in my opinion is the school and quarter-parade (De Schull un Veedelszöch) in Cologne, perhaps because it´s more creative than the more traditional in Cologne, more creative and more political.
Today my ladies will take part in the Veedelszoch in our quarter. There is a very small parade on a march through the quarter of Leverkusen-Lützenkirchen and the school of Lützenkirchen, now attended by my younger daughter, will be the cutest part of it. Since all the young children were endangered by the glass-fibre-cables that were put beneath the side-walks and they couldn´t change sides of the streets because there aren´t many street-lights, they were in danger on the way to school. So they made that to the motto of the parade. And my younger daughter is dressed as a mole and my older daughter and wife as orange and white pylons that blocked the sidewalk.
Day 105
I´m back in Leverkusen, preparing for my walk to the Bayer-04-open-air-workout-area. Although my body feels better, my coughing is still bad after the infection started two weeks ago. I´m thinking of using something to make the slime more fluid, since I don´t want to develope something chronic.
So far I´m in the ten-km-range this week and I hope to hold this up the next days. Today is the Schmalziger Samstag (lardy saturday?) The people who painted other people black yesterday can do good today by baking something in lard/fat. And what is baked are products with eggs since those you are not supposed to eat those products in the time of fasting/fastening? These products are noodles made of eggs or crullers(?). And this is the basis of a famous german product called Berliner. That is the german version of the doughnut without the whole but filled with marmelade and the upper half is sugared. In the eastern part of Germany it´s called Eierkuchen (egg-cake).
Have you seen the interview of Dump and Selensky. I feel ashamed of what Dump and The Vance argued, of the pressure they wanted to inflict. That was bullying in it´s highest form. I wonder how Americans think about that.
03/01/2025
02/28/2025
Day 104
It´s still cold outside 1 Degree Celsius and the rain is mixed with snow. It´s 6.50 in the morning and after my workout with weights I´ve accumulated 9474 steps but only 400 kcal got burned. Actually I don´t know why, because I walked even more this morning.
Today is "Rußfreitag" (Soot Friday). In some regions of Germany people colored their faces with soot or with a paste made out of blackberry. Since we all know that we are not supposed to play with something you can eat I think that this "Brauchtum" custom is something that people still do, because they are not supposed to do it. Like cutting the tie of a person on Weiberfastnacht. (look what I wrote yesterday).
Day 103
Today is the beginning of the Carnival (Karneval) and it has to do something with meat but I´m going to come to that theme on Aschermittwoch, next wednesday, when the Nubbel gets burned.
After my workout without weights I´ve accumulated 9084 steps so far.
Today is Weiberfastnacht. I found this on Wikipedia:
Weiberfastnacht is an unofficial holiday in the Rhineland. At the majority of workplaces, work ends before noon. Celebrations start at 11:11 am in Germany. In comparison with Rosenmontag, there are hardly any parades, but people wear costumes and celebrate in pubs and in the streets. Beueler Weiberfastnacht ("women's carnival in Beuel") is traditionally celebrated in the Bonn district of Beuel.The tradition is said to have started here in 1824, when local women first formed their own "carnival committee". The symbolic storming of the Beuel town hall is broadcast live on TV. In many towns across the state of North Rhine Westphalia, a ritual "takeover" of the town halls by local women has become tradition. Among other established customs, on that day women cut off the ties of men, which are seen as a symbol of men's status. The men wear the stumps of their ties and get a Bützchen (little kiss) as compensation.
I don´t know whether that tradition should be held on, because it implies that men are still the ones in power and that there is only this one day where the hierarchy gets turned upside down by the cutting of the ties.
I think that this Brauchtum (tradition) has to end.
02/27/2025
02/26/2025
Day 102
It´s 7.15 in the morning and I got 9098 steps so far after doing my workout with weights (so I burned 492 kcal according to my pedometer).
There is another thing that I didn´t want to achieve. But here it is in 105 days I burned 115358 kcal and so I burned 1098, 65 kcal each day, more than 1000, (10x100).
Of course this could only be achieved by walking 100 Kilometers on three weekends, when I really burned a lot of kcal. there were some days, when I couldn´t do any workouts because of illness.
The fun fact is, that I haven´t really lost any weight. But I think at least that I gained some muscles.
Hmmh the possible new coalition of CDU/CSU and SPD will have to go through a voting of the members. I sure hope that the coalition will be voted for by the SPD-members, because the alternative would be a new election and actually this wouldn´t help anybody. I would like the coalition to be built fast, because there is a lot of work to do.
02/25/2025
Day 101
As I said I keep my regime and I got more than 8000 steps so far after my workout with weights.
Here are my stats with the steps I made. I got 104 days since I started to use my new pedometer a few days before starting 1hundred4 peace.
Monat Tage Schritte Kilometer
Nov. 18 244748 168,89
Dez 31 630050 457,7
Jan 31 522947 364,68
Feb 24 380380 258,81
Summe 104 1778125 1250,08
Durchschnitt 17097,36 12,2
Therefore I reached my goal to get more than 10.000 (100x100) steps per day in average
And I even reached more than 10 (100x100 meters) kilometers per day in average.
02/24/2025
Day 100
Wow, what a weekend. Yesterday I walked 18071 steps and at 7.05 in the morning I accumulated 8483 steps so far. I did a short workout at the Bayer 04 open air workout area yesterday and today I did a longer workout with weights. I don´t have pains in the back anymore. I still have to cough a lot but I feel better than in then last two days.
Yesterday on my way back to Bad Wildungen I stopped at 6.00 in the afternoon to have a live feed to my family´s election party. Of course at 6.00 there was only the first prognosis constisting of nearly 30.000 interviews with people who left the electoral buros. And the result in opinion could have been worse.
The federal returning officer posted the results of the election:
Results Germany - The Federal Returning Officer
The biggest result in my opinion is the high number of voters. 82.5%, how great is that. And I think that only thanks to every voter the outcome of the AFD was only 20.8 %. I think that actually Merz´s act caused a lot of undecided voters to vote for the AFD since this made the topic of the whole election change to immigration.
The other big surprise was the result of Die Linke (the Left). This might also have been a consequence of this immigration-shift and that the Green Party could not capitalize because it was part of the Streetlight-coalition. Especially young voters voted for Die Linke and they nearly doubled their last election result and reached 8.8 %.
And even though Sahra Wagenknecht also took some votes from them. The BSW (Coalition Sahra Wagenknecht) only reached 4.9 % but that is too close and so the Federal Returning officer hasn´t posted their result yet. Because those votes seem to have to be recounted, because they are too close underneat the 5 % cut-off.
The SPD (16.4) and the Greens (11.6) were the biggest loosers. This will have enormous consequences for the SPD who has lost the contact to the younger generation. And the Greens will have to renew themselves most likely in the opposition.
The CDU/CSU won the election with 28.5 %. The Federal Returning officer got their result wrong or they posted only the result of the CDU without the result of the CSU.
I think that these numbers show the result better.
German election results explained in graphics – DW – 02/24/2025
I won´t stop blogging the next days because I´m going to post the results of my 1hundred4Peace acitivities and no they are nothing special, but I´m still proud of them. And of course I´m trying to keep my activities up, at least my walking and workouting.
Day 99
Yesterday I reached more than 24.000 steps because in the evening we joinde the Jeisterzoch.
I found this information on Wikipedia:
There are numerous parades in the city districts, a so-called ghost parade in the evening of the Saturday before Fat Thursday. It is a demonstration for social and cultural projects and, contrary to the other parades, everybody can join and walk through the streets with the spooky crowd.
We thought that this parade is the perfect way to end our seasonal fight for democracy since this was one of the themes of the Jeisterzoch (Geisterzug, Parade of the ghosts). I think it was formerly introduced 1991 and was a demonstration against the war in Iraque, the first war during the times of Bush senior. And it was always the left-wing, more political version of the carnival, although the carnival parade is political too, but not so much in Cologne, where it is still more traditional.
My family will host an election-party but I will be back on the streets to Bad Wildungen. And I hope my back will tolerate the car-time better. It feels a little bit better today. I skipped the workout yesterday at the open-air-gym and I will see, how I feel, when I get there. I will accompany my younger daughter to church and to the communion-preparation.
02/23/2025
02/22/2025
Day 98
Yesterday I also reached more than 15.000 steps. So I reached 10 km each day, which makes me proud.
I´m in Leverkusen, preparing for my walk to the Bayer-04 open-air-gym. Yesterday morning I thought my illness was gone. But after spending 3,5 hours on my ride back, my whole body hurt. Last night was not good, but I´m sure that the illness is gone.
Thelocal.de writes, what I feel. The surge in the polls of Die Linke is one of the biggest surprises.
German far left in surprise comeback ahead of election
I´m feeling an energy-surge, too and I´m looking forward to a wonderfull saturday.
Day 97
It´s 6:50 in the morning and I got 8205 steps so far. I had a strong headache in the evening for the second time in the row and so I chose to take ibuprofen before I went to bed. I could leave the window open, because we are back in the positive Degrees Celsius. And although I used no additional blanket (I did that in the minus 9 Degrees Celsius area) I sweated a lot last night. I slept for over 9 hours and my pedometer protests that I sleep too much. But I feel better after a week, since last friday my infection broke loose. Yes Tom Waits you are right, I should have been home, but I left ... right....left.
Hmmmh Heidenheim lost the playoffs in the conference league, in over-time. And it hurts me, because they were so close after winning the first match against Kopenhagen. And they struggle to stay in the Bundesliga. I hope they will make it, because the whole concept of this Football Club is amazing. They don´t have much money behind them but the most numerous armada of doneurs.
Bayer Leverkusen Players published a video yesterday to make their fans go and vote:
#machdeinkreuz – am 23. Februar ist Bundestagswahl | Bayer04.de
And I´m very proud to be a fan of this club. I´m sure that other football clubs do that too.
Ahh FC Bayern Munich, didn´t do such a thing but they stood up against the AFD. ran.de published this on msn:
Vor Bundestagswahl: FC Bayern positioniert sich klar
Two days to got until the vote....
02/21/2025
02/20/2025
Day 96
Since the temperature went up to -2 Degrees Celsius I could walk longer outside than the last two days. It´s 6:50 in the morning and I could reach 8291 steps so far.
Last night sleep was a little bit better, but I still feel in the infection in my bones and the coughing is still bad, so I still skip the workout.
Hmmmh, I fear, that Trump should be careful with some of his thoughts. The New York Times writes:
Trump Calls Zelensky a ‘Dictator’ as Feud Escalates Over Ukraine Peace Talks - The New York Times
I fear, that Trumps want a fast peace and thinks, he doesn´t need the Ukraine nore the European Community to reach it. The European Community just needs to secure the peace with their troops.
To lure people to go voting Duisburg, the city where I was born, has an unusual approach. DW writes on MSN:
German election: Duisburg lures early voters by free beer
Day 95
it´s 6:40 in the morning and again I had to make a shorter walk because it´s another morning of -9 Degrees Celsius. It´s so cold that tears come into the eyes and that I started to get a headache. So I got 6324 steps so far.
Last night was not good. I had to cough so much that getting into sleep was difficult and I could witness most of the match of Bayern Munich against Celtic Glasgow and I suffered with Glasgow because they fought very well. But Munich scored the goal they needed to advance in the 91st minute, I think.
The election gets nearer and I hope that I wrote that my two daughters took part in the mock-election for the youth under 18. They took part in it as part of the political education in their pathfinders-group. And I love it, that the pathfinders offer that education. Here are the results of the german votes offered by deepNewz:
Die Linke Wins Germany's U18 Mock Election with 20.... | DeepNewz
Well, this again fills me up with hope. I wonder why the Green Party has such a drop, but the youth shows that their election resonates much more with the themes that are important for them: education, environment....
02/19/2025
02/18/2025
Day 94
I skipped the workout today. The infection is still there and although I slept for 7.30 hours my body hurts a lot. And since it´s minus 9 Degrees Celsius outside. I limited my walk, because I just couldn´t walk any more. It´s 6.30 in the morning and I got 7044 steps so far. I´m sure that I can reach 10.000 steps today but that will be enough for today.
There was another meeting of the 4 party leaders of the CDU, SPD, The Greens and the AFD. The Brandmauer held. Friedrich Merz made the most positive impression on the viewers. All this takes out a little bit of interest in the election I fear. There will be no chance of an Alternativ to Merz being chancelor. The only question now is whether the BSW and the FDP will make the cut and get over 5 %. Every party below 5 % won´t get seats in the parliament. Actually against my speculation it seems as if the Left, die Linke, will make it. The Prognosises show them by 7%. Actually that is not good for Merz. Because if two or all three of the "small" parties make the cut, it´s nearly impossible to govern with a two party-coalition. And Kenia will not be anything different to the Streetlight-coalition.
Day 93
Here you can see the stats of my last week.
Getting my steps today was quite hard because of the weather. It´s Minus 8 Degrees Celsius and it feels even colder. But so far I got 8872 steps and it´s 6:50 in the morning.
After the Vance asked Germany to put down the "Brandmauer", the firewall against the AFD there were a lot of protests again in Germany. This is what Le Monde wrote:
Germany: Thousands march against far right in Berlin
There was even a small protest in Leverkusen.
But I´m still recovering from my infection and so I didn´t join the protests this weekend. But my wife and my younger daughter did on Saturday in Dusseldorf.
Tens of thousands protest against far-right ahead of Germany election
Yahoo wrote that 13.000 people gathered there on saturday.
But that doesn´t seem to have an effect on the election
https://politpro.eu/en/germany
Still 20 % of the German voters will vote for the AFD at least. One week to go. We decided to vote via mail. And so the votes of my family are already in. My daughters voted via the pathfinders. And the fun thing is that a lot of the kids voted for the Left, (21.18), SPD (19.65), The Greens (18.26), the CDU (14.92) and only 8.59 for the AFD. Of course this is influenced by what the parents vote for and you can argue that the parents who send their kids to the pathfinders are more "left wing" (although the pathfinders are a catholic institution), but this also shows that even the young kids in the pathfinder-organisation have their own heads.
mar
2020
02/16/2025
Day 92
Last night I could sleep a lot better. But since the fever is still there I will skip the workout again. But I´m preparing for my walk. Yesterday I could gather 15456 steps.
I don´t have to write too much about the Donald and the JDee. I think that you´ve already read that you don´t start negotiations by giving the other everything they want unless there is nothing you want. Hmmmh I think there might be a reason why Donald´s father held onto his economical empire as long as possible....
Today I would like to round up the AFD-week, before we come into the final week of the project and the last week before the election.
The AFD we see today has got nothing to do with the vision of Bernd Lucke, one of the founders. I think that the right-wing guys saw the potential from the beginning, to gather voters that are fed up with the current situation, protest voters and to change the party into the right-wing party that we have now. The theme changed a lot. Whereas the initial intention of Lucke was to make Germany independant of Europe and giving it back it´s own currency, the current focus lies on the immigration system. And it´s easy to point out what has to be changed, if you don´t have any idea how to change it, because you don´t have any ideas about the European law. I think that the goal of the AFD of Gauland and Höcke is to make the right-wing ideas "salonfähig", to give them a normality. As I wrote a lot I fear that the idea of Friedrich Merz of the CDU/CSU is very dangerous, to adopt the views, because people tend to vote for the original and not the copycat, who actually can change the law. The AFD will be the party with the second highest votes and that won´t change for a long time. I think that we will someday face the same problem as does Austria right now, that there won´t be a government without the populist party.
Day 91
I´ve got a respiratory infection but my young daughter is still doing worse. It´s the second day of vomiting so that the medicament against it, doesn´t stay in. But at least she didn´t have to vomit at night. But still I couldn´t sleep due to my infection. I will skip the workout today and I´m preparing for my walk. It´s 5:45 in the morning.
Today I would like to focus on Björn Höcke. I think that no-one incorporates the right-wing turn of the AFD more than him. I found this on Wikipedia:
Björn Uwe Höcke (born 1 April 1972) is a German politician of Alternative for Germany (AfD, Alternative für Deutschland, a right-wing German political party). After Andreas Kalbitz was banned from the AfD, Höcke has been the sole leader of the party's far-right Der Flügel faction, which the German government's Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution declared a suspected right-wing extremist organization. He is chair of AfD Thuringia, also classified as a right-wing extremist organization.
Höcke led the AfD to its first-ever first place finish in a state election at the 2024 Thuringian state election. It was the first time a far-right party placed first in an election since the Nazi era.
Early life and education
Björn Höcke was born in Lünen, Westphalia. His paternal grandparents were expelled Germans from East Prussia. He took his Abitur at the Rhein-Wied-Gymnasium, Neuwied, in 1991.
Höcke studied sport and history at University of Giessen and at University of Marburg before working as a teacher. He taught at the Rhenanus School, a comprehensive school in Bad Sooden-Allendorf.
Political career
Björn Höcke congratulates FDP's Thomas Kemmerich on his election, during the 2020 Thuringian government crisis.
In 1986, Höcke was for a short time member of the Junge Union, the joint youth organisation of the CDU/CSU coalition.
As one of the founders of AfD Thuringia, he became Member of the assembly of the federal state of Thuringia following the 2014 election. He is the speaker of the parliamentary group of the AfD and the spokesman of the Thuringia Regional Association (Landesverband) of his party. He is said to be the leader of the "national-conservative wing" of the AfD, a faction known as the Flügel (the Wing), with which 40 percent of the AfD party members identify themselves.
The rather obscure regional politician of a new party became known nationwide in 2015, when party leader Bernd Lucke was ousted in July, and the 2015 European migrant crisis unfolded. In October 2015, one day after a knife attack on Cologne mayor Henriette Reker, during the political talkshow "Günther Jauch", otherwise a popular TV entertainer with Germany's Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?, Höcke pulled out a small German flag and stated "3000 years of Europe, 1000 years of Germany".[18]
In September 2019, Höcke threatened "massive consequences" to a ZDF journalist who refused to restart an interview after a series of difficult questions and the journalist asked party members whether various quotes are from Höcke's book or from Hitler's Mein Kampf.
In the 2019 Thuringian state election, the AfD, led by Höcke, more than doubled its vote share to 23%, overtaking the opposition's major party, the Christian Democratic Union (CDU), to place second.
In 2021, Jörg Meuthen, moderate co-leader of AfD attempted to remove Höcke from the party on account of his alleged racism, but failed. This led to Meuthen ultimately quitting the party in 2022.
In November 2021, Höcke's parliamentary immunity in the Landtag of Thuringia was cancelled. He was accused to have ended a speech in May with the phrase Alles für Deutschland [de] ("All/Everything for Germany") that was used by the Hitlerian regime's SA and whose use is illegal under insignia legislation.
In June 2023, Höcke was officially indicted.
In the 2024 Thuringian state election, the AfD, under the leadership of Höcke, increased its vote share to a record high of 33%, and became the biggest party in the state. It is its biggest share of the vote ever captured by the party and the first time AfD placed first in a federal state election.
02/15/2025
02/14/2025
Day 90
Today I had to go on "eine Nummer sicher"-Mode. I had to gather more steps, because I will leave work early due to illness. I am ill (only an infection) but my younger daughter has to stay home due to an intenstinal infect. And I want to care for her. So I will try to condense my work and leave around noon.
It´s 6.55 in the morning and I have gathered. 9755 steps so far after my workout with weights, which was a little more intensive.
Today I would like to concentrate on two persons that we call political party-soldiers in Germany. Totally on line with the directive and doing no harm to anybody (but themselves). They are currently leading the AFD, Tino Chrupalla and Alice Weidel.
Alice Weidel is quite interesting, because she is living in a lesbian relationship in a party where fat unattractive guys shout about the ideal family, father, mother and children. I found this on wikipedia:
Alice Elisabeth Weidel (born 6 February 1979) is a German politician who has been serving as co-chairwoman of the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party alongside Tino Chrupalla since June 2022. Since October 2017, she has held the position of leader of the AfD parliamentary group in the Bundestag.
Weidel became a member of the Bundestag (MdB) in the 2017 federal election, where she was the AfD's lead candidate alongside Alexander Gauland. In the 2021 federal election, she once again served as their lead candidate, alongside Tino Chrupalla. From February 2020 to July 2022, Weidel held the position of chairwoman of the AfD state association in Baden-Württemberg. In 2024, she was selected as her party's candidate for Chancellor in the upcoming 2025 German federal election.
Alternative for Germany
Weidel joined the Alternative for Germany (AfD) in October 2013.According to Weidel, she was first attracted to the party due to her opposition to the euro.[She was elected to the federal executive committee of the AfD in June 2015. In April 2017, she was elected co-lead candidate of the party.[She is the first lesbian to serve as a lead candidate of her party. She has been identified by the media as belonging to the more moderate conservative Alternative Mitte faction within the AfD.
The Switzerland-based property billionaire Henning Conle supported AfD. He donated a total of 132,000 euros by means of straw men for the 2017 federal election campaign of Alice Weidel. Conle disguised his donation from Switzerland in 18 tranches.The AfD had to pay the Bundestag a high fine for this donation, but Weidel and three other officials went unpunished.
In January 2024, it emerged that Roland Hartwig – who had been appointed as an advisor to Weidel – attended a controversial meeting with German far-right activists in which plans to deport millions of people living in Germany, including some with German citizenship, were presented and discussed. In the wake of this, Weidel fired Hartwig as her advisor.
LGBT issues
Weidel has said she supports civil partnership for gay and lesbian couples, noting she is a lesbian herself and in a civil partnership with another woman.
She combines this position with her negative attitude towards asylum in Germany and Islam. Weidel said that she sees family policy as more liberal than her party: "Family is where children are."
Weidel has stated her opposition to discussion of sexuality prior to puberty saying that "I don't want anyone with their gender idiocy or their early sexualisation classes coming near my children."She has also expressed her opposition to legalization of same-sex marriage, stating that she supports protection of the "traditional family" while also supporting "other lifestyles".
Tino Chrupalla, the guy with the typical german name stuggling to look german at least. He was the guy who needed the most courses to make a good figure. I think he is still in the co-leader position because nobody takes him seriously. This is, what I found on Wikipedia:
Tino Chrupalla (German: [ˈtiːno kʁʊˈpala]; born 14 April 1975) is a German politician from the right-wing populist party Alternative for Germany (AfD). A member of the German parliament (Bundestag) since 2017, he has served as co-chairman of the AfD since 2019 along with Alice Weidel. In November 2019, Chrupalla was nominated by Alexander Gauland to replace the latter as co-chairman of the AfD; he later won election as co-chair.
Biography
Chrupalla was born on 14 April 1975 in Weißwasser, then part of East Germany. In 2003 he completed state professional exams to become a licensed house painter and master varnisher. He later became owner of a construction company. Chrupalla is married with two children.
In March 2020, Chrupalla's car caught fire on his property in Gablenz, a town in northeastern Saxony. The local police suspected arson, but it was never confirmed. Chrupalla condemned the act as a direct attack on his family, one that went beyond all conceivable boundaries of political debate.
In October 2023, Chrupalla was hospitalised following a suspected attack with a syringe that occurred shortly before he was due to speak at an election rally. The incident came just days after AfD's other co-leader, Alice Weidel, cancelled a public rally due to concerns that her family would also be attacked. A witness told the local daily Donaukurier that Chrupalla had taken a few selfies before he collapsed and was transported to hospital. Andreas Aichele, a spokesman for the Upper Bavaria Police Department, said it remained unclear whether the politician had been attacked, had fallen, or was simply not feeling well. Aichele said authorities ruled nothing out and that the investigation was ongoing.
Day 89
it´s 6:50 in the morning and so far I´ve reached 8573 steps after doing my workout without weights mindfull. So I´ve nearly burned 500 kcal by now according to my pedometer.
The Donald broke with Biden´s policy. He breaks with it inside the US. The Kennedy center was as I understand it run by members of the republican and democratic party. I think that Trump now has a different agenda. I found this at Forbes:
Trump’s Kennedy Center Takeover: What To Know As He’s Named Chair
And the Donald breaks with Biden´s policy internationally. Sky news writes this:
I thought he had already ended it shortly after the election. Well, wasn´t that what he said, back then.
In Germany Gerhard Schroeder thought the same since he was a manager at Gazprom, thinking he has a special relationship with Putin.
Today I would like to focus on Jörg Meuthen. Because the developement of the AFD being overrun by the right can be seen in his development in the party. I found this on wikipedia:
Jörg Hubert Meuthen (German: [ˈjœɐ̯k ˈmɔʏtn̩]; born 29 June 1961) is a German economist, academic and Independent politician who was a Member of the European Parliament (MEP) for Germany from 2017 until 2024.
He was frontrunner for the Alternative for Germany (AfD) party at the 2016 Baden-Württemberg state election and was a Member of Parliament and parliamentary leader from March 2016.[4] He was the leading candidate of the AfD for the 2019 European Parliament election. He served as federal spokesman for, and thus leader of, the AfD from July 2015 until his resignation in January 2022, caused by conflict with right-wing extremist elements in the party. From June 2022 to September 2023, he sat as a member of the German Centre Party. He sat as an independent MEP for the remainder of his term.
Life
Meuthen is a professor of political economy and finance at the Academy of Kehl. Initially close to the Free Democratic Party of Germany (FDP), he joined the AfD because of its eurosceptic positions. He strongly defends economic liberalism. He is married to the Russian-born Natalia Zvekic, whose ex-husband came from Yugoslavia.
He was leader of the AfD in the 2016 regional elections in Baden-Württemberg and has been a member of parliament and parliamentary leader since March 2016. In November 2017, he joined the European Parliament following the resignation of Beatrix von Storch. Re-elected MEP in May 2019, he is a member of the parliamentary group Identity and Democracy (ID). While he maintains that "the AfD must be a bourgeois party with a bourgeois reason and endowed with an appearance of seriousness," he was strongly challenged in 2020 by 'the wing' (Der Flügel) a far-right faction within the party. Meuthen was trying to exclude one of the wing’s leaders (Björn Höcke) because of his neo-Nazi, failing ultimately.[10] This provoked a split within the party. Meuthen was accused by his internal opponents of wanting to polish the image of the AfD, of asserting his personal ambitions to obtain the top candidate position on the list (and therefore of candidate for the chancellorship of the AfD for the Bundestag elections). He was booed at the party congress in November 2020. A motion of no confidence received 47 per cent of the votes.
In September 2019, the regional film fund HessenFilm [de] fired its CEO Hans Joachim Mendig over a controversial meeting with Jörg Meuthen.
Meuthen announced in October 2021 that he would not be running in the next leadership election.[13] In January 2022, he announced that he would step down from his official positions and leave the AfD, because the party had moved too far to the right.
02/13/2025
02/12/2025
Day 88
It´s 6:50 in the morning and I got 8243 steps so far after doing my workout with weights.
Hmmh, Donald Dump still threatens, "All hell will break loose"
Trump: "All hell will break loose" if Hamas doesn't free all hostages by 12pm Saturday
or he jokes that he doesn´t need to buy Gaza
and he doesn´t see that this makes it much more difficult to get the rest of the hostages out alive. And since he doesn´t have anyone who could explain that to him, since everybody around him is loyal, there is no way to learn for Donald than the hard way...
Today I would like to focus on Alexander Gauland, another founder of the AFD, who opened up the door for the right to take over the AFD. I found this on Wikipedia:
Eberhardt Alexander Gauland (born 20 February 1941) is a German politician, journalist and lawyer who has served as leader of the far-right political party Alternative for Germany (AfD) in the Bundestag since September 2017 and co-leader of the party from December 2017 to November 2019. He has been a Member of the Bundestag (MdB) since September 2017. Gauland was the party's co-founder and was its federal spokesman from 2017 to 2019 and the party leader for the state of Brandenburg from 2013 to 2017.
Biography
Gauland was born in 1941 in Chemnitz, a city that became part of East Germany in 1949 and was renamed Karl-Marx-Stadt. After graduating from high school in 1959, he fled as a refugee to West Germany. He studied political science and law at Marburg, where he also received his doctorate.
In 1972, Gauland entered the Federal Press Office and worked as the Director of the Office of the Mayor of Frankfurt am Main for 10 years.
Afterwards, he became the head of a department of the Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation, Building and Nuclear Safety in Bonn and Member of the Hessian Prime Minister's cabinet.
From 1991 to 2006, he worked as an editor of the local newspaper Märkische Allgemeine in Potsdam.
Founding the AfD
On the morning of 25 March 2010, German Chancellor Angela Merkel publicly promised there would be no direct financial aid to Greece, but reversed that statement hours later by agreeing with the leaders of the Euro countries to send the first of many "rescue packages" to Greece. Gerd Robanus, Assessor in the Federal Executive of the CDU-Business Association cited this as the reason for founding the Alternative for Germany together with Alexander Gauland, Konrad Adam and Bernd Lucke.
In February 2014, Gauland received about 80 percent of the vote during an Extraordinary National Congress in Diedersdorf, becoming chairman of the Brandenburg State Association of Alternative for Germany.[
Landtag of Brandenburg
The AfD got 12.2 percent of the vote in the 2014 Brandenburg state election, enabling it to enter the assembly of that state for the first time. On Tuesday, 10 July 2014 Gauland opened the inaugural session of the Landtag of Brandenburg:
As part of this speech, after quoting Edmund Burke, Gauland wished the other members of parliament "all the strength and the courage, to tackle the tasks now ahead of them, in the interest of the voters and in the interest of the common good".
Political affiliation and ideals
Before becoming an AfD founding member Gauland was a member of the CDU. In 2012 Gauland became involved in the Berliner Kreis [de] ("Berlin circle"), a loose association of federal and state politicians within the CDU, which has been trying for years to make the CDU conservative again, because they consider that under Angela Merkel's leadership it has moved away from these ideals.
He is a supporter of a line that is both conservative on the societal level and liberal on the economic level. He opposed the idea of an aid plan for Greece, which was then plunged into an economic crisis. He called for the closure of Germany's and the European Union's borders, targeting Muslims in particular.
Alexander Gauland said he can not detect any right-wing extremists or radicals at the PEGIDA-Demonstrations. Gauland said: "I do not see right-wing extremists. I see citizens who demonstrate out of concern about developments in Germany, who are afraid. But I haven't seen any right-wing extremists, and we are not the allies of the right-wing extremists, but we are the allies of the people who have these concerns."
In May 2016, Gauland reportedly made comments about Bayern Munich and black German international footballer Jérôme Boateng in a conversation with Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung. The paper cited Gauland, "people like [Boateng] as a footballer, but they don't want to have a Boateng as a neighbour". A controversy arose about this sentence. Gauland defended himself, saying he was fooled by the newspaper and it had been a background discussion, which was classified as confidential and thus not intended for publication. The newspaper refuted this. Gauland added that the effect of the statement – which in his words was meant descriptive – was distorted by the headline of the newspaper, "Gauland insults Boateng" (Gauland beleidigt Boateng). The newspaper had no audio recording of the statement, but independently written memos of two journalists. While Boateng himself stated that he was "saddened" by the statement of Gauland, the German federal government said it was "a vile and sad sentence" (ein niederträchtiger und ein trauriger Satz). But also the FAS was criticised for making "mistakes".
In September 2017, a video emerged of Gauland in which he said that Germany should "be proud of" its soldiers in both world wars and people should no longer "reproach" Germans for the Second World War. He was quoted as saying: "If the French are rightly proud of their emperor and the Britons of Nelson and Churchill, we have the right to be proud of the achievements of the German soldiers in two world wars". He continued, "If I look around Europe, no other people has dealt as clearly with their past wrongs as the Germans." In response, Germany's justice minister tweeted that the statements showed that Gauland's AfD was on the extreme right.[ Gauland's comment was defended by numerous right-leaning supporters both publicly and on social media.
Position in the AfD
Gauland is one of the party founders. From 2013 to 2017, he was party leader in the state Brandenburg and entered the Landtag of Brandenburg in the 2014 election.
He resigned as party leader in Brandenburg, when he led the AfD in the 2017 German federal election next to Alice Weidel, with whom he's now leading the AfD group in the Bundestag. In December 2017, he was elected co-leader of the party next to Jörg Meuthen. In November 2019, he resigned as party leader.
Personal life
Gauland's life companion Carola Hein is editor of a local newspaper, the Märkische Allgemeine, which he had previously edited.
As a 26-year-old man, Gauland suffered from depression. He also suffered a heart attack in 2007, and has been taking medication to lower his blood pressure ever since.
Gauland is a member of the Evangelical Church in Germany. His daughter is a Protestant pastor and publicly distanced herself from her father's statements on refugees in 2016.
Day 87
Tonight it snowed again in Reinhardshausen. But since we´ve got above 0 Degrees Celsius the snow is already melting. So my walk was not that pleasant, wet, but it´s 7.00 in the morning and I got 8260 steps so far after my workout without weights. The developement is that I hardly don´t need pauses between my sets. But I don´t think that it´s too good to power through the workout with hardly any pauses.
Why did Trump leave during the Superbowl? Well of course because after half time the result was very clear, I guess and that bored him. Otherwise we know that his attention-span is not too long.
Today I would like to focus on Bernd Lucke. He was one of the founders of the AFD and actually was the economical brain behind it. He was the person with the clearest view of the future. The tragic story is the change of the party and in my opinion that is Gauland´s fault, the other founder of the AFD. I found this about Bernd Lucke on Wikipedia:
Bernd Lucke (born 19 August 1962) is a German economist, professor, author and former politician. He co-founded the Alternative for Germany (AfD) in 2013 and served as the party's federal chairman until July 2015, when he was displaced and left the party soon after. He had been elected a member of the European Parliament (MEP) for the AfD in 2014 and served the five-year full term as a member of various other new parties, similar to some other former AfD MEPs.
Lucke was a professor of economics at the University of Hamburg before helping to found Wahlalternative 2013 ("Electoral Alternative 2013"), which would become the AfD. Lucke served as the party's spokesman until he lost a leadership election to Frauke Petry in July 2015. Petry's election was considered a party shift to extremist positions; Lucke subsequently left the party. In July 2015, he and other former AfD members founded the political party Liberal-Konservative Reformer (formerly Allianz für Fortschritt und Aufbruch, "Alliance for Progress and Renewal", abbreviated ALFA). He failed to win reelection in 2019 and has since returned to an academic career.
Early life and professional career
Lucke was born in West Berlin in 1962. His father was an engineer, and his mother was a schoolteacher. In 1969, he moved to Haan in North Rhine-Westphalia.
From 1982 to 1984, Lucke studied economics, history, and philosophy at the University of Bonn; he undertook graduate studies in economics at the University of Bonn and UC Berkeley from 1984 to 1987. He completed his doctorate in 1991 with a dissertation on price stabilization in world agricultural markets under Jürgen Wolters at the Free University of Berlin. After the fall of the Berlin Wall, he worked in the Council of Economic Experts of the East German Government and, after the German reunification, as an assistant to the Senate of Berlin. Lucke's research interests include sovereign default, news-driven business cycles, growth in developing countries, dynamic CGE models, and applied econometrics.
Lucke has been an advisor to the World Bank and a visiting scholar at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver. He is a frequent guest on political talk shows in Germany. He is married and has five children.
Political career and the AfD
Lucke joined the Junge Union, the youth wing of the Christian Democratic Union of Germany, as a teenager in response to the conditions of his relatives living in East Germany under communism. He was a member of the CDU for thirty years until 2011 when he cancelled his membership in opposition to the party's eurozone rescue policies. He first contested an election as a member of the Free Voters in the 2013 Lower Saxony state election but was not elected.
In 2013, he founded Wahlalternative 2013 ("Electoral Alternative 2013") with Alexander Gauland, Frauke Petry and Konrad Adam to oppose the German government's handling of the eurozone crisis. The group was later founded as the Alternative for Germany in April 2013, with Lucke as one of the party's three spokespeople. During his speech at the party's founding rally, he described the Euro currency as a "historic mistake."
During a campaign speech in Bremen on 24 August 2013, Lucke was attacked with pepper spray by two members of Anti-fascist Action. Several people in the audience were treated for irritation of the eyes and throat.
During the 2013 German federal election, Lucke stood as the AfD's top list candidate in Lower Saxony and for the directly elected seat of Harburg but was not elected to either. During the 2014 European Parliament election, Lucke was elected as an MEP and negotiated for the AfD to join the European Conservatives and Reformists. Lucke stated that the AfD's preferred partners in the European Parliament would be the British Conservative Party and that they would not team up with "xenophobic" parties.
Following the rise of the Pegida protests in Germany, which were welcomed by some AfD state branches, Lucke stated that most of the arguments voiced by Pegida were legitimate and that the movement was a sign that politicians had not listened to concerns felt by ordinary people.
On 4 July 2015, Lucke was displaced as leader of the party Alternative for Germany (AfD) by his former deputy, Frauke Petry, in a leadership election after several months of infighting.[19] On 9 July 2015, Lucke left the Alternative for Germany, saying that the party had "fallen irretrievably into the wrong hands" after Petry's election and moved too far to the right by adopting what he termed as anti-foreigner positions. He also cited an “anti-Western, decidedly pro-Russian foreign and security policy orientation” and increasing calls to “pose the ‘system question’ regarding our parliamentary democracy” as reasons for his departure from the party. On 19 July, he and other former members of the AfD founded a new party, the Alliance for Progress and Renewal (ALFA). ALFA has since been renamed Liberal-Konservative Reformer ("Liberal Conservative Reformers," LKR) and later Wir Bürger ("Us Citizens").
In 2015, Lucke was announced as the LKR's top candidate for the Bundestag ahead of the 2017 German federal election. However, the LKR decided not to contest the election. The party stood in the 2019 European Parliament election, but all its MEPs, including Lucke, lost their seats.
02/11/2025
02/10/2025
Day 86
Wow, what a Super Bowl. I didn´t expect that. And I´m gonna enjoy the youtube videos of the Philadelphian Fan-reactions tonight. What a tactical masterpiece it was. This win gives me hope again.
It´s 7.00 in the morning and I´ve accumulated 8059 steps after doing my workout with weights this morning.
As I expected the Chancelor-duel wasn´t so exciting. I think that Scholz had a strong moment at the beginning destroying a citation with which Merz wanted to show him that Scholz destroyed the Brandmauer, the firewall against the AFD first, but Scholz reacted superbly thanking Merz to give the full citation in which he could point out that this was a reaction to an AFD-Scheme in communal votes and he pointed out how to deal with that. But I think that this duel won´t have any effects on the voters. I fear that the undecided voters won´t vote for CDU/CSU nor SPD.
And so I start the week of the AFD. I found this on Wikipedia:
Alternative for Germany (German: Alternative für Deutschland, AfD, German pronunciation: [aːʔɛfˈdiː] ⓘ) is a far-right and right-wing populist[ political party in Germany. The AfD is Eurosceptic, and opposes immigration into Germany, especially Muslim immigration. The name of the party reflects its resistance to (uncontested by mainstream parties) policies of Angela Merkel with her insistence on Alternativlosigkeit (lit. 'alternative-less-ness', a German version of "there is no alternative"). The Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution, Germany's domestic intelligence agency, has classified the party as a "suspected extremist" organisation.
Established in April 2013, AfD narrowly missed the 5% electoral threshold to sit in the Bundestag during the 2013 German federal election. The party won seven seats in the 2014 European Parliament election in Germany as a member of the European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR). After securing representation in 14 of the 16 German state parliaments by October 2017, AfD won 94 seats in the 2017 German federal election and became the third-largest party in the country, as well as the largest opposition party; its lead candidates were the co-vice chairman Alexander Gauland and Alice Weidel, the latter having served as the party group leader in the 19th Bundestag. In the 2021 federal election, AfD dropped to being the fifth-largest party. Since 2023, polling shows AfD as the second most popular party.
AfD was founded by Gauland, Bernd Lucke, and former members of the Christian Democratic Union of Germany (CDU) to oppose the policies of the Eurozone as a right-wing and moderately Eurosceptic alternative to the centre-right but pro-European CDU. The party presented itself as an economically liberal, Eurosceptic, and conservative movement in its early years. AfD subsequently moved further to the right, and expanded its policies under successive leaderships to include opposition to immigration,Islam, and the European Union. Since 2015, AfD's ideology has been characterised by German nationalism,[Völkisch nationalism[ and national conservatism with policy focus on opposing Islam, opposing immigration,[ welfare chauvinism,[ Euroscepticism, denial of human-caused global warming, and supporting closer relations with Russia.
Several state associations and other factions of AfD have been linked to or accused of harboring connections with far-right nationalist and proscribed movements, such as PEGIDA, the Neue Rechte, and the Identitarian movement, and of employing historical revisionism, as well as xenophobic rhetoric.They have been observed by various state offices for the protection of the constitution since 2018. AfD's leadership has denied that the party is racist and has been internally divided on whether to endorse such groups. In January 2022, after a lost power struggle, party leader Jörg Meuthen resigned his party chairmanship with immediate effect and left the AfD, as he claimed he came to acknowledge that the party had developed very far to the right with totalitarian traits and in large parts was no longer based on the liberal democratic basic order. Former party chairman and co-founder of the AfD, Lucke, had left the party in 2015 with the same remark.
The party is the strongest in the areas of the former communist German Democratic Republic (East Germany), especially the states of Saxony and Thuringia, largely due to economic and integration issues that still continue to persist post-reunification,[47][48][49] in addition to the East German voters' perceived propensity for strongman rule. In the 2021 federal elections, AfD fell from third to fifth place overall but made gains in the eastern states (the former East Germany). In the former East Berlin, it came in second after SPD with 20.5% of the vote; in the west, it came in fifth with 8.4% of the vote.
Chrupalla and Weidel (2022–present)
AfD held their three seats in the 2022 Saarland state election. At the same time, they lost all their seats in the 2022 Schleswig-Holstein state election. In the 2022 Lower Saxony state election in October, the AfD won 9 more seats compared to 2017 to a total of 18. In the 2023 Berlin repeat state election, the AfD recorded a small upswing by gaining 4 seats compared to the 2021 election.In the 2023 Bremen state election, AfD did not participate and lost all their seats, as the Bremen electoral committee had barred the AfD from the election due to internal divisions that had resulted in them submitting two lists of candidates. The Citizens in Rage, another right-wing party, participated instead; they have received 10 seats (after having only one seat in 2019) in Bremen's state parliament.] On 25 June 2023, amid rises in polls, Thuringia's AfD won its first district election in Sonneberg. In the run-off election held on 2 July, the AfD candidate Hannes Loth [de] won against the independent politician Nils Naumann, becoming AfD's first ever mayor.
On 8 October state elections, AfD significantly increased its share in Hesse where it became the second biggest party (+9 seats) and in Bavaria, where it became the third (+10 seats).
Observers considered the increase of support for the AfD as not being limited to the local level. Opinion polling for the next German federal election conducted in early July 2023 showed that the AfD polled more than the SPD, achieving second place behind the CDU/CSU alliance.[ The SPD co-leader said a ban should be considered if the AfD is categorized as a group of "proven Right-wing extremists" by the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution. Friedrich Merz, the CDU leader, warned that "banning parties has never actually solved political problems". Germans are evenly split on a ban, with 47 per cent in favour and 47 per cent against; the ban is more popular in the west and among liberal Greens.
In December 2023, Tim Lochner of AfD was elected mayor of Pirna (Saxony), he became the first mayor of a city with more than 20,000 inhabitants to be a member of the party.
In 2023, the AfD saw over 86 violent attacks on AfD party representatives. This was more than on any other German party.
2023 meeting and subsequent protests
Main articles: Meeting of right-wing extremists at Potsdam in 2023 and 2024–2025 German anti-extremism protests
In January 2024, Correctiv reported that members of the AfD had secretly met with figures from the German and Austrian far-right in November 2023, in which they allegedly discussed a "remigration" plan for deporting immigrants, which could include naturalised German citizens. The figures present included Identitarian activist Martin Sellner.
The AfD distanced itself from the meeting, saying it was not responsible for what was discussed and that its members had attended only in a personal capacity. Alice Weidel parted ways with Roland Hartwig, an advisor who was present at the meeting.
The plan was condemned by German politicians, including chancellor Olaf Scholz. The report sparked protests against the AfD across Germany, with protestors calling for a ban of the AfD.Subsequently, the AfD was expelled from the ID group, with EKRE supporting expulsion of Krah, but opposing the removal of the entire AfD delegation, and the FPÖ opposing the expulsion of the AfD.
2024
On 9 June 2024, the AfD won 16% of the vote in the European Parliament elections, second only to the CDU/CSU and almost five percentage points more than in the 2019 election.[ The AfD prevailed in all five former East German states.
One of the party's leaders, Tino Chrupalla, hailed the results as "historic."In an attempt to rejoin the ID group, the AfD replaced its controversial candidate Maximilian Krah with René Aust as head of the AfD delegation in the European Parliament. However, the AfD failed to join ID, or now named Patriots for Europe. Instead, the AfD formed the new ESN group which was composed predominantly of AfD members, as well as some other ethnonationalist parties across Europe.
State elections in East Germany
In the 2024 Thuringian state election, the AfD became the first far-right party in Germany since the Nazi Party to win a plurality of seats in a state election. The AfD also performed strongly in Brandenburg and Saxony.
Day 85
Yesterday I got 25950 steps. I won´t reach as many today. I will walk to the Bayer04-open-air-workout-area again, visit a friend in a home for elderly people and I will accompany my two little girls to watch Paddington in Peru.
Today I want to try to explain why both parties, the BSW and Die Linke might fail to get more than 5 % of the votes and therefore might not be represented in the Bundestag.
If you read the history of Oskar Lafontaine it semes to be his scheme, that he gets involved with a new party only to fuse with a bigger party and perhaps it was his agenda to fuse with the SPD in a not so friendly take-over. By leaving the Left Sahra Wagenknecht destroyed the faction and of course a lot of voters moved to the BSW. But she could not get many voters from the AFD. I think that that was her plan after all, believing that many protest-voters now have a left alternative and therefore there is an astounding overlap of the two "radical parties" in the treatment of immigrants. In the eastern part of Germany this might work. But not in the western part where Sahra is regarded as Putin´s Pearl, because of her past in the SED, the party of the DDR, the eastern part of Germany after the second World War.
Well, I found this article:
BSW faces hard fight in first Bundestag campaign – DW – 01/12/2025
And of course Sahra does complain, that the BSW only gets bad treatment by the press/media.
I stay with my prognosis, that the Left and the BSW won´t be represented in the Bundestag.
P.S.: It`s 7.10 in the evening and I´ve reached 15503 steps today making it an average of more than 15.000 steps per day in the last week and more than 10 Kilometer per day.
There are two things special about the night to come. I will watch the duel of Friedrich Merz CDU/CSU against Chancelor Scholz, although there will be hardly anything new. And of course there will be the Super Bowl. Hmmh, I´m not going to watch it, because this year I´m not that hooked like in the last year, where I hoped that the Ravens would reach the final. Hmmm I sure hope that the Eagles will win, but I fear that Kansas will win the Super Bowl again. And the half time show is nothing I´m looking forward to this year. I enjoyed the half time show on the 25th of December in Texas though. Beyonce was superb.
mar
2020
02/08/2025
Day 84
Today I didn´t walk yet. It´s 5.30 in the morning and I´m preparing for my walk to the Bayer04-open-air-workout-area.
We have an online-tool in Germany to help us with our decision which party to elect. It´s called the Wahl-O-Mat and in 38 questions you can define your political standpoints and you can weigh them pointing out which questions are the most important for you. And here you can see my result. Funny thing is that CDU/CSU and BSW reached the same result/overlap with my political view.
Today I would like to focus on Oscar Lafontaine. He has been married to Sahra Wagenknecht for 14 years, I think. And I think that he is the mastermind behind it all. And I think, that they are not really married. It´s more kinda like a management, or kinda like Palpatine and Darth Vader. I found this on wikipedia:
Oskar Lafontaine (German pronunciation: [ˈɔskaʁ lafõˈtɛːn, -fɔnˈ-]; born 16 September 1943) is a German politician. He served as Minister-President of the state of Saarland from 1985 to 1998 and was federal leader of the Social Democratic Party (SPD) from 1995 to 1999. He was the lead candidate for the SPD in the 1990 German federal election, but lost by a wide margin. He served as Minister of Finance under Chancellor Gerhard Schröder after the SPD's victory in the 1998 federal election, but resigned from both the ministry and Bundestag less than six months later, positioning himself as a popular opponent of Schröder's policies in the tabloid press.
In the lead-up to the 2005 federal election, as a reaction to Schröder's Agenda 2010 reforms, Lafontaine co-founded the left-wing party Labour and Social Justice – The Electoral Alternative. Following a merger with the Party of Democratic Socialism in June 2007, he became co-chairman of The Left. He was the lead candidate for the Saarland branch of the party in the 2009 Saarland state election, where it won over 20% of the vote. He announced his resignation from all federal political functions after being diagnosed with prostate cancer in 2009. He retained his position as a member of the Saarland legislature and from May 2012 to 2022 he was the leader of the opposition in Saarland. Lafontaine resigned from the Left Party on 17 March 2022 because it was no longer an "alternative to the politics of social insecurity and inequality," he said.
Family and education
Lafontaine was born in Saarlautern (now Saarlouis) into a family of craftsmen. His father, Hans Lafontaine, was a professional baker and was killed serving in World War II. He spent his childhood living with his mother, Katharina (née Ferner), and his twin brother, Hans, in Dillingen.
He attended a Catholic episcopal boarding institution in Prüm and there was educated at the Regino-Gymnasium, a public school. He left school in 1962 and received a scholarship from Cusanuswerk, the scholarship body of the Catholic Church in Germany, to study physics at the universities of Bonn and Saarland. Lafontaine graduated in 1969; his thesis concerned the production of monocrystalline barium titanate. He worked for Versorgungs- und Verkehrsgesellschaft Saarbrücken until 1974, serving on its board from 1971.
Lafontaine has been married four times and has two sons by his second and third wives. Lafontaine was married to Ingrid Bachert from 1967 to 1982. From 1982 to 1988 he was married to the artist Margret Müller. Together they have a son (Frederic, born 1982). From 1993 to 2013 he was married to Christa Müller. They have a son together (Carl-Maurice, born 1997). In November 2011, Lafontaine officially presented fellow politician Sahra Wagenknecht as his new girlfriend, who is 26 years his junior. Since 22 December 2014 they have been married. He is a non-practising Catholic.
Political rise
Lafontaine rose to prominence locally as mayor of Saarbrücken and became more widely known as a critic of chancellor Helmut Schmidt's support for the NATO plan to deploy Pershing II missiles in Germany. From 1985 to 1998 he served as Minister-President of the Saarland. In this position he struggled to preserve the industrial base of the state, which was based on steel production and coal mining with subsidies, and served as President of the Bundesrat in 1992/93.
Chancellor candidacy and assassination attempt
Lafontaine election poster, 1990
Lafontaine was the SPD's candidate for Chancellor in the German federal election of 1990. He faced nearly impossible odds. The election had been called two months after the reunification of Germany, and the incumbent government of Helmut Kohl was in a nearly unassailable position.
During the campaign he was attacked with a knife by a mentally deranged woman after a speech in Cologne. His carotid artery was slashed and he remained in a critical condition for several days.
Political comeback
At the "Mannheim convention" in 1995, he was elected chairman of the SPD in a surprise move, replacing Rudolf Scharping. He was mainly responsible for bringing the whole political weight of the SPD to bear against Kohl and his CDU party, rejecting bipartisan cooperation that had characterized German politics for many years. Lafontaine argued that any help given to Kohl would only lengthen his unavoidable demise.
After the SPD's unexpectedly clear victory at the polls in September 1998, he was appointed Federal Minister of Finance in the first government of Gerhard Schröder.
Minister of Finance
During his short tenure as Minister of Finance, Lafontaine was a main bogeyman of UK Eurosceptics. This was because, among other things, he had called for the prompt tax harmonisation of the European Union, which would have resulted in an increase in UK taxes. In 1998, English tabloid The Sun called Lafontaine "Europe's most dangerous man". On 11 March 1999, he resigned from all his official and party offices, claiming that "lack of cooperation" in the cabinet had become unbearable. Until the formation of the Left Party he was known for his attacks against the Schröder government in the tabloid Bild-Zeitung, which is generally considered conservative.
Leaving the SPD, formation of The Left party and later
On 24 May 2005 Lafontaine left the SPD. After two weeks of speculation it was announced on 10 June that he would run as the lead candidate for The Left party (Die Linke), a coalition of the Labor and Social Justice Party (WASG), which was based in western Germany, and the Left Party.PDS, which was the successor to the ruling East German Socialist Unity Party (SED). Lafontaine joined the WASG on 18 June 2005 and was selected to head their list for the 2005 Federal Election in North Rhine-Westphalia on the same day. Moreover, he also unsuccessfully contested the Saarbrücken constituency, which he had previously represented from 1990 to 2002. Nevertheless, the result of the Left party in the Saarland was by far the best in any of the federal states in the West of Germany.
In 2007, when the Left Party was formed in a merger between "Left Party.PDS" and WASG, he became chairman alongside Lothar Bisky.
In May 2009, he declared that "Financial capitalism has failed. We need to democratize the economy. The workforce needs to have a far greater say in their companies than has been the case so far."
In 2022, he published the book Ami, it's time to go where he criticizes NATO and American influence in German politics, arguing that Germany has become an American vassal state. The book became a bestseller.
In 2024, Lafontaine announced that he had joined the Bündnis Sahra Wagenknecht (BSW). On 27 January 2024 he spoke at the founding party congress.
Controversies
In the late 1980s and early 1990s, he caused controversy among his left-wing base with a plea for pro-business policies and a call for the reduction of immigrants and asylum-seekers.
At one event in 2005, Lafontaine described Fremdarbeiter ("foreign workers", a term associated with the Nazi regime) as a threat to German labour. He said afterwards that he had misspoken, but in an article published in Die Welt, a group of prominent German writers accused him of deliberately appealing to xenophobic and far-right voters.
Lafontaine lives in a manor-like house, commonly known as the "palace of social justice" (Palast der sozialen Gerechtigkeit). When asked by the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung about whether this could be in conflict with his socialist ideas, Lafontaine said politicians of the left do not have to be poor, but they have to fight against poverty.
In a column published by the same newspaper Lafontaine criticized the expansion of wind power, citing the alleged "destruction of the German Cultural landscape" as a cause for his objection. The Alliance 90/The Greens top candidate Barbara Meyer-Gluche pushed back at this stance and accused Lafontaine of "irrational fearmongering".
Day 83
After getting more than 12.000 steps yesterday, I wanted to be safe today, because I will only work until 03.00 in the afternoon. So it´s 5 to 7 in the morning and I got 9058 steps so far after doing my workout with weights. But my kilocalory count is still under 400 so far.
Merz of the CDU/CSU did something extraordinary yesterday. He said that 4 % for the FDP is 4 % too much for the FDP and 4 % less for the CDU, that means he asks the voters of the CDU/CSU not to vote for the FDP. And that is shaking up the FDP. And they shout out that voting for the FDP is the only way to prevent the Green Party from taking part in a coalition with the CDU/CSU.
Today I would like to focus on Sahra Wagenknecht, once the Face of the Left party, followed by Amira Mohamed Ali and now the leading figur of the BSW- Bündnis Sahra Wagenknecht. The only party where only one person is the program. She once founded a Movement called "Aufstehen", Rise and I think the plan behind that was already the formation of a new party. But Aufstehen could not gather enough people. Tomorrow I will focus on her husband Oscar Lafontaine. I found this on Wikipedia:
Sahra Wagenknecht (born Sarah Wagenknecht; German: [ˌzaːʁa ˈvaːɡŋ̍ˌknɛçt]; 16 July 1969) is a German politician, economist, author, and publicist. She has been a member of the Bundestag since 2009, where she represented The Left until 2023. From 2015 to 2019, she served as that party's parliamentary co-chair. With a small team of allies, Wagenknecht left the party on 23 October 2023 to found her own party in 2024, Bündnis Sahra Wagenknecht, to contest elections onwards.
Wagenknecht became a prominent member of the Party of Democratic Socialism (PDS) from the early 1990s. After the foundation of The Left in 2007, she was a leading member of one of the party's most left-wing factions as leader of the Communist Platform. Her economic views shifted since then; she laid them out in her book Freedom instead of Capitalism, in which she analyses Germany’s economic policy at the time of the euro crisis and criticises it on the basis of ordoliberalism.
She has been a controversial figure throughout her career due to her hardline and populist stances, statements about East Germany, immigration and refugees, and her political movement Aufstehen. From 2020 onward Wagenknecht was less active in parliament, but often interviewed by German media. She is not a member of any parliamentary committee.
Since 2021 she had openly considered forming her own party, due to growing and enduring conflicts within the Left Party and at the end of September 2023 Wagenknecht formed the Sahra Wagenknecht Alliance political party, better known as BSW (Bündnis Sahra Wagenknecht), at the start of 2024. She is running as the Chancellor candidate of the BSW in the 2025 German federal election.
Early life
Wagenknecht was born on 16 July 1969 in the East German city of Jena. Her father, who is Iranian, came to West Berlin to study; her mother, who worked for a state-run art distributor, is German. Her father disappeared in Iran when she was a child. She was cared for primarily by her grandparents until 1976, when she and her mother moved to East Berlin. While in Berlin, she became a member of the Free German Youth (FDJ). She completed her Abitur exams in 1988 and joined the (then ruling) Socialist Unity Party (SED) in early 1989.
From 1990, Wagenknecht studied philosophy and modern German literature as an undergraduate in Jena and Berlin, completing the mandatory coursework, but did not write a thesis as she "could not find support for her research aims at the East Berlin Humboldt University". She then enrolled as a philosophy student at the University of Groningen, completing her studies and earning an MA in 1996 for a thesis on the young Karl Marx's interpretation of Hegel, supervised by Hans Heinz Holz and published as a book in 1997. From 2005 until 2012 she completed a PhD dissertation in microeconomics at TU Chemnitz, on "The Limits of Choice: Saving Decisions and Basic Needs in Developed Countries", awarded with the grade magna cum laude in the German system and subsequently published by the Campus Verlag.
Political career
After the fall of the Berlin Wall and the transformation of the SED into the Party of Democratic Socialism (PDS), Wagenknecht was elected to the new party's National Committee in 1991. She also joined the PDS's Communist Platform, a Marxist-Leninist faction.
In the 1998 German federal election, Wagenknecht ran as the PDS candidate in a district of Dortmund, garnering 3.25% of the vote. Following the 2004 European elections, she was elected as a PDS representative to the European Parliament. Among her duties in the parliament were serving on the Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs and Delegation, as well as the Euro-Latin American Parliamentary Assembly.
Following the merger of the PDS and the WASG that formed the Left Party (Die Linke), Wagenknecht considered campaigning for the position of party vice-chair. However, party leaders such as Lothar Bisky and Gregor Gysi objected to the idea primarily because of her perceived sympathies for the former German Democratic Republic (GDR or East Germany). Following the controversy, she announced that she would not run for the post. Wagenknecht successfully contested a seat in the 2009 federal election in North Rhine-Westphalia. She became the Left Party's spokesperson for economic politics in the Bundestag. On 15 May 2010, she was at last elected vice president of the Left Party with 75.3% of the vote.
Early in 2012, the German press reported that Wagenknecht was one of 27 Left Party Bundestag members whose writings and speeches were being collected and analyzed by the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution.
She has been one of the main driving forces in the formation of Aufstehen, a left-wing political movement established in 2018, which exists outside of traditional political party structures and has been compared to the French movement La France Insoumise. In March 2019, Wagenknecht announced her withdrawal from her leadership role within Aufstehen, citing personal workload pressures and insisting that after a successful start-up phase, for which political experience was necessary, the time had come for the movement's own grass roots to assume control. She complained that the involvement of political parties at its heart had "walled in" the movement. She would nonetheless continue to make public appearances on its behalf.
Wagenknecht was elected co-leader of the Left's Bundestag group in 2015 alongside Dietmar Bartsch succeeding long-time leader Gregor Gysi. Wagenknecht won 78.4% of votes cast. As the Left was at the time the largest opposition party in the Bundestag, she became a prominent leader of the opposition for the remainder of the parliamentary term. Bartsch and Wagenknecht were the Left's lead candidates for the 2017 federal election.
The biography Sahra Wagenknecht. Die Biografie by Christian Schneider [de] was published in 2019 and focuses on Wagenknecht as a person, including her family background and interest in Johann Wolfgang von Goethe. In November 2019, she announced her resignation as parliamentary leader, citing burnout.Her activities from 2017 to 2019, culminating with her resignation, are covered in the 2020 documentary film Wagenknecht [de], directed by Sandra Kaudelka.
Wagenknecht speaking at Leipzig in 2019
Wagenknecht was again nominated as the lead candidate on the party's North Rhine-Westphalia list in the 2021 federal election. She was re-elected, but described the results as a "bitter defeat" for her party.
Secession from Die Linke
Due to the growing conflicts within Die Linke, Wagenknecht considered forming her own party. There was speculation since 2021 that her faction and other like-minded groups within Die Linke, such as the Socialist Left or the Karl Liebknecht circles, would break off to form a separate party. Policy-wise, the new party was expected to follow a left-nationalist strategy.
At the end of September 2023, people from Wagenknecht's circle founded the association "BSW – For Reason and Justice e. V.". According to the news magazine Der Spiegel, the abbreviation in the club's name stands for "Bündnis Sahra Wagenknecht" ("Sahra Wagenknecht Alliance"). The association is intended to serve as a precursor to a future party.
In mid-October, over 50 members of Die Linke submitted an application for Wagenknecht's exclusion from the party. The initiators said they wanted to prevent Sahra Wagenknecht from building a new party with the resources of Die Linke. "This is no longer acceptable," said Sofia Leonidakis [de], leader of Die Linke in the Bremen parliament. The ongoing speculation about the founding of a new party and the resulting breakup of Die Linke also put a strain on the election campaigns in Bavaria and Hesse. Die Linke failed to enter both state parliaments.
In January 2024, her new party was officially launched.
02/07/2025
02/06/2025
Day 82
It´s 6:50 in the morning. After reaching 16.667 steps yesterday and since I know I won´t go shopping today I´ve accumulated 8586 steps so far after my workout without weights, which according to my pedometer was effective (200 Kilocalories in 30 minutes).
Donald Dump wants to move the palastenians to Egypt (" When Israel was in Egypt-land, Let my people go!" Citation from the Gospel Go down, Moses) and wants to build a huge, enormous and millions of people will attend golf course in Gaza and wants to rebuild it to the Riviera of Israel. What a great plan. No?
‘Pandemonium’: Palestinian Americans React to Trump’s Gaza Takeover Plan - The New York Times
This is something we German call Schnapsidee (my translator shows me Crazy Idea). Well Schnapsidee is more than a crazy idea. Schnaps is the German word for high-percentage-alcoholic drink and it was adopted in english: Schnapps. Schnapsidee means that it can only come out of a drunk´s mind. And those ideas are not always the best. No Donald Dump does not drink but there must be an effect of the stuff he uses to anchor his orange hair into his orange skin. What is it called, Agent Orange?
Well today I want to focus on Amira Mohamed Ali and no there is no connection to Cassius Clay, well with the exception that both are/were muslims. Well she got out of the Left Party although she was a person that many hoped would shape the future of the Left. I found this on Wikipedia:
Amira Mohamed Ali (Arabic: أميرة محمد علي; born 16 January 1980) is a German politician and member of the Bundestag since 2017. From 12 November 2019 till October 2023, she was the parliamentary co-chairperson of The Left alongside Dietmar Bartsch. In October 2023, she left The Left alongside others like Sahra Wagenknecht to found a new party. Mohamed Ali is the chairwoman of the board of the Bündnis Sahra Wagenknecht-Association which was founded to prepare a new party in January 2024.
Life
Amira Mohamed Ali was born in Hamburg and grew up in Hamburg-Fuhlsbüttel. Her father is Egyptian and her mother is German. After graduating from the Gelehrtenschule des Johanneums in Hamburg-Winterhude in 1998, Mohamed Ali studied law at the universities of Heidelberg and Hamburg, where she began and completed her studies. She completed her legal clerkship at the Higher Regional Court of Oldenburg between 2005 and 2007.
She was admitted to the bar in 2008 and worked as an in-house lawyer and contract manager for an automotive supplier until 2017.[ She is a member of IG Metall and the German Animal Welfare Association.
Mohamed Ali is married and has lived in Oldenburg since 2005.
Political activity
Mohamed Ali has been a board member of the Oldenburg/Ammerland district association of the party Die Linke in Lower Saxony since 2015.[6] She ran for political office for the first time in the 2016 local elections on list number 2 in electoral district VI of the city of Oldenburg.[7] In this election, the Left Party achieved its best result in a local election since its foundation.
Mohamed Ali ran as a direct candidate for the Oldenburg-Ammerland constituency in the 2017 federal election. She was elected number 5 on her party's Lower Saxony state list and was elected to the Bundestag through that list. In the 19th Bundestag, she is a member of the Committee for Legal Affairs and Consumer Protection and the Committee for Food and Agriculture.She was spokesperson for consumer protection and for animal protection of the Left parliamentary group in the Bundestag.
On 12 November 2019, she was elected as Sahra Wagenknecht's successor–alongside Dietmar Bartsch–as co-chair of the parliamentary group. Mohamed Ali won in a competitive vote against Caren Lay, 36 votes to 29.[
In 2023, the dispute between left-wing populist and conservative Sarah Wagenknecht and the party leadership came to a head. As a result, Wagenknecht put forward the prospect of founding her own party. In August 2023, Mohamed Ali, who currently belongs to the Wagenknecht Group, announced that she would be stepping back from co-chair of the parliamentary group because of the dispute. She said that it was difficult for her to represent the course of the party board in the Bundestag.
Founding a new party and leaving The Left
Mohamed Ali was involved in the founding of Bündnis Sahra Wagenknecht (BSW), a registered association with the goal of founding a new political party in Germany. Mohamed Ali serves as the chairperson of the organization. At a press conference on 23 October 2023, which announced BSW to the public, she announced that she had left The Left party.
Political positions
In December 2024, Bundestag decided to better protect the Federal Constitutional Court against political attacks. For this purpose, the structure (16 judges and two senates) was incorporated into the basic law. All parties (CDU/CSU, FDP, A90/Greens, SPD, The Left) voted for the proposed action, except for the right-wing AfD and the BSW. Mohamed Ali described the inclusion of the Bundeverfassungsgericht in the basic law, which can only be changed with a 2/3 majority, as "undemocratic" and "arrogance of those in power".
Day 81
It´s 6.50 in the morning. Yesterday I reached more than 12.000 steps. And so far I´ve reached 7734 steps. Today I will top the 12.000 steps because I have to do some shopping after work.
Oh, what a joy I felt this morning and what an admiration I have for an american judge. Such a humor, such an ingenuity. I have no German sentence in mind that equals this ruling:
Proud Boys Lose Control of Their Name to a Black Church They Vandalized - The New York Times
How great is that. This sentencing totally restores my hope, my faith. What did the Proud Boys do, after attacking democracy and the parliament, they vandalized a church. And the judge ruled that all the money they would now want to make by selling products with the "Proud Boys-Name/Logo" will go into the pocket of the church. I hope that the sentencing also include other stuff, that they would like to print now, like "Sissies formerly known as Proud Boys" or "Not so Proud Boys" or "Symbol", no they cannot use that, or "Spiff Daddy´s Boys".
Today I´m looking forward to the football-match of Bayer 04 against 1.FC Colone in the DFB-Pokall. Since Cologne went to second league this might be one of two matches this year, because currently it looks good for Cologne and they might advance to the Bundesliga again. Oh, the match takes place in Leverkusen and it can be seen on free TV and I´m looking forward to the Choreo of the Leverkusen Fans. It will be a superb match.
Why I think the Left party is still alive is because of her, Carola Rackete. Rakete in German means rocket. And what a fine young woman she is. I really admire her for her whole life. I found this on Wikipedia:
Carola Rackete (pronounced [kaˈʁoːla 'ʁakætə];[nb 1] born 8 May 1988) is a German conservation ecologist, activist, politician and former ship captain. She was elected to the European Parliament as an independent candidate for the Left Party on June 9, 2024.
Rackete participated in several research expeditions to Antarctica and the Southern Ocean and is co-founder of the Antarctic Rights initiative. She also supported the Extinction Rebellion movement and took part in forest protests in Sweden, as well as the occupations of the Hambach Forest and the Dannenrod Forest in Germany. Between 2016 and 2019, she occasionally volunteered for non-governmental sea rescue organisations in the Mediterranean. In June 2019, she was arrested for docking a migrant rescue vessel without authorization in the port of Lampedusa, Italy. The custodial judge considered Rackete’s actions as justified because she had a duty to save lives at sea and ruled that Rackete should not have been arrested. In 2021, the pending investigation was formally dismissed, since the state prosecutor didn‘t see reason to proceed to court.
Early life
Rackete was born in Preetz, near Kiel, Germany. She graduated high school in 2007, then studied at Maritime School at Jade University of Applied Sciences in Elsfleth, earning a Bachelor of Science in nautical science and maritime transport in 2011. The B.Sc. in Nautical science at Jade University meets the written examination requirement for the captain's licence of the Federal Maritime and Hydrographic Agency of Germany, which is later acquired on the basis of professional experience only.
In 2018 she earned a master's degree in conservation management from Edge Hill University in England.
Career
Rackete was a navigation officer for two years in scientific expeditions in the Arctic and the Antarctic for the Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research.
She worked as a conservation volunteer for nine months as part of a European Volunteer Service within the Bystrinsky Nature Reserve in the Kamchatka Peninsula in Russia. Later, Carola Rackete worked for 10 weeks as safety officer for Silversea Cruises, a luxury cruise line headquartered in Monaco. She later worked as second-officer and Chief Mate on ships owned by Greenpeace and the British Antarctic Survey.
From 2015 to 2018 she studied Conservation Management at Edge Hill University in Ormskirk, England, graduating with a Masters.
Since completing her degree in conservation management in 2018, Rackete has been working as a conservation ecologist and activist. She supported the environmental movement Extinction Rebellion in its beginning and co-founded Extinction Rebellion Germany in Berlin in 2019. She was involved in the occupations of Hambach Forest and Dannenröder Forest in Germany.
As part of the field research for her master's thesis, Rackete studied the development of the wandering albatross population in South Georgia between 2017 and 2018[ and took part in the long-term monitoring of seabirds and vegetation. In spring 2020, Rackete was part of a research cruise to the Antarctic conducted by Greenpeace. In 2023, she worked as a research assistant on a research expedition on fin whales in the West Antarctic conducted by the University of Hamburg. Rackete successfully campaigned against the Davis airport project in Antarctica with the Bob Brown Foundation and is committed to the long-term protection of Antarctica and its wildlife.She is a co-founder of the Antarctic Rights initiative and one of the main initiators of the Antarctic Declaration, which calls for Antarctica to be recognised as a legal entity.In 2022, she took part in a protest by the indigenous Sámi population against deforestation in the Arctic and for the land rights of the Sámi.
In her podcast ‘Just Nature?’, Rackete talks about species extinction and the importance of justice in the global conservation movement.
In November 2021, Racket published the translation of her German environmental justice bestseller, The Time to Act is Now, with the Rosa Luxemburg Stiftung.[20]
Sea-Watch 3 incident of June 2019
On 12 June, the ship picked up 53 migrants in the Mediterranean off the Libyan coast. Sea-Watch 3 rejected an offer to dock at Tripoli, which is considered unsafe by the European Union and the humanitarian organizations, and headed toward Lampedusa. According to a map they posted, and also to a report by the Süddeutsche Zeitung and other non-governmental organizations (NGOs) this was the nearest safe harbor per maritime law. On 14 June, Italy closed its ports to migrant rescue ships. Italian interior minister Matteo Salvini refused to allow the ship to dock until other European nations had agreed to take the migrants. Ten of the migrants, including children, pregnant women, and those who were ill, were allowed to disembark. On 28 June, Finland, France, Germany, Luxembourg and Portugal offered to take the migrants.
On 29 June, without authorization, Rackete decided to dock. The motivation for this was that according to her the passengers were exhausted. Rackete was arrested by the Italian authorities after docking.
Italian interior minister Matteo Salvini accused Rackete of trying to sink an Italian patrol boat that was trying to intercept her and that her ship collided with, calling the incident an act of war and demanding the Netherlands intervene.
Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte "scrambled to address the matter" at the 2019 G20 Osaka summit.[ Germany protested against the arrest. Crowdfunding appeals in Italy and Germany had raised over €1 million as of 1 July for Sea-Watch legal defence.[Fortune called Rackete the "fresh new face" of the European migrant crisis.
Sea-Watch 3 has a mainly German crew but sailed under Dutch flag. In the Netherlands, main government party VVD stated that NGOs that deliberately without permission pick up people should be convicted for facilitating human trafficking. Spokesman Jeroen van Wijngaarden said that: "They are factually not a rescue service but a ferry service." Within the Dutch coalition government, they got support from the CDA, and in the Dutch parliament there basically was a majority that supported this. Nevertheless, the two other parties in the coalition government protested strongly against this statement.
Eventually, Rackete was released from house arrest after a court ruling that she had broken no laws and acted to protect passengers' safety. Rackete's lawyer filed a lawsuit against Salvini for defamation on social media, alleging that he incited his followers to threaten her.
The council of the City of Paris on 12 July 2019 announced that the two captains of Sea-Watch 3, Pia Klemp and Carola Rackete, will receive the Grand Vermeil Medal, the top award of the City of Paris, for saving migrants at sea, because the two captains symbolized "solidarity for the respect of human lives". Both refused the medal, defining this decision "hypocritical". Klempt wrote in a statement: "You want to award me a medal...because our crews 'work' to rescue migrants from difficult conditions on a daily basis. At the same time your police steal blankets from people you force to live on the streets while you suppress protests and criminalise people who defend the rights of migrants and asylum seekers."[
As of July 2019, Rackete was under investigation by Italian authorities for possible criminal activities in regards to undocumented migration. If convicted, Rackete would have faced up to 15 years in prison. In January 2020, on appeal the Italian Supreme Court of Cassation ruled that Rackete should never have been arrested.
On 10 September 2019 she was awarded with the Medal of Honor of the Parliament of Catalonia, given by the president of the Catalan Parliament, in recognition for her humanitarian work.[40] In October 2020, Carola Rakete was awarded the first Karl Küpper [de] award. On 6 May 2021, two days before her 33rd birthday, she was awarded a doctor honoris causa from the University of Namur in Belgium.
On May 19, 2021 a court in Agrigento ruled that no trial should be held, agreeing with a state prosecutor that the actions had been undertaken in an effort to save the lives of the migrants.
Political engagement
In July 2023, Rackete and the federal leadership of The Left announced that the independent Carola Rackete would be one of the party's top candidate for the 2024 European elections. The Left is a democratic socialist political party descended from the Marxist-Leninist Socialist Unity Party of Germany. Rackete suggested that the party should consider distancing itself from its Stalinist past but apologized for this demand after receiving intense criticism from the party. She said at her presentation that she wanted to give the social movements a parliamentary voice. The climate crisis is the result of capitalist exploitation and it is the biggest crisis of justice in the world, she said. As an independent candidate for the European Parliament, Rackete is committed to climate and social justice. She campaigns for affordable renewable energy for all, a just restructuring of the economy and the preservation and restoration of nature.
02/05/2025
02/04/2025
Day 80
After reaching 10820 steps yesterday I got up a little earlier today and after finishing my workout without weights, I walked a little more and have reached 7333 steps so far, it´s 6.45 in the morning. Today I need a little mor time for my blog, because it´s Dumb-Time again or as the Wall-Street-Journal as well as many other news-agencies title:
The Dumbest Trade War in History - WSJ
Why is that: Because Donald Dumb wanted to impose 25 % on Canada and Mexico imports and wait for it .... 10% on China (why, are you afraid, to also impose 25%). And the explenation for it is even dumber: the drugs that get over the American borders. Well, how strange that I write this, China is right by pointing out that Fentanyl is an American made problem.
As you can read here: A Brief History of Opioids in the U.S. | Hopkins Bloomberg Public Health Magazine, the legalisation of Oxy-Contin after the Purdue-Pharmaceutics said it´s so powerfull that it doesn´t cause an addiction and after the US-government saw how their college-kids got addicted they wanted to solve the problem by making it available only with medics who would subscribe it but the addicted youth turned to heroin instead. And which medicament is more powerfull than Oxy-Contin. Yes Fentanyl. And since the heroin-market was being stormed by users heroin got laced with Fentanyl causing 100.000 overdose deaths in the States in 2021, the number came down a bit in 2023 only to go up again in 2024. And yes, the fentanyl mainly comes out of chinese labs, than why does Donald Dumb impose only 10% on China and wait for it.....just to stall this tax-shit. I think he knows that his followers think that is only fake news and that it´s only important to them that he does what he says, like making Mexico finance the Wall.
And what does Muskito do. He threatens to close USAID and what is one of USAID´s main goals:
Development Experience Clearinghouse
https://pdf.usaid.gov › pdf_docs · PDF Datei
Substance Abuse: Ending the Global Drug Epidemic - United States …
against specific groups such as women (rape, domestic vio lence, lack ofaccess to better education or jobs); children (child abuse, neglect); and ethnic populations (genocide, hate …
U.S. Agency for International Development
https://www.usaid.gov › primary-impact › being-changemaker-helping...
Being the Changemaker: Helping Filipinos Recover From …
USAID RenewHealth (2019-2024) is USAID's project aimed to expand access to Community-Based Drug Rehabilitation programs in the Philippines, works in partnership with Philippine
U.S. Agency for International Development
https://www.usaid.gov › document › positive-youth-development-histor…
Positive Youth Development History and Programs that Affect …
Positive Youth Development History and Programs that Affect Substance Use and Delinquency. Positive Youth Development History and Programs that Affect Substance Use and Delinquency …
U.S. Agency for International Development
https://www.usaid.gov › sites › default › files · PDF Datei
ADS Chapter 410 - Drug-Free Workplace Program - U.S. Agency for ...
USAID will promote its drug-free policy through the implementation of its USAID Drug- Free Workplace Plan. For the purposes of this chapter, the term “employee” includes all personnel …
You cannot open those pages any more because of the Muskito I guess. Well, Muskito, you are such a hypocrite.
Well, how can I get back to The Left (Die Linke). I think I just present one of it´s biggest politicians, but I think he is not that active in politics any more: Gregor Gisy. I really like him, when I was young, 30 years ago I even saw him life. He is witty, clever, funny and he is a lawyer, so he learned to be that. But although I like him, I never voted for the Left although the computer-based help to find the party that has the most overlaps with my views the Left nearly always comes first and the Greens second but the difference is marginal. I found this on Wikipedia:
Gregor Florian Gysi (German pronunciation: [ˈɡʁeːɡoːɐ̯ ˈɡiːzi]; born 16 January 1948) is a German attorney, former president of the Party of the European Left and a prominent politician of The Left (Die Linke) political party.
He belonged to the reformist wing of the governing Socialist Unity Party of Germany at the time of the pro-democracy transition inspired by then Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev. He has strongly denied allegations that he used to assist the Stasi, the East German secret police. He was the last leader of the Socialist Unity Party of Germany and led the effort that transformed it into the post-Communist Party of Democratic Socialism (PDS), forerunner of The Left.
Family background
Gysi was born in Berlin-Lichtenberg in East Berlin, Soviet Zone of Germany. His father was Klaus Gysi,a high-ranking official in East Germany who served as the Minister of Culture from 1966 to 1973. His mother, Irene Olga Lydia Gysi (née Lessing; 1912–2007), was the sister of political activist Gottfried Lessing, who was married to British writer and Nobel laureate Doris Lessing during his exile in Southern Rhodesia. The surname "Gysi" is of Swiss-German origin.He is of partial Jewish ancestry; his paternal grandmother was Jewish, as was one of his maternal great-grandfathers. One of his maternal great-grandmothers was Russian. His sister, Gabriele, is an actress who left East Germany in 1985. Today, she is chief dramaturge at the Volksbühne in Berlin.
Career
Pre-1989
Gysi's political career began in the then-ruling Socialist Unity Party of Germany (SED) of East Germany, to which he was admitted in 1967. In 1971 he became a licensed attorney, and during the 1970s and 1980s defended several prominent dissidents, including Rudolf Bahro, Robert Havemann, Ulrike Poppe, and Bärbel Bohley.
In addition to his legal work, Gysi emerged as one of East Germany's leading Gorbachev-inspired political reformists within the SED, especially towards the end of the 1980s. In 1989, he and a group of lawyers presented a counter-draft to the government's Travel Bill, which authorised mass public demonstrations. This led to a mass rally on East-Berlin's Alexanderplatz on 4 November in which he spoke and called for reforms, including free elections. In December 1989, he became a member of a special SED party session investigating official corruption and abuse of power.
Fall of Communism
In an interview conducted in 2011, Gysi recalled that in late 1989 he had become the attorney for several of the people who were arrested in the first early public protests. As such he became known to leading figures in the Artistic and Cultural unions and was contacted by a group of actresses about the legality of a large demonstration. He recalls having examined the laws and advising them that they could apply for such a permit from the police and the worst outcome would be that their request could be denied, but they would not be breaking any law or doing anything illegal. He further recalls assisting the group in requesting and completing the appropriate forms and paperwork required for such a permit.
In December 1989, Egon Krenz, the last Communist leader of East Germany, resigned all of his posts. Gysi was elected as the party's chairman. He did not, however, become the leader of East Germany; the SED had abandoned its monopoly of power on 1 December. In his first speech, Gysi admitted that the SED had brought the country to ruin, repudiating everything it had done since 1949. He declared that the party needed to adopt a new form of socialism.
To that end, he immediately set about transforming the SED into a democratic socialist party. Before the year was out, the last hardliners in the SED leadership had either resigned or been pushed out. On 16 December, the SED was renamed the Socialist Unity Party – Party of Democratic Socialism (SED-PDS), it later became simply the Party of Democratic Socialism (PDS). Gysi remained as party chairman, and in March 1990 was elected to the Volkskammer in the first free election of that body, serving there until it was dissolved upon German reunification on 3 October 1990.
Post-unification
In the first post-reunification all-German elections, he was elected to the Bundestag from Berlin's Hellersdorf–Marzahn constituency, and served there until 2000. He remained chairman of the PDS through 1998, and then from 1998 to 2000 served as chairman of the party's parliamentary group.
In 1992, it was alleged Gysi was an informer (Inoffizieller Mitarbeiter, IM) of East Germany's Ministry for State Security (the Stasi). He denied these allegations, and the matter was largely dropped due to his parliamentary immunity. In 1995, the Hamburg state court ruled in Gysi's favour in a complaint against Bärbel Bohley, Gysi's former client, who had accused him of Stasi collaboration. However, the allegations were raised again in 1996, and this time the Bundestag voted to revoke his immunity and proceed with an investigation.
In 1998, the Bundestag's immunity committee concluded that Gysi had been a collaborator with the Stasi from 1978 to 1989 under the name IM Notar, and fined him 8,000 Deutsche Mark. However, both the Free Democratic Party and his own PDS disputed the verdict, and Gysi appealed against the finding. Despite the affair, he retained his seat in the Bundestag in the 1998 elections.[citation needed]
In 2000, he resigned as chairman of the PDS's parliamentary group, but continued as an active member of the party. Following the victory of a "Red-red" (SPD-PDS) coalition in the 2001 Berlin state election, he was elected Senator for Economics, Labour, and Women's Issues and Deputy Mayor. He emphasised practical issues and advocated the reinstitution of some of what he sees as the better aspects of East Germany's system, such as extended child-care hours and a longer school day. After a scandal involving his use of airline "bonus miles" he had acquired on trips as a Bundestag member, he resigned on 31 July 2002 from the Berlin city government. The resignation was a blow to his public "can-do" image, but he has recovered from that to some extent in the wake of increasing public opposition to a number of new policies of the federal government, like the Hartz reforms lowering unemployment benefits to the levels of mere subsistence welfare, which he strongly opposes.
In late-2004, he survived brain surgery and a heart attack. Formerly a heavy smoker, Gysi quit smoking as a result of surviving the heart attack.
Gysi remained the PDS's undisputed front man in many people's minds and continued to appear in public. In May 2005, when Federal Chancellor Gerhard Schröder planned to call an early election in September, many prominent PDS leaders including chair Lothar Bisky called on Gysi to front their campaign. He was a lead candidate of the PDS, and returned to the Bundestag as the member for Berlin-Treptow-Köpenick. The PDS fought the election in an alliance with the new western-based ElectoralAlternative Labour and Social Justice (WASG), under the new name Left Party.PDS, with Gysi at times sharing a platform with WASG's Oskar Lafontaine, former finance minister (in the first months of the Schröder government) and formerly party leader of the SPD. In June 2007, the PDS and WASG formally merged to form a united party called The Left.
In 2014, Gysi wrote his analysis on the contemporary Ukraine crisis in the Israel Journal of Foreign Affairs, where he described similarities between the United States and Russia in their transgressions of international law. Gysi calls for "a new Ostpolitik" to prevent war and promote "democracy and freedom in Russia".[9] In 2015, Gysi was one of the leading supporters of Greece during the Greek government-debt crisis. He described the current German government as "blackmailers".
Gysi is an outspoken supporter of the Campaign for the Establishment of a United Nations Parliamentary Assembly, an organisation which campaigns for democratic reformation of the United Nations. This is due to his belief in the need for "functioning and democratically legitimate global politics."
In the 2021 German federal elections Gysi once more won his constituency of Berlin-Treptow-Köpenick. While the Left came up short of the five percent electoral threshold, his win, together with those of Gesine Lötzsch in Berlin-Lichtenberg and Sören Pellmann in Leipzig II, qualified the party for list seats proportional to its vote. Under longstanding German law, a party can bypass the electoral threshold by winning three constituency seats.
Day 79
As you can see I almost reached 70 Kilometers last week only 50 meters were missing. So close. I got up at 4.30 today and did my workout with weights. It´s 07.10 in the morning and I´ve reached 6478 steps so far.
I´ll start the week with "The Left" party and I will end the week with Sarah Wagenknecht before I will concentrate on the AFD for a week and then we are very close to the election. I like it, when a plan works (That´s a re-translation of Hannibal´s catch-phrase in the A-Team-series).
The Left, die Linken, they were always an interesting party. They were born in the eastern part of Germany and Sarah Wagenknecht was one of their members. I don´t know whether it´s her fault or that of her husband that they killed die Linken, when she anounced to build up her own party. But by doing this the Left were outnumbered and weren´t a political Fraction in the Bundestag any more. They lost a lot of money had to clean their rooms and get out and they had to fire their assisstances. But you can read it here. I found this on Wikipedia:
The Left (German: Die Linke [diː ˈlɪŋkə]), commonly referred to as the Left Party (German: Die Linkspartei [diː ˈlɪŋkspaʁˌtaɪ] ⓘ), is a democratic socialist political party in Germany. The party was founded in 2007 as the result of the merger of the Party of Democratic Socialism (PDS) and Labour and Social Justice – The Electoral Alternative. Through the PDS, the party is the direct descendant of the Marxist–Leninist ruling party of former East Germany, the Socialist Unity Party of Germany (SED). Since October 2024, The Left's co-chairpersons have been Ines Schwerdtner and Jan van Aken. The party holds 28 seats out of 736 in the Bundestag, the federal legislature of Germany, having won 4.9% of votes cast in the 2021 German federal election. Its parliamentary group is the second-smallest of seven in the Bundestag, and is headed by parliamentary co-leaders Heidi Reichinnek and Sören Pellmann.
The Left is represented in eight of Germany's sixteen state legislatures, including all five of the eastern states. As of 2024, the party participates in governments in the states of Bremen and Mecklenburg-Vorpommern as a junior partner. From 2014 to 2024 the party led a coalition in Thuringia with the Social Democratic Party and The Greens headed by Minister-President Bodo Ramelow. The Left is a founding member of the Party of the European Left, and is the third-largest party in the European United Left–Nordic Green Left group in the European Parliament. In December 2022, The Left had 54,214 registered members, making it the sixth-largest party in Germany by membership, this decreased further to 50,251 members in December 2023.The Left promotes left-wing populism, anti-fascism and anti-militarism, and is neutral on European integration.
In late 2023, prominent member Sahra Wagenknecht and several supporters split from the party and formed Bündnis Sahra Wagenknecht, resulting in the dissolution of The Left's official faction in the Bundestag.
Background
The main predecessor of The Left was the Party of Democratic Socialism (PDS), which emerged from the ruling Socialist Unity Party (SED) of East Germany (GDR). In October 1989, facing increasing unpopularity, the SED replaced long-time leader Erich Honecker with Egon Krenz, who began a program of limited reforms, including the legalisation of opposition groups. He also loosened restrictions on travel between East and West Berlin, which inadvertently led to the fall of the Berlin Wall. The SED gave up its "leading role" in November, and Krenz resigned soon afterward. He was succeeded by Gregor Gysi, part of a group of reformers who supported the Peaceful Revolution. His ally Hans Modrow, the new Chairman of the Council of Ministers, became the de facto national leader.
Seeking to change its image, the party expelled most of its former leadership, including Honecker and Krenz; the new government negotiated with opposition groups and arranged free elections. By the time of a special congress in mid-December, the SED was no longer a Marxist-Leninist party. It added Party of Democratic Socialism to its name, dropping the SED portion in February. The PDS oriented itself as pro-democratic, socialist, and supportive of East German sovereignty. The party chose Modrow as its lead candidate for the 1990 East German general election but was decisively defeated, finishing in third place with 16.4% of votes cast. The PDS was excluded from further political developments due to the aversion of the opposition, now in power, which considered it essentially tied to the Communist regime despite its change of name.
After debuting with a meagre 2.4% nationwide in the 1990 German federal election immediately after reunification, the PDS gained popularity throughout the 1990s as a protest party in the eastern states. In the 1998 German federal election it won 5.1% of votes, enough to win seats outright without relying on direct constituencies as it had in 1994. By the 2000s, it was the second-largest party in every eastern state legislature except Mecklenburg-Vorpommern. Despite electoral successes, the PDS faced internal strife due to ideological disputes, a chronic decline in membership, and a near-complete lack of support in the western states, which has been home to 85% of Germany's population. The 1994 German federal election also saw a "red socks" campaign used by the centre-right, including the CDU/CSU and the Free Democratic Party (FDP), to scare off a possible red–red–green coalition (SPD–PDS–Greens). Analysts have stated that such a strategy likely paid off, as it was seen as one of the decisive elements for the narrow victory of Kohl for the CDU/CSU–FDP. The campaign was criticized as an obvious attempt to discredit the whole political left; the PDS reinterpreted it for itself by printing red socks.
2022–present: infighting and party split
The 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine highlighted fault lines within the party. The leadership and majority took a strongly pro-Ukrainian stance, while the faction around Sahra Wagenknecht opposed sanctions against Russia.At the party congress in June, incumbent Janine Wissler was re-elected as leader, while co-chair of The Left in the European Parliament (GUE/NGL) group Martin Schirdewan was elected as Hennig-Wellsow's successor. They both faced challenges from candidates aligned with Wagenknecht's faction, winning majorities of 57% and 61% of votes respectively.
During a Bundestag speech in September, Wagenknecht attacked the federal government for launching what she called "an unprecedented economic war against our most important energy supplier," and called for the end of sanctions against Russia. The speech was boycotted by half The Left's deputies, and prompted numerous calls for her resignation by colleagues. Hundreds of members were reported to have left the party over the dispute, including prominent former MdB Fabio De Masi. Die Tageszeitung reported that Wagenknecht's supporters had begun planning a breakaway party to compete in the 2024 European elections.
In the 2023 Berlin state election, The Left lost two seats in the Abgeordnetenhaus of Berlin; further, in the 2023 Bremen state election, they retained their 10 seats in the Bürgerschaft of Bremen. In the 2023 Hessian state election, The Left were wiped out after achieving 3.1% of the vote, thus losing their 9 seats due to falling short of the 5% threshold needed for representation.
In October 2023, Wagenknecht and nine other Bundestag members, including faction co-leader Amira Mohamed Ali, announced their intention to leave The Left and launch the Sahra Wagenknecht Alliance.This pushed The Left below the minimum number of members required to sustain an official faction in the Bundestag, and it was preemptively dissolved on 6 December. In February it was reorganised as a group with reduced status. Former faction leader Dietmar Bartsch declined to run again. Heidi Reichinnek and Sören Pellmann, who previously ran against Wissler and Schirdewan for the federal leadership, announced their intention to contest against the pro-leadership duo of Clara Bünger and Ates Gürpinar. On the first ballot, Reichinnek defeated Bünger 14 votes to 13; Gürpinar withdrew in favour of Bünger in the second ballot, but she was defeated again by Pellmann, again 14 to 13.
Wissler and Schirdewan announced in August 2024 that they would not seek re-election at the upcoming party congress.[58] In September, the party suffered major defeats in state elections in Brandenburg, Saxony and Thuringia. They were reduced to fourth place in Thuringia with 13%, while in Brandenburg and Saxony they fell below 5%, only narrowly retaining their seats in the latter state. BSW, conversely, performed strongly and placed third in each state. In October, the party congress elected Ines Schwerdtner and Jan van Aken as the new co-leaders with only marginal opposition.
mar
2020
02/02/2025
Day 78
Because we joined a demonstration yesterday in Cologne, I reached 24488 steps yesterday. Today at 5.00 in the morning I haven´t got any steps, but I will take the same route as yesterday morning but will not walk through our woods, because the pathes there are currently used by trucks, which move dead trees out of the woods and the pathes therefore are destroyed by their weels and have to be reformed after the work.
We made some signs made with cardstock and got a lot of positive remarks by people who commented about our clever remarks, but we also were confronted by two people who just didn´t get it. One worked in a mall telling us, we shouldn´t peddle in the mall. I think he couldn´t read. The other person wanted to argue with us about the situation of the state and obviously was a supporter of the AFD. And my kids walked with us (14 and 8 years old) and I went into protecting mode and got loud and regretted that right away because my kids got afraid. But the overall experience was good for them and we try to teach them that it´s worth to take your principals to the street.
I will return to the political party-system tomorrow, because on friday a milestone has been reached in Great Britain,
5 years after Britain left the EU, the full impact of Brexit is still emerging - ABC News
and it was overshadowed (at least in my perception) by the developement in the German Bundestag.
But it is important to point out to anyone who wants America first, or Britain first that the consequences will be dealt with by the local firms. And some just couldn´t survive in England or they had to open a store in Ireland because Ireland is still allowed to trade with the EU. The EU suffered because of the Brexit but not as much as many english folks. And I´m still feeling bad because of the Brexit, because even Harry Potter couldn´t use his magic to prevent it.
Day 77
It´s 5.30 in the morning. I´m home in Leverkusen preparing for a longer work and a workout in the Bayer 04-open-air-workout-area and I couldn´t sleep well last night.
Something very special happened in the German Bundestag yesterday.
Here is the background:
What happened in the German parliament and why is the far right hailing it as a ‘historic’ moment?
But the law didn´t pass the second reading. So, what happened. The CDU wanted to pass a law, a populistic one that is not in tune with international law, it´s kinda like Trump´s rubbish that he signed on his first day of office. The AFD found itself in the position to help to get this law through and to present themselves as the original idea-giver, because Friedrich Merz of the CDU also used their jargon while proposing the law. Not good. On friday the law passed the first hearing but there weren´t enough votes in the second hearing. There were some people in the FDP not convinced and 12 people in the CDU. They didn´t vote at all and not against the law but still there weren´t enough votes.
So far so good? No. In my opinion this Friday will have very bad consequences for our democracy. I don´t know how a party can make a coalition with the CDU/CSU after the election. I think the green party is out. And even the SPD cannot go into a coalition seriously. But there won´t be an alternative coalition, because the Green Party and the SPD won´t get enough votes to form a coalition that can move something. Germany will move to the streets this weekend. There were some big demonstrations yesterday and there will be bigger demonstrations this weekend.
Sorry I will start with the Left (Die Linken) tomorrow or on monday, because, what is happening right now is more important.
02/01/2025
01/31/2025
Day 76
After reacheing15220 steps yesterday, I decided to walk a little bit more this morning (it´s 7.10 and I go 7918 steps) after doing a workout without weights but with more awareness.
Another fun thing about RFK, who was chosen by trump to become minister of the health department, but only because he decided to stand back in the presedential election and endorsed Trump to the delight of his family. Well isn´t it funny what happened yesterday:
Alsobrooks grills Kennedy on belief that Black Americans should get different vaccine schedules
Actually you should make a movie out of that in the line of "Get out", "Blink twice" and it should be named "Vaccinate your afro-american child after it died". And he remembers a study made in....wait for it....Poland. Because Poland in his history was the biggest slavery nation. It robbed half the african continent of his inhabitants... Why should a country without hardly any inhabitants with african roots conduct such a study. RFK, a stupid, stupid rat-creature (citation of Bone by Jeff Smith).
Today to round-up my FDP week and to change to something more worth of our time, I would like to point to the d-day once again, when Christian Lindner killed our traffic-light-coalition. On the weekend I would like to concentrate on The Left (Die Linken) their downfall and the Rise of Sarah Wagenknecht. But first the D-Day, I found this on Wikipedia:
On 6 November 2024, Olaf Scholz, the incumbent chancellor of Germany, announced the dismissal of Christian Lindner, the then-finance minister and leader of the Free Democratic Party (FDP), from his cabinet. This occurred following recent disputes in the three-party coalition government over the country's economic policies and ongoing tensions within the coalition. Lindner's dismissal caused the collapse of the coalition, as the FDP moved into the opposition, leaving a two-party minority government of SPD and The Greens.
On 16 December 2024, Scholz called a vote of confidence in the ruling government, which was lost. As a result, an early 2025 federal election is to be held, with the parties having agreed on 23 February 2025 as the date.] The 23 February date for the election was confirmed by Federal President Frank-Walter Steinmeier on 27 December 2024.
Background
The traffic light coalition between SPD, The Greens, and FDP was a first in German history.
The 2021 German federal election resulted in the Social Democratic Party (SPD) emerging as the strongest party in the Bundestag, with 25.71% of the vote (206 seats out of 736). The SPD reached an agreement to form a ruling coalition with The Greens (118 seats) and the FDP (91 seats), with SPD leader Olaf Scholz as federal chancellor. The resulting Scholz cabinet was appointed in December 2021. This marked the first time the governing coalition in the Bundestag was a traffic light coalition (Ampelkoalition), named after the colours associated with the three parties: red (SPD), yellow (FDP) and green (Greens).
With SPD and The Greens being considered centre-left and FDP economically liberal, the ideological differences between the three parties led to challenges in the newly formed government from the start.This showed itself in disagreements in areas such as budget planning, environmentalism or social services, often resulting in gridlocks. Additionally, the country entered an economic crisis while under leadership of the traffic light coalition, leading to falling approval ratings.
In November 2023, Germany's Federal Constitutional Court (Bundesverfassungsgericht) declared parts of the government's budget policy unconstitutional. Scholz's cabinet had reallocated unspent debt proceeds – originally designated to mitigate the COVID-19 pandemic – to its climate action budget. The court ruling left the budget €60 billion short. The government attempted to cover the resulting shortfall through re-allocating already planned funds, but this resulted in the 2023–2024 German farmers' protests and further decreased the public perception of the already unpopular government.
In September 2024, three state elections in eastern Germany (Thuringia [1 September], Saxony [1 September] and Brandenburg [22 September]) yielded disastrous results for the parties in the federal traffic light coalition. In Thuringia, the SPD received its worst result in any post-war state election, although it held its vote in Saxony and increased its vote in Brandenburg. The Greens and FDP performed even worse, losing all their seats in Thuringia and Brandenburg and losing seats in Saxony. In all three states, far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) and left-populist Sahra Wagenknecht Alliance (BSW) gained large numbers of voters. The bad state election results for the traffic light coalition parties were seen by many as reflecting dissatisfaction with their performance at the federal level.
In October 2024, Robert Habeck, Minister for Economic Affairs and Climate Action and member of The Greens, proposed a debt-financed fund to promote investment by companies in order to fill the gap in the government's budget. The plan would be irreconcilable with Germany's debt brake (Schuldenbremse), which limits annual structural deficits to 0.35% of GDP. On 1 November 2024, Lindner issued an 18-page policy paper, calling for a new economic policy for the coalition. Lindner called for halting new regulations, introducing new tax cuts, and cutting public spending, including on action against climate change, in order to solve the country's economic crisis. In November 2024, the newspapers Die Zeit and Süddeutsche Zeitung found evidence that Lindner's paper was part of a broader plan by the FDP to intentionally cause the collapse of the coalition.
Lindner's paper was deemed a "provocation" by The Greens and SPD, who considered his positions incompatible with the coalition agreement. This led to crisis talks in the Chancellery over the continued existence of the coalition, which culminated in a session of coalition representatives, including Scholz, Habeck and Lindner meeting on 6 November.
Dismissal of Christian Lindner
Christian Lindner (FDP), former German Minister of Finance and coalition partner of Scholz's cabinet
On the night of 6 November, shortly after talks with Lindner and Habeck, Scholz announced he would ask Frank-Walter Steinmeier, the president of Germany, to dismiss Lindner from his position as finance minister. According to the German Constitution, only the president can dismiss federal ministers from their post, which in the past generally has been done by request from the chancellor.
In his statement, Scholz said he saw himself forced to this measure to prevent damage to the country and to uphold the government's capacity to act. He stated he had made an offer to Lindner earlier that day as to how the gap in the budget could be filled, which Lindner had failed to accept.[
On 7 November, President Steinmeier officially dismissed Lindner and swore in his successor, Jörg Kukies (SPD), as requested by Scholz. As Kukies was formerly an investment banker at Goldman Sachs, his appointment was criticised by some politicians, including members of Scholz's own Social Democratic Party as well as Sahra Wagenknecht, leader of the left-populist BSW.
In response to Lindner's dismissal, the FDP ministers Marco Buschmann and Bettina Stark-Watzinger resigned. Minister for Transport Volker Wissing announced he would leave the FDP to remain in his post, also taking over Buschmann's position as Minister of Justice in a dual mandate. Similarly, Stark-Watzinger's position as Minister of Education and Research was taken over by Cem Özdemir, who is the current Minister for Food and Agriculture. This effectively moved the FDP into the opposition, rendering the current coalition a two-party minority government between the SPD and The Greens.
On 8 November, Wissing's website became victim of a hostile takeover, after which the homepage displayed FDP advertisements.
Vote of confidence
On 6 November, after the announcement of Lindner's dismissal, Scholz also announced his intention to call for a vote of confidence in his government on 15 January 2025, potentially enabling an early 2025 federal election.Should the chancellor not win the confidence of the majority of the Bundestag in the vote, he would be able to request the president to dissolve the Bundestag (Article 68 of the constitution). The president would then have 21 days to consider the request; if he agreed to the dissolution, a snap election would be held within 60 days of the dissolution date.
Scholz' plan for a vote of confidence on 15 January 2025 would require a possible snap federal election in early April at the latest, per the constitution. Several opposition parties called for a vote of confidence in November 2024, much sooner than the date proposed by Scholz. Supporters of this initiative include the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) and the Christian Social Union (CSU) parties (both centre-right), the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) and the left-populist Sahra Wagenknecht Alliance (BSW).
A poll taken by German public broadcaster ARD found that 65% of those surveyed favoured immediate elections.
On 8 November, Ruth Brand, the Federal Returning Officer responsible for organising the election, raised concerns about an election date in January, deeming it administratively difficult to organise the election by then, because of the Christmas break. The left-wing opposition party Die Linke also supported the chancellor in his push for a later election date.
On 10 November, Scholz showed himself open to moving his vote of confidence to before the Christmas break, declaring he would orient himself to a schedule by SPD parliamentary group leader Rolf Mützenich and opposition leader Friedrich Merz (CDU). On 12 November, a compromise was reached between the SPD and the CDU/CSU for the vote of confidence to occur on 16 December 2024 and the election to be held on 23 February 2025.
The results of the vote. Yes is green, no is magenta, gray is abstain, and black is not voting.
On 16 December, Scholz lost the confidence vote, paving the way for elections to be held in February 2025.[
Day 75
Wow, time flies 75% of my project is already accomplished. Today I did my workout with weights. I decided to stay with 15 repetitions in my HIT-training but I do each move more concentrated, all the way, pay more attention and be more aware. And my pedometer tells me that I burned more calories. Awareness leads to better fat-burning. After getting 15059 steps yesterday I didn´t walk as much as yesterday morning, got 6017 steps and it´s 07.17 in the morning right now.
Friedrich Merz just broke the Firewall against the far right. He moved a 5-Points-Proposal through the Bundestag only with the AFD backing it. I can understand his intention behind it, showing the voters, that he can be populistic too. But would you vote for the copy or the original. Would you buy a coke of a supermarket or Coca Cola, when it´s price is reduced. Well, I still think that this might not cause a movement from the voters of the AFD to the CDU but this will cause non-decided voters to vote for the AFD. Merz, this move will cost everyone of us in German dearly. There are a lot of demonstration planned against the far-right and now all those demonstations will focus on you, Merz.
But I will focus on Christian Lindner, killer of two coalitions. I found this on Wikipedia:
Christian Wolfgang Lindner (born 7 January 1979) is a German politician of the Free Democratic Party (FDP) who was the Federal Minister of Finance from 2021 until his dismissal in 2024 during the 2024 German government crisis. Serving since 2013, Lindner is the longest-serving party-leader of the FDP and a Member of the Bundestag (MdB) for North-Rhine-Westphalia since 2017, previously holding a seat from 2009 until 2012.
Early life and education
Christian Lindner was born in Wuppertal, West Germany. His father Wolfgang Lindner is a teacher of mathematics and computer science at the Städtisches Gymnasium in Wermelskirchen.
After graduating from Gymnasium in 1998 and an alternative civilian service, Christian Lindner studied political science at the University of Bonn from 1999 to 2006. After eleven semesters he acquired the academic degree of Magister Artium (M.A). In his master's thesis at the Institute of Political Science, he dealt with the topic: "Tax competition and revenue sharing. Can the financial constitution be reformed?" In 2006, he began writing his dissertation under supervision from political science professor Frank Decker, which he has so far not completed due to his political activities.
While studying, Lindner became a reserve officer in the German Air Force. In 2002, he was promoted to First Lieutenant (Oberleutnant) in the Reserve. In 2008 he was a liaison officer to the state command Landeskommando of the state of North Rhine-Westphalia in Düsseldorf. Since September 2011 he has held the rank of Captain (Hauptmann) in the Reserve. Currently, Lindner is a Major in the Air Force.
Early political career
Lindner joined the FDP in 1995. He has been a member of the executive board of the FDP in the state of North Rhine-Westphalia since 1998 and became Secretary General in 2004 (until February 2010).[] At the May 2000 election for the Landtag of North Rhine-Westphalia, the 21-year old Lindner was elected, becoming the youngest MP in the history of the state parliament of North Rhine-Westphalia. Lindner was from 2000 initially 'spokesman for Intergenerational Affairs, Family and Integration' and then from 2005 to 2009 was also vice chairman of the FDP parliamentary group in the parliament and spokesman for Innovation, Science and Technology. In 2007 he also became a member of the executive board of the FDP on federal level.
From 2009 Lindner was a member of the German Bundestag. In the negotiations to form a coalition government following the 2009 federal elections, he was part of the FDP delegation in the working group on families, integration of immigrants and culture, led by Maria Böhmer and Hans-Joachim Otto.
From December 2009 until his surprise resignation[10] in December 2011, Lindner was also Secretary General of the FDP on federal level, largely under the leadership of party chairman Guido Westerwelle and later under Philipp Rösler when Westerwelle had to resign. Lindner's resignation was caused by an internal party vote which had been forced by a group centered around the Eurosceptic FDP parliamentarian Frank Schäffler to determine the FDP's future course on questions pertaining to the European Stability Mechanism (ESM).
Lindner was later chosen to chair the North Rhine-Westphalian FDP in the 2012 state election of North Rhine-Westphalia, succeeding Daniel Bahr. In the election, the FDP received 8.6% of the vote, surpassing all expectations at the time as the party had been fighting over all the country to reach the minimum representation of 5% for years and was losing representation in several states. Following the party's victory at that election he was elected Parliamentary leader of the FDP in the North Rhine-Westphalian Landtag, succeeding Gerhard Papke on 15 May 2012, and worked in the opposition. In March 2013, he was elected one of Rösler's deputies, alongside Sabine Leutheusser-Schnarrenberger and Holger Zastrow.
FDP Chairman
Lindner was elected the new chairman of the FDP following the resignation of Chairman Philipp Rösler after the 2013 German federal elections in which the FDP failed to clear the 5% hurdle to enter the Bundestag for the first time since 1949.
Ahead of the 2014 European elections, Lindner and Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte served as 'mediators' between Olli Rehn and Guy Verhofstadt, the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe's candidates for the presidency of the European Commission; eventually, the candidates agreed to jointly lead the ALDE's campaign for elections, with Verhofstadt running to succeed José Manuel Barroso. At the time, Lindner was widely regarded to support Rehn.
Lindner was a FDP delegate to the Federal Convention for the purpose of electing the President of Germany in 2017, where he endorsed the government's candidate Frank-Walter Steinmeier.[20] That same year, he led his party's successful campaign for the 2017 state elections of North Rhine-Westphalia, which resulted in the FDP joining the state government of incoming Minister-President Armin Laschet. Lindner himself did not take a position in the new government because of his aim to lead the FDP back to the Bundestag in September 2017, which he achieved with a result of 10.7%. After that success he was elected leader of the FDP parliamentary group in the Bundestag.
In October 2017, Angela Merkel's CDU and Katrin Göring-Eckardt's and Cem Özdemir's Greens started negotiations with the FDP to form a government, in which Lindner was widely seen as the future Minister of Finance, as the CDU had even nominated the former Minister Wolfgang Schäuble as President of the Bundestag to make place for the FDP. Such a coalition was the only realistic possibility to form a government (except for a Grand coalition) but had almost never been used before on any regional level in Germany. In November 2017, after midnight, Lindner and his party left the already prolonged negotiations after four unsuccessful weeks, which led to the longest government formation in German history and finally in March 2018 once more to a Grand Coalition with the SPD, which had previously rejected any participation in the new government.
In 2021 Christian Lindner was re-elected federal chairman of the FDP with 93 percent of the vote and at the same time was chosen as the party's top candidate for the federal election.
Federal Minister of Finance
Following the 2021 German federal election, the FDP agreed to enter government with the Greens and Social Democrats, as part of a traffic light coalition led by Olaf Scholz. Lindner was named as Finance Minister, and took office on 8 December 2021.
After the G7 countries announced that they would present strong sanctions against Russia, Lindner stated that they should target Russian oligarchs. He stated: "We are working on further sanctions. I am particularly concerned that the oligarchs should be affected. Those who have profited from Putin and stolen the wealth of the Russian people, including through corruption, should not be allowed to enjoy their prosperity in our Western democracies".
On the night of 24 February 2022, right after Russia started its invasion of Ukraine, Lindner according to the Ambassador of Ukraine in Germany told Ukraine's ambassador Andriy Melnyk that "Ukraine has only a few hours" left, so he opposed arms supplies to Kyiv and Russia's disconnection from SWIFT.[24][25] On 17 May 2022, Lindner said he is "politically open to the idea of seizing" the frozen foreign-exchange reserves of the Central Bank of Russia —which amount to over $300 billion— to cover the costs of rebuilding Ukraine after the war.
In August 2022, Lindner announced a "big step" to improve anti-money laundering and sanctions enforcement in Germany: he wanted to create a "Federal Financial Criminal Investigation Office" to end the good conditions for money laundering in Germany. The GdP warned of fragmented responsibilities and authorities at federal and state levels; rather, Lindner should strengthen the existing Federal Customs Office. To this day there is no "Federal Financial Criminal Investigation Office". Experts criticize that the new agency lacks the authority to seizure suspicious assets by administrative order and the exclusion of tax-related offences from its jurisdiction, according to a draft published until September 2023.
Lindner has been a staunch defender of the constitutionally-enshrined debt brake and seen as reluctant to agree another suspension in 2024.
In July 2024 Lindner argued that Germany would need to halve its aid to Ukraine. In August 2024 Lindner halted new aid to Ukraine, saying the aid would in future be supplied from the frozen funds in the west of the Russian Central Bank. Robert Habeck, among others, thought that this might stress the ruling coalition, and this had already impacted the promised Diehl IRIS-T system, which turned out not to have been funded by Germany after all because of the restrictions put in place by Lindner.
In September 2024, Lindner agreed with an FDP position paper that proposed cuts to the social benefits for asylum seekers, as well as designating some North African countries as "safe" for ease of repatriation.
On 6 November 2024, Lindner's dismissal was proposed by Olaf Scholz, citing loss of trust. On 7 November he was dismissed from office by the Federal President Frank-Walter Steinmeier. His removal led to the collapse of the governing coalition, with two other FDP members resigning from their ministries and a third minister leaving the FDP.
01/30/2025
01/29/2025
Day 74
Today I woke up a little earlier at 3.30 and had a more intensive workout without weights and walked a little longer, since I got 10810 steps yesterday. It´s 7.00 in the morning and I´ve accumulated 8060 steps so far. It´s raining outside but all the ice and all the snow is gone. So it´s safe again to walk on my route.
Today I would like to focus on the German ministry of transport and justice and on Volker Wissing. I really like him, because when Lindner left the traffic ight-coalition Volker Wissing left the FDP. And I really respect him for that move and he also took over the ministry of justice, because a FDP guy Volker Buschmann left it on D-Day. I think that Volker Wissing is the only Man in the FDP with an Arsch in der Hose, an Ass in his trousers, that means he is a real man and someone with a lot of courage. But than again becaus he left the FDP there is no reason to vote for them and some great reasons not to vote for them, because they should not get over 5 % in the election. He´s also a man of courage because the ministry of transport is a ministry where you can hardly do a good job, because the managers of the German Bahn (railway) don´t do a good job and because nobody invested money in the Autobahn and the bridges some bridges have to be destroyed and build completely new causing insane traffic jams and stress the people on the alternative routes. So this causes a lot of frustration and Volker Wissing is the Main Man who faces it. He is the Lobo (DC Comics Main Man, who will be played by the Aquaman-actor Jason Momoa) of the Government. I found this on Wikipedia:
Volker Wissing (born 22 April 1970) is a German lawyer and former judge who has been serving as the Minister for Transport in the federal government of Chancellor Olaf Scholz since 2021 and as Minister of Justice since 2024.
Wissing was previously the Deputy Minister-President of Rhineland-Palatinate in the state government under Minister-President Malu Dreyer from 2016 to 2021 and a member of the German parliament from 2004 to 2013. He was the general secretary of the Free Democratic Party from 2020 to 2022. Wissing declared his resignation from the party on 7 November 2024 in order to remain part of the Scholz cabinet in the wake of the 2024 German government crisis. Following the resignation of Marco Buschmann, he also assumed the office of Minister of Justice.
Early life and education
Wissing was born 1970 in the German town of Landau in der Pfalz and studied law at the Saarland University.
Wissing achieved a law degree and worked for some time as a judge before he entered professional politics.
Political career
Career in national politics
Wissing entered the FDP in 1998. He became a member of the German Bundestag in 2004 when he took the seat of Marita Sehn who had died in a car accident. From 2004 until 2013, he served on the Finance Committee; he chaired the committee from 2009 until 2013. From 2011 until 2013, he also served as one of his parliamentary group's deputy chairpersons, under the leadership of chairman Rainer Brüderle.
In the negotiations to form a coalition government of the FDP and the Christian Democrats (CDU together with the Bavarian CSU) following the 2009 federal elections, Wissing was part of the FDP delegation in the working group on financial policy and taxes, led by Thomas de Maizière und Hermann Otto Solms.
Career in state politics
On the state level, Wissing became chairman of the party's branch in Rhineland-Palatinate in 2011 succeeding Rainer Brüderle. He led the Free Democratic Party back into the Landtag of Rhineland-Palatinate in the 2016 state election. After coalition negotiations Wissing became Deputy Minister President and State Minister for Economics, Transport, Agriculture and Viticulture in Malu Dreyer's second cabinet.
In 2020 FDP leader Christian Lindner nominated Wissing to serve as General Secretary of the party, succeeding Linda Teuteberg. Subsequently, Wissing announced his switch for state politics to the federal arena, announcing his candidacy for the Bundestag in the 2021 federal election.
Minister of Digital Affairs and Transport, 2021–present
On 24 November 2021, Wissing was nominated by the Federal Executive Committee of the FDP for the post of Minister for Transport and Digital Affairs in the designated federal government. He took office as Transport Minister on 8 December as the Scholz cabinet was sworn in.
Early in his tenure, Wissing ordered the blocking of German airspace for Russian aircraft in response to the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
In July 2022, Wissing publicly presented his plans to meet emissions reductions targets in the German transport sector, shortly before the deadline. The scientific committee tasked with assessing the sufficiency of his proposed measures declared the plan entirely insufficient and decided not even to evaluate it, given there was "nothing to be evaluated".
In March 2023, Wissing participated in the first joint cabinet meeting of the governments of Germany and Japan in Tokyo, chaired by Chancellor Scholz and Prime Minister Fumio Kishida.[8] In October 2023, he joined the first joint cabinet retreat of the German and French governments in Hamburg, chaired by Scholz and President Emmanuel Macron.
During the German government crisis of 2024, Wissing announced that he would leave the FDP to continue his term as Transport Minister. He was additionally appointed Minister of Justice on 7 November 2024 after Federal President Frank-Walter Steinmeier had dismissed the FDP's Marco Buschmann upon Scholz' request.
Day 73
It´s 7.10 in the morning. Since I had to add another walk yesterday evening to get 10649 steps, I got 7792 steps so far after my workout without weights. These days I have to do some overtime at work and if I don´t get the steps during worktime, I get a little bit grumpy. Yes I´m starting to get a grumpy old man.
Today I want to focus on Wolfgang Kubicki. He is not in the center of media attention but he is still there somewhere in the dark, pulling the strings. He´s the Palpatine of the FDP (yes I know some Star-Wars-stuff, although I still think it sucks). Why that is a fact: Wolfgang Kubicki is the really grumpy old man of the FDP. He was never fond of the traffic-light-coalition always was afraid of the FDP loosing their profile. He never shied away from talk-shows, was always a populist. I think he chose to get of the media-radar to work in the background. I found this on Wikipedia:
Wolfgang Kubicki (born 3 March 1952) is a German politician of the Free Democratic Party of Germany (FDP) and member of the Bundestag from 1990 until 1992 and 2017 onwards. He has been vice chairman of the FDP in Germany since December 2013. Since 24 October 2017 he has served as Vice President of the Bundestag. From 1992 to 1993 and from 1996 to 2017 he served as chairman of the FDP-group in the Schleswig-Holstein state parliament..
Early life and education
After high school diploma in 1970 in Braunschweig Kubicki studied economics at the University of Kiel, where Peer Steinbrück was among his fellow students.[2] He graduated in 1975. After that he worked for a consulting company and from 1978 in a Steuerberater ("tax advisor") office. From 1981 to 1983 he worked as a researcher for the FDP in the Schleswig-Holstein Landtag. He finished a second degree in law, completed while working, at the University of Kiel in 1982 with the first state examination. In 1985 he completed the second state examination and has worked as a lawyer since.
Political career
Kubicki in 2019
Kubicki joined the FDP in 1971. In 1972/73 he was deputy federal chairman of the Liberal University Association and in 1975/76 state chairman of the Young Democrats in Schleswig-Holstein. Subsequently, Kubicki was first elected to the state executive committee of the Schleswig-Holstein FDP in 1976, where he served until 1988, most recently as deputy state chairman.
From 1987 to 1989, he was chairman of the Rendsburg-Eckernförde FDP district association. He relinquished this office after his election as state chairman in September 1989. In September 1993, Kubicki resigned as state chairman in the wake of the Schönberg Landfill Affair. As state chairman, Kubicki was also a member of the Liberals' federal executive committee. He has done so again since 1997. He was also his party's top candidate in state elections in Schleswig-Holstein in 1992, 2000, 2005, 2009, 2012 and 2017.[
Kubicki lobbied since 2000 for Guido Westerwelle to be elected federal chairman of the FDP and to become parliamentary party leader of the FDP parliamentary group in the Bundestag. Westerwelle thus pushed Wolfgang Gerhardt out of both positions at the time. In mid-December 2010, Kubicki publicly advocated for Westerwelle's replacement as party leader of the FDP in May 2011. He compared the situation of the FDP with the late phase of the GDR and blamed the party leadership for the poll results below 5%. He said that the FDP was not in a good position to be replaced.
In the 2012 state election, the FDP, with Kubicki as its top candidate, received a result of 8.2 percent of the second votes. While this was a significant loss compared to the 2009 state election, when 14.9 percent was achieved, it was still the second-best election result achieved in Schleswig-Holstein. Previously, the FDP had been eliminated from six state parliaments. Therefore, the result was considered an extraordinary success, which was mainly attributed to Kubicki and labeled the "Kubicki effect". In polls, he achieved 54 percent approval of the electorate of Schleswig-Holstein (compared to 18 percent for Philipp Rösler) and 63 percent saw large differences between the state and federal FDP. Although Kubicki had never been sparing with criticism of his own party's federal policies, he already emphasized in the ZDF election broadcast that this result, which was perceived as an election victory, was precisely also a success for the federal party. In doing so, he clearly countered putsch rumors against the chairman of the federal FDP Philipp Rösler that had previously arisen in public even before the end of the election evening. In August 2012, Kubicki announced his intention to run as the top candidate for the Schleswig-Holstein FDP in the 2013 federal election.
At the 2013 FDP federal party convention, Kubicki succeeded then-Development Minister Dirk Niebel, who was eliminated in the first round of voting, as an assessor on the federal presidium. Kubicki then won in a fight vote against Health Minister Daniel Bahr. The Extraordinary Party Congress of the FDP in December 2013 elected Kubicki as 1st Deputy to the new party leader Christian Lindner with 89.87% of the vote. The 2015 FDP Federal Party Congress confirmed Kubicki in this position with 94.2% of the vote, and the 2017 FDP Federal Party Congress with 92.29%.
Kubicki is a member of the FDP's Executive Committee.
Kubicki is a member of the advisory board of the German-Arab Society.
01/28/2025
01/27/2025
Day 72
This morning I´m back in the normal rhythm. I got up at 4.00, did my workout without weights, got 6519 steps so far (7:10 in the morning) and added the stats of my steps of the last week (13154 in average per day).
This week I´m going to focus on the FDP, since it was part of our traffic light-coalition. I´ll see, whether I will spend a whole week with them, because I wrote so much about Lindner and the D-day already. I found this on Wikipedia:
The Free Democratic Party (German: Freie Demokratische Partei, FDP, German pronunciation: [ɛfdeːˈpeː] ⓘ) is a liberal political party in Germany.
The FDP was founded in 1948 by members of former liberal political parties which existed in Germany before World War II, namely the German Democratic Party and the German People's Party. For most of the second half of the 20th century, particularly from 1961 to 1982, the FDP held the balance of power in the Bundestag.] It has been a junior coalition partner to both the CDU/CSU (1949–1956, 1961–1966, 1982–1998 and 2009–2013) and Social Democratic Party (SPD) (1969–1982, 2021–2024). In the 2013 federal election, the FDP failed to win any directly elected seats in the Bundestag and came up short of the 5 percent threshold to qualify for list representation, being left without representation in the Bundestag for the first time in its history. In the 2017 federal election, the FDP regained its representation in the Bundestag, receiving 10.6% of the vote. From the 2021 federal election to the 2024 German government crisis, the FDP was part of governing Scholz cabinet in a traffic light coalition with the Social Democratic Party and the Greens.
Apart from a brief progressive and social liberal period in the 1970s (Freiburger Thesen), the FDP has traditionally been located in the centre-right of the political spectrum. Since the 1980s, the party, consistently with its ordoliberal tradition, has pushed economic liberalism and has aligned itself closely to the promotion of free markets and privatization. The FDP is a member of the Liberal International, the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe and Renew Europe.
History
Predecessors
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The history of liberal parties in Germany dates back to 1861, when the German Progress Party (DFP) was founded, being the first political party in the modern sense in Germany. From the establishment of the National Liberal Party in 1867 until the demise of the Weimar Republic in 1933, the liberal-democratic camp was divided into a "national-liberal" and a "left-liberal" line of tradition. After 1918 the national-liberal strain was represented by the German People's Party (DVP), the left-liberal one by the German Democratic Party (DDP, which merged into the German State Party in 1930). Both parties played an important role in government during the Weimar Republic era, but successively lost votes during the rise of the Nazi Party beginning in the late-1920s. After the Nazi seizure of power, both liberal parties agreed to the Enabling Act of 1933 and subsequently dissolved themselves. During the 12 years of Hitler's rule, some former liberals collaborated with the Nazis (e.g. economy minister Hjalmar Schacht), while others resisted actively against Nazism, with some Liberal leaning members and former members of the military joining up with Henning von Tresckow (e.g. the Solf Circle).
Soon after World War II, the Soviet Union pushed for the creation of licensed "anti-fascist" parties in its occupation zone in East Germany. In July 1945, former DDP politicians Wilhelm Külz, Eugen Schiffer and Waldemar Koch called for the establishment of a pan-German liberal party. Their Liberal-Democratic Party (LDP) was soon licensed by the Soviet Military Administration in Germany, under the condition that the new party joined the pro-Soviet "Democratic Bloc".
In September 1945, citizens in Hamburg—including the anti-Nazi resistance circle "Association Free Hamburg"—established the Party of Free Democrats (PFD) as a bourgeois left-wing party and the first liberal Party in the Western occupation zones. The German Democratic Party was revived in some states of the Western occupation zones (in the Southwestern states of Württemberg-Baden and Württemberg-Hohenzollern under the name of Democratic People's Party).
Many former members of DDP and DVP however agreed to finally overcome the traditional split of German liberalism into a national-liberal and a left-liberal branch, aiming for the creation of a united liberal party.[8] In October 1945 a liberal coalition party was founded in the state of Bremen under the name of Bremen Democratic People's Party. In January 1946, liberal state parties of the British occupation zone merged into the Free Democratic Party of the British Zone (FDP). A similar state party in Hesse, called the Liberal Democratic Party, was licensed by the U.S. military government in January 1946. In the state of Bavaria, a Free Democratic Party was founded in May 1946.
In the first post-war state elections in 1946, liberal parties performed well in Württemberg-Baden (16.8%), Bremen (18.3%), Hamburg (18.2%) and Greater Berlin (still undivided; 9.3%). The LDP was especially strong in the October 1946 state elections of the Soviet zone—the last free parliamentary election in East Germany—obtaining an average of 24.6% (highest in Saxony-Anhalt, 29.9%, and Thuringia, 28.5%), thwarting an absolute majority of the Socialist Unity Party of Germany (SED) that was favoured by the Soviet occupation power. This disappointment to the communists however led to a change of electoral laws in the Soviet zone, cutting the autonomy of non-socialist parties including the LDP and forcing it to join the SED-dominated National Front, making it a dependent "bloc party".
The Democratic Party of Germany (DPD) was established in Rothenburg ob der Tauber on 17 March 1947 as a pan-German party of liberals from all four occupation zones. Its leaders were Theodor Heuss (representing the DVP of Württemberg-Baden in the American zone) and Wilhelm Külz (representing the LDP of the Soviet zone). However, the project failed in January 1948 as a result of disputes over Külz's pro-Soviet direction.
Founding of the party
The Free Democratic Party was established on 11–12 December 1948 in Heppenheim, in Hesse, as an association of all 13 liberal state parties in the three Western zones of occupation. As such, the party included former members of the pre-1933 German People's Party (DVP) which represented the more conservative and national tradition of German liberalism and members from the social liberal German Democratic Party (DDP). The proposed name, Liberal Democratic Party, was rejected by the delegates, who voted 64 to 25 in favour of the name Free Democratic Party (FDP).
The party's first chairman was Theodor Heuss, a member of the Democratic People's Party in Württemberg-Baden; his deputy was Franz Blücher of the FDP in the British Zone. The place for the party's foundation was chosen deliberately: the "Heppenheim Assembly" was held at the Hotel Halber Mond on 10 October 1847, a meeting of moderate liberals who were preparing for what would be, within a few months, the German revolutions of 1848–1849.
1949–1969: reconstruction of Germany
"Schlußstrich drunter!"—FDP election campaign poster reading "Draw a line under it" before the 1949 Bundestag election in Hesse calling for a halt to "denazification, disenfranchisement, disempowerment, second class citizenship" and for "equality of civil rights"
In the first elections to the Bundestag on 14 August 1949, the FDP won a vote share of 11.9 percent (with 12 direct mandates, particularly in Baden-Württemberg and Hesse), and thus obtained 52 of 402 seats. In September of the same year the FDP chairman Theodor Heuss was elected the first President of the Federal Republic of Germany. In his 1954 re-election, he received the best election result to date of a President with 871 of 1018 votes (85.6 percent) of the Federal Assembly. Adenauer was also elected on the proposal of the new German President with an extremely narrow majority as the first Chancellor. The FDP participated with the CDU/CSU and the national-conservative German Party (DP) in Adenauer's coalition cabinet; they had three ministers: Franz Blücher (Vice-Chancellor), Thomas Dehler (justice), and Eberhard Wildermuth (housing).
On the most important economic, social and German national issues, the FDP agreed with their coalition partners, the CDU/CSU. However, the FDP offered to middle-class voters a secular party that refused the religious schools and accused the opposition parties of clericalization. The FDP said they were known also as a consistent representative of the market economy, while the CDU was then dominated nominally from the Ahlen Programme, which allowed a Third Way between capitalism and socialism. Ludwig Erhard, the "father" of the social market economy, had his followers in the early years of the Federal Republic in the CDU/CSU rather than in the FDP. The FDP won Hesse's 1950 state election with 31.8 percent, the best result in its history, through appealing to East Germans displaced by the war by including them on their ticket.
Up to the 1950s, several of the FDP's regional organizations were to the right of the CDU/CSU, particularly the Hesse, Lower Saxony and North Rhine-Westphalia branches where Friedrich Middelhauve tried to foster a „National Rally" as a third bloc next to Social Democrats and Christian Democrats. This was criticized by the social liberals around Theodor Heuss who distanced himself from the "Nazi FDP" branches. Under the influence of the party's right wing, the Free Democrats campaigned against West Germany's denazification provisions and courted even former office-holders of the Third Reich with nationalist values. At their party conference in Munich in 1951 they demanded the release of all "so-called war criminals" and welcomed the establishment of the "Association of German soldiers" of former Wehrmacht and SS members to advance the integration of the Nazi forces in democracy. The FDP members were seen as part of the "extremist" block along with the German Party in West Germany by the US intelligence officials. The 1953 Naumann Circle, named after Werner Naumann, consisted of a group of former Nazis who tried to infiltrate the party. After the British occupation authorities had arrested seven prominent members of the Naumann Circle, the FDP federal board installed a commission of inquiry, chaired by Thomas Dehler, which particularly sharply criticized the situation in the North Rhine-Westphalian FDP. In the following years, the right wing lost power, and the extreme right increasingly sought areas of activity outside the FDP. In the 1953 federal election, the FDP received 9.5 percent of the party votes, 10.8 percent of the primary vote (with 14 direct mandates, particularly in Hamburg, Lower Saxony, Hesse, Württemberg and Bavaria) and 48 of 487 seats.
In the second term of the Bundestag, the South German Liberal Democrats gained influence in the party controlling the party leadership between 1954 and 1960.[citation needed] Thomas Dehler, a representative of a more social-liberal course from Bavaria took over as party and parliamentary leader. The former Minister of Justice Dehler, who in 1933 suffered persecution by the Nazis, was known for his populist rhetorics and tried to emancipate the party from Adenauer's CDU/CSU. In the mid-1950s, there were some disagreements between Dehler and Adenauer over foreign policy issues, particularly the founding of the European Defence Community and the Saar statute. The FDP took an emphatically nationalist stance on both issues. In 1956, the infights between Dehler and Adenauer culminated in a government crisis: The FDP in North Rhine-Westphalia terminated their alliance with the Christian Democrats and formed a new state government with the Social Democratic Party of Germany and the German Center Party which led to a party split. 16 members of parliament, including former party leader Franz Blücher and the four federal ministers from the FDP left their party and founded the short-lived Free People's Party (FVP). Whilst the FVP continued the government coalition with Adenauer's CDU/CSU and merged with the right-wing German Party (DP) in 1957, the FDP took it to the opposition for the first time in its history.
Only one of the smaller post-war parties, the FDP survived despite many problems. In the 1957 federal elections they still reached 7.7 percent of the vote and held 41 of 497 seats in the Bundestag. However, they still remained in opposition because the Union won an absolute majority. At the federal party meeting in Berlin at the end of January 1957, Thomas Dehler was replaced as party chairman by another liberal democrat from South Germany, Reinhold Maier, who was able to stabilize his party before he made way for Erich Mende from North Rhine-Westphalia in 1960. With Mende as party leader the FDP went into the 1961 federal election with the promise of ending Konrad Adenauer's leadership and gained 12.8 percent nationwide, the best result until then. After the election, however, the FDP again formed a coalition with Adenauer's CDU on the condition that he would retire as chancellor after two years. These events led to the FDP being nicknamed the Umfallerpartei ("pushover party"). In the 1962 Spiegel affair, the FDP temporarily withdrew their ministers from the federal government forcing Defence Minister Franz-Josef Strauß to resign. In accordance with his agreement with the FDP, Adenauer resigned from his chancellorship in October 1963, making place for Ludwig Erhard who appointed FDP leader Erich Mende as Vice Chancellor and Minister of All-German Affairs.
In the 1965 federal elections the FDP gained 9.5 percent. The Free Democrats initially renewed their alliance with the CDU under Erhard but the coalition broke up in 1966 on the issue of tax increases. During the 1966-1969 Grand coalition the party led the opposition. Under their new chairman, Walter Scheel, there were signs of a change both in foreign policy and in party strategy: For the first time, the FDP opened up to a coalition with the SPD on a federal level, embracing foreign minister Willy Brandt's Ostpolitik.
1969–1982: social changes and crises
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Walter Scheel served as Foreign Minister, Vice Chancellor, Acting Chancellor and President of Germany.
The 1969 West German federal election led to the first social-liberal coalition between Social Democrats and Free Democrats in German post-war history. Even though the Christian Democrats won the election, the Free Democrats rejected a new centre-right alliance and opted for a centre-left coalition under the new Chancellor Willy Brandt. With FDP leader Walter Scheel as Vice Chancellor and Foreign Minister, the liberals initiated a new controversial Ostpolitik effectively normalizing relations between capitalist-democratic West Germany and communist-led East Germany. Within the FDP, this policy was quite controversial, especially after the de facto recognition of the Oder-Neisse line by the 1970 Treaty of Warsaw.
In July 1970, right-wing members founded a "non-partisan" organization called the National-Liberal Action with the goal of breaking up the SPD/FDP coalition government. A little later, members of parliament Siegfried Zoglmann, Heinz Starke and former party leader Erich Mende left the party with Starke and Mende joining the CDU and Zoglmann founding a new splinter party called German Union (Deutsche Union). This led to the 1972 snap elections from which the SPD/FDP government emerged even stronger. In 1974, party leader Walter Scheel was the second Liberal to be elected Federal President after Theodor Heuss. He was succeeded by Interior Minister Hans-Dietrich Genscher as the new FDP leader and Foreign Minister who continued the centre-left coalition under new SPD Chancellor Helmut Schmidt.
The party's centre-left strategy was supported by a new party manifesto, the 1971 Freiburg Theses (Freiburger Thesen) which set the party on a progressive and social liberal course. Among other things, the party committed itself to "self-determination", "democratization of society", a "reform of capitalism" and a form of ecoliberalism which prioritized "environmental protection over profit and personal gains". However, in 1977, the progressive liberal Freiburg Theses were supplemented and partially revised by the more economically liberal Kiel Theses (Kieler Thesen), effectively setting the party back on a classical liberal course.
Even prior to the 1980 West German federal election, cooperation between Social Democrats and Free Democrats seemed to come to an end but the candidacy of CSU chairman Franz Josef Strauss for chancellor led both parties to once again renew their coalition government.
1982–1998: Kohl government, economic transition and reunification
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In the fall of 1982, the FDP reneged on its coalition agreement with the SPD and instead threw its support behind the CDU/CSU. On 1 October, the FDP and CDU/CSU were able to oust Schmidt and replace him with CDU party chairman Helmut Kohl as the new Chancellor. The coalition change resulted in severe internal conflicts, and the FDP then lost about 20 percent of its 86,500 members, as reflected in the general election in 1983 by a drop from 10.6 percent to 7.0 percent. The members went mostly to the SPD, the Greens and newly formed splinter parties, such as the left-liberal party Liberal Democrats (LD). The exiting members included the former FDP General Secretary and later EU Commissioner Günter Verheugen.
At the party convention in November 1982, the Schleswig-Holstein state chairman Uwe Ronneburger challenged Hans-Dietrich Genscher as party chairman. Ronneburger received 186 of the votes—about 40 percent—and was just narrowly defeated by Genscher who went on to act as party chairman as well as Vice Chancellor and Foreign Minister in the new Kohl government. In the following federal election campaigns during the 1980s and 1990s, the party sided with the CDU and CSU, the main conservative parties in Germany.
in 1980, FDP members who did not agree with the politics of the left-leaning FDP youth organization Young Democrats founded the Young Liberals (JuLis). For a time JuLis and the Young Democrats operated side by side, until the JuLis became the sole official youth wing of the FDP in 1983. The Young Democrats split from the FDP and were left as a party-independent youth organization ultimately merging with a marxist youth group to form the "Young Democrats/Young Left" in 1992.
During the "Peaceful Revolution" of 1989 in the GDR, a couple of new liberal parties emerged from the opposition, like the Free Democratic Party (East Germany) or the German Forum Party. Prior to the March 1990 Volkskammer elections they joined the established Liberal Democratic Party, who had previously acted as a pro-communist bloc party on the side of the SED, to form the Alliance of Free Democrats (BFD). In the Volkskammer election of March 1990 the Association of Free Democrats was heavily supported by the West German FDP and polled 5.28% of the votes. Most of the seats went to Liberal Democratic Party members, whose leader Rainer Ortleb became their parliamentary leader. It then participated in the last GDR government led by Lothar de Maizière. After the Liberal Democratic Party and another former bloc party, the National Democratic Party of Germany, merged into the new party Association of Free Democrats in late March, the several liberal parties all united with the West German FDP in August 1990 to form the first all-German party. The merger brought the Free Democrats a great, albeit short-lived, increase in membership and assets of DM 6.3 million in cash and property.
At the time of reunification, the FDP's objective was a special economic zone in the former East Germany, but the party could not prevail against the CDU/CSU. In the first all-German Bundestag elections, the centre-right Kohl coalition was confirmed, the FDP received 11.0 percent of the valid votes (79 seats) and won in Genscher's city of birth Halle (Saale) the first direct mandate since 1957. During the 1990s, the FDP won between 6.2 and 11 percent of the vote in Bundestag elections.
In the second half of the 1990s, however, the FDP had to contend with a series of electoral defeats at local and state level, which led to it falling out of twelve of the 16 state parliaments and the European Parliament between 1993 and 1995. The party was derisively referred to as the ‘lady without an abdomen’. At the same time, the party was shaken by new infights between the left and right wings. In 1996, Federal Minister of Justice Sabine Leutheusser-Schnarrenberger, a prominent representative of the party's social liberal wing, resigned in protest to the government's policy of expanding the state's right to interfere in citizens' private domain by means of acoustic observation (Großer Lauschangriff, literally "big eavesdropping attack"). On the other hand, former Public Prosecutor General Alexander von Stahl tried to rebuild the party's national liberal wing in an ultimately failed attempt to bring the FDP onto a right-wing course modelled on Jörg Haider's FPÖ in Austria.
These infights contributed to the CDU/CSU-FDP defeat in the 1998 German federal election which ended the 16-year centre-right coalition in Germany and the FDP's nearly three decade reign in government. For the first time since 1969 (apart from a brief period in 1982), the Free Democrats now found themselves in opposition and out of power on a federal level.
2002 and 2005 federal elections
Following their electoral defeat, the party developed a strategy of equidistance to the CDU and SPD championed by North Rhine-Westfalia state party leader Jürgen Möllemann who led the party to a good result in the 2000 state elections. At their 2001 party conference in Düsseldorf, outgoing party leader Wolfgang Gerhardt was replaced by a 39 year old Guido Westerwelle who became the youngest FDP leader in history. The party conference also adopted a strategy developed by Möllemann which became known as ‘Project 18’. It aimed at winning new groups of voters through new forms of communication and presentation and at profiling the party as an independent force autonomous from SPD and CDU. The name referred to the electoral goal of tripling the party's share of the vote from 6% to 18%. While Westerwelle and Möllemann generated a lot of media attention, the party was once again embroiled in controversy on Westerwelle's perceived lack of seriousness in his election campaign ("Spaßwahlkampf") and on Möllemann's alleged right-wing populism. Many critics interpreted the use of the number 18 as a hidden right-wing extremist symbol (a code for the letters A and H, meaning Adolf Hitler) and an attempt to attract voters on the far right. In addition, Möllemann launched a leaflet campaign with harsh criticism of the Israeli government under Ariel Sharon and the German-Jewish journalist Michel Friedman, which critics interpreted as anti-Semitism. Amid controversy over a possible right-wing populist orientation associated with this, the FDP ultimately achieved 7.4% instead of the targeted 18 per cent in the 2002 German federal election.
Former logo (2001–2014)
In the 2005 general election the party won 9.8 percent of the vote and 61 federal deputies, an unpredicted improvement from prior opinion polls. It is believed that this was partly due to tactical voting by CDU and Christian Social Union of Bavaria (CSU) alliance supporters who hoped for stronger market-oriented economic reforms than the CDU/CSU alliance called for. However, because the CDU did worse than predicted, the FDP and the CDU/CSU alliance were unable to form a coalition government. At other times, for example after the 2002 federal election, a coalition between the FDP and CDU/CSU was impossible primarily because of the weak results of the FDP.
The CDU/CSU parties had achieved the third-worst performance in German postwar history with only 35.2 percent of the votes. Therefore, the FDP was unable to form a coalition with its preferred partners, the CDU/CSU parties. As a result, the party was considered as a potential member of two other political coalitions, following the election. One possibility was a partnership between the FDP, the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD) and the Alliance 90/The Greens, known as a "traffic light coalition", named after the colors of the three parties. This coalition was ruled out, because the FDP considered the Social Democrats and the Greens insufficiently committed to market-oriented economic reform. The other possibility was a CDU-FDP-Green coalition, known as a "Jamaica coalition" because of the colours of the three parties. This coalition wasn't concluded either, since the Greens ruled out participation in any coalition with the CDU/CSU. Instead, the CDU formed a Grand coalition with the SPD, and the FDP entered the opposition. FDP leader Guido Westerwelle became the unofficial leader of the opposition by virtue of the FDP's position as the largest opposition party in the Bundestag.
In the 2009 European election, the FDP received 11% of the national vote (2,888,084 votes in total) and returned 12 MEPs.[18]
2009–2013: Merkel II government
Christian Lindner is the party chairman, having succeeded Philipp Rösler in December 2013.
In the September 2009 federal elections, the FDP increased its share of the vote by 4.8 percentage points to 14.6%, an all-time record. This percentage was enough to offset a decline in the CDU/CSU's vote compared to 2005, to create a CDU-FDP centre-right governing coalition in the Bundestag with a 53% majority of seats. On election night, party leader Westerwelle said his party would work to ensure that civil liberties were respected and that Germany got an "equitable tax system and better education opportunities".
The party also made gains in the two state elections held at the same time, acquiring sufficient seats for a CDU-FDP coalition in the northernmost state, Schleswig-Holstein, and gaining enough votes in left-leaning Brandenburg to clear the 5% hurdle to enter that state's parliament.[citation needed]
However, after reaching its best ever election result in 2009, the FDP's support collapsed. The party's policy pledges were put on hold by Merkel as the Great Recession unfolded and with the onset of the European debt crisis in 2010.[22] By the end of 2010, the party's support had dropped to as low as 5%. The FDP retained their seats in the state elections in North Rhine-Westphalia, which was held six months after the federal election, but out of the seven state elections that have been held since 2009, the FDP have lost all their seats in five of them due to failing to cross the 5% threshold.
Support for the party further eroded amid infighting and an internal rebellion over euro-area bailouts during the debt crisis.
Westerwelle stepped down as party leader following the 2011 state elections, in which the party was wiped out in Saxony-Anhalt and Rhineland-Palatinate and lost half its seats in Baden-Württemberg. Westerwelle was replaced in May 2011 by Philipp Rösler. The change in leadership failed to revive the FDP's fortunes, however, and in the next series of state elections, the party lost all its seats in Bremen, Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, and Berlin.[25] In Berlin, the party lost nearly 75% of the support they had had in the previous election.
In March 2012, the FDP lost all their state-level representation in the 2012 Saarland state election. However, this was offset by the Schleswig-Holstein state elections, when they achieved 8% of the vote, which was a severe loss of seats but still over the 5% threshold. In the snap elections in North Rhine-Westphalia a week later, the FDP not only crossed the electoral threshold, but also increased its share of the votes to 2 percentage points higher than in the previous state election. This was attributed to the local leadership of Christian Lindner.
2013 federal election
The FDP last won a directly elected seat in 1990, in Halle—the only time it has won a directly elected seat since 1957.[ The party's inability to win directly elected seats came back to haunt it at the 2013 election, in which it came up just short of the 5% threshold. With no directly elected seats, the FDP was shut out of the Bundestag for the first time since 1949. After the previous chairman Philipp Rösler then resigned, Christian Lindner took over the leadership of the party.
2014 European and state elections
In the 2014 European parliament elections, the FDP received 3.4% of the national vote (986,253 votes in total) and returned 3 MEPs. In the 2014 Brandenburg state election the party experienced a 5.8% down-swing and lost all their representatives in the Brandenburg state parliament. In the 2014 Saxony state election, the party experienced a 5.2% down-swing, again losing all of its seats. In the 2014 Thuringian state election a similar phenomenon was repeated with the party falling below the 5% threshold following a 5.1% drop in popular vote.
2015–2020
The party managed to enter parliament in the 2015 Bremen state election with the party receiving 6.5% of the vote and gaining 6 seats. However, it failed to get into government as a coalition between the Social Democrats and the Greens was created. In the 2016 Mecklenburg-Vorpommern state election the party failed to get into parliament despite increasing its vote share by 0.3%. The party did manage to get into parliament in Baden-Württemberg, gaining 3% of the vote and a total of 12 seats. This represents a five-seat improvement over their previous results. In the 2016 Berlin state election the party gained 4.9% of the vote and 12 seats but still failed to get into government. A red-red-green coalition was instead formed relegating the FDP to the opposition. In the 2016 Rhineland-Palatinate state election, the party managed to enter parliament receiving 6.2% of the vote and 7 seats. It also managed to enter government under a traffic light coalition. In 2016 Saxony-Anhalt state election the party narrowly missed the 5% threshold, receiving 4.9% of the vote and therefore receiving zero seats despite a 1% swing in their favour.
The 2017 North Rhine-Westphalia state election was widely considered a test of the party's future as their chairman Christian Lindner was also leading the party in that state. The party experienced a 4% swing in its favour gaining 6 seats and entering into a coalition with the CDU with a bare majority. In the 2017 Saarland state election the party again failed to gain any seats despite a 1% swing in their favour. The party gained 3 seats and increased its vote share by 3.2% in the 2017 Schleswig-Holstein state election. This success was often credited to their state chairman Wolfgang Kubicki. They also managed to re-enter the government under a Jamaica coalition.
In the 2017 federal election the party scored 10.7% of votes and re-entered the Bundestag, winning 80 seats. After the election, a Jamaica coalition was considered between the CDU, Greens, and FDP. However, FDP chief Christian Lindner walked out of the coalition talks due to a disagreement over European migration policy, saying "It is better not to govern than to govern badly." As a result, the CDU/CSU formed another grand coalition with the SPD.
The FDP won 5.4% and 5 seats in the 2019 European election.
In the October 2019 Thuringian state election, the FDP won seats in the Landtag of Thuringia for the first time since 2009. It exceeded the 5% threshold by just 5 votes. In February 2020, the FDP's Thomas Kemmerich was elected Minister-President of Thuringia by the Landtag with the likely support of the CDU and AfD, becoming the second member of the FDP to serve as head of government in a German state. This was also the first time a head of government had been elected with the support of AfD. Under intense pressure from state and federal politicians, Kemmerich resigned the following day, stating he would seek new elections. The next month, he was replaced by Bodo Ramelow of The Left; the FDP did not run a candidate in the second vote for Minister-President.
2021–present
In 2021, the FDP returned to the Saxony-Anhalt state parliament after five years of absence. They had similar success in Baden-Württemberg and Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, but faced setbacks in Baden-Württemberg, Berlin and Rhineland-Palatinate.
In the September 2021 federal election, the CDU/CSU under Armin Laschet was defeated. The FDP saw both its vote share and number of seats grow, to 11.5% and 92 seats respectively. As a result, the SPD, Greens, and FDP entered talks to form an Ampelkoalition (traffic light coalition). In the agreement finalised on 24 November, the FDP held four federal ministries in the Scholz cabinet (Finance, Justice, Digital and Transport and Education and Research).
Throughout 2022, the FDP saw poor approval in national opinion polls. In State Parliament elections they also performed poorly. In March, the FDP didn't win any seats in Saarland.In May they lost over half their seats in North Rhine-Westphalia and Schleswig-Holstein. In October, the FDP lost all 11 of their seats in Lower Saxony. It also lost all 12 seats in the 2023 Berlin repeat state election.
In the 2023 Bavarian state election, where Martin Hagen led the party, all 11 seats were lost. In the 2024 European Parliament elections, the FDP narrowly surpassed the 5% threshold, remaining on 5 seats and coming in sixth, behind the newly formed BSW. The FDP were similarly wiped out in the 2024 Thuringian state election, where Thomas Kemmerich lost his party's 5 seats.[41] In the 2024 Saxony state election, the FDP achieved less than 1% of the vote.
In November 2024, Christian Lindner was fired as Minister of Finance.[43] The FDP leaving the coalition meant the collapse of the traffic light government. Marco Buschmann and Bettina Stark-Watzinger also resigned from the cabinet. Justice minister Volker Wissing decided to resign from the FDP in order to stay in cabinet.
Day 71
The day in Munich was incredibly nice. I reached 16641 steps by visiting a lot of churches in the city by walking over the Viktualienmarkt after having a Weißwurst-Frühstück in a Brauhaus (Schneider´s Weisse). And between 01.00 and 05.00 in the afternoon I visited the Max-Goelitz-Galery and listened to excerpts of Ju Young Kim artbook, where she collected pictures of her art and impressions from all the time she spended in the air when trevelling, and she called it Air-Conditioned Hours. Of course the excerpts were written in the style of the information given by the captain or onboard-personal during a flight and a limited-edition of her book inserted into a meal package that you get on a flight could be bought for 100 Euros which is not expensive, if you consider the limit of this edition being only 100 boxes. Of course Ju Young Kim was there and Max Goelitz and both are so nice and interesting and I hope you have the chance to meet them.
Yesterday since I took the Deutsche Bahn there were delays. Only ten minutes to Munich, but 20 Minutes when I went back. And because the connection to the Autobahn was being renovated on my route back I spent an additional 30 Minutes on the road. And although I got up at 07.00 my pedometer told me that I didn´t have enough sleep. But I did my workout with weights and by now now I´ve reached 7341 steps, but I have a headache so I got a Chococino (my own brand-name for a cappucino with cacao (with a very strong chocolate taste, which covers-up the bitterness of the coffee)).
To round up my Green Week, I stay with the decision that the Green Party is the only Party that can and should be elected in this election. I think that the people who worked in the ministries are the most capable once, that we have right now. But I fear that they might not be part of the next German government. I tried to explain, why the CSU doesn´t want a coalition with the green party, but it might be the only solution, if the FDP doesn´t get over 5 percent of the votes, and if the coalition of SPD and CDU doesn´t reach a majority of seats in the parliament. And here I found something very interesting on Wikipedia:
Arguments for and against Black-Green
Compared to other coalition arrangements, this model is still quite young, as both parties have long-standing opposition to cooperation. However, there are some voices in both camps in favour of a black-green coalition, also at the level of the federal states or the federal government. This goes hand in hand with a socio-economic rapprochement between the voting milieus of the Greens and the Union ("New Citizenship"), which is not necessarily linked to a political rapprochement. The common values and concerns mentioned are the preservation of creation [de], subsidiarity, decentralization, personal responsibility of the individual, solid finances, an intact homeland and a healthy environment.
The Union parties are looking for a strategic coalition alternative. In recent years, the SPD has entered into coalitions at federal or state level with the CDU (red-black coalition), with the FDP (social liberal coalition), with the Greens (red-green coalition) and the PDS or Left Party (red-red coalition), as well as a minority government with PDS tolerance (Magdeburg model [de]), traffic light coalitions (with the FDP and the Greens) and, in Schleswig-Holstein, a coalition with the Greens and the South Schleswig Voters' Association (SSW), the so-called Danish traffic light coalition [de]. The SPD has thus implemented seven coalition variants. The CDU, on the other hand, currently only has Black-yellow coalition [de] and black-red as coalition options. For example, Jürgen Rüttgers, the CDU's top candidate at the time and Minister-President of North Rhine-Westphalia from 2005 to 2010, explained his temporary flirtation with the Greens before the 2005 North Rhine-Westphalia state election by saying that having several coalition options gave me "a great deal of freedom".
The Greens have a broader range of coalition options with the tried and tested red-green coalition, possible alliances involving the Left Party (red–red–green coalition) and the traffic light coalition, which is rarely realised. However, all of these alliances are necessarily linked to the SPD's participation in government. The realistic possibility of a black-green coalition alone strengthens the Greens' negotiating position vis-à-vis the SPD. There is also another argument in favour of black-green for the Greens: where the Left Party is strong, an alliance of the SPD and the Greens has little chance of entering into a coalition without a third party, i.e. the Left Party or the FDP.
With the extension of the operating life [de] of German nuclear power plants by the black-yellow federal government in autumn 2010, which was fiercely opposed by the Greens, the Union and the Greens again drifted apart. From the end of 2010, the Union identified the Greens as its new main opponent.[33] Due to the rejection of various major projects such as the Stuttgart 21 train station reconstruction or the Munich Olympic bid, politicians from the CDU, CSU and FDP repeatedly referred to Alliance 90/The Greens as the "anti-party" during the election campaign. In November 2010, Angela Merkel declared a black-green alliance to be a "pipe dream".
After the decision to phase out nuclear power in June 2011 following the Fukushima nuclear accident, this point of contention between the CDU/CSU and the Greens seemed to have been resolved. However, with the changes on the international energy markets in 2022 (reaction with trade changes or sanctions to the Russian invasion of Ukraine), an extension of the operating life of German nuclear power plants is once again an issue, as are changes surrounding the phase-out of coal in Germany.
01/26/2025
01/25/2025
Day 70
Today everything is a little different. It´s 02.00 in the morning, or better at night. I´ve just finished my workout without weights. And I prepare for a short trip to Munich. On the Art Cologne I met a South-Korean Artist and today I will visit the Max-Goelitz-Gallery in Munich for a presentation of her art-book. And since I´m going by bus and since I also want to meet a friend in Augsburg, I´m pretty nervous and couldn´t sleep, but I can get a lot of sleep on the train.
Well, I´ll take the train to Bavaria today and Aschaffenburg is in Bavaria. An Afghanistan stabbed two toddlers of a Kindergarden-group and a pedestrian, who wanted to help:
German park stabbing: Toddler and man killed, Afghan man held - BBC News
But what happens now, is what my previous rambling was all about. The CSU and especially Markus Söder want more strict legislation and that all people seeking assylum and who get criminally envolved will be send back to their origin-country. So far, so populistic and that is what Trump is rambling about all along, he wants people to be send away who eat dogs... But the fact is, that Aschaffenburg is in Bavaria and it´s been run by the CSU for it feels like 70 years. And to point at the current government in Berlin is just covering 70 years of what? And now Merz is going to get active, since he owns Söder for stepping down and he will propose a change of legislation together with...wait for it... the right-wing AFD. And that will be the sign for the undecided voters that the AFD is a political party like all the others and the result will be a surge in the polls of something like two or three %. In Germany we have somthing like a Brandmauer, a firewall, an agreement, that no party of the middle joins the AFD in their movement. And the CSU and Merz are going to erode the Brandmauer. Peace is in danger and currently Germany mobilizes again in demonstrations against the far-right.
The Green Party is in my perception the only Party not yet corrupted. Here you can find an abstract (The relationship between the youth-led Fridays for Future climate movement and voting, politician and media behaviour in Germany | Nature Human Behaviour) showing that the Friday for Future protests in Germany are related to the media-coverage of environmental changes, to the activity of the Green Party in the media and is dependant on a good relationship to the parents. And the article shows that the activity of the youth actually could change society.
And for that I think that the green Party is the only logical choice in the coming election. But tomorrow I will focus on the limits of a Green cooperation in the governments, especially in my home Bundesland Nordrhein-Westfalen ( Northern Rhine Westfalia?) NRW.
Day 69
Since I struggled getting the 10.000 steps yesterday (I reached 10126), after my workout with weights I walked a little more today. It´s 07.10 in the morning and so far I´ve accumulated 7281 steps.
Four states stopped Trump´s birthright-law-making-trial, because the effort seems to be sloppy, amateurish. And there seems to be a way, that the 1500 people who Trump freed because of the 6th-january attack in the democracy might go back to jail. Well, we´ll see.
Today I´m going to focus on Robert Habeck, because he´s the candidate for the chancelor of the Green party. There will be a duel on TV between Merz and Scholz. But only because Scholz is chancelor. I think that the Green Party will get more votes and I think that a duel between Habeck and Merz would have been the wiser and more interesting choice. I like Habeck very much because he is a very fast solution-finder. The trouble is, that the solution is correct, but the repercussions of it are immense because sometimes the solutions have not been discussed with the party, because they are new. I´ve got the same problems, because sometimes I´m too intuative. I found this on Wikipedia:
Robert Habeck (German pronunciation: [ˈʁoːbɛʁt ˈhaːbɛk] ⓘ; born 2 September 1969) is a German politician (Alliance 90/The Greens) and writer who has been serving as Vice Chancellor of Germany, Federal Minister for Economic Affairs and Climate Action in the cabinet of Chancellor Olaf Scholz and as a Member of the German Bundestag for Flensburg – Schleswig since 2021. From 2018 to 2022, he also served as co-leader of Alliance 90/The Greens, alongside Annalena Baerbock. For the 2021 German federal election, he was a member of the leading duo, alongside Baerbock, who ran for chancellor of Germany.
In 2009, Habeck was voted into the state parliament of Schleswig-Holstein as a deputy of The Greens and became group chairman. In both early elections in 2012 and at the federal elections in 2017 he ran as the top candidate of his party. From 2012 to 2018 he held office as deputy minister-president and minister for energy revolution, agriculture, environment, and nature (since 2017 for digitisation as well) for the cabinet of Albig as well as for the cabinet of Günther. After he was elected federal chairman of his party in 2018, he retired from his function as minister.At the 2021 federal elections, he achieved the direct mandate of his electoral district of Flensburg – Schleswig with 28.1 percent of first votes.
Early life, education and writing
Habeck passed his final secondary school examinations in 1989 at the Heinrich Heine School in Heikendorf in the Plön district. After completing his alternative civilian service in 1991 he began studying for a master's degree with a combination of philosophy, German and philology at the Albert Ludwigs University in Freiburg im Breisgau. After the intermediate examination in 1992/93 he attended Roskilde University in Denmark. In 1996 Habeck received a master's degree from the University of Hamburg. From 1996 to 1998 he completed a doctorate at the University of Hamburg and was awarded a doctorate in philosophy in 2000, with a thesis on the depiction of nature in literature.
From 1999 Habeck and his wife Andrea Paluch worked as freelance writers. In addition to children's books and translations of English poetry, Habeck, with Paluch, published six novels, among others, Hauke Haien's Death (2001), The Day I Met My Dead Man (2005) and Under the Gully Lies the Sea (2007). Habeck is fluent in Danish.
Schleswig-Holstein Landtag
In 2009, Habeck was elected to the Schleswig-Holstein Landtag via the party list.In November 2011, he was voted as the top candidate of his party for the 2012 Schleswig-Holstein election. From 2009 to 2012, Habeck was chairman of the Alliance 90/The Greens group in Schleswig-Holstein.
Habeck served as Deputy Minister-President and State Minister for Energy, Agriculture, Environment and Rural Areas in the centre-left Albig Cabinet since 2012 and in the centre-right Günther Cabinet between 2017 and 2018. Under his leadership – he was not a candidate for parliament – the Green Party became the third largest group in the Landtag after the 2017 state elections. As one of his state's representatives at the Bundesrat, he served on the Committee on Agricultural Policy and Consumer Protection; the Committee on the Environment, Nature Protection and Reactor Safety; the Committee on Economic Affairs; and the Committee on Transport. From 2014 and 2016, Habeck was one of the members of Germany's temporary National Commission on the Disposal of Radioactive Waste.
Habeck served as a Green Party delegate to the Federal Convention for the purpose of electing the President of Germany in 2012. He ran to become one of the two top candidates for the Greens for the 2017 German federal election, but lost by 75 votes to Cem Özdemir.
Member of the Bundestag
On 27 January 2018, the Green Party's national convention in Hanover elected him as chairman, a position shared with Annalena Baerbock.
In an interview in 2018 Habeck positioned himself against an ethnic notion of nation, which he clearly differentiated from the notion of constitutive people. Additionally, he warned of uncritically acquiring the demands of identity politics.
Habeck in Dortmund in August 2021
Habeck was elected to the Bundestag in the 2021 German federal election, defeating the CDU incumbent Petra Nicolaisen in the constituency of Flensburg – Schleswig.
Vice Chancellor and Minister for Economic Affairs
After the Greens agreed to form a traffic light coalition government with the centre-left Social Democrats and liberal Free Democrats, new Chancellor Olaf Scholz named Habeck as Minister for Economic Affairs and Climate Action and vice chancellor in December 2021, making him one of the most powerful politicians in Europe.
In March 2023, Habeck participated in the first joint cabinet meeting of the governments of Germany and Japan in Tokyo, chaired by Chancellor Scholz and Prime Minister Fumio Kishida.
COVID-19 pandemic
In an interview with Der Tagesspiegel at the end of May 2020, Habeck argued that the COVID-19 pandemic was "maybe the first time" that health care was more important than the profit motive and economic growth. He added: "The moral is that we have to configure our economy in a way that it supports common interests and that it becomes crisis-proof as well." Part of this was environmental and climate change mitigation, saying: "The time of minor compromises is over. All parties can think much bigger." The money that had been made liquid for the crisis management must also be used to fight the economic crisis as well as the climate crisis. The past idea that a speed-limit on the Autobahn would restrict personal freedom seemed ridiculous after the decisions that had been made concerning the COVID crisis. He stated: "If one acts brave enough, one can broadly anchor the willingness of change. Ambitious politicians have received a second wind".
On 6 May 2021, Habeck demanded the federal government waive patent rights for the COVID-19 vaccine.
Energy policy
In April 2022, Habeck presented a package of measures to speed up Germany's expansion of renewable energy, as the need to reduce the country's heavy reliance on Russian fossil fuels added urgency to its green transition plans; the package envisaged green energy accounting for 80% of the power mix by 2030, up from about 40% in 2022 and a previous target of 65%.
An opponent of nuclear energy, Habeck pushed against efforts at the EU level in 2022 to label nuclear power as a sustainable and green energy source.However, amid the 2022 Russia–European Union gas dispute, he announced plans to keep two of Germany's three remaining nuclear power stations on standby, beyond a year-end deadline to ditch the fuel, to ensure enough electricity supply through the winter during a gas crunch.
When energy-intensive German industry and German exporters were hit particularly hard by the 2021–present global energy crisis, Habeck presented on 29 September 2022 a €200 billion plan to support industry and households.
On 5 October 2022, Habeck accused the United States and other "friendly" gas supplier nations that they were profiting from the Ukraine war with "astronomical prices". He called for more solidarity by the US to assist energy-pressed allies in Europe.
Habeck supported the European Green Deal. In June 2022, he said: "In the middle of Europe's biggest energy crisis, we have launched one of the most comprehensive climate packages in EU history." In July 2023, Habeck stated that the German transition to green energy will "put a burden on people" and there's "a major transformational period ahead of us until 2030".[26] He called for a phase-out of coal by 2030. In January 2024, he became the target of protests by German farmers for his role in promoting green policies and pushing for cuts in agricultural subsidies.
In November 2023, Habeck led efforts on backstopping Siemens Energy with guarantees worth €7.5 billion ($8.1 billion) as part of a deal with other stakeholders to help the energy company fulfil its order book; the guarantees were part of a package totaling €15 billion agreed with private banks and other stakeholders and also imposed a pause on dividends and higher level bonuses.
After Russia's invasion of Ukraine, Habeck's ministry vetoed extending the life of Germany's remaining nuclear plants, arguing that the costs involved outweighed the benefits. Critics said that nuclear energy was a way to reduce Germany's reliance on Russian gas. Habeck cautioned, "If we do not obtain more gas next winter and if deliveries from Russia were to be cut then we would not have enough gas to heat all our houses and keep all our industry going". On 20 March 2022, he met Qatar's Emir Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani. Habeck said Germany reached a long-term energy partnership with Qatar, one of the world's largest exporters of liquefied natural gas,[ and added: "Although we might still need Russian gas this year, in the future it won't be so any more. And this is only the start". Habeck said Germany plans to end imports of Russian natural gas by mid-2024. According to Habeck, the planned end of Russian energy imports will permanently raise energy prices for German industry and consumers.In June 2022, Habeck warned that Germany is facing a "more significant" energy crisis than during the 1973 oil crisis.
The last three nuclear power plants in Germany were shut down on 15 April 2023.
In April 2024, there was a controversy related to the decommissioning of nuclear power plants in Germany. German magazine Cicero claimed that Habeck had misled the public in 2022 and ignored the advice of experts who said nuclear facilities were still safe to operate.
Foreign investments and free trade
beck's leadership, the ministry stopped Beijing-based Aeonmed Group in April 2022 from purchasing German medical device manufacturer Heyer Medical, based on a government assessment that there were dangers to public safety. In November 2022, he formally blocked Silex, a Swedish subsidiary of China's Sai Microelectronics, from buying a Elmos Semiconductor plant for €85 million, saying the country had to protect key industries from potential security threats.
Habeck voiced support for the European Union–Mercosur free trade agreement, saying the agreement would be "an opportunity for South America as well as for Europe and for Germany".
Arms exports
In September 2022, Habeck confirmed that Germany approved new arms export deals to Saudi Arabia, despite the ban imposed as a result of the Saudi Arabian–led intervention in Yemen. The biggest importers of German weapons were South Korea, Algeria and Egypt.
Domestic policies
Habeck repeatedly declared himself in favor of evacuating refugees out of the camps on the Greek islands.
In November 2020, Habeck presented a 11-points-action-plan against potential and a controversial Islamic "Gefährder" – individuals deemed a security risk due to extremist views without necessarily being accused of a crime – which he worked out with Konstantin von Notz and Irene Mihalic, politicians for domestic policy. One topic of this paper is to recruit more staff for the local authorities to make closer surveillance and eventually a more consequent enforcement of prevailing arrest warrants possible. Another aspect of these demands was the prohibition of relevant Salafist associations.
In October 2023, Habeck called for more immigration to Germany, saying the shortage of skilled workers was the country’s "most pressing structural problem". Net immigration to Germany was 663,000 in 2023, down from a record 1,462,000 in 2022. Germany's 2023 immigration reforms include easier requirements for obtaining work visas for skilled workers from non-EU countries. In July 2024, Habeck suggested the tax relief for skilled foreign workers.
In September 2024, in response to the threat of mass layoffs at the Volkswagen car manufacturer, Habeck said that the government would consider how it could help Volkswagen. He said that the government should support the transition to electric cars.
2023 Gaza war and protests in Germany
On 2 November 2023, Habeck posted a video on X/Twitter about the protests in Germany in relation to the 2023 Israel–Hamas war.[56] He declared that the burning of the flag of Israel and praise for Hamas is a felony in Germany and stated: "Germans will have to answer for this in court, while non-Germans also risk losing their residence status. Anyone who does not yet have a residence permit provides a reason to be deported." ("Wer Deutscher ist, wird sich dafür vor Gericht verantworten müssen, wer kein Deutscher ist, riskiert außerdem seinen Aufenthaltsstatus. Wer noch keinen Aufenthaltstitel hat, liefert einen Grund, abgeschoben zu werden.") His video received wide recognition in Germany and was viewed more than 42 million times in the first two weeks.
On 11 January 2024, while visiting Sderot near the Gaza strip, Habeck called the lawsuit South Africa v. Israel (Genocide Convention) to be one of the biggest absurdities ("eine der größten Absurditäten") one could come up with. The vice-chancellor of Germany declared: "but genocide is something else, it is the deliberate will to wipe out ethnic groups or religious communities, the deliberate extermination." ("Aber Völkermord ist etwas anderes, es ist das gezielte Auslöschenwollen von Ethnien oder religiösen Gemeinschaften, das gezielte Auslöschen.")
In May 2024, however, he argued that Israel's actions, especially the Rafah offensive, are "incompatible with international law".
Increased defense spending
In March 2024 Habeck said:
We cannot rely on the Americans to always foot the bill for everything or to provide the necessary materials. That means that ramping up military production, the defense and armaments industries, and scenarios including for national defense — these all need to be reactivated again.
Hate crimes
Supported by non-profit organization Hate Aid, Habeck had filed more than 700 criminal complaints relating to hate crime by 2024.
01/24/2025
01/23/2025
Day 68
It´s 7.20 in the morning. I´ve reached 5635 steps so far, because the rain has started this night and some of the pathes I walk there is still ice and the rain on the ice makes it quite slippery as I feared. But nevertheless I will reach 10.000 steps today.
Today I will focus on Annalena Baerbock. She is so interesting and in the high time of the Green prognosises I thought she would become the lady-chancelor (chancelorette?) after Angela Merkel. She is our current foreign ministress. Yes she studied international law and yes who can be put into that position but her. But sadly I think she doesn´t always make a good figure. Angela Merkel had the same problem. In muslimic countries the males cannot shake her hand and that theme always covers what is really important in those visits. It´s just a handshake, but there should be an agreement that is respectfull for both sides. But that is only my opinion. I would have wanted her protected from that experience, especially because Angela Merkel also faced this. I found this on Wikipedia:
Annalena Charlotte Alma Baerbock (German: [anaˈleːna ˈbɛːɐ̯bɔk] ⓘ; born 15 December 1980) is a German politician of the Alliance 90/The Greens party serving as Germany's minister for foreign affairs since 2021.
From 2018 to January 2022, Baerbock served as co-leader of Alliance 90/The Greens, alongside Robert Habeck. She was the party's candidate for chancellor in the 2021 federal election. Olaf Scholz from SPD secured the chancellery instead of Baerbock.[][2] After the election, the Greens formed a traffic light coalition led by Olaf Scholz, and Baerbock was sworn in as Germany's first female foreign minister on 8 December 2021.
Born in Hanover, West Germany, in 1980, Baerbock attended the University of Hamburg and the London School of Economics and Political Science. She was first elected to the Bundestag in 2013. From 2012 to 2015, she was a member of the party council of Alliance 90/The Greens and from 2009 to 2013, the leader of her party's group in the state of Brandenburg.
Early life and education
Baerbock is the daughter of a social worker and a mechanical engineer[ who worked for WABCO Vehicle Control Systems.[ After initially living in Nuremberg for several years she moved to live in an old reconstructed farmhouse that her family owned[ in Schulenburg, which is part of Pattensen, near Hanover in Lower Saxony.There, she grew up with her two sisters and two cousins. As a child, she joined her parents at anti-war and anti-nuclear power protests organized or supported by the Green Party.] She attended the Humboldt School in Hanover and at the age of 16 spent an exchange year at Lake Highland Preparatory School in Orlando, Florida.[
As a teenager, Baerbock was a competitive trampoline gymnast, taking part in German championships and winning bronze three times.[
From 2000 to 2004, Baerbock studied political science at the University of Hamburg, where she qualified for a pre-diploma. She also worked as a journalist for the Hannoversche Allgemeine Zeitung from 2000 to 2003.[] She completed internships at Norddeutscher Rundfunk, Deutsche Presseagentur and the Council of Europe.
In 2005, Baerbock completed a one-year master's course in public international law at the London School of Economics (LSE).[During her time at LSE, she stayed at Carr-Saunders Hall in Fitzrovia.] In 2005, she was a trainee at the British Institute of International and Comparative Law (BIICL).[] She also started a dissertation on natural disasters and humanitarian aid at the Free University of Berlin, but did not finish it.[
Early career
After her studies, Baerbock worked from 2005 to 2008 in the office of MEP Elisabeth Schroedter. In 2008 and 2009, she worked as an adviser on foreign and security policies for the parliamentary group of the Alliance 90/The Greens in the Bundestag.
Political career
Beginnings
Baerbock in 2012
Baerbock became a member of Alliance 90/The Greens in 2005.[9] In October 2008, she was elected to the executive board of her party's state group in Brandenburg. The next year she succeeded Ska Keller as co-chair of the board (with Benjamin Raschke), an office she held until 2013.[
Baerbock served as the national spokesperson for the Green Party's working group on European affairs from 2008 to 2013. From 2009 to 2012, she was a member of the executive board of the European Green Party, under the leadership of co-chairs Philippe Lamberts and Monica Frassoni.[
Member of the German Bundestag: 2013–present
In 2009, Baerbock unsuccessfully ran for a place on her party's electoral list for the federal elections. In 2013, she was the Green Party candidate in the constituency of Potsdam – Potsdam-Mittelmark II – Teltow-Fläming II and also secured the leading spot on the party's electoral list for the State of Brandenburg.] Through the electoral list, she became a member of the Bundestag.[
During her first term, Baerbock was a member of the Committee on Economic Affairs and Energy and the Committee on European Affairs. In her parliamentary group, she served as speaker for climate policy. In the latter capacity, she participated in the United Nations Climate Change Conferences in Warsaw (2013), Lima (2014), Paris (2015) and Marrakesh (2016).
In addition to her committee assignments, Baerbock served as deputy chair of the Berlin-Taipei Parliamentary Circle of Friends and a member of the German-Polish Parliamentary Friendship Group from 2014 until 2017.
In the 2017 election, Baerbock was again the leading candidate in the state of Brandenburg, retaining her seat in Parliament. After the election, she was a member of the Green Party's negotiating team in the (unsuccessful) coalition talks with the CDU/CSU and FDP.[21][22] She has since been a member of the Committee on Families, Seniors, Women and Youth.
Co-leader of the Green Party: 2018–2022
Baerbock speaking in the Bundestag, October 2020
On 27 January 2018, at the Green Party's national convention in her hometown of Hanover, Baerbock was elected as one of two equal chairpersons of her party at the federal level, with Robert Habeck.[18][23] She won 64% of the vote, more than her challenger, Anja Piel.At a 2019 party convention, she was re-elected with 97.1% of the votes, the highest-ever result for a party chair.[
In the negotiations to form a coalition government under the leadership of Minister-President of Brandenburg Dietmar Woidke after the 2019 state elections, Baerbock was a member of her party's delegation.[
Chancellor candidate: 2021
On 19 April 2021, the federal board of the Greens officially nominated Baerbock as candidate for chancellor for the 2021 federal election – the first time the party had nominated a single candidate instead of co-leaders.[] This was formally confirmed at the party congress from 11 to 13 June. Baerbock is the second woman after Angela Merkel to seek the highest government office, and the first woman nominated by her party. On election day, she was only 12 days older than Guido Westerwelle in 2002, the youngest chancellor candidate ever.[ On 12 June 2021, Baerbock was confirmed as candidate for chancellor after receiving 98.5% of the confirmation votes.[] In the 2021 German federal election, she again ran in the constituency of Potsdam – Potsdam-Mittelmark II – Teltow-Fläming II, this time against fellow chancellor candidate Olaf Scholz. She lost the constituency to Scholz by over 15,000 votes, but was nonetheless elected to the Bundestag through the Green list in Brandenburg.
During this time, plagiarism by Baerbock in her 2021-book Now. How we renew our country [de ] (Jetzt. Wie wir unser Land erneuern) came to light,[] with Baerbock becoming the latest in a series of German politicians found to have plagiarised since the 2011-Guttenberg scandal. In the book, Baerbock included work of other authors without attributing that work to them thereby falsely presenting it as her own,[] with one researcher, Stefan Weber, detailing 100 instances of plagiarism before ceasing to look further.[
Around the same time, scrutiny of Baerbock's published curriculum vitae (CV) revealed falsehoods. For example, Baerbock claimed membership of the German Marshall Fund and United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees when she, in fact, was not a member. While she did have associations with these and other minor institutions, the claims in her CV were exaggerated.[] Similarly, statements about her education were misleading and her professional career incorrect. These revelations triggered widespread condemnation in the German public.[
According to studies conducted by the German Marshall Fund and the Institute for Strategic Dialogue, both German and Russian state-backed sources have targeted Baerbock, spreading a large amount of disinformation, from false assumptions about the Greens to explicit sexism, such as the circulated online image featuring Baerbock's face photoshopped onto a naked female body with the caption "I was young and I needed the money".
Under Baerbock's leadership, the Greens won 14.8% of the national vote in 2021 and 118 seats in the Bundestag, the best result in the party's history. However, the performance was considered somewhat disappointing as the party finished third after having led in some polls earlier in the year.[
Foreign minister: 2021–present
Prior to the 2021 election, Wolfgang Streeck wrote that Baerbock harbours strong Atlanticist and pro-NATO views and would follow a foreign policy aligned with that of U.S. President Joe Biden.[48][full citation needed]
Following the 2021 German federal election, the Greens agreed to enter government with the FDP and the Social Democrats, as part of a traffic light coalition led by Olaf Scholz. Baerbock was named Foreign Minister and took office on 8 December 2021, the first woman ever to hold the role.[
Baerbock visited Warsaw in December 2021 to meet with the Polish Foreign Minister Zbigniew Rau. They discussed Poland's dispute with the EU over the rule of law and the superiority of European Union law. Baerbock backed Poland's efforts to stop the flow of migrants seeking entry in EU territories from Belarus.She rejected the notion of Germany paying further World War II reparations to Poland. Germany asserts that Poland renounced all reparation rights under a 1953 agreement and that the dispute is settled. Poland rejects this view, stating that the Polish government was then under the sway of the Soviet Union and that its 1953 agreement is non-binding,[ somewhat similar to the manner in which German reunification was predicated upon Germany renouncing explicitly any possible claims to the former eastern territories of Germany including East Prussia, most of Silesia, as well as the eastern parts of Brandenburg and Pomerania in the Two Plus Four Agreement.
On 23 December 2021, Baerbock warned that Afghanistan is "heading into the worst humanitarian catastrophe of our time", with major economic sectors collapsing and more than 24 million people in need of humanitarian assistance.[] She said, "We cannot allow hundreds of thousands of children to die because we don't want to take action."[She also promised to speed up the evacuation of more than 15,000 vulnerable Afghans, including staff who worked for Germany and their family members.
When Germany held the rotating presidency of the Group of Seven (G7) in 2022, Baerbock chaired the meetings of G7 Ministers of Foreign Affairs.[
Baerbock meeting with Ukrainian Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal in Kyiv, on 7 February 2022
In January 2022, Baerbock refused to supply German weapons to Ukraine amid rising tensions on the Ukraine-Russia border, while the NATO allies including the United States opted to send arms in support of Ukraine.[58][59] In the aftermath of the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, she argued against blocking Russian access to SWIFT.[ Following the Bucha massacre in April 2022, she expelled 40 Russian diplomats and embassy staff from Berlin, joining other European Union countries in their response to war crimes perpetrated by Russian troops in Ukraine.] Also in April 2022, she hosted a donor conference during which European and international governments agreed to extend 659.5 million euros ($718.6 million) in aid to Moldova, which hosted more than 100,000 refugees from Ukraine at the time.
In July 2022, she rejected Turkey's territorial claims to Greek islands in the Aegean Sea, stating that "Lesbos, Chios, Rhodes and many others are Greek territories and nobody has the right to question them."[63] She warned that Turkey's threat to launch a new offensive against Kurdish forces in northern Syria will only help the Islamic State jihadists.[
In January 2023, Baerbock and French Foreign Minister Catherine Colonna arrived in Ethiopia and met with Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed on a mission to support the Ethiopia–Tigray peace agreement ending the Tigray War.[
In January 2023, Baerbock made her third visit to Ukraine by touring Kharkiv, following her travels to Bucha in May and Kyiv in September of the previous year.[ In a keynote speech to the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe on 24 January, she said in English "We are fighting a war against Russia, not against each other", which was critically portrayed in the popular tabloid newspaper Bild with the headline "We are at war with Russia".[66] Her phrasing received criticism from conservative and right-wing politicians in Germany as demonstrating un-professionalism, and criticism from Russia. A German Foreign Ministry spokesman said that Germany was not a party to the conflict and the speech was in a context of establishing a unified stance in opposition to a war of aggression.
In March 2023, on a visit to Baghdad, Baerbock called on Iran to cease its missile attacks on Iraqi territory.[
In May 2023, she urged China to take a clear stance on the Russo-Ukrainian War, saying "neutrality means taking the side of the aggressor.",[after the Chinese President Xi Jinping first visited Vladimir Putin in Russia, and later on the next day visited Ukraine, with offending Russian dissidents and opponents of Vladimir Putin while being in Ukraine.[
In September 2023, she named the Chinese President Xi Jinping "a dictator" next to Vladimir Putin, but that also followed the U.S. President referring to the Chinese President a dictator in June.
Baerbock with Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev on 4 November 2023
In May 2023, she visited Saudi Arabia and praised Saudi efforts to find a solution to the wars in Yemen and Sudan.[
On 6 July 2023, U.S. President Joe Biden authorized the provision of cluster munitions to Ukraine in support of a Ukrainian counter-offensive against Russian forces in Russian-occupied regions in Southeastern Ukraine.Baerbock opposed the decision of the Biden administration to supply cluster munitions to Ukraine.[
In September 2023, Baerbock accused Azerbaijan of breaking its promise not to resort to military action in Armenian-held Nagorno-Karabakh and called on it to halt the offensive and return to negotiations.[ In February 2024, she hosted the foreign ministers of Azerbaijan and Armenia for two days of peace talks in Berlin.
Baerbock expressed support for Israel and its right to self-defense during the 2023 Israel–Hamas war. On 23 October 2023, she blocked a declaration by EU ministers calling for "an immediate humanitarian cease-fire" to help civilians in the Gaza Strip.[On 11 November 2023, she visited Israel to express solidarity with the country.[ Baerbock rejected calls for a ceasefire but supported "humanitarian pauses" to deliver aid to Palestinian civilians in Gaza.[] She stated that "For Germany, Israel's security is non-negotiable."[ She pointed to Germany's "historic and moral responsibility to the Jewish people and the Israeli state" because of the Holocaust.[ She and UK Foreign Secretary David Cameron wrote a joint article published in The Sunday Times on 17 December 2023 calling for actions which would "pav[e] the way to a sustainable ceasefire in Gaza".[
Baerbock at the Riyadh Meetings on Syria, in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia on 12 January 2025
Francesca Albanese, incumbent UN Special Rapporteur on the occupied Palestinian territories, criticised Baerbock[ following a speech by the Foreign Minister in the German Bundestag on 7 October 2024, in which Baerbock alluded to Israeli attacks on Palestinian civilian sites as "self-defense" and said that "that's what Germany stands for" to much applause.[Though civilian sites can lose protected status if used for military purposes, under international law they still cannot be attacked if the harm to civilians will be disproportionate. What's more, Article 52 of the Protocol Additional to the Geneva Conventions states that “In case of doubt whether an object which is normally dedicated to civilian purposes, such as a place of worship, a house or other dwelling or a school, is being used to make an effective contribution to military action, it shall be presumed not to be so used”.[
In January 2025, Baerbock and her French counterpart Jean-Noël Barrot visited Damascus to meet Ahmed al-Sharaa, the de facto leader of Syria since December 2024,[] on behalf of the European Union, thereby becoming the first ministers from the EU to visit the country since the fall of the Assad regime.[ Despite shaking hands with his French counterpart Jean-Noël Barrot, al-Sharaa did not shake hands with Annalena Baerbock.[
Day 67
Wow it´s minus 6 degrees Celsius outside. I did my workout with weights today and reached 6701 steps so far.
I read some funny articles about Trump´s lawsuits for example to change the Gulf of Mexico into Gulf of America and that it seems to be generated by AI or that it is copied and pasted because the semantic errors can be seen in different lawsuits that are now on it´s way. What have they done in the last 67 days. That is the time they had to prepare all this. Okay, I haven´t accomplished anything either, but I´m not President of the US.
Today I would like to focus on Cem Özdemir. In my memory he´s also been there forever. I think he was a good choice for the ministry of agriculture because he is muslim and vegetarian and I wanted him to change the consumption of meat. I found this on Wikipedia:
Cem Özdemir (German: [ˈdʒɛm ˈʔœsdemiːɐ̯], Turkish: [ˈdʒem ˈœzdemiɾ]; born 21 December 1965) is a German politician who currently serves as Federal Minister of Food and Agriculture since 2021. He is a member of the Alliance 90/The Greens party.
Between 2008 and 2018, Özdemir co-chaired the Green Party, together with Claudia Roth and later Simone Peter. He has been a Member of the German Bundestag since 2013, previously holding a seat between 1994 and 2002. From 2004 to 2009, he served as a Member of the European Parliament. Alongside Katrin Göring-Eckardt, he stood as one of the top two Green candidates in the 2017 federal election.[ From 2018 until 2021, he chaired the Bundestag Committee on Transport. Since 8 December 2021, he has been Minister of Food and Agriculture in the cabinet of Chancellor Olaf Scholz. In November 2024, following the government crisis, he replaced Free Democratic Party (FDP) politician Bettina Stark-Watzinger as Federal Minister of Education and Research.
Life and work
Born in Urach, a small town in the hills between Stuttgart and Ulm, Cem Özdemir is the son of Gastarbeiter ("guest worker") parents from Turkey. Özdemir's father is of Circassian origin and is originally from Tokat. Özdemir's mother is of Turkish origin and comes from a middle-class family in Istanbul; her father was an officer in the Turkish War of Independence. In 1983 Özdemir and his immigrant parents acquired German citizenship. After graduating from a German Hauptschule and a Realschule Özdemir completed an apprenticeship, becoming an early childhood educator. After qualifying for advanced technical college entrance he studied social pedagogy at the Evangelical University of Applied Science in Reutlingen, Germany. After completing his studies in 1987, he worked as an educator and a freelance journalist.
Özdemir describes himself as a "secular Muslim" and is married to Argentine journalist Pía María Castro. They have two children: a son and a daughter.Özdemir is a vegetarian.[
Political career
Beginnings
Özdemir has been a member of the Green Party since 1981, originally in the district chapter of Ludwigsburg. Between 1989 and 1994 he was a member in the State Executive (Landesvorstand) of the Green Party in Baden-Württemberg. During that time he was one of the founding members of Immi-Grün – Bündnis der neuen InländerInnen, an alliance of InländerInnen (locals), as opposed to the German word Ausländer (foreigners).
Member of the German Bundestag, 1994–2002
From 1994 until 2002, Özdemir was a member of the German Bundestag; along with Leyla Onur of the Social Democrats, he was the first person of either Turkish or Circassian descent ever elected to the country's federal parliament.From 1998 until 2002, he was a member of the Committee on Home Affairs and served as his parliamentary group's spokesperson on this issue. In this capacity, he advocated for reforms to Germany's citizenship laws. In addition, he was the chairman of the German-Turkish Parliamentary Friendship Group. (See list of the German Parliamentary Friendship Groups and the pages from the German Bundestag website that describes their purpose and their membership as at January 2024.
In 1999, nine months after the Greens for the first time joined a German federal government under Chancellor Gerhard Schröder, Özdemir was among 40 younger party members of the self-described "youth of the second generation" who declared in a controversial manifesto "[that] we cannot and will not idly watch the moralizing know-it-alls in our party from the founding generation" around Jürgen Trittin.
In 2002, Özdemir was accused of violating parliamentary regulations for retaining "Miles & More" frequent-flier miles accrued during official travel as a member of the Bundestag for personal use. He was also criticised for having taken out a credit with Moritz Hunzinger, a German PR consultant and lobbyist, in order to overcome personal financial issues. This affair was also associated with Rudolf Scharping, former German Minister of Defence (1998–2002). Subsequently, Özdemir resigned as spokesman for domestic affairs and as a member of the Bundestag.
In 2003, Özdemir joined the German Marshall Fund of the United States in Washington, D.C., and Brussels as a Transatlantic Fellow. During his fellowship he gave various speeches and brown bag lectures at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, on the issue of Turkey and Europe.[citation needed] He also researched on the ways that minority groups in the United States and Europe organize themselves politically.
Member of the European Parliament, 2004–2009
Özdemir in 2009
From 2004 until 2009, Özdemir was a Member of the European Parliament in the parliamentary group The Greens/European Free Alliance (Greens/EFA). During that time he served as the group's spokesperson on foreign policy and a member of the Committee on Foreign Affairs (AFET). In addition, he served as the European Parliament's rapporteur on Central Asia and as vice chair of the Permanent Ad Hoc Delegation for Relations with Iraq.
Between 2006 and 2007, Özdemir also served as vice president of the "CIA Committee" (Temporary Committee on the alleged use of European countries by the CIA for the transport and illegal detention of prisoners).
Co-chair of the Green Party, 2009–2013
On 2 June 2008, Özdemir announced his candidacy as co-chair of his party. Özdemir's rival candidate was Volker Ratzmann, leader of the Green parliamentary group in the Berlin House of Representatives, who eventually withdrew his candidacy on 4 September 2008 for personal reasons.
In the run-up to the party co-chair elections, Özdemir also ran for a promising party list position for the 2009 German elections at the federal state party conference of Baden-Württemberg. In two separate runs he lost to his respective direct opponents. Nevertheless, Özdemir adhered to his candidacy for the party chairmanship.[citation needed]
Since 15 November 2008, Özdemir has been one of two co-chairs of Alliance 90/The Greens. He received 79.2 percent of the delegate votes.[citation needed]
Anti-nuclear protest near nuclear waste disposal centre at Gorleben in northern Germany on 8 November 2008
In the 2009 elections, Özdemir was not elected to the Bundestag. As a candidate in the constituency of Stuttgart I, which covers south Stuttgart he polled 29.9%, but lost to Stefan Kaufmann, the candidate of the CDU.[citation needed]
Member of the German Bundestag, 2013–present
Özdemir re-entered the Bundestag as a result of the 2013 elections. He served as deputy chairman of the German-Chinese Parliamentary Friendship Group.[citation needed] In 2017, Özdemir ran for the male top candidacy of the Greens in the subsequent federal election and narrowly won the party membership election over Schleswig-Holstein Deputy Minister-President Robert Habeck and Bundestag parliamentary leader Anton Hofreiter by only 75 votes. He led the Greens into the federal election alongside parliamentary leader Katrin Göring-Eckardt. Following the election, the Greens were first expected to form a government with the CDU and the FDP, in which Özdemir was widely expected to become the Minister of Foreign Affairs. However, when the FDP abruptly ended the negotiations, this fell apart. Özdemir had already declared not to stand for reelection as party leader (with Robert Habeck succeeding him), and the parliamentary leadership had been reelected directly after the federal election, so there was no leadership post left for him. Instead, from 2018 until 2021, he chaired the Bundestag Committee on Transport. Nevertheless, Özdemir remained one of the most popular politicians of the country and at times even was the most popular politician, placed before Angela Merkel.
In September 2019, Özdemir unsuccessfully challenged incumbents Katrin Göring-Eckardt and Anton Hofreiter at the middle of the legislative term and announced his candidacy to co-chair the Green Party's parliamentary group, together with Kirsten Kappert-Gonther. Following the announcement of Fritz Kuhn to not seek re-election as Mayor of Stuttgart in 2020, Özdemir was widely considered a potential successor. Shortly after, he decided not to run for the position.In the negotiations to form a coalition government under the leadership of Minister-President of Baden-Württemberg Winfried Kretschmann following the 2021 state elections, Özdemir was a member of the working group on economic affairs, labor and innovation.
In May 2021, several months ahead of the national elections, various media outlets reported that Özdemir had been late to declare to the German Parliament's administration a total of €20,580 in additional income he had received over the course of five years – 2014 through 2018 – in his capacity as leader of the Green Party. In the negotiations to form a so-called traffic light coalition of the Social Democrats (SPD), the Green Party and the FDP following the 2021 federal elections, Özdemir led his party's delegation in the working group on economic policy; his co-chairs from the other parties were Carsten Schneider and Michael Theurer.
Minister of Food and Agriculture, 2021–present
Following the 2021 German federal election, the Greens entered government as part of a traffic light coalition led by Social Democrat Chancellor Olaf Scholz, and Özdemir was sworn in as Food and Agriculture Minister on 8 December 2021. The appointment of Özdemir, instead of outgoing parliamentary leader and biologist Anton Hofreiter by the party leaders Robert Habeck and Annalena Baerbock came after infighting within the party over the Agriculture Ministry, and was seen as somewhat surprising, since he had no prior experience in agriculture policy and was considered to be a moderate within the Greens, while Hofreiter was left-leaning.However, Özdemir had also been one of the most prominent and popular politicians in Germany for several years.
Özdemir is the only minister in the Scholz cabinet to come from an ethnic minority, and is the first government minister of Turkish descent in Germany's history.
In October 2023, Özdemir participated in the first joint cabinet retreat of the German and French governments in Hamburg, chaired by Scholz and President Emmanuel Macron.
In its ruling of 15 November 2023, the Federal Constitutional Court declared the second supplementary budget for 2021 as unconstitutional and therefore invalid. This resulted in a budget deficit of 17 billion euros for the 2024 federal budget. Özdemir announced one element of the government's response - the abolition of subsidies for agricultural diesel and the introduction of a vehicle tax for agricultural vehicles. This led to farmers' protests across the country.
Campaign for minister president of Baden Württemberg
In October 2024, SWR reported that Cem Özdemir wants to become the Green Party's top candidate in the state elections in Baden-Württemberg in spring 2026. Özdemir has long been considered a candidate for this task within the party. He should succeed Winfried Kretschmann, who has been the only Green head of government in a German state for 13 years.
01/22/2015
mar
2020
Day 66
It´s 07.10 in the morning and I got 5592 steps so far. And I did my workout without weights. Yesterday I reached more than 16.000 steps but I got some groceries in Bath Wildungen 4 kilometers away from my working place. Today I will not reach as many steps.
Yesterday I saw the most boring inauguration speech ever. Of course it was nothing else than Trump´s election rethorics. But I think that this time the effects will be felt by the nation. No more gendering means there will be an exodus. And Germany will welcome many creative people and many soldiers. Trump pardons the head of the proud boys sentenced for 16 years. That is a slap in the face of the people who defended the parliament with their lives and it´s a slap in the face of the whole justice-system and the people of the United states. Trump wants to welcome back many soldiers, well, perhaps those soldiers who wanted to mob their homosexual colleagues. Trump is going to mass-deportate, will destroy families and lives and he hasn´t seen the effect of an England-first in Great Britain, because he´s America-first and just wanted to visit the Queen. Well repercussions are gonna be felt because most of what he plans is against the law. Yes America is not going to prosper and we Europeans are gonna laugh about this president but only for a short time, because what he plans is dangerous. Naming the gulf of Mexico, Gulf of America, stupid, stupid Rat-Creature (google it and you will find hilarious comic strips of Jeff Smith´s "Bone"-comic).
And what does Muskito do. He shows the Hitler-Gruß, totally knowing that he will create a very heated discussion. Stupid, stupid Rat-Creature, again I´m just quoting and I would never dare to call Muskito that or Donald Dumb, uh Trump.
Today I would like to focus on Claudia Roth. She´s been there right in the beginning of the rise of the Green Party and she´s still active today and I want her to be active for many years to come. What a life, what a wonderful woman. I found this on wikipedia:
Claudia Benedikta Roth (German: [ˈklaʊdi̯a ˈʁoːt]; born 15 May 1955) is a German politician (Alliance 90/The Greens). She was one of the two party chairs from 2004 to 2013 and previously served as one of the vice presidents of the Bundestag. She is currently serving as Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media [de] in the government of Chancellor Olaf Scholz since 2021.
Biography
Roth was born in Ulm, Germany. She began her artistic work, which she always regarded as also being political, in the 1970s as a trained artistic director at a theatre in Memmingen. She then worked at the municipal theatre in Dortmund and the Hoffmanns-Comic-Teater, and subsequently began managing the political rock band "Ton Steine Scherben" until 1985, when the band disbanded due to the band's high debt burden.
She came into contact with the Green party on election campaign tours. In 1985, she became press spokesperson for the Green Party's parliamentary group in the Bundestag, despite being a newcomer to this line of work.
Member of the European Parliament
In West Germany's 1989 European elections, Roth was elected for the first time as a Member of the European Parliament for the Greens.
Roth served as a member of the new Committee on Civic Liberties and Internal Affairs, the Committee on Foreign Affairs and the Sub-Committee on Human Rights. In addition, she was a member of two committees of inquiry in the European Parliament, namely the Committee of Inquiry into Racism and Xenophobia and the Committee of Inquiry into Links between Organized Crime and Drugs, as well as of the EC-Turkey Joint Parliamentary Committee.
From 1989 to 1990, Roth briefly served as deputy chairperson of the Green Group in the European Parliament.
In the 1994 European elections, Roth was again elected to the European Parliament as a lead candidate of Alliance 90/The Greens. She was chairperson of the Green Group in the European Parliament until 1998, first alongside co-chairman Alexander Langer (1994–1995) and later Magda Aelvoet (1995–1998). During this second term as an MEP, she was again a member of the European Parliament Committee on Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs, the Sub-Committee on Human Rights and the EC-Turkey Joint Parliamentary Committee, of which she was elected deputy chairperson. She also remained involved with the Committee on Foreign Affairs as a substitute member.
Member of the German Bundestag
Roth in 2005
Claudia Roth ended her work as an MEP when she became part of the Alliance 90/The Greens parliamentary group in the Bundestag after the 1998 German federal election. She became a member of the Committee on the Affairs of the European Union and a substitute member of the Committee on Internal Affairs of the German Bundestag. Furthermore, she was elected chairperson of the newly established Committee on Human Rights and Humanitarian Aid.
On 9 March 2001, Roth was elected Federal chairperson of Alliance 90/The Greens at the party conference in Stuttgart and resigned as a Member of the Bundestag at the end of March 2001 as a result. At the same time, she was spokesperson of the Alliance 90/The Greens on women's affairs.
In the 2002 national elections, Roth was elected to the Bundestag as Bavarian lead candidate for Alliance 90/The Greens. Since then, she has been a member of the Bundestag's Committee on Foreign Affairs and the Committee on Cultural and Media Affairs. She is also cultural affairs spokesperson for the Alliance 90/The Greens parliamentary group in the Bundestag and chairperson of the German-Turkish Parliamentary Friendship Group.
Between March 2003 and October 2004, in Chancellor Gerhard Schröder's second cabinet, Roth served as the Federal Government Commissioner for Human Rights Policy and Humanitarian Aid at the Federal Foreign Office.
Roth became federal chairperson of Alliance 90/The Greens again in October 2004 and was re-elected as such several times, most recently in November 2010. In 2012, she failed to become the number-one woman in the campaign for the 2013 national elections. After this defeat she was unsure to run again for the position of leader of the party's board. Fellow party member Volker Beck started a support campaign in favour of her in social media networks and called it candystorm. The party members subsequently re-elected Roth with 88.5 percent backing.
Roth served as deputy chairwoman of the German-Iranian Parliamentary Friendship Group between 2005 and 2009 and held the same office in the German-Turkish Friendship Group between 2005 and 2013.
Vice-President of the German Bundestag
Roth was elected as Vice-President of the German Bundestag on 22 October 2013. In addition, she is a member of the parliament's Council of Elders, which – among other duties – determines daily legislative agenda items and assigning committee chairpersons based on party representation. She also serves as a member of the Committee on Economic Cooperation and Development as well as of the Sub-Committee on Cultural Relations and Education Policy. In addition, she is a member of the Art Advisory Board of the German Bundestag.
In the unsuccessful negotiations to form a coalition government with the Christian Democrats – both the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) and the Christian Social Union in Bavaria (CSU) – and the Free Democratic Party (FDP) following the 2017 national elections, Roth was part of the 14-member delegation of the Green Party. In the negotiations to form a so-called traffic light coalition of the Social Democrats (SPD), the Green Party and the FDP following the 2021 federal elections, she led her party's delegation in the working group on cultural affairs and media; her co-chairs from the other parties are Carsten Brosda and Otto Fricke.
Political career
- 1985–1989: Press spokeswoman for the Green party of West Germany
- 1985–1998: Member of the European Parliament (Chairwoman of the Green Party faction from 1994 to 1998)
- 1998 – March 2001: Member of the Green Party faction in the German Parliament (Bundestag)
- Chairwoman of the Human Rights Board in the German Parliament
- March 2001 – December 2002: Chairwoman of the German Green Party (together with Fritz Kuhn)
- 22 September 2002 – present: Member of the Green Party faction in the Bundestag
- October 2004 – October 2013: Chairwoman of the German Green Party (together with Reinhard Bütikofer until 2008, then Cem Özdemir)
- 22 October 2013 – present: Vice president of the Bundestag
Day 65
It´s 7.00 in the morning. After I reached more than 21.000 steps yesterday, even though the church was closed - can you believe that - I´m back in my old rhythm. I got up at 4.00 did my workout with weights and on my walk 5732 steps so far.
This week I´m going to concentrate on the green party of Germany. I grew up with them and there was so much enthusiam, when they first entered the Bundestag. Fresh faces, fresh ideas, there was revolution in the air. But there also was the other side. A group wanted to legalize sex with young boys, because that was something normal in ancient greece and even great philosophers had it.... Well, simply sad, what a megalomaniac idea. Now we have got Trump and Muskito for that. And when the green party formed the coalition with the SPD there was a time for realism and of course the realisation that not all the really good ideas can be realised. I found this on Wikipedia:
Alliance 90/The Greens (German: Bündnis 90/Die Grünen, pronounced [ˈbʏntnɪs ˈnɔʏntsɪç diː ˈɡʁyːnən] ⓘ), often simply referred to as Greens[a] (Grüne, pronounced [ˈɡʁyːnə] ⓘ), is a centre to centre-left green political party in Germany. It was formed in 1993 by the merger of the Greens (formed in West Germany in 1980) and Alliance 90 (formed in East Germany in 1990). The Greens had itself merged with the East German Green Party after German reunification in 1990.
Since November 2024, Franziska Brantner and Felix Banaszak have been co-leaders of the party. It currently holds 117 of the 733 seats in the Bundestag, having won 14.8% of votes cast in the 2021 federal election, and its parliamentary group is the third largest of six. Its parliamentary co-leaders are Britta Haßelmann and Katharina Dröge. The Greens have been part of the federal government twice: first as a junior partner to the Social Democrats (SPD) from 1998 to 2005, and then with the SPD and the Free Democratic Party (FDP) in the traffic light coalition from the 2021 election until that coalition's collapse in 2024. In the incumbent Scholz cabinet, the Greens have five ministers, including Vice-Chancellor Robert Habeck and Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock.
The party holds seats in most of Germany's state legislatures, except Saarland, Thuringia and Brandenburg, and is a member of coalition governments in seven states. Winfried Kretschmann, Minister-President of Baden-Württemberg, is the only Green head of government in Germany. The Landtag of Baden-Württemberg is also the only state legislature in which Alliance 90/The Greens is the largest party; it is the second largest party in the legislatures of Berlin, Hamburg, and Schleswig-Holstein.
Alliance 90/The Greens is a founding member of the European Green Party and the Greens–European Free Alliance group in the European Parliament. It is currently the largest party in the G/EFA group, with 21 MEPs. In the 2019 European election, Alliance 90/The Greens was the second largest party in Germany, winning 20.5% of votes cast. The party had 126,451 members in December 2022, making it the fourth largest party in Germany by membership.
History
Background
The Green Party was initially founded in West Germany as Die Grünen (the Greens) in January 1980. It grew out of the anti-nuclear energy, environmental, peace, new left, and new social movements of the late 20th century.
Grüne Liste Umweltschutz (green list for environmental protection) was the name used for some branches in Lower Saxony and other states in the Federal Republic of Germany. These groups were founded in 1977 and took part in several elections. Most of them merged with The Greens in 1980.
The West Berlin state branch of The Greens was founded as Alternative Liste, or precisely, Alternative Liste für Demokratie und Umweltschutz (AL; alternative list for democracy and environmental protection) in 1978 and became the official West Berlin branch of The Greens in 1980. In 1993, it renamed to Alliance 90/The Greens Berlin after the merger with East Berlin's Greens and Alliance 90.
The Hamburg state branch of the Green Party was called Grün-Alternative Liste Hamburg (GAL; green-alternative list) from its foundation in 1982 until 2012. In 1984, it became the official Hamburg branch of The Greens.
12–13 January 1980: Foundation congress
The political party The Greens (German: Die Grünen) sprung out of the wave of New Social Movements that were active in the 1970s, including environmentalist, anti-war, and anti-nuclear movements which can trace their origin to the student protests of 1968. Officially founded as a German national party on 13 January 1980 in Karlsruhe, the party sought to give these movements political and parliamentary representation, as the pre-existing peoples parties [de] were not organised in a way to address their stated issues. Its membership included organisers from former attempts to achieve institutional representation such as GLU [de] and AUD [de]. Opposition to pollution, use of nuclear power, NATO military action, and certain aspects of industrialised society were principal campaign issues.[citation needed] The party also championed sexual liberation and some of their members supported the abolition of age of consent laws.
The formation of a party was purportedly first discussed by movement leaders in 1978. Important figures in the first years were – among others – Petra Kelly, Joschka Fischer, Gert Bastian, Lukas Beckmann [de], Rudolf Bahro, Joseph Beuys, Antje Vollmer, Herbert Gruhl [de], August Haußleiter, Luise Rinser, Dirk Schneider [de], Christian Ströbele, Jutta Ditfurth, Baldur Springmann and Werner Vogel.
In the foundational congress of 1980, the ideological tenets of the party were consolidated, proclaiming the famous Four Pillars of the Green Party:
1980s: Parliamentary representation on the federal level
In 1982, the conservative factions of the Greens broke away to form the Ecological Democratic Party (ÖDP). Those who remained in the Green party were more strongly pacifist and against restrictions on immigration and reproductive rights, while supporting the legalisation of cannabis use, placing a higher priority on working for LGBT rights, and tending to advocate what they described as "anti-authoritarian" concepts of education and child-rearing. They also tended to identify more closely with a culture of protest and civil disobedience, frequently clashing with police at demonstrations against nuclear weapons, nuclear energy, and the construction of a new runway (Startbahn West) at Frankfurt Airport. Those who left the party at the time might have felt similarly about some of these issues, but did not identify with the forms of protest that Green party members took part in.[citation needed]
After some success at state-level elections, the party won 27 seats with 5.7% of the vote in the Bundestag, the lower house of the German parliament, in the 1983 federal election. Among the important political issues at the time was the deployment of Pershing II IRBMs and nuclear-tipped cruise missiles by the U.S. and NATO on West German soil, generating strong opposition in the general population that found an outlet in mass demonstrations. The newly formed party was able to draw on this popular movement to recruit support. Partly due to the impact of the Chernobyl disaster in 1986, and to growing awareness of the threat of air pollution and acid rain to German forests (Waldsterben), the Greens increased their share of the vote to 8.3% in the 1987 federal election. Around this time, Joschka Fischer emerged as the unofficial leader of the party, which he remained until resigning all leadership posts following the 2005 federal election.
The Greens were the target of attempts by the East German secret police to enlist the cooperation of members who were willing to align the party with the agenda of the German Democratic Republic. The party ranks included several politicians who were later discovered to have been Stasi agents, including Bundestag representative Dirk Schneider, European Parliament representative Brigitte Heinrich, and Red Army Faction defense lawyer Klaus Croissant. Greens politician and Bundestag representative Gert Bastian was also a founding member of Generals for Peace [de], a pacifist group created and funded by the Stasi, the revelation of which may have contributed to the murder-suicide in which he killed his partner and Greens founder Petra Kelly.[15] A study commissioned by the Greens determined that 15 to 20 members intimately cooperated with the Stasi and another 450 to 500 had been informants.
Until 1987, the Greens included a faction involved in pedophile activism, the SchwuP short for Arbeitsgemeinschaft "Schwule, Päderasten und Transsexuelle" (approx. working group "Gays, Pederasts and Transsexuals"). This faction campaigned for repealing § 176 of the German penal code, dealing with child sexual abuse. This group was controversial within the party itself, and was seen as partly responsible for the poor election result of 1985.[18] This controversy re-surfaced in 2013 and chairwoman Claudia Roth stated she welcomed an independent scientific investigation on the extent of influence pedophile activists had on the party in the mid-1980s. In November 2014, the political scientist Franz Walter presented the final report about his research on a press conference.
1990s: German reunification, electoral failure in the West, formation of Alliance 90/The Greens
In the 1990 federal elections, taking place post-reunified Germany, the Greens in the West did not pass the 5% limit required to win seats in the Bundestag. It was only due to a temporary modification of German election law, applying the five-percent "hurdle" separately in East and West Germany, that the Greens acquired any parliamentary seats at all. This happened because in the new states of Germany, the Greens, in a joint effort with Alliance 90, a heterogeneous grouping of civil rights activists, were able to gain more than 5% of the vote. Some critics attribute this poor performance to the reluctance of the campaign to cater to the prevalent mood of nationalism, instead focusing on subjects such as global warming. A campaign poster at the time proudly stated, "Everyone is talking about Germany; we're talking about the weather!", paraphrasing a popular slogan of Deutsche Bundesbahn, the German national railway. The party also opposed imminent reunification that was in process, instead wanting to initiate debates on ecology and nuclear issues before reunification causing a drop in support in Western Germany.[22] After the 1994 federal election; however, the merged party returned to the Bundestag, and the Greens received 7.3% of the vote nationwide and 49 seats.
1998–2002: Greens as governing party, first term
A cycle rickshaw (velotaxi) in front of the German Bundestag in Berlin with the Alliance 90/The Greens livery for the 2005 federal election
In the 1998 federal election, despite a slight fall in their percentage of the vote (6.7%), the Greens retained 47 seats and joined the federal government for the first time in 'Red-Green' coalition government with the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD). Joschka Fischer became Vice-Chancellor of Germany and foreign minister in the new government, which had two other Green ministers (Andrea Fischer, later Renate Künast, and Jürgen Trittin).
Almost immediately the party was plunged into a crisis by the question of German participation in the NATO actions in Kosovo. Numerous anti-war party members resigned their party membership when the first post-war deployment of German troops in a military conflict abroad occurred under a Red-Green government, and the party began to experience a long string of defeats in local and state-level elections. Disappointment with the Green participation in government increased when anti-nuclear power activists realised that shutting down the nation's nuclear power stations would not happen as quickly as they wished, and numerous pro-business SPD members of the federal cabinet opposed the environmentalist agenda of the Greens, calling for tacit compromises.
In 2001, the party experienced a further crisis as some Green Members of Parliament refused to back the government's plan of sending military personnel to help with the 2001 invasion of Afghanistan. Chancellor Gerhard Schröder called a vote of confidence, tying it to his strategy on the war. Four Green MPs and one Social Democrat voted against the government, but Schröder was still able to command a majority.
On the other hand, the Greens achieved a major success as a governing party through the 2000 decision to phase out the use of nuclear energy. Minister of Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety Jürgen Trittin reached an agreement with energy companies on the gradual phasing out of the country's nineteen nuclear power plants and a cessation of civil usage of nuclear power by 2020. This was authorised through the Nuclear Exit Law. Based on an estimate of 32 years as the normal period of operation for a nuclear power plant, the agreement defines precisely how much energy a power plant is allowed to produce before being shut down. This law has since been overturned.
2002–2005: Greens as governing party, second term
Despite the crises of the preceding electoral period, in the 2002 federal election, the Greens increased their total to 55 seats (in a smaller parliament) and 8.6%. This was partly due to the perception that the internal debate over the war in Afghanistan had been more honest and open than in other parties, and one of the MPs who had voted against the Afghanistan deployment, Hans-Christian Ströbele, was directly elected to the Bundestag as a district representative for the Friedrichshain-Kreuzberg – Prenzlauer Berg East constituency in Berlin, becoming the first Green to ever gain a first-past-the-post seat in Germany.
The Greens benefited from increased inroads among traditionally left-wing demographics which had benefited from Green-initiated legislation in the 1998–2002 term, such as environmentalists (Renewable Energies Act) and LGBT groups (Registered Partnership Law). Perhaps most important for determining the success of both the Greens and the SPD was the increasing threat of war in Iraq, which was highly unpopular with the German public, and helped gather votes for the parties which had taken a stand against participation in this war. Despite losses for the SPD, the Red-Green coalition government retained a very slight majority in the Bundestag (4 seats) and was renewed, with Joschka Fischer as foreign minister, Renate Künast as minister for consumer protection, nutrition and agriculture, and Jürgen Trittin as minister for the environment.
One internal issue in 2002 was the failed attempt to settle a long-standing discussion about the question of whether members of parliament should be allowed to become members of the party executive. Two party conventions declined to change the party statute. The necessary majority of two-thirds was missed by a small margin. As a result, former party chairpersons Fritz Kuhn and Claudia Roth (who had been elected to parliament that year) were no longer able to continue in their executive function and were replaced by former party secretary general Reinhard Bütikofer and former Bundestag member Angelika Beer. The party then held a member referendum on this question in the spring of 2003 which changed the party statute. Now members of parliament may be elected for two of the six seats of the party executive, as long as they are not ministers or caucus leaders. 57% of all party members voted in the member referendum, with 67% voting in favor of the change. The referendum was only the second in the history of Alliance 90/The Greens, the first having been held about the merger of the Greens and Alliance 90. In 2004, after Angelika Beer was elected to the European Parliament, Claudia Roth was elected to replace her as party chair.
Federal party convention in Oldenburg; Renate Künast speaking (2005)
The only party convention in 2003 was planned for November 2003, but about 20% of the local organisations forced the federal party to hold a special party convention in Cottbus early to discuss the party position regarding Agenda 2010, a major reform of the German welfare programmes planned by Chancellor Schröder.
The November 2003 party convention was held in Dresden and decided the election platform for the 2004 European Parliament elections. The German Green list for these elections was headed by Rebecca Harms (then leader of the Green party in Lower Saxony) and Daniel Cohn-Bendit, previously Member of the European Parliament for The Greens of France. The November 2003 convention is also noteworthy because it was the first convention of a German political party ever to use an electronic voting system.
The Greens gained a record 13 of Germany's 99 seats in these elections, mainly due to the perceived competence of Green ministers in the federal government and the unpopularity of the Social Democratic Party.
In early 2005, the Greens were the target of the German Visa Affair 2005, instigated in the media by the Christian Democratic Union (CDU). At the end of April 2005, they celebrated the decommissioning of the Obrigheim nuclear power station. They also continue to support a bill for an Anti-Discrimination Law (Allgemeines Gleichbehandlungsgesetz [de]) in the Bundestag.
In May 2005, the only remaining state-level red-green coalition government lost the vote in the North Rhine-Westphalia state election, leaving only the federal government with participation of the Greens (apart from local governments). In the early 2005 federal election the party incurred very small losses and achieved 8.1% of the vote and 51 seats. However, due to larger losses of the SPD, the previous coalition no longer had a majority in the Bundestag.
2005–2021: In opposition
For almost two years after the federal election in 2005, the Greens were not part of any government at the state or federal level. In June 2007, the Greens in Bremen entered into a coalition with the Social Democratic Party (SPD) following the 2007 Bremen state election.
Professionalization of G-Coordination since 2007
In April 2008, following the 2008 Hamburg state election, the Green-Alternative List (GAL) in Hamburg entered into a coalition with the Christian Democratic Union (CDU), the first such [de] state-level coalition in Germany. Although the GAL had to agree to the deepening of the Elbe River, the construction of a new coal-fired power station and two road projects they had opposed, they also received some significant concessions from the CDU. These included reforming state schools by increasing the number of primary school educational stages, the restoration of trams as public transportation in the city-state, and more pedestrian-friendly real estate development. On 29 November 2010, the coalition collapsed, resulting in an election that was won by SPD.
Following the Saarland state election of August 2009, The Greens held the balance of power after a close election where no two-party coalitions could create a stable majority government. After negotiations, the Saarland Greens rejected the option of a left-wing 'red-red-green' coalition with the SPD and The Left (Die Linke) in order to form a centre-right state government with the CDU and Free Democratic Party (FDP), a historical first time that a Jamaica coalition has formed in German politics.
In June 2010, in the first state election following the victory of the CDU/CSU and FDP in the 2009 federal election, the "black-yellow" CDU-FDP coalition in North Rhine-Westphalia under Jürgen Rüttgers lost its majority. The Greens and the SPD came one seat short of a governing majority, but after multiple negotiations about coalitions of SPD and Greens with either the FDP or The Left, the SPD and Greens decided to form a minority government, which was possible because under the constitution of North Rhine-Westphalia a plurality of seats is sufficient to elect a minister-president. So a red-green government in a state where it was defeated under Peer Steinbrück in 2005 came into office again on 14 June 2010 with the election of Hannelore Kraft as minister-president (Cabinet Kraft I).
The Greens founded the first international chapter of a German political party in the U.S. on 13 April 2008 at the Goethe-Institut in Washington D.C. Its main goal is "to provide a platform for politically active and green-oriented German citizens, in and beyond Washington D.C., to discuss and actively participate in German Green politics. [...] to foster professional and personal exchange, channeling the outcomes towards the political discourse in Germany."
In March 2011 (two weeks after the Fukushima nuclear disaster had begun), the Greens made large gains in Rhineland-Palatinate and in Baden-Württemberg. In Baden-Württemberg they became the senior partner in a governing coalition for the first time. Winfried Kretschmann is now the first Green to serve as Minister-President of a German State (Cabinet Kretschmann I and II). Polling data from August 2011 indicated that one in five Germans supported the Greens.From 4 October 2011 to 4 September 2016, the party was represented in all state parliaments.
Like the Social Democrats, the Greens backed Chancellor Angela Merkel on most bailout votes in the German parliament during her second term, saying their pro-European stances overrode party politics. Shortly before the elections, the party plummeted to a four-year low in the polls, undermining efforts by Peer Steinbrück's Social Democrats to unseat Merkel.[28] While being in opposition on the federal level since 2005, the Greens have established themselves as a powerful force in Germany's political system. By 2016, the Greens had joined 11 out of 16 state governments in a variety of coalitions.Over the years, they have built up an informal structure called G-coordination to organize interests between the federal party office, the parliamentary group in the Bundestag, and the Greens governing on the state level.
The Greens remained the smallest of six parties in the Bundestag in the 2017 federal election, winning 8.9% of votes. After the election, they entered into talks for a Jamaica coalition with the CDU and FDP. Discussions collapsed after the FDP withdrew in November.
After the federal election and unsuccessful Jamaica negotiations, the party held elections for two new co-leaders; incumbents Özdemir and Peter did not stand for re-election. Robert Habeck and Annalena Baerbock were elected with 81% and 64% of votes, respectively. Habeck had served as deputy premier and environment minister in Schleswig-Holstein since 2012, while Baerbock had been a leading figure in the party's Brandenburg branch since 2009. Their election was considered a break with tradition, as they were both members of the moderate wing.
The Greens saw a major surge in support during the Bavarian and Hessian state elections in October 2018, becoming the second largest party in both.[33][34] They subsequently rose to second place behind the CDU/CSU in national polling, averaging between 17% and 20% over the next six months.
A map showing the percentage of votes won by the Greens by district and state in the 2019 European Parliament election. Darker shades indicate a higher vote share.
In the 2019 European Parliament election, the Greens achieved their best ever result in a national election, placing second with 20.5% of the vote and winning 21 seats. National polling released after the election showed a major boost for the party. The first poll after the election, conducted by Forsa, showed the Greens in first place on 27%. This was the first time the Greens had ever been in first place in a national opinion poll, and the first time in the history of the Federal Republic that any party other than the CDU/CSU or SPD had placed first in a national poll. This trend continued as polls from May to July showed the CDU/CSU and Greens trading first place, after which point the CDU/CSU pulled ahead once more. The Greens continued to poll in the low 20% range into early 2020.
The Greens recorded best-ever results in the Brandenburg (10.8%) and Saxony (8.6%) state elections in September 2019, and subsequently joined coalition governments in both states. They suffered an unexpected decline in the Thuringian election in October, only narrowing retaining their seats with 5.2%. In the February 2020 Hamburg state election, the Greens became the second largest party, winning 24.2% of votes cast.
In March 2021, the Greens improved their performance in Baden-Württemberg, where they remained the strongest party with 32.6% of votes, and Rhineland-Palatinate, where they moved into third place with 9.3%.[
Due to their sustained position as the second most popular party in national polling ahead of the September 2021 federal election, the Greens chose to forgo the traditional dual lead-candidacy in favour of selecting a single Chancellor candidate. Co-leader Annalena Baerbock was announced as Chancellor candidate on 19 April and formally confirmed on 12 June with 98.5% approval.
A map showing the percentage of votes won by the Greens by constituency and state in the 2021 federal election. Darker shades indicate a higher vote share.
The Greens surged in opinion polls in late April and May, briefly surpassing the CDU as the most popular party in the country, but their numbers slipped back after Baerbock was caught up in several controversies. Her personal popularity also fell below that of both Armin Laschet and Olaf Scholz, the Chancellor candidates for the CDU and SPD, respectively. The party's fortunes did not reverse even after the July floods, which saw climate change return as the most important issue among voters.The situation worsened in August as the SPD surged into first place to the detriment of both the CDU and Greens.
2021–present: Return to government
The Greens finished in third place in the 2021 federal election with 14.8% of votes. Though their best ever federal election result, it was considered a bitter disappointment in light of their polling numbers during the previous three years. They entered coalition talks with the FDP and SPD, eventually joining a traffic light coalition under Chancellor Olaf Scholz which took office on 8 December 2021.The Greens have five ministers in the Scholz cabinet, including Robert Habeck as Vice-Chancellor and Annalena Baerbock as foreign minister.
Since party statute mandates that party leaders may not hold government office, Baerbock and Habeck stepped down after entering cabinet. At a party conference in January 2022, Ricarda Lang and Omid Nouripour were elected to succeed them. At the time of her election, Lang was 28 years old, speaker for women's issues, and a former leader of the Green Youth. 46-year-old Nouripour was foreign affairs spokesman and a member of the Bundestag since 2006. Of the new leaders, Lang is considered a representative of the party's left-wing, while Nouripour represents the right-wing.
Lang and Nouripour announced their resignations as party leaders in September 2024 after heavy defeats in the Saxony, Thuringia and Brandenburg state elections that month. In all three states, governing coalitions involving the Greens were not returned, and the party was wiped out in the latter two states while only narrowly retaining representation in Saxony. The party had fallen out of five state governments (additionally Berlin and Hesse) since entering the federal governing coalition in 2021. Analysts pointed to its participation in the federal government requiring it to take stances that are contrary to its traditional clean-energy and pacifist ideals, as well as a stark collapse in support with young voters. Lang and Nouripour remained in office until successors are elected in November.
Felix Banaszak and Franziska Brantner elected as co-leaders in November. Meanwhile, party chose current Vice Chancellor Robert Habeck as their Chancellor candidate for the 2025 federal election.
01/20/2025
01/18/2025
Day 64
It´s 4.30 in the morning and of course I didn´t make any steps yet, well only 36 to go to the toilet and back to bed. Yesterday I reached 16658 steps, which was not bad, because it was a family day (and because I reached most of the steps while my ladies were still in bed). Today I will go on a walk at 6.00 o´clock again. It will be -3 degree by then. But the next days we will hit higher temperatures. Bayer04 won again yesterday, which still fuels me, juices me up. I will walk to the open-air-gym, where I work with weights, which a few years I never thought of and which I won´t reveal here, because even you wouldn´t believe me (oh my god, I sound like Trump should sound). We are invited on a birthday party, which is nice and I will drive to Bath Wildungen again to my next work-week.
Why the SPD won´t be able to reach more than 18 % of the votes (I still think that this is realistic) and why Olaf Scholz won´t be chancelor: Thanks to Christian Lindner the impact of the SPD in the streetlight-coalition was never that visible. Olaf Scholz mostly interpreted his job as the middle brother who had to hold the family together and who had to find compromisses, while the other two brothers sometimes had wild ideas (I decided to focus on the green party next week, followed by the FDP before I have to turn to the AFD, although they will get a ludicrous amount of votes but are a Fliegenschiss in der Geschichte Deutschlands). Other explenations are: Because Lindner wanted the vote to be sooner than planned the effect in my opinion always is a turn away from the status quo. Why do we have an election? Because the streetlight-coalition failed. And because of that voters tend to look for an alternative (even the AFD, Alternative Für Deutschland). Lindner knew that an election will strengthen the right-wing party, blast him. But I think that the biggest fail of the SPD is, that it doesn´t have a connection to younger people. Klaus Wowereit former SPD-mayor of Berlin once said Berlin is poor but sexy and that made the SPD look sexy (well, although because Klaus Wowereit was openly gay, which was refreshing in those times). Kevin Kühnert who was general secretary of the SPD was young and he was active in the SPD since being 16 years old. And in my opinion he should have been the candidate for chancelor but in mid 2024 he quit because of his illness (probably a depression). And now the SPD cannot reach the next generations any more. And the result will be 18% or less but a junior position in a "big coalition" with CDU/CSU otherwise they will get invisible in the opposition because of the other parties more extreme behaviour.
Day 63
It´s 05.10 in the morning and I only got 137 steps, since I only went to into the cellar to clear the washing machine and put a part of the wet clothes into the dryer. At 6.00 o´clock I´ll walk to the Bayer04 open air gym and I´ll go the limits, well not to the limits of right knee, but that theme gets a little boring, doesn´t it. And at 8.00 I will ride my bicycle to Leichlingen, where I will buy 25 american superhero-comics, mainly DC but also some old Ultimate Spider-Man (HCs and TPBs) and hope I can savely transport them back. I hope my wife doesn´t see me, she would be so mad. But it´s just 170 Euros for them, it´s a great offer.
Yesterday Markus Söder (CSU and never chancelor) had to present a book about Friedrich Merz (CDU and next chancelor) and you can imagine how pissed he is about it. When asked about the differences between him and Merz he focused on his better grades at school. What a lame asshole...
Well today I´m gonna present Olaf Scholz. When the streetlight-coalition started, I was so enthusiastic, because Olaf Scholz in my opinion had a good relationship with Angela Merkel and I thought him to be the perfect successor. But the coalition had a hard time because of the ukraine-war and the price-increases, like Biden had. And of course now the people are in mood for change. Olaf Scholz was part of the Cum-Ex-Scandal and he still just says I don´t remember or he avoids this topic. And that is not good in my opinion. He reacts like some patients I liked to treat, but not like a chancelor, that he still is, but won´t be for long, I fear... I found this on Wikipedia:
Olaf Scholz (German: [ˈoːlaf ˈʃɔlts] ⓘ; born 14 June 1958) is a German politician who has been Chancellor of Germany since 2021. A member of the Social Democratic Party (SPD), he previously served as vice chancellor in the fourth Merkel cabinet and as Federal Minister of Finance from 2018 to 2021. He was also First Mayor of Hamburg from 2011 to 2018, deputy leader of the SPD from 2009 to 2019, and Federal Minister of Labour and Social Affairs from 2007 to 2009.
Scholz began his career as a lawyer specialising in labour and employment law. He became a member of the SPD in the 1970s and was a member of the Bundestag from 1998 to 2011. Scholz served in the Hamburg Government under First Mayor Ortwin Runde in 2001 and became general secretary of the SPD in 2002, where he served alongside SPD leader and then-chancellor Gerhard Schröder. He became his party's chief whip in the Bundestag, later entering the First Merkel Government in 2007 as Federal Minister for Labour and Social Affairs. After the SPD moved into the opposition following the 2009 election, Scholz returned to lead the SPD in Hamburg. He was then elected deputy leader of the SPD. He led his party to victory in the 2011 Hamburg state election and became first mayor, a position he held until 2018.
After the Social Democratic Party entered the fourth Merkel government in 2018, Scholz was appointed as both minister of finance and Vice Chancellor of Germany. In 2020, he was nominated as the SPD's candidate for Chancellor of Germany for the 2021 federal election. The party won a plurality of seats in the Bundestag and formed a "traffic light coalition" with Alliance 90/The Greens and the Free Democratic Party. On 8 December 2021, Scholz was elected and sworn in as chancellor by the Bundestag, succeeding Angela Merkel.
As chancellor, Scholz has overseen Germany's response to the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine. Despite giving a restrained and timid response compared to many other Western leaders, Scholz oversaw a significant increase in the German defence budget, weapons shipments to Ukraine, and the Nord Stream 2 pipeline was put on hold. Three days after the invasion, Scholz set out the principles of a new German defence policy in his Zeitenwende speech. In September 2022, three of the four Nord Stream pipelines were destroyed. During the Israel–Hamas war, he authorized substantial German military and medical aid to Israel, and denounced the actions of Hamas and other Palestinian militant groups. In November 2023, the Federal Constitutional Court demanded budget cuts totaling €60 billion to ensure the government would not surpass debt limits as set in the constitution; this proved a significant challenge for Scholz's cabinet and contributed to the 2023–2024 protests.
On 6 November 2024, his government majority collapsed as he dismissed Christian Lindner from the post of Federal Minister of Finance and broke up the coalition agreement. On 16 December 2024, Scholz lost a vote of no confidence. On the same day, he requested the President of Germany to dissolve the Bundestag; the President, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, did so and called out new elections for 23 February 2025.
01/18/2025
01/17/2025
Day 62
It´s 07:15 in the morning and I just stored some stuff I need for the weekend for my family weekend. A present for a birthday party we´ll attend and all the stuff I need for the weekend..
I reached 6300 steps so far and I´m sure I will hit the 10.000 by 3.00 in the afternoon, when I will hit the road to Leverkusen. I did my workout with weights and the next two days I´ll use the Bayer-04 open-air-gym in Leverkusen.
Today I want to present Boris Pistorius. He has some similarities to Armin Laschet the last wanna-be chancelor of the CDU. He´s the head of the ministry of defense and more popular than Olaf Scholz, but he has only lead the ministry of defense and I think it´s the right decision that Olaf Scholz is the candidate of the SPD. I found this on Wikipedia:
Boris Ludwig Pistorius (German pronunciation: [ˈbɔʁɪs pɪsˈtoːʁiʊs];[] born 14 March 1960) is a German lawyer and politician. A member of the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD), he has served as Federal Minister of Defence in the cabinet of Chancellor Olaf Scholz since 19 January 2023.
Earlier in his career, Pistorius was a member of the State Parliament of Lower Saxony, and served as State Minister for Interior and Sports in the state government of Lower Saxony (Cabinet Weil II) from 2013 to 2017.From 2006 to 2013, Pistorius was Lord Mayor of Osnabrück.[
Early life and education
Pistorius was born in Osnabrück, the second son of Ursula Pistorius (née Raabe; 1933–2015) and Ludwig Pistorius (1923–2009). His mother was a member of the Osnabrück city council from 1972 to 1996 and also served as a member of the Landtag of Lower Saxony from 1978 to 1990.
After taking his abitur at the Ernst-Moritz-Arndt Gymnasium in Osnabrück, he was conscripted to military service in the Bundeswehr in 1980 before taking up law studies at the University of Münster and Osnabrück University, and also, for a brief period, at the Catholic University of the West.
Early career
Pistorius worked as the personal advisor to State Minister for Interior of Lower Saxony Gerhard Glogowski in government led by Minister-President Gerhard Schröder from 1991 to 1995, and was the deputy head of his office from 1995 to 1996.
Political career
Career in local politics
Pistorius joined the SPD in 1976.
Pistorius was part of the city council from 1996 until 2013 and from 1999 to 2002 he served as second mayor of Osnabrück.[
Pistorius served as Mayor of Osnabrück, starting his mayoral term on 7 November 2006 winning with 55.5% against Wolfgang Griesert[ who would later go on to become the Mayor after Pistorius's resignation due to his position at the Lower Saxony government in 2013.[
State Minister of the Interior and Sports (2013–2022)
After the Lower Saxony state elections in 2013, Pistorius was sworn in as State Minister of the Interior and Sports at the constituent session of the 17th State Parliament of Lower Saxony on 19 February 2013.
From 2013 to 2017, Pistorius was one of the state's representatives on the German Bundesrat; from 2017, he was an alternate member.[ In this capacity, he was a member of the German-Russian Friendship Group set up in cooperation with the Russian Federation Council. He was also an alternate member of the German delegation to the NATO Parliamentary Assembly, where he was part of the Political Committee, its Sub-Committee on NATO Partnerships and its Sub-Committee on Transatlantic Relations.[
During his time in office in state government, Pistorius was widely seen as standing out in his state for his tough stance on Islamist radicalism, terror threats, organized crime and far-right extremism.[
Role in national politics
In the negotiations to form a fourth coalition government under Chancellor Angela Merkel's leadership following the 2017 federal elections, Pistorius was part of the working group on internal and legal affairs, led by Thomas de Maizière, Stephan Mayer and Heiko Maas.
In the 2019 SPD leadership election, Pistorius was a candidate for the position as the party's co-chair, together with Saxony State Minister Petra Köpping.[Köpping and Pistorius came in fifth place, receiving only 14.41% of the vote.
In the negotiations to form a so-called traffic light coalition of the SPD, the Green Party and the Free Democrats (FDP) following the 2021 German elections, Pistorius led his party's delegation in the working group on migration and integration; the co-chairs from the other parties were Luise Amtsberg and Joachim Stamp.
Federal Minister of Defence (2023–present)
On 17 January 2023, Chancellor Olaf Scholz announced that Pistorius would succeed Christine Lambrecht, who resigned on 16 January after numerous political blunders, as Minister of Defence in Chancellor Olaf Scholz's cabinet.[21] This came as a surprise to many political observers, with SPD co-leader Lars Klingbeil and Bundestag Armed Forces Commissioner Eva Högl being floated most often as replacements.The appointment was criticized,[ as it would mean breaking the gender parity Scholz had promised upon the cabinet's formation.] A plausible explanation is that, in the acute European military crisis – many people, including people in the Bundeswehr – thought it irresponsible to again appoint somebody without any military experience, and to instead appoint based on competency rather than gender.
Pistorius with US Ambassador to Germany Amy Gutmann in 2023
Pistorius and US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin in Berlin, Germany, 19 January 2023
Pistorius was formally appointed by German president Frank-Walter Steinmeier and eventually took the oath of office at the Bundestag on 19 January 2023.
During his first year in office, Pistorius announced military aid worth 2.7 billion euro ($3.0 billion) to Ukraine both in May 2023[and 1 billion euros ($1.1 billion) in October 2023.
In March 2023, Pistorius participated in the first joint cabinet meeting of the governments of Germany and Japan in Tokyo, chaired by Chancellor Scholz and Prime Minister Fumio Kishida. In October 2023, he joined the first joint cabinet retreat of the German and French governments in Hamburg, chaired by Scholz and President Emmanuel Macron.
In July 2024, Christian Lindner warned Boris Pistorius that no additional funds would be provided for military modernization beyond what the coalition government had already agreed upon. This followed a budget decision that left Pistorius, responsible for revitalizing Germany's defenses amid increased security concerns following Russia's invasion of Ukraine, feeling disappointed. Lindner defended the funding arrangement, highlighting a special 100-billion-euro fund that had been made available to Pistorius for military upgrades, a resource unprecedented for previous defense ministers, and urged efficient use of these resources. This budgetary restraint came as the IMF noted that Germany's low public infrastructure investment was affecting its economic growth, despite having the lowest debt-to-GDP ratio in the G7.
Under Pistorius' leadership, Germany joined the US-led United Nations Command (UNC) in South Korea in August 2024, becoming the 18th nation to do so.[ Also in August 2024, Pistorius and his Philippine counterpart Gilberto Teodoro committed to establishing long-term relations between their armed forces to expand training and bilateral exchanges, explore opportunities to expand bilateral armaments cooperation and engage in joint projects.[
In July 2024, the United States announced its intention to deploy long-range missiles in Germany beginning in 2026.[35] US weapons in Germany would include SM-6 and Tomahawk cruise missiles and hypersonic weapons. The United States' decision to deploy missiles in Germany has been compared to the deployment of Pershing II launchers in Western Europe in the 1980s.[ The decision was supported by Boris Pistorius and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz. Critics say the move would trigger a new arms race. According to Russian military analysts, it would be extremely difficult to distinguish between a conventionally armed missile and a missile carrying a nuclear warhead, and Russia could respond by deploying longer-range nuclear systems targeting Germany.
Polling conducted in 2024 found Pistorius to be the most popular politician in Germany. He declined to be the SPD's Chancellor-candidate in the 2025 election.[
Day 61
Like yesterday it´s 7.00 in the morning. I did my workout without weights today. My right knee still doesn´t bend so well, so it´s still swollen but it doesn´t hurt at all. I interpret that as a good sign. And I think that I walk normally. I have got 5885 steps by now. Yesterday I got 12500 steps in total, which is good, because I didn´t have an additional walk to buy groceries.
This morning I listened to a podcast with the guest Christian Lindner. I will showcase him in four weeks. God, I really hate this guy. His only hope is that voters of the CDU/CSUI vote for the FDP, to have them in the coalition and he doesn´t realize, that he killed a coaltion for the second time. I don´t think anyone wants him in a coalition any more.
Today I want to present Karl Lauterbach. He is a person I really like. I like his humor. I like the strictness in his diet because he chose to live with very little salt. And he is a local politicion lives near our place (Leverkusen). I found this on Wikipedia:
Karl Wilhelm Lauterbach (German pronunciation: [kaʁl ˈlaʊtɐbax] ⓘ; born 21 February 1963) is a German scientist, physician, and politician of the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD), who has served as Federal Minister of Health since 8 December 2021. He is professor of health economics and epidemiology at the University of Cologne (on leave since 2005).Since the 2005 German federal election, he has been a member of the Bundestag (the German parliament).
During the COVID-19 pandemic in Germany, his name became well known through his frequent appearances on television talk shows as an invited guest expert, along with his frequent use of Twitter to provide commentary about the ongoing pandemic.[3]
Early life and education
Lauterbach studied human medicine at the RWTH Aachen University, University of Texas at San Antonio and graduated from the University of Düsseldorf. From 1989 to 1992, he studied health policy and management as well as epidemiology at the Harvard School of Public Health in Boston, graduating with a Doctor of Science in 1992.
Career
From 1992 to 1993, he held a fellowship at the Harvard Medical School, sponsored by the Konrad Adenauer Foundation, which is close to the CDU. Lauterbach was a CDU member for several years before joining the SPD in 2001.
From 1998 until 2005, Lauterbach served as the director of the Institute of Health Economics and Clinical Epidemiology (IGKE) at the University of Cologne.[He was a member of the Sachverständigenrat zur Begutachtung der Entwicklung im Gesundheitswesen (the council of experts advising the federal government on developments in the German healthcare system) from 1999 until he was elected to the Bundestag in September 2005.[ In 2003, he was a member of the Rürup Commission, a government-appointed committee of experts that was established to review the financing of the social insurance systems.
He was appointed adjunct professor at the Harvard School of Public Health in 2008.[
In the majority (16th) Bundestag and in opposition (17th Bundestag)
At the 2005 federal elections Lauterbach made his entry to the Bundestag with a direct mandate by winning in his electoral district Leverkusen – Cologne IV . He was part of the governing coalition until 2009, when his party went into opposition. Between 2005 and 2013, he served on the Health Committee. Within the SPD parliamentary group, Lauterbach belongs to the Parliamentary Left, a left-wing movement.[
Shadow Minister of Health (18th and 19th Bundestag)
Ahead of the 2013 federal elections, Peer Steinbrück included Lauterbach in his shadow cabinet for the SPD's campaign to unseat incumbent Chancellor Angela Merkel. During the campaign, he served as shadow minister of health. In the negotiations to form a government following the elections, he led the SPD delegation in the health working group and his co-chair from the CDU/CSU was Jens Spahn. From 2013 until 2019, he served as deputy chairman of the SPD parliamentary group under the leadership of successive chairpersons Thomas Oppermann (2013–2017) and Andrea Nahles (2017–2019).
Appointed by Federal Minister of Health Hermann Gröhe, Lauterbach served as member of an expert commission on the reform of Germany's hospital care from 2015 until 2017.[9] From 2018 until 2019, he chaired an expert commission advising Mayor of Berlin Michael Müller on strategies for the city's health sector.
2019 SPD leadership bid and COVID-19 advisor to Merkel
In the 2019 SPD leadership election, Lauterbach announced his intention to run for the position as the party's co-chair, together with Nina Scheer.[He has since been serving on the German Parliament's Committee on Legal Affairs and Consumer Protection and its Subcommittee on European Law.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, Lauterbach quickly rose to national prominence. He served as an advisor of Chancellor Angela Merkel during the pandemic.[He became well known to a wide audience through his frequency of appearances – an unsurpassed 30 by 17 December 2020 – as guest expert in talk shows, as well as his frequent use of Twitter.[ Early on in the pandemic, during the first lockdown from April to June 2020, he often cautioned against the negative effects of premature relaxation of restrictions.[ Later he was one of those who warned early of a second wave of the pandemic.[3] In August 2021, he criticized state governments – education is managed by individual states in Germany – for what he saw as their poor pandemic preparation for the upcoming school year, and proposed to limit travelling by long-distance trains to those with a recent negative COVID-19 test, the vaccinated, and the recovered (the '3G rule').[For his views he became the target of intense hatred by many critics[ and anti-vaxxers, frequently receiving death threats.[However, his reputation was believed to have contributed to his strong result in the 2021 federal election.
Minister of Health (20th Bundestag)
In the 2021 German federal election, Lauterbach comfortably won the seat in Leverkusen and thus secured his return to the Bundestag, in spite of not having been nominated at a top place in the SPD's party list.[ In the negotiations to form a so-called traffic light coalition of the SPD, the Green Party and the Free Democratic Party (FDP) following the 2021 federal elections, Lauterbach was part of his party's delegation in the working group on health, co-chaired by Katja Pähle, Maria Klein-Schmeink and Christine Aschenberg-Dugnus.[
In December 2021, Lauterbach was designated as Federal Minister of Health in the traffic light coalition.[5] He assumed the office on 8 December 2021 when the Scholz cabinet was formally appointed by President Frank-Walter Steinmeier. Due to Lauterbach's high profile in Germany as a media commentator on COVID-19 pandemic, The Economist' described his nomination to the cabinet as "perhaps the most eagerly awaited health minister appointment in the history of the democratic world".[
At his formal induction ceremony, Lauterbach said: "Health policy, as I see it, can only be successful when it’s anchored in evidence-based medicine."[On 10 December, the Bundestag passed a healthcare worker COVID-19 vaccine law, which was to come into effect on 15 March 2022. Lauterbach told the Bundestag that: "Such a vaccine mandate is necessary because it is completely unacceptable that at the end of the second year of this pandemic [despite Deltacron infection surge], Germans who live in care homes die unnecessarily because workers there are unvaccinated."[
On 11 December 2021, the Washington Post celebrated Lauterbach's appointment to Health Minister. Its headline read "Germany’s ‘Fauci,’ a Harvard-educated doctor, gets ready to tackle the pandemic", while it noted that the Health Ministry has an annual 56 billion euro budget.[ A week into his tenure during a visit to Hanover after Merkel's retirement, Lauterbach expressed concerns that Germany might be headed towards a much stronger fourth wave of COVID-19, fueled by Deltacron hybrid variant that is combined of Delta and Omicron mutations. However, Lauterbach also said that he expected the country to suffer from a vaccine shortage in the first quarter.
On 16 February 2022, Lauterbach said that German federal government will be easing COVID-19 restrictions alongside two neighboring countries, Austria and Switzerland, in the following words: "We can withdraw the restrictions step-by-step, but we should continue to be careful". However, on 28 March 2022 despite Germany reported 305,000 COVID-19 Deltacron cases, Lauterbach said that Germany will be lifted all COVID-19 restrictions up by 8 April, although COVID infections was "no longer increasing".[citation needed] As of May 2022, Germany has surpassed 140,000 COVID-related-deaths, a highest mortality toll.
On 14 April 2022, German federal prosecutors announced publicly that they had detained four people suspected of plotting to kidnap Lauterbach and destroy power facilities to cause a nationwide power outage.
On 18 May 2022, Lauterbach announced government plans to spend an additional 830 million euros on COVID-19 vaccines.[ On 19 May, Lauterbach expressed his approval of the Federal Constitutional Court's ruling that COVID-19 vaccines could be mandated for healthcare workers, in the following words: "The state is obliged to protect vulnerable groups."[
In August 2022 despite COVID Deltacron infection surge, Lauterbach announced his plans to submit for Parliamentary approval a new wave of COVID-19 measures: Masks would be mandatory on planes, trains, and long-distance buses from October 2022 to April 2023. Mask would be mandatory indoor public events, on local public transportation, and in schools, universities, and colleges.
On 13 October 2022, the ringleader of plot to kidnap Lauterbach was arrested. However, plotters were opposed to the federal government's COVID-19 measures amid Deltacron infection surge, and they were intent on "Triggering civil war-like conditions in Germany and thus ultimately bringing about the overthrow of the federal government and parliamentary democracy."[
On 26 October 2022, Lauterbach presented a cornerstone paper on planned legislation to regulate the controlled distribution and consumption of cannabis for recreational purposes among adults.[
On 28 November 2022, Lauterbach was said to be one of the main targets of a suspected terrorist group of conspirators that was rounded up by German federal police. However, the terrorist group planned his kidnapping, among other things. The terrorists planned to act during a talk show appearance of his, and in the further course of events, a coup was to be incited.[
In October 2023, Lauterbach participated in the first joint cabinet retreat of the German and French governments in Hamburg, chaired by Scholz and President Emmanuel Macron.[
01/16/2025
01/15/2025
Day 60
It´s 7.00 in the morning. I did my workout with weights today and by now I´ve got 5973 steps. Since I went out yesterday to buy some stuff in Bath Wildungen I reacht 16871 steps yesterday. Yesterday the temperature got up to 1 Degree Celsius and right now it´s the same temperature.
Bayer 04 won it´s 7th match in a row and if Bayern Munich would loose today there would only be 1 point difference in the German Bundesliga, but I don´t think that Bayern Munich will make the Bundesliga interesting today, but a part of me hopes for it.
The SPD has got some resorts in the current government. Before we turn to Olaf Scholz, chancellor and candidate for the next chancellor, I would like to introduce the ministry of the intereor and Nancy Faeser. She should change her name to Phaser, but I don´t know if she is a Trecki. I found this on Wikipedia:
Nancy Faeser (German pronunciation: [ˈnɛnsi ˈfɛːzɐ]; born 13 July 1970) is a German lawyer and politician of the Social Democratic Party (SPD), serving as Federal Minister of the Interior and Community in Chancellor Olaf Scholz's cabinet since 2021. She served as a member of the State Parliament of Hesse from the 2003 elections until 2021. In 2019, she became the party's leader in Hesse, as well as the leader of the Opposition in the Landtag of Hesse.
Education and early career
Faeser went to elementary school in Schwalbach am Taunus, a suburb of Frankfurt am Main, and passed her Abitur at the Albert-Einstein-Gymnasium.
From 1990 to 2000 Faeser studied law at the Goethe University Frankfurt. She completed a semester abroad at the New College of California and graduated with her second state bar exam as a licensed attorney
Until 2000, Faeser worked as a research assistant at Clifford Chance in Frankfurt am Main and then, after her bar exam, worked as a full-time lawyer at Clifford Chance from 2000 to 2007.[
Career in state politics
Faeser joined the SPD in 1988. In parliament, Faeser served as a member of the Committee on Legal Affairs (2003–2009), the Committee on the Election of Judges (2003–2013), the Committee on Economic Affairs, Energy and Transport (2014–2018) and the Committee on Internal Affairs (since 2009). From 2009, she was her parliamentary group's spokesperson on internal affairs.
In the 2013 Hesse state election, Faeser was the shadow minister for internal affairs in the campaign team of SPD candidate Thorsten Schäfer-Gümbel. In 2019, she was elected her parliamentary group's chairwoman.
On 17 June 2023, Faeser was elected as the top candidate on the party list in the upcoming 2023 Hessian state election, and also stood as the party's direct candidate in the Main-Taunus I electoral district in Frankfurt's northwestern suburbs, which includes her hometown of Schwalbach am Taunus. However, she won only 14.8% of the direct vote in the district, coming third after CDU (43.9%) and the Greens (16.1%).[She was elected on the party list, but all three federal government parties (SPD, the Greens and FDP) suffered losses in the election, with SPD winning only 15% of the vote in its worst performance in the state history and coming third after CDU (34.6%) and AfD (18.4%). The loss can be attributed to discontent with Scholz's government, of which she is a minister.[
Minister of the Interior, 2021–present
In the negotiations to form a so-called traffic light coalition of the SPD, the Green Party and the Free Democrats (FDP) following the 2021 German elections, Faeser was part of her party's delegation in the working group on migration and integration, co-chaired by Boris Pistorius, Luise Amtsberg and Joachim Stamp.
After the coalition was successfully formed, on 6 December 2021, it was announced that Faeser would become the first female Interior Minister of Germany in the German government in the Scholz cabinet. In her capacity as minister, Faeser also takes part in the meetings of the Standing Conference of Interior Ministers and Senators of the States (IMK).
Faeser was nominated by her party as delegate to the Federal Convention for the purpose of electing the President of Germany in 2022.
Nancy Faeser in 2023
In September 2022, the Ministry of the Interior under Faeser closed the "Expert Group on Political Islamism" set up by her predecessor, Horst Seehofer.[13]
Prior to the 2022 FIFA World Cup in Qatar, when asked in an interview with ARD's Monitor about the awarding of the event to the country, she emphasised that awarding major sporting events should be linked to compliance with human rights and principles of sustainability, by saying: "There are criteria that must be adhered to and it would be better that tournaments are not awarded to such states." In response, the Gulf Cooperation Council condemned the remarks, and Qatar summoned the German ambassador to protest against her comments. Faeser attended Germany's first game at the World Cup on 23 November where she wore a OneLove armband (a pro LGBTQ+ symbol) which FIFA had prevented players from wearing in the tournament with threats of sanctions.
Faeser with Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas in Munich, Germany, 18 February 2023
In March 2023, Faeser participated in the first joint cabinet meeting of the governments of Germany and Japan in Tokyo, chaired by Chancellor Scholz and Prime Minister Fumio Kishida.
In April 2023, Faeser appointed an eight-person commission to re-appraise the attack on Israeli athletes and team members at the 1972 Summer Olympics to answer unresolved questions.
After the outbreak of the Israel–Hamas war, Faeser passed laws criminalizing alleged Hamas slogans, including "from the river to the sea".] Liz Fekete criticized Faeser's interpretation that the slogan was uniquely linked to Hamas. Such a reading, according to Fekete, can be seen as "silencing Palestinians and smearing their aspirations".
In July 2024 Faeser imposed a ban on the magazin Compact arguing that the magazine worked against constitutional order. The editor-in-chief Jürgen Elsässer described the decision as "the worst invasion of press freedom in Germany."
Immigration
In her first year in office, Faeser extended border checks at crossings from Austria for six months after a rise in the number of migrants arriving via the Western Balkans route.
Following Faeser's propospal, Germany's coalition government listed Georgia and Moldova as safe countries of origin in August 2023, in an effort to process asylum applications from those countries more quickly and lead to faster deportations for failed applicants.
In September 2023, more than 120 boats carrying around 7,000 migrants from Africa arrived on the Italian island of Lampedusa within 24 hours. Faeser said that "in view of the massive influx of migrants to Lampedusa, Berlin wants to once again, voluntarily, accept migrants from Italy, which was recently halted."
Day 59
It´s 7.00 in the morning. I did my workout today without weights, my knee didn´t hurt, but it is still swollen, so I cannot bend it like the left knee. Since it doesn´t hurt at all I´m not goint to visit an orthopedian/orthopedic (?). I´ve already accumulated 5898 steps. It´s -10 degrees Celsius out there. And I felt every one minus-degree on my walk. But I got more secure than yesterday. I walked the same route with the same length but I took longer steps than yesterday, what explains the different steps. I have three kinds of shoes, that I use. I bought all of them at a discounter for 17.99 Euiros each. One pair is Winter-Jogging-Shoes, a little water protected and good profile. I used them the last days. On my walk through the oowder snow I used my soft-shell-.boots water-protected up until 70 minutes, but they did a very good job in the powder-snow,
Back to politics and back to the SPD. Oh Olaf, you don´t do a good job in your visit of the small regional groups, your jokes are lame and I don´t think I´m going to vote for the SPD either, although this is my traditional family vote. But the SPD has the richest history of all the German parties. I found this on wikipedia:
The Social Democratic Party has its origins in the General German Workers' Association, founded in 1863, and the Social Democratic Workers' Party, founded in 1869. The two groups merged in 1875 to create the Socialist Workers' Party of Germany [de] (German: Sozialistische Arbeiterpartei Deutschlands). From 1878 to 1890, the Anti-Socialist Laws banned any group that aimed at spreading socialist principles, but the party still gained support in elections. In 1890, when the ban was lifted, the party adopted its current name. The SPD was the largest Marxist party in Europe and consistently the most popular party in German federal elections from 1890 onward, although it was surpassed by other parties in terms of seats won in the Reichstag due to the electoral system.
In the years leading up to World War I, the SPD remained radical in principle, but moderate in reality. According to Roger Eatwell and Anthony Wright, the SPD became a party of reform, with social democracy representing "a party that strives after the socialist transformation of society by the means of democratic and economic reforms". They emphasise this development as central to understanding 20th-century social democracy, of which the SPD was a major influence.[] In the 1912 federal election, the SPD won 34.8 per cent of votes and became the largest party in the Reichstag with 110 seats, although it was still excluded from government. Despite the Second International's agreement to oppose militarism,[] the SPD supported the German war effort and adopted a policy, known as Burgfriedenspolitik, of refraining from calling strikes or criticising the government. Internal opposition to the policy grew throughout the war. Anti-war members were expelled in 1916 and 1917, leading to the formation of the Independent Social Democratic Party of Germany (USPD).
The SPD played a key role in the German Revolution of 1918–1919. On 9 November 1918, leading SPD member Friedrich Ebert was designated chancellor and fellow Social Democrat Philipp Scheidemann, on his own authority, proclaimed Germany a republic.[ The government introduced a large number of reforms in the following months, introducing various civil liberties and labor rights.The SPD government, committed to parliamentary liberal democracy, used military force against more radical communist groups, leading to a permanent split between the SPD and the USPD, as well as the Spartacist League which would go on to form the Communist Party of Germany (KPD) and integrate a majority of USPD members as well. The SPD was the largest party during the first 13 years of the new Weimar Republic. It decisively won the 1919 federal election with 37.9 per cent of votes, and Ebert became the first president in February. The position of chancellor was held by Social Democrats until the 1920 federal election, when the SPD lost a substantial portion of its support, falling to 22 per cent of votes. After this, the SPD yielded the chancellery to other parties, although it remained part of the government until 1924. Ebert died in 1925 and was succeeded by conservative Paul von Hindenburg. After making gains in the 1928 federal election, the SPD's Hermann Müller became chancellor.
A widely publicized SPD election poster from 1932, with the Three Arrows symbol representing resistance against reactionary conservatism, Nazism and Communism, and with the slogan "Against Papen, Hitler, Thälmann"
As Germany was struck hard by the Great Depression, and unable to negotiate an effective response to the crisis, Müller resigned in 1930. The SPD was sidelined as the Nazi Party gained popularity and conservatives dominated the government, assisted by Hindenburg's frequent use of emergency powers. The Reichsbanner Schwarz-Rot-Gold, the SPD's paramilitary wing, was frequently involved in violent confrontations with the Nazi Sturmabteilung.The Nazis overtook the SPD as the largest party in July 1932 and Adolf Hitler was appointed chancellor in January 1933. Of the parties present in the Reichstag during the passage of the Enabling Act of 1933, the SPD was the only one to vote against; most of the communist deputies had been arrested ahead of the vote.The SPD was banned in June. Many members were subsequently imprisoned and killed by the Nazi government while others fled the country. The party-in-exile was called Sopade.[ After the end of World War II, the re-establishment of the SPD was permitted in the Western occupation zones in 1945. In the Soviet occupation zone, the SPD was forcibly merged with the KPD in 1946 to form the Socialist Unity Party of Germany (SED). The SED was the ruling party of East Germany until 1989.[28] In West Germany, the SPD became one of two major parties, alongside the Christian Democratic Union (CDU). In the inaugural 1949 federal election, it placed second with 29.2 per cent of votes and led the opposition to the CDU government. In its 1959 Godesberg Program, the party dropped its commitment to Marxism and sought to appeal to middle class voters, becoming a big tent party of the centre-left.
Although strongly leftist, the SPD was willing to compromise. Only through its support did the governing CDU/CSU pass a denazification law that its coalition partner the Free Democratic Party (FDP) and the far-right German Party voted against. At the same time, the SPD opposed the pro-West integration of West Germany because they believed that made a re-unification of Germany impossible. Austria could have become a sovereign neutral state in 1956, but a 1952 Soviet suggestion for Germans to form a neutral state was ignored by the CDU/CSU–FDP government. After 17 years in opposition, the SPD became the junior partner in a grand coalition with the CDU/CSU which lasted from 1966 to 1969. After the 1969 federal election, the SPD's Willy Brandt became chancellor in a coalition with the liberal Free Democratic Party. His government sought to normalise relations with East Germany and the Eastern Bloc, a policy known as Ostpolitik. The party achieved its best ever result of 45.8 per cent in 1972, one of only three occasions in which it formed the largest Bundestag faction.[After Brandt's resignation in 1974, his successor Helmut Schmidt served as chancellor until 1982, when the SPD returned to opposition.
During the Peaceful Revolution in East Germany, the East German SPD was refounded. It merged with the West German party in 1990, shortly before German reunification. The SPD returned to government under Gerhard Schröder after the 1998 federal election in a coalition with The Greens.[ This government was re-elected in 2002 but defeated in 2005.The SPD then became junior partner of a grand coalition with the CDU/CSU until 2009. After a term in opposition, they again served as junior partner to the CDU/CSU after the 2013 federal election.] This arrangement was renewed after the 2017 federal election.] SPD narrowly won against the CDU/CSU in the September 2021 federal election, becoming the biggest party in the federal parliament (Bundestag). Social Democrat Olaf Scholz became the new chancellor in December 2021, and formed a coalition government with the Green Party and the Free Democrats.
01/14/2025
01/13/2025
Day 58
it´s 07:19 in the morning and I´ve reached 6301 steps so far and I´ve done my workout with weights.
As you can see I walked 35 kilometers on saturday and sunday. Yesterday I could walk a lot faster, since I didn´t have to walk through the forest, but I slipped and fell down two times and I think that I have stressed the inner ligaments in my right knee. It made a sound yesterday and makes sounds from time to time. But I walked out the pain yesterday and this morning I was really carefully, because we had the coldest night of the year with -7 degrees Celsius here. So it was slippery today as well.
This week I will showcase the SPD, although there are parties in Germany that in the opinion polls have more voters. But the SPD was the head of the streetlight-coalition and Olaf Scholz is still our chancellor.
In my youth the votes were rather clear. If there are workers in your family you vote for the SPD, since it is more socially oriented.. I found this on Wikipedia:
The Social Democratic Party of Germany (German: Sozialdemokratische Partei Deutschlands), is a social democratic political party in Germany. It is one of the major parties of contemporary Germany. Saskia Esken has been the party's leader since the 2019 leadership election together with Lars Klingbeil, who joined her in December 2021. After Olaf Scholz was elected chancellor in 2021, the SPD became the leading party of the federal government, which the SPD formed with the Greens and the Free Democratic Party, after the 2021 federal election. The SPD is a member of 12 of the 16 German state governments and is a leading partner in eight of them.
The SPD was founded in 1875 from a merger of smaller socialist parties, and grew rapidly after the lifting of Germany's repressive Anti-Socialist Laws in 1890 to become the largest socialist party in Western Europe until 1933. In 1891, it adopted its Marxist-influenced Erfurt Program, though in practice it was moderate and focused on building working-class organizations. In the 1912 federal election, the SPD won 34.8 percent of votes and became the largest party in the Reichstag, but was still excluded from government. After the start of the First World War in 1914, the party split between a pro-war mainstream and the anti-war Independent Social Democratic Party, some members of which later formed the Communist Party of Germany (KPD). The SPD played a leading role in the German revolution of 1918–1919 and in the foundation of the Weimar Republic. The SPD politician Friedrich Ebert served as the first president of Germany from 1919 to 1925.
After the rise of the Nazi Party to power, the SPD was the only party in the Reichstag which voted against the Enabling Act of 1933; the SPD was subsequently banned, and operated in exile as the Sopade. After the Second World War from 1939 to 1945, the SPD was re-established. In East Germany, it merged with the KPD under duress to form the Socialist Unity Party of Germany. In West Germany, the SPD became one of two major parties alongside the CDU/CSU. In its Godesberg Program of 1959, the SPD dropped its commitment to Marxism, becoming a big tent party of the centre-left. The SPD led the federal government from 1969 to 1982 (under Willy Brandt and Helmut Schmidt), 1998 to 2005 (under Gerhard Schröder) and again since 2021. It served as a junior partner to a CDU/CSU-led government from 1966 to 1969, 2005 to 2009 and from 2013 to 2021. During Scholz's chancellorship, the party has set out principles of a new German defence policy in the Zeitenwende speech.
The SPD holds pro-European stances and is a member of the Party of European Socialists and sits with the Progressive Alliance of Socialists and Democrats group in the European Parliament. With 14 MEPs, it is the third largest party in the group. The SPD was a founding member of the Socialist International, but the party left in 2013 after criticising its acceptance of parties they consider to be violating human rights.The SPD subsequently founded the Progressive Alliance and was joined by numerous other parties around the world. Previously, the SPD was a founding member of both the Second International and the Labour and Socialist International.
Day 57
Yesterday I walked 36 kilometers and it was an adventure again. I followed google-maps on trails through the woods, that don´t exist anymore or on trails, where I was the first person to make steps in snow around 15 centimeters high and my shoes got really wet because the snow was higher than my boots. But the snow was powdery and I didn´t have to crush through an icy topping. Once I reached the monestry (Kloster) Haina, which is not used as a monestry any more but as a forensic clinic, I realised that the monestry-museum and the shop was closed. So I went to the clinic café and got some energy to walk back.
I loved it and today I´m going to do another 35 kilometer-walk to Fritzlar, but since that route is more commonly used it will be more easy to walk.
It´s 5:17 in the morning right now and since I will walk a lot again today I will skip my workout today.
To summerize the information of the CDU/CSU. Markus Söder (CSU) still has the ambition to become chancelor and so to be able to get more privileges for Bavaria. But he has not to be chancelor to get the privileges because he now backs Friedrich Merz and to get that unity Friedrich Merz has to pay back. So there won´t be a coalition with the green party. So there will be more strict policy with people searching refuge and help in Germany. So there won´t be any green energy in Bavaria that changes the view. And I fear that this will result in a coalition of CDU/CSU and SPD, because that is the only alternative.
Friedrich Merz has presented the Agenda 2030. The Agenda 2010 was introduced by Gerhard Schröder, a SPD chancelor.
Bloomberg wrote this:
Germany’s Would-Be Leader Touts His Recipe for a Growth Miracle
01/12/2025
01/11/2025
Day 56
It´s 7:30 in the morning. I got up at 5.00 after watching a glorious win of Bayer 04 in Dortmund yesterday. I´m still feeling so good. I just did my workout with weights and get ready for a 30 kilometers-walk to Kloster Heina.
I just wanted to show you something about Friedrich Merz, our next chancelor. I found this on wikipedia:
Joachim-Friedrich Martin Josef Merz (German: [mɛʁts]; born 11 November 1955) is a German politician[1][2] serving as Leader of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) since 31 January 2022 and as leader of the parliamentary group of CDU/CSU (Union) as well as the Leader of the Opposition in the Bundestag since 15 February 2022.[3] In September 2024, Merz became the Union's designated candidate for Chancellor of Germany for the 2025 federal election.[4][5][6]
Merz joined the Young Union in 1972. After finishing law school in 1985, he worked as a judge and corporate lawyer before entering full-time politics in 1989 when he was elected to the European Parliament. After serving one term he was elected to the Bundestag, where he established himself as the leading financial policy expert in the CDU. In 2000 he was elected chairman of the CDU/CSU parliamentary group in the same year as Angela Merkel was elected chairwoman of the CDU, and at the time they were chief rivals for the leadership of the party, which led the opposition together with CSU.[7][8]
After the 2002 federal election, CDU party leader Angela Merkel claimed the parliamentary group chairmanship for herself, while Merz was elected deputy parliamentary group leader. In December 2004, he resigned from this office, thereby giving up the years-long power struggle with Merkel[9][8] and gradually withdrew from politics, focusing on his legal career and leaving parliament entirely in 2009, until his return to parliament in 2021. In 2004 he became a senior counsel with Mayer Brown, where he has focused on mergers and acquisitions, banking and finance, and compliance. He has served on the boards of numerous companies, including BlackRock Germany. In 2018, he announced his return to politics. He was elected CDU leader in December 2021, assuming the office in January 2022. He had failed to win the position in two previous leadership elections in 2018,[10][11] and January 2021.[12][13]
After Angela Merkel announced her intention to step down as leader of the CDU party, Merz announced he would run in the subsequent 2018 party leadership election.[10] His candidacy was promoted by the former CDU chairman and "crown prince" of the Kohl era, Wolfgang Schäuble (former President of the Bundestag, ranked second in federal precedence).[51] On 7 December 2018, in the second round of the leadership election, Merz was defeated by Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer.[10][11]
On 25 February 2020, he announced his candidacy in the first 2021 CDU leadership election.[52] His closest competitors were Armin Laschet and Norbert Röttgen.[53][54] After several postponements, the election of the new CDU party president took place at the party congress on 15–16 January 2021, which was the first time in the party's history that it was held fully online. In the first round, Merz received 385 votes, 5 more than Laschet. In the second round, Merz received 466 votes out of 1001 delegates, while Laschet received 521 votes, thus failing to win the party president's post for the second time.[55][56][57][58]
The same day, after losing the leadership election, Merz proposed to "join the current government and take over the Ministry for Economy". The ministry was already headed by his party colleague Peter Altmaier at the time and the proposal was rebuffed.[59] Laschet was quick to placate Merz by recruiting him to his campaign team. Laschet justified this by saying that Merz was "without doubt a team player" and that his economic and financial expertise could provide crucial help in overcoming the huge challenge of the pandemic in a sustainable way.[60]
Ahead of the 2021 German federal election, Patrick Sensburg, Merz's successor in his seat in the Bundestag, failed to secure his party's support for a new candidacy. Merz instead replaced him, returning to the Bundestag after a 12-year absence.[61]
On 15 November 2021, Merz announced his candidacy in the second 2021 CDU leadership election.[62][63] His opponents were Norbert Röttgen and Helge Braun.[64]
During their short campaign, Merz's rivals positioned themselves as Merkel's heirs. Against them, Merz promised a decisive break with the centrist line Merkel had followed for 16 years.
In total, some 400 000 CDU members were able to vote online or by letter. By 17 December 2021, Merz had already won an absolute majority of 62.1 percent of the membership in the first round of voting, so a second round of voting was not necessary. This meant that at his third attempt, he managed to win the party presidency. Asked for his reaction to the results of the vote, Merz said: "Quietly I just said to myself, 'WOW'; but only quietly, the winning marching songs are far from me."[65][66][67]
Merz was formally elected Chairman of the CDU by its 1001 congress delegates at the virtual federal party congress on 22 January 2022. In the end, 915 out of 983 delegates voted for him, winning 94.6% of the valid votes to become the leader of the largest opposition party in the Bundestag. The vote was formally a so-called "digital pre-vote", the result of which has been confirmed in writing by the delegates.[68][69][70]
After Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer and Armin Laschet, Merz became the third leader of the Christian Democratic Union within three years.[69] He officially took office as party leader on 31 January 2022.[3]
In September 2024 Merz became the Union's designated candidate for Chancellor of Germany for the 2025 federal election, after Hendrik Wüst (CDU) and Markus Söder (CSU) decided not to run and after both declared their support for Merz.[4][5]
Day 55
It´s 07.23 in the morning. By now I´ve reached 5901 steps over half of my daily goal. Against my predection it started snowing again yesterday, so there is even more snow outside right now, but on some parts of the ground it´s still really wet. I did my workout without weights today.
Here is a funny article about the Muskito:
Elon Musk's bizarre US-UK invasion X post amid 'liberation' claims - Irish Star
I don´t have to comment that.
The current head of the CSU is Markus Söder. I found this on Wikipedia:
Background, education and military service
Söder was born in Nuremberg and is the son of a building contractor. After graduating from the Dürer-Gymnasium Nuremberg in 1986, Söder completed his compulsory year of military service from 1986 to 1987. He then studied law at the University of Erlangen–Nuremberg from 1987, with a scholarship from the Konrad Adenauer Foundation. He passed his first state examination in 1991 and was a research assistant at the department of constitutional, administrative and church law at the same university. In 1998, he was awarded a doctorate in law with a dissertation in legal history with the title Von altdeutschen Rechtstraditionen zu einem modernen Gemeindeedikt. Die Entwicklung der Kommunalgesetzgebung im rechtsrheinischen Bayern zwischen 1802 und 1818 (lit. 'From old German legal traditions to a modern municipal edict: The development of municipal legislation in Bavaria on the right bank of the Rhine between 1802 and 1818').[3] He worked as a trainee and then as an editor with Bayerischer Rundfunk, a public-service television and radio network, based in Munich, from 1992 to 1994, when he was elected to the Bavarian Parliament and became a full-time politician.
Potential candidate for Chancellor
After the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic in Germany, Söder was discussed as a possible candidate to succeed Angela Merkel in the 2021 German federal election. A May 2020 poll indicated that 53% of Germans favoured him as the CDU/CSU's Chancellor candidate. During the same time, he enjoyed approval ratings of over 90% in Bavaria.
After the election of Armin Laschet as CDU chairman in January 2021, he and Söder considered themselves the major contenders for the Chancellor candidacy. As the contest intensified in March/April 2021, Söder was backed by the CSU as well as some state and local CDU associations, while Laschet received the support of most of the CDU. The two men failed to come to an agreement by the given deadline of 19 April, leading the federal CDU board to hold an impromptu meeting to break the deadlock. The board voted 31 to 9 in favour of Laschet.[After the vote, Söder announced his support for Laschet as Chancellor candidate.
On 21 June 2021, Söder and Laschet jointly presented the joint election manifesto of the two parties, CSU and CDU. In the programme, it is stated that the fight against pandemics, climate change and the defence of prosperity and freedom are global challenges and that the aim is to create a Germany open to the world, which strives for both modernisation and green policies.
In September 2021, Söder was reelected as chair of the CSU, winning 87.6 percent of the vote at a party congress in Nuremberg.
In September 2024, having first expressed his readiness to run as Unions candidate,[ Söder announced his support for Friedrich Merz as Union's candidate for Chancellor of Germany for the 2025 federal election, after Hendrik Wüst (CDU) had expressed his support for Friedrich Merz.[
Role in national politics
Söder was a CSU delegate to the Federal Convention for the purpose of electing the President of Germany in 1999, 2004, 2009, 2010, 2012, 2017[citation needed] and 2022
In the negotiations to form a coalition government of the Christian Democrats (CDU together with the Bavarian CSU) and the Free Democratic Party (FDP) following the 2009 federal elections, Söder was part of the CDU/CSU delegation in the working group on health policy, led by Ursula von der Leyen and Philipp Rösler.
In the negotiations to form a Grand Coalition of the CDU/CSU and the SPD following the 2013 federal elections, Söder was part of the CDU/CSU delegation in the working groups on financial policy and the national budget, led by Wolfgang Schäuble and Olaf Scholz, and on bank regulation and the Eurozone, led by Herbert Reul and Martin Schulz.
01/10/2025
01/09/2025
Day 54
It´s 7:24 in the morning. I´ve reached 6824 steps so far, because we´ve got a lot of wet snow outside. I´m glad my winter-shoes got not too wet, I don´t own rubber-boots. I did my workout with weights today and my pedometer tells me I burned 485 kcal.
To understand the current situation of the CDU/CSU we should have a look at the tensions between them. I found this on wikipedia:
Tensions in 2016–2021
The Munich scandal of November 2015: Horst Seehofer, CSU leader and Bavarian minister-president, with CDU leader and chancellor Angela Merkel, at the 2015 CSU party rally. At this occasion, Seehofer humiliated his guest by letting her stand next to him for minutes while he lamented her liberal politics with regard to refugees.
Under the chairmanship of Angela Merkel (2000–2018), the CDU left some right wing positions behind and shifted more to the political centre. Especially the 2015 refugee crisis divided the German population and caused conflict between the CDU and the CSU.
Therefore, a federal CSU was discussed again among party members and journalists. For example conservative Welt columnist Ansgar Graw wrote in 2016 that CDU and CSU lost its stance as a law and order party. As Merkel's CDU could not move to the right without losing credibility, Graw called the CSU to become a federal party, a right wing party that rigorously deports asylum seekers without right to stay.[14] On the contrary, former CSU leader Theo Waigel warned against a separate election campaign. In such a campaign, CDU and CSU would fight much more each other than the rest of the parties.
In 2018, Interior Minister Horst Seehofer, a former Minister-President of Bavaria and the leader of the CSU, opposed CDU Chancellor Angela Merkel's policy on Syrian refugees in Germany. Seehofer hoped to place restrictions on incoming refugees, many of whom enter the country through Bavaria. His stance was seen as being in part motivated by the 2018 Bavarian state election in which it was feared that the far-right Alternative for Germany would make gains. The dispute threatened to bring down the Merkel government which relied on the CSU for its parliamentary majority as Seehofer had indicated his resignation on 2 July, but he already rescinded it a day later after an agreement over the issue between the coalition parties (the CDU, the CSU and the SPD) had been reached.[
In June 2018, CDU and CSU Bundestag members held separate meetings on the topic of refugees, which was highly unusual. A fake Twitter account announced that CSU leader Seehofer had abolished the CDU/CSU alliance and that CDU vice chair Bouffier had called for a CDU in Bavaria. Many journalists published the news, which was interpreted by the Merkur as a sign that such events are considered no longer absurd or unlikely.[Political scientist Heinrich Oberreuter did not believe in Seehofer's threat to expand the CSU to the rest of Germany. Both parties aim essentially for the same voters. As separate parties in the general elections both would lose voters. The CSU would lose its unique selling point as a Bavarian party. With a CDU in Bavaria, the CSU would fall from 47 to 30 percent in Bavaria.
A federal CSU was again discussed prior to the general elections of 2021. CSU leader Markus Söder was unhappy about the CDU decision to declare CDU leader Armin Laschet the chancellor candidate and successor of Angela Merkel. In September 2020, the CSU created online memberships for people not living in Bavaria. A survey in May 2021 foresaw that a federal CSU may win at least 9 percent of the votes, especially in Eastern Germany and among FDP voters.[
Both parties suffered heavy losses in elections after 2017. In the Bavarian state elections of October 2018, the CSU lost 10.5 percent. With 37.2 percent, this was its worst election result since 1950. In the federal elections of 2021, the CDU lost 7.9 percent and the CSU 1.0 percent of the (party list) votes.
Day 53
It´s 7.30 in the morning and I have reached 6621 of my dayly 10.000 steps. Yesterday evening I had reached more than 17.000 steps, the day before 10.000. I did my workout without weights and my pedometer says I burned 465 kcal by now.
Hmmmh, the news seem to be ambivilant, whether Trudeau´s move is a good idea. Opinion polls in Germany show that the SPD with Scholz seems to gather momentum (+3%) but would have gotten 2 % more if Pistorius would be the candidate for the chancelor.
Funny article about a guy calling himself a biographer thinking Musk is going mad:
Elon Musk Biographer Details Why He Thinks Billionaire Is ‘Going Mad’
By the way, I don´t think that. I think that due to his personality disorder he is just a dangerous asshole, bloody Muskito.
Coming back to the CDU/CSU in Germany. To understand the situation it´s important to understand the CSU ambition for the whole of Germany although it is only a communal party. On Wikipedea I found this:
CSU ambitions to become a nationwide party
CSU party rally in June 1976. On the right Franz Josef Strauß, the CSU leader since 1961, on the left Helmut Kohl, leader of the federal CDU since 1973 and main candidate for the general elections in October 1976.
During the 1970s and then again after 2015, several CSU leaders have expressed the wish to make the CSU a truly independent party without formal ties to the CDU. Usually they combined this wish with an expansion to the rest of Germany.
After 1969, CDU and CSU were in the opposition in the Bundestag. CDU leader Kohl wanted to win the liberal FDP again for a coalition with the CDU/CSU, while the CSU leader Strauß had different plans. He aimed for a right wing majority without the FDP. Additionally, Strauß thought little of the current CDU leader Kohl, a more moderate Christian Democrat.
Strauß believed that CDU and CSU should be separate national parties to address different audience: the CDU the moderate, social and liberal voters, the CSU the conservative voters. After the elections they should still form a government together.
In 1975, the federal CDU declared Kohl to be the next CDU/CSU chancellor candidate for the 1976 general elections – without consulting the CSU. Kohl did well in the elections on October 3, 1976, although Social Democrats and FDP had still enough seats to continue their coalition. Kohl decided to leave his post as prime minister of the state of Rhineland-Palatinate for the chairmanship of the CDU/CSU Bundestag faction.
The Hans-Seidel-Stiftung is a political foundation linked to the CSU. From 1975 to 2016, it had an educational centre in this building in the municipality of Kreuth, close to the Austrian border. For decades, spirit of Kreuth was a reference to an independent, conservative CSU.
In November that year, the 49 CSU Bundestag members gathered in the party's educational centre in Wildbad Kreuth, Southern Bavaria. 30 of them voted for a proposal to form a CSU Bundestag parliamentary group of its own. CDU leader Kohl was informed only later via the media. This 'Kreuth separation decision' (Kreuther Trennungsbeschluss) was a major political earthquake and caused the CDU to react swiftly and resolutely. Kohl threatened the CSU by preparing the creation of a CDU party organization in Bavaria. In March 1977, the CDU Bayern was supposed to be founded in Nuremberg.
During the conflict, the Aktionsgemeinschaft Vierte Partei, the Bund Freies Deutschland (West-Berlin), the Christlich Soziale Wähler Union (Saarland), the Deutsche Union (North Rhine-Westphalia) and the Partei Freier Bürger (Bremen) were founded. On 12 December 1976, the vote was rescinded after the CDU had threatened in turn to form local associations within Bavaria and to run in Bavarian elections against the CSU.
Strauß himself polemicised against Kohl in a closed CSU meeting on November 24 (this Wienerwald speech was leaked, and published on November 29 in Der Spiegel):
That Helmut Kohl will never become chancellor. Being 90 he will write his memoirs: 'I was chancellor candidate for 40 years; lessons and experiences from bitter times.' The last chapter written maybe in Siberia or elsewhere.
— Franz Josef Strauß
It turned out that most local CSU leaders and also conservative CDU state leaders did not approve a separation between CSU and CDU. The CSU Bundestag members revoked their decision. On December 7, the CDU/CSU Bundestag group elected Kohl as its chairman.[12] In 1980, Strauß was the joint CDU/CSU chancellor candidate and lost more than 4 percent of the votes. This ended his ambitions for a federal CSU.
01/08/2025
01/07/2025
Day 52
I got up too early today, I think I´m gonna start the 4.00 o´clock-Club. But I used the time to read a lot of news and the blinkist-of-the-day. I did my workout with weights and walked 6502 steps and now it´s 7.30 in the morning.
On Wikipedia I found some information, which in my opinion is important to understand CDU and CSU:
Both the CDU and the CSU were established after World War II and share a perspective based on Christian democracy and conservatism and hold the dominant centre-right position in the German political spectrum. The CSU is usually considered the de facto successor of the Weimar Republic–era Bavarian People's Party (BVP), which itself broke away from the all-German Catholic Centre Party (DZP) after World War I, but the CSU included also parts of the agrarian and liberal Bavarian Peasants' League and parts of the Bavarian wing of the DVP. However the CDU's foundation was the result of a major re-organisation of the centre-right political camp compared to the Weimar Republic. Although the CDU was largely built as the de facto successor of the Centre Party, it successfully opened out to non-Catholic Christians (many of them affiliated with the German People's Party until 1933) and successfully asserted itself as the only major conservative party (outside of Bavaria) against initial competition from other Catholic, Protestant or national conservative parties such as the German Party during the early years of the Federal Republic.
The BVP became the sister party of the DZP and they did not compete against each other except for the May 1924 German federal election, the 1924 Bavarian state election and the 1925 German presidential election. The DZP and BVP were mostly jointly represented at the Imperial governments. Similarly to the modern CDU/CSU split, the Bavarian People's Party was generally seen as the party further to the political right, as evidenced by the 1925 second round of the presidential election when the Center Party backed Rhenish Catholic and Weimar Coalition candidate Wilhelm Marx while the BVP made common cause with the monarchist and nationalist parties in backing Prussian junker and former general Paul von Hindenburg despite him being a Protestant and the long-standing mutual animosity between Bavaria and Prussia.
For short periods of time, there existed
- the Christian People's Party of the Saarland [de] as sister party of the CSU during the 1957 West German federal election,
- the German Social Union (DSU) as sister party of the CSU before the 1990 East German general election,
- the East German CDU as sister party of the CDU until the German reunification and
- the Baden Christian-Social People's Party [de] until 1947.
Alliance for Germany was a coalition for the 1990 East German general election consisting of the CDU, the DSU and Democratic Awakening which merged into the CDU.
Day 51
Today I made my workout without weights and my pedometer tells me I burned 168 kcal, but it also tells me that it is uneffeciant, because my heartrate does not go up as it feels it should. It´s 7.00 in the morning and I 5363 steps.
I also added my stats of the last week to show you that in average I walked more than 10.000 steps each day.
This week I want to start writing about the big German parties, that we have to deal with in the coming election and I will start with the CDU/CSU since they will gain the most votes.
CDU/CSU, unofficially the Union parties (German: Unionsparteien, pronounced or the Union, is a centre-right Christian democratic and conservative political alliance of two political parties in Germany: the Christian Democratic Union of Germany (CDU) and the Christian Social Union in Bavaria (CSU).
The CSU contests elections only in Bavaria, while the CDU operates in the other 15 states of Germany. The CSU also reflects the particular concerns of the largely rural, Catholic south. While the two Christian Democratic parties are commonly described as sister parties, they have shared a common parliamentary group, the CDU/CSU Parliamentary Group, in the German Bundestag (German: CDU/CSU-Fraktion im Deutschen Bundestag)since the foundation of the Federal Republic of Germany in 1949. According to German Federal Electoral Law, members of a parliamentary group which share the same basic political aims must not compete with one another in any federal state.
The parties themselves officially remain completely independent with their own leadership and only few issue- or age-based joint organisations, which makes the alliance informal. However, in practice the committees of the parties harmonise their decisions with each other and the two parties run behind a common candidate for Chancellor, and the leader of one party is usually invited to party conventions of the other party.
Both the CDU and CSU are members of the European People's Party and the International Democracy Union. Both parties sit in the European People's Party Group in the European Parliament. The CDU and CSU share a common youth organisation, the Young Union, a common pupil organisation, the Pupil Union of Germany [de], a common student organisation, the Association of Christian Democratic Students and a common Mittelstand organisation, the Mittelstand and Business association.
I got that info from wikipedia. And I think it´s important to know the history of the parties, but we have a whole week of interesting information to go. It´s very important to know the costs that Friedrich Merz has to pay for Markus Söder to back him and step back in his own efforts to become chancellor...
01/06/2025
01/05/2025
Day 50
Yesterday I walked 31,55 kilometers and what an adventure it was. Google maps in the forest is not that accurate, or due to the dead trees caused by the Borkenkäfer (bark beetle) some trails in the forest don´t exist anymore. I lost a trail several times, but armed with my headlight it was an adventure to find a regular trail again, climbing over dead trees and over rests of blackberry plants with thorns. And it was so beautiful seeing the landscape and the two castles I visited covered in snow. Furtunately I had good shoes. My feet only got a little wet, so little, that I didn´t even feel it, while walking, so that I didn´t change the footwear.
Elon Muskito made a fool of him again by asking Prince Charles to dissolve the left-wing-dominated parliament, something any right-wing-illusionist should do to please his master.... I like the british response, just calling Elon Muskito to be misinformed. And actually he is just that, as was Trump when he told people to inject desinfectant to combat Corona. Misinformed...
Austria is getting interesting because the right-wing party will cause a new election there. And perhaps the right-wing party will get even more votes then.
Back to the FDP, because it did the same thing, that the right-wing party did in Austria. Politico wrote: Germany’s fiscally conservative Free Democratic Party (FDP) is reeling following revelations that its members had meticulously planned the demise of the now-fallen three-party coalition of which they had been a part.
The disclosure of an eight-page powerpoint presentation titled “D-Day Scenarios and Measures” led the FDP’s general secretary, Bijan Djir-Sarai, who was responsible for the party’s strategy and election campaign, to resign from the post on Friday.
In a 50-second statement, Djir-Sarai said he had “no knowledge of the document” but would step down to take “political responsibility to avert damage to [his] credibility and that of the FDP.”
And the FDP did that in full knowledge that the right-wing party in Germany might get more votes and thus a higher representation in the government.
Day 49
It´s 05.19 in the morning and I´ve just realized, that I still have problems to realize that it´s 2025 (look at the dates of the last posts). I just got up and I am preparing for my workout with weights and since a little bit of snow came down I plan a walk to Waldeck (about 15 kilometers from here). No, not a hundred kilometers, because the weather just won´t allow it. On my walks I have to walk at the side of some streets and that will be critical today because of the weather.
The FDP blew up the governmental coalition and called this "D-Day". And did they really think that this wouldn´t leak. The thing about this is that the reaction of the FDP-Leader Christian Lindner after our chancellor "fired" him and the FDP was that he presented himself and the FDP as a victim while being the offender in this case. He even seemed to be crying, because of the tension his act put him into. I don´t like Christian Lindner, never did, but since he is the leader he had to know about this D-Day-plan. And this has to be highlighted in the knowledge of the German voters and should not be forgotten. This party does not belong in the German government and should never appear there again. But then again this is just one opinion, my opinion.
01/04/
2025
01/03/2024
Day 48
Only 4205 steps but it´s just 07.21 in the morning. Yesterday I moved more during work and I plan to do the same today. And I try to motivate myself by walking less before work. But I did my workout without weights after an eternaty again.
Two attacks in the US. One with a Tesla Truck, how about that incompetent Elon Muskito, and the other one on Bourbon Street, where I once stood with a white cross and the sign "regret your sins or you will burn in hell" in the "invasion week" and a discipling course for young protestants in a rather conservative new orleans church. Yes the guy who did that was mad, because he wrote about killing his family but that he chose otherwise because that would not be a signal in the war against the non-believers. Well I think that this guy was in war with himself, the biggest non-believer of them all. Because no religion tells someone to kill his own family well with the exception of Jim Jones, who was also as mad as a Muskito.
Well Germany was led by the Streetlight-Coalition and the FDP was the smallest of the three party, who gained the spotlight during the coalition. The FDP could chase the SPD and the Green Party with it´s stupid stupid decisions causing the SPD and the Green Party to make decisions in contrast to what they are actually standing for. Thus the coalition could give less pressure to move Germany to climate-neutrality. The FDP had one of the most important posts in the gorvernment: the financial resort and caused one of the most desastrous hole in finance because it moved 80 Millions of money into a green future investment which was against the law (the CDU initiated the law-proof and won). Lindner the chief of finance and head of the FDP finally chose to show a profile that could not be held in the coalition and it turned out that that was his plan all along called D-Day. But more on that on the S-Day (saturday).
Day 47
My weekly rythm is gone. Today is thursday, but it feels like monday. To make a reset, to come back into the weekly rythm, I´ll have to bridge my theme of the week.
But first: I´m back into my body-rythm. I had a good sleep. My intestinal flue is gone. So my stomach still feels strange but everything else is okay. So I got up at 5.00, did my workout with weights, and made a smaller walk reaching 4500 steps. I have to force myself not to work in my lunch pause, so it helps to plan a few steps then.
My plan for the next weeks is to focus on the different German political parties in the weeks to come, because we prepare for an election. This election is necessery because the FDP destroyed the Streetlight-Coalition of the red-yellow-and-green-coalition of SPD, FDP and the Green Party. So for the rest of the week I´m going to ramble about why we´re in this f*cking mess.
01/02/2024
01/01/2024
Day 46
I wish you a Happy New Year.
The good thing about intestinal infections is I don´t have to waste thoughts on gaining weight. It was a shame, I couldn´t eat as much yesterday as I normally do.
Since December is the first full month of my project I can show you my steps in December. Of course the numbers are a big bloated because of the two 100-Kilometers-Weekend thus resulting in 20.000 steps in average on every day. But as I said the numbers are bloated...
I got my 6 hours of sleep, I had to skip the 5.00 o´clock-Club though. At the toilet the situation is still not normal but I think that the cramps start to cease. I plan to do my steps now. My ladies are still in bed. And I will also do my workout. And I will think of a new theme. I think it´s time to become a little more political this year.
Day 45
It´s 9:43 in the morning. I got up at 5.00 and already got my steps (11363 right now) and after quite a long time I did my workout again. But my intestines are still in turmoil. Still the outcome is very fluent. Of course I mean my words...
How can I end the year with a firework of insights. Well I can end it with one insight.
You can always choose. Nobody can force you to do something, there is always an alternative. Don´t believe anybody who tells you otherwise, who tells you that you have to elect that party, or that he is the only cretin who can make America great again.
There is always an alternative, always hope, that is your freedom and that is the foundation of peace.
12/31/2024
12/30/2024
Day 44
Still no workout today, since I still spend too much time on the toilet. Well it seems to be the intestinal flu and like all my recent infects, they seem to stay longer than I remember them to last. But I think that this is a memory glitch and that I normally don´t hold on to bad memories, like the number of days being sick.
One of the German traditions for the New Year is to have plans for the next year, that we call "Vorsätze". That is why some people burn their last cigarette on New Years Eve, to snip it into the sky like a firework with the good intentention (Vorsatz) to get rid of the addiction in the next year. I don´t have gute Vorsätze for the next year, because I have a goal to reach every day, my 10.000 steps. It´s 6.37 in the morning and I already got 7088 steps.
Day 43
Still no workout today. My sleep is getting better, but I´m still spending too much time on the toilet.
And I´m glad, that I have a minimal goal, that I can reach every day, which are my 10.000 steps. I think that a minimal goal is a kind of anchor. And I´m glad, that I have this anchor in my job, which is to help other people and to make them feel better. So I´m actually getting paid for fulfilling my cause of existence.
12/29/2024
12/28/2024
Day 42
Even though yesterday I wasn´t feeling so well, I reached 12117 steps. Today I will also skip the workout.
I will walk my 10.000 steps though. Yesterday I found out, that it´s exactly the distance that I walk through the wood (Bürgerbusch) to a supermarket on the other side of our little wood, where I will buy some buns (Brötchen) for my girls and back.It´s minus 2 degrees outside, that means, that the ground in the wood isn´t too wet, so that is good for the shoes I use.
I think that the political parties here in Germany use the holidays to save energy before they have to become really active in the next two months before the election. Well every party should become active with the exception of the FDP. This party caused the last government to fail and thanks to them we´ve got this early vote. So screw them.
Day 41
It´s 5.30 in the morning, so I´m still in the 5.00 o´clock-club. I don´t have to go to work today. So we plan to go to the movies and watch Mufasa, yes, talking lions who can´t show too much facial movement, because otherwise they would look like joker-fishes.
I read an article about the Madison-school-shooting:
Analysis: Six common factors in the school shooting at Abundant Life Christian
And it shows that a German band KMFDM seems to be the music of choice for school shooters. And in essence the articel says that the shooter is in crisis and wants to die. 12 percent of the shootings are done by female shooters.
P.S. It´s one in the afternoon. I walked 10041 steps. But I couldn´t do my workout today. I feel sick, think I got a flue effecting my intestines. So my daughters have to go to the cinema by themselves, which is okay, they are 14 and 8 years old.
12/27/2024
12/26/2024
Day 40
It´s 5:40 in the morning. And Yesterday I learned, that I´m the first member of the extreme 5.00-club. There seems to be a book saying that you should get up at 5.00 meditate for 20 minutes, walk for 20 minutes and then learn for 20 minutes. I walk definitely more than 20 minutes. My current workout at the Bayer-04-open-air-workout station is aproximately 15 minutes, invest at least 20 minutes each day in duolingo.... Well, I know I should do it as the book says. But should we really do as a book say!
I say thee, ny!!! No, you should not do as told in books, because frankly said, those books cannot be taken out of the context of time, when they were written in. Even the bible or the Koran weren´t written like that in the context of dirty bombs laced with atomical waste. You shouldn´t do as anyone else tells you, because you should not act in anyone else´s interest but in your own. And you should definitely not endanger yourself. Now everyhing coincides, that I have written about in the 40 days of 1hundred4peace. Hope should lead to freedom, to inner peace and ultimately to peace. And there is no place for radical right-wing parties in this concept.
Day 39
Yesterday I reached more than 17.000 steps because I walked to church with my younger daughter. It was a catholic mass aimed for young children. And I was delighted that a woman held it but only until her first sentence that like all the others didn´t connect to the children and she wanted me to do her job, telling the parents to speak with the children about the stuff she said. In really thought that since there were a lot of young children it would have been easy to get into a close contact, by adressing and asking them, by letting them be part of the mass. But my daughter told me after 10 minutes it was boring and the good thing was, that it was over after 34 minutes. Sorry to say that. Next year I will take her to a protestant church.
It´s a quarter to eight in the morning. We went to bed at Midnight. We didn´t have too much alcohol. I got up at 6.00. I plan to have a a longer walk and a workout at the Bayer-04-open-air-workout station. And then we will meet again for breakfast with the bigger family.
12/25/2024
12/24/2024
Day 38 X-Mas
Today is X-Mas and as the two followin days X-Mas is family. I get up at least 3 hours before my girls, so that I can write and prepare stuff and to do my walking and workout, which hardly takes two hours. I got up at five, cleaned myself, took out everything that was in the dish-washer, will change the washing machine and then I will start my walk for today and I will visit the Bayer-04 open-air workout space. Yesterday one blister opened up and now walking is a little bit easier. Since yesterday I walked a little uneven with the blister my back hurts a little bit, but I am sure I can walk and work out the pain today. Today I will spend a lot of time with the big family this evening. I will go to mass at 3.00 am and again. And since there are small kids we will do the present-stuff at 5.00 am. Here in Germany we receive the present at the 24th.
And yes I fully indulge in the christian joy that tonight is the birthday of Jesus Christ. I´m aware that the date was chosen, because in egypt it´s the longest night and therefore egyptians prayed to Ra, that the sun might come back. As you can see, it´s all about faith and hope.
Day 37
Today I skipped my workout. It´s 07.22 pm and I already reached 7053 steps, 3000 to go.
I skipped the workout because I completed the 100 by walking 35 Kilometers yesterday and here is the proof.
Oh it´s so funny what is happening to incompetent Elon Musk and Humpty Trumpty in the States. Even the own party won´t vote for a proposal that Trump and Musk failed to see as a proposal that the Democrates long to for years. So the Republicans had no choice to vote against the will of the two wanna-be-leaders.
Do you see, why I believe, that even in the States things will turn for the better, even under Trump and in the short time of Elon Muskito?
12/23/2024
12/22/2024
Day 36
Today I don´t feel good. I´ve got blisters and the weather is even worth than yesterday. I think, I will walk at least 23.000 steps. So I will reach 100.000 steps in the two days although I won´t be able to reach the 100 kilometers like two weeks ago. But 100.000 is a nice goal for this weekend.
Bayer Leverkusen like Bayern Munich won 5:1 and there is only a difference of 4 points. I surely hope for them to do the double again next year.
I not only hope, I believe in that. And "The Secret" (book, movie and stuff) and the string-theory tells us, that if you believe, there is an overlap with the alternate-reality in which that already is reality.
Day 35
It´s 08:23 am and I´m exhausted. No workout today, but I walked 65 kilometers. I will post the proof for that tomorrow.
Today all of Germany is shocked because of the islamistic attack at the Christmas-Market in Magdeburg. The attacker is a saudi-arabian doctor working on a forensic station.
And even Elon Musk has to realize, that he is not the typical attacker. But now I can focus all my frustration on this whimp Elon Musk. Come on you dwarf, jump up and down, show your belly and you think of our chancelor as an incompetent fool? Well, you are a very successfull narcistic personality, you know that and you should also know that one should gather some information before opening one´s mouth. And now I´m trying to feel compassion. There is hope for you Elon Musk, if you get a psychological treatment and overcome your fear to be totally ignored.
12/21/2024
12/20/2024
Day 34
7205 steps, 30-Minute-Workout with weights done and it´s 7:43 pm.
Well the process of Mme. Dominique Pelicot ended yesterday in France. Her husband was sentenced to 20 years. But the 50 persons who abducted her while sedated got less than what the prosecuters wanted. And as I understood it, that´s because Mme. Pelicot couldn´t say "No". I think it´s kinda nuts, that a law like this still exists.
But I believe, that this can and must be changed.
Day 33
07:39 am, 6774 steps, 30 minutes work-out without weights, which is in my opinion harder than my workout with weights, mission nearly accomplished for the day.
Ooops, I didn´t read that before, but the girl-shooter in the States went to a christian church:
The Abundant Life School:
Mission Statement
Our mission is to develop students who are committed disciples of Jesus Christ through an excellent, comprehensive, Biblically-integrated educational program.
The Distinctive Culture of ALCS
The men and women who founded ALCS in 1978 felt strongly that God was calling them to establish an academically excellent school that would proclaim the Lordship of Jesus Christ, honor the Bible as the Word of God, and embrace the presence and the present working of the Holy Spirit. At the time, the school’s emphasis on the Person and the ministry of the Holy Spirit set it apart from many other Christian schools in the region. That emphasis continues today.
Hmm, sorry I would have bet she wasn´t christian. But she was treated for a psychological problem in 2022 and she was in contact with a person who planned another mass-shooting. She was only fifteen.
12/19/2024
12/18/2024
Day 32
It´s 7:32 pm and I´ve got 8192 steps on my pedometer and have done my 30-Minutes-Workout with weights.
As most of you already know I´m a nerd. I´ve profound knowledge of American Super-Hero-Comics, of Horror-Movies and of Star-Trek. And there is something that the christian believe-system, Superman (I don´t like him very much) and Star-Trek The next Generation have in common (not my favorite series, I prefer DS9). And that is hope.
Superman one of the few super-heroes incorporating hope like no other superhero, especially not all the fractured heroes of the Marvel-Universe. Therefore the reference of DC-Superheroes to Gods as can be seen in Zack Snyder´s Justice League Director´s Cut. Star Trek TNG is a bright future on a shining white and clean bridge, not on an oily freighter in the Alien-Movie, with an alien that is the ultimate Killing Machine. Star Trek TNG and especially Captain Picard gives us hope that every problem can be solved peacefully or with tactics only hurting a few.
And that is what in my opinion a believe-system should do. It should install hope and not the hope of a better existance in the after-life.
Day 31
7:13 pm, 6710 steps, 30 minutes of workout without weight.
But all that doesn´t matter because of the amok-run in the US. And now it´s a fifteen year-old girl. Yes, we are going to read a lot about her childhood, about her training on the weapon. Trump will say nothing, I guess. I don´t know whether she believed in something, I guess, she didn´t. I think she had no hope, that something could change. I think she was hurt a lot and wanted to spread the hurt. And of course she knew that she was going to die on her killing spree.
Could a believe-system have changed something. If she would have been part of a protestant group of hardliners I actually think she wouldn´t have done it, because the result of her action would be eternal damnation in that belief-system. I fear that society failed to strengthen a believe, a hope that something can change into something better (well, not Trump), that if she got mobbed by her class-mates the school will help her and that if her grades were not so good that it is in her abilities to change that. She was fifteen years old.
12/17/2024
12/16/2024
Day 30
As you can see I reached all my goals for the last week, the week after the 100 kilometers march on the last weekend. Nearly 14.000 steps in average, not bad.
Today I have already reached 8282 steps, I´ve done my 30-Minutes-Workout with weights and my greetings-O-meter is already on 22 although it´s 07.37 pm.
Since Christmas is getting near, I think that I will spend the days until Christmas rambling about your believe.
I think that my believe is also your believe and I think that a believe and it can also be an atheistic believe is important. I think it´s important to have a believe-system, to live in a set of rules, whatever they might be. And I think it´s important to show rules to your children and yes to mine too.
Now here is a small exercise: Stand up, close your eyes and ask yourself what you are standing for.
Day 29
Yesterday I visited a comic book exhibition about the developement of comics in France, which was superb, because it presented not only all the french comic books I like (like Asterix, Tintin, Lucky Luke). But I got to know that Yoko Tsuno was the first female heroine. And I got to know that the magazine Métal (known in the States as Heavy Metal) even inspired the Alien(movie)-Design, since the director was a fan of the magazine.
My pedometer showed me more than 20.000 steps in the evening.
My daughters and me also watched Vaiana II, which was a great joy. The theme is, that a god that wanted to divide all the people had to be battled for the human races to find all the divided parts of humanity to survive. And I like that theme very much. Because there can be no inner peace in seclusion. Although I think that the judgement should be left outside, inner peace in my experience can only be reached in contact and in openness to others.
12/15/2024
12/14/2024
Day 28
It´s 5.30 am and I´m getting ready for my walk. Since I´m at home with my ladies I take care of the laundry and I do my "sports" while they sleep. It´s dry outside and I will walk to the Bayer 04 open-air workout space.
Inner Peace. Yesterday I said that the key for inner peace is leaving out the judgement of your actions. The decisions lead to different consequences. But what happens, when the consequences suck. Well, then I try to do something good, I try to repent. And I think that this is something I want to give to my kids. There is nothing inrepairable.
Day 27
Yeah, weekend is near. 6893 steps and it´s 07:37 am right now. I did my 30-minutes-workout without weights today. Well, the christmas-party yesterday was rather sad. That is something that we have got to change. Christmas-parties should be festivities of love and happyness and not boredom. But I used the party for my breathing exercises, kept calm and left with the first swarm of people leaving and as a gentleman I held the doors open to the ladies following me.
Well, inner peace. Before the weekend I give you the key to happiness. Although, beware, because I have not reached it and perhaps I never will. The key to inner peace is to leave judgement behind. Don´t accept judgement of others and don´t judge your decisions, because there are no wrong decisions, only the consequences differ.
12/13/2024
12/12/2024
Day 26
Right now it´s 07:34 am and I got 7814 of my day daily goal of 10.000 steps. I also had my 30-Minutes-Workout with weights and don´t feel any repercussions of my walks last weekend. I neither do feel the blisters on my right foot when walking.
Since I work in a clinic my greeting goal of 100 people can be easily met, and even a goal of making 100 people happy can be met because I will attend a christmas-party from work this night and I will say goodbye to two persons leaving our unit.
Inner peace. What else helps to reach that. Well, what disturbs it is our bad conscience or how Siegmund Freud calls it: our Über-Ich. That are the voices of persons that are or were near to us. And sometimes those voices hurt and the bad conscience hurts. But it could help you to realize, that those voices want to help you get better, they want to save you from harm, they want you to live a better life. I want to accept those voices as my councellors, nothing more.
Day 25
Wow, already a quarter of my days are gone and I´ve reached nothing. And should there be a higher goal in everyday life other than just to be. Well, I try to live that way and I have to do something to reach this inner peace.
In work with my patients I work in the following mindset. It´s buddhist and it´s actually compassion: It´s the wish that the other person gets better. Try it out. When another person hits you in the face (well, it might be your wife), stay in the wish, that she feels better, which cannot be reached, when you hit back. I think this is what the bible wants to tell you, when it wants you to turn the other cheek, when someone hits you on one cheek.
And the feeling, you get inside, is something that I would call inner peace.
By the way, it´s 07:48 am and I´ve reached 7743 steps and I´ve had my 30-minutes-workout without weights.
12/11/2024
Day 24
I still feel some results of my 100 Kilometers-Walk. Since I used hiking boots for the first half of my two walks, the skin is irritated above my ankles, most likely because of the pressure of the shaft of the hiking-boots. I have blisters only in the toe-area of my right foot, because the shoes I used for the second parts of my walking days (I´ve learned and changed shoes) were slightly to big and in my left shoe I inserted some silicon in the heel area, because I normally have problems with my left achilles tendon. So my right foot had more space in the slightly too big shoe.
Today I´ve already walked half of my steps and had my 30 minutes-Workout with weights, because my musculature feels good again. I had some yogurt the last two days and ate 250g of quark. That was the only additional protein I ate to my normal meals.
Erdogan really had a good strategy in my opinion and I´m looking forward to get to know more about it. Irania is in struggle with Israel and Russia with the Ukraine. And so it was the perfect time for his move in Syria.
Peace for him means less Syrian people in Turkiye and the Kurds under control in northern Syria, which is why he still bombs them, so that they cannot control the oil there, I think.
You see that the definition of peace is something very individual.
12/10/2024
09/12/2024
Day 23
Last night I woke up sometimes. The legs feel fine, but my back hurts from the rucksack, which was really heavy. But I slept 7 1/2 hours, which is good and even the sleep evaluation of my pedometer said I slept well.
I´ve already walked half of my steps, but didn´t do my workout. I will pause that after the 100 kilometres that I walked in the last two days.
A new week and a new theme and I think that it´s time to talk about peace. Assad went to Moskva and I was so surprised when I watched the news after my walk yesterday. We have a new syrian Doctor in the house and I talked to him about that. And he said that he´s looking forward to a bright syrian future. Turkiye did everything right by supporting the rebel groups while the russian army was occupied in the Ukraine and even the Iranian Army seemed occupied (because they gave all their drones to the russians?). Turkiye´s interest is that the syrian refugees return to Syria and I think that this is a very realistic scenario.
But will it be peace? The aggression of the Syrians showed up yesterday. The headquarter of Assad´s special forces was burned down and even the national note-bank was attacked. The rebel groups had to enact a curfew. Assad´s palace was stripped. I sure hope that the syrian people can have a fair election now. I hope that the rebel groups are not as islamistic as the Taliban in Afghanistan.
Peace in Syria has to be reached via stabilty, via a new government via the return of the financial elite to the country so that it can be built up again. Peace means that there is hope again that the future will be worth working for.
Day 22
Yay, I did it. As you can see, I nailed the 100 kilometres. I wasn´t as fast as on saturday. And I had a longer pause in Fritzlar. I went to the catholic church, went into the Hochzeitshaus(wedding house) Museum and had a coffee, so that I could go to the toilet and change my shoes. I found three book-cabinets, couldn´t resist and packed four books, adding weight in my rucksack. I neither ate my cookies nor did I drink anything, so the weight stayed the same.
I had a lot of amusing contacts. In church I apologised because the mass had already started and sayed that´s because I´m a protestant, which is true. The lady I talked to found that amusing. And I met some witches on the Weihnachtsmarkt. I like witches a lot. Perhaps that´s because I´m, married and yes, women change of the years....
12/08/2024
12/07/2024
Day 21
It´s 2 p.m. and I covered 56 kilometres today. And I ask myself how I managed to do 100 three years ago.
My leg hurts and my back hurts. Weather wasn´t optimal, it was cold and it was raining so the ground got muddy in the woods. I still can´t move my hands like normal because they are still frozen. I have to tip with my nose (no just kidding, I need more time than I normally need to write this).
Tomorrow I try to walk 10 kilometres less.
Nothing funny happened on my walk because I started it twelve hours before, so I hardly met any people and there was no occasion to talk to a person.
We will see Macron this weekend, when Notre-Dame opens up again. We won´t see a prime Minister. Now I have to eat some proteins and can listen to the football-conference. I have to laugh a lot today, because evertything hurts.
Day 20
It´s St. Niclas-Day and I hope that everybody has been nice this year. Today I got up at 5.30 and that´s okay and not 2 hours earlier. I got most of my steps done, had my 30-minutes workout without weights.
Macron will try to appoint a new prime Minister and I think it will be a member of the Neuveau Front Populaire, because otherwise he won´t be appointed. But it will get harder for Macron to show the influence of his party.
South-Korea: I hope that there will be a positive change, because the martial-law-enactment was way to far. It was on the Far Side. Oh god, how I love those comic-strips. As a kid I prefered the Peanuts and Calvin & Hobbes, but when getting older I started to appreciate Gary Larson. Does he still live?
Tomorrow I´m going to walk my first 50 Kilometres. That will be a little adventure, because it will be raining. And I don´t know whether the route I chose will be 50 Kilometres I will visit Fritzlar and Homburg tomorrow, make a little round trip. And on sunday I plan to visit the Edersee, because weather should be better.
12/06/2024
Day 19
Time flies. Something strange happened on my way to wake up. I looked at my watch, well my new pedometer with a new watchface, thought it was half past 5, got up brushed my teeth looked at my watch again and it was 3.40. What a funny way to get up. Actually on this watchface 3 and 5 are pretty similar. So I had my daily walk and the Kurpark (the spa gardens) was still dark and my pulse went up to 60, when I saw another person, but in a second I remembered it to be a statue, that I already know. It´s good to know a statue sometimes...
So you can see that humor also helps to keep your resting heart-rate. Humor is good for your body. Did you know that the slightly smiling face uses less facial musculature than a sad face? So we smile and relax our face at the same time.
And now to something quitely not amusing. What the f**k just happened in France. Who the f**k does Le Pen think she is. Why does the f**king Nouveau Front Populaire (a left-wing-coalition) join forces with the Rassemblement National for the first time in French history to a Vote of no confidence against the Prime Minister Michel Barnier. Oh, my activity here takes place in a very interesting time. What the f**k. Sometimes even swearing makes me smile, because this is totally absurd. (absurd is identical in english and german)
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12/05/2024
Day 18
I created a routine. I get up between 5 and 6, have a walk to warm up and get most of my 10.000 steps and then I have a 30 Minutes work-out with or without weights, training different muscle groups. Actually, since I work in a clinic I greet more than 100 people every day. But I cannot make everyone who is in contact with me happy.
But still humor helps. It helps to calm down the other person. It´s like the comical relief in a horror movie. And what should be part of everyone´s repertoire is the ability to lough about oneself.
South-Korea. To shout out martial law when you have a state like North-Korea bordering you is not a good idea. And again it´s hard to take that with humour.
12/04/2024
Day 17
Again I had all of my physical activities reached before work. I added 30 Minutes of a different workout (no, I´m not going to film it again) with weights.
My humor is sometimes dark and nearly black, because this is also a way to play with expectations, but I cannot joke about the situation in Syria, the next war that is currently flooding us. I know that the russian-backed Assad is not ideal, but I don´t know the rebel groups that took control of Aleppo (second biggest City in northern Syria, bordering Turkiye). I think we don´t need a second Afghanistan. And exorzising the Devil with Satan, might be read funny, but there is no humor in that.
12/02/2024
12/02/2024
Day 16
Today I reached all of my steps before I started work and ended the day with 17.000 steps. I also had my Malsbender-30M-Workout before work, but drank not enough water, not good.
This week I would like to open the theme humor. In my opinion humor is, when someone exceeds the expectation, if the joke is not what the other person thought it would be. It could change the view of a situation.
12/01/2024
Day 15
The weekly summery shows that I roughly walked 10 kilometers every day in the last week and already today.
Additionally I accompanied my younger daughter to church in preperation for the communion in the next year.
The summery of my nutrition-week: I try to eat more mindful. That reduces the amount of food I eat and I think that this is also giving what I eat more worthiness.
11/30/2024
Day 14
Additionally to my 10.000 steps I´ve already done my 15 minute workout with sport equipment of Bayer 04 on the public open air workout space and 30 minutes of fitness training. And today I´m going to contact 100 friends and get on their nerves with 1hundred4peace.
And no after my workouts I didn´t take in any proteins. The german health-ministerium thinks that the consumation of 20g of protein after a workout can inhance muscle growth. It is the equivalent of 200g of curd. So how come someone wants to sell you proteindrinks with 1g of protein per 1 kilo of your weight. Ask them to show a study that proofs the effect. I trust our ministerium of health. In my philosophy protein help in the regeneration of the muscle and the consumation of protein helps me to train the other day. But I also try to do different exercises from one day to the other. I believe that to have a positive training effect one day of musculature training should be accompanied by a perseverence-training on the other day, allowing the body to regenerate. And I believe that stretching after sport is important.
11/29/2024
Day 13
I´ve already accumulated 16.000 steps today, perhaps because it is Black Friday and because of that I analogly bought a lot of stuff and my wife will be (fast and) furious.
For example I bought two inflatabel balance pods to enhance my fitness training. I already used them and it doesn´t feel as if there is an effect, but I believe that the rubber spikes have an effect on my meridians. But I will come back to that theme in a couple of days.
Back to nutrition and to the theme fat. I don´t avoid fat (the Greasy Strangler is one of my favourite movies) and I think that fat is very important because some vitamines are solutable in fat and cannot be digested otherwise. Yesterday I got the check up by my doc and he said that my colestoral level is a little bit enhanced. Well, I try to avoid the saturated fatty acids, since the body can produce them itself and I try to get omega-3-fatty-acids. But I don´t avoid saturated fatty acids. And sometimes I get in feeding-franzy-mode and I eat 200g of Chips, for example, when I drive 440 Kilometers. And of course I believe that I can get rid of the fat my body stores underneath the skin and between my organs and stuff. I will get more wrinkles but I´m proud of them.
11/28/2024
Day 12
Today I had planned nothing additionally to my 10.000 steps. I visited my mom because today it´s her birthday. On our short visit of the city of Dinslaken I got some presents for St.Niclas but I fear that they won´t fit into the shoes of my girls.
Nutrition and sugar. I don´t believe in the reduction of carbohydrates. My main intake of calories is in form of carbohydrates (noodles and rice). I don´t believe in the reduction of sugar, because I had to eat a cake without sugar once and I had to deduce: That´s not my cake. And it´s not my philosophy to take in sweetener.
In my philosphy sweetener leads to the production of insulin to highten the intake of sugar in the cells of your body. But when you use sweetener, insulin gets produced and no sugar goes into the cells. I believe that our body reacts by reducing the production of insulin thus causing diabetes. This also happens because the sweeteners use changes our gut bacteria and this might cause a resistance of our cells to insulin. So I try to drink zero or diet drinks accompanying a meal with carbohydrates and sugar. I think that this is an important theme because peace can hardly be upheld in a society that gets older but sicker and gets more cranky or indignated.
11/27/2024
Day 11
Today my new Xiaomi Band 9c had a breakdown. Additionally to my 10.000 steps I went to the saunarium and swimming. And I swam 100 laps à 25 Meters. But I can only show you the result of the first 40 laps and not the other two rounds of 30 laps, because my wristband shutted down. I was the owner of the Xiaomi band 4, which never did that. It could be that it was also stressed by the heat in the saunarium or the water making it hard to use the touchscreen, but again, the Band 4 didn´t have that problem.
So you just have to believe me that I added another sixty laps to my first 40, to make it 1hundredLaps4peace.
I went to 6 saunarium with infusions (is that correct? I mean saunarium with water being added to the stove and a person whirling around the hot humid air with his towel) and I couldn´t make it ten, because those six sessions already were too much.
And I drank 4 Liters of water over the day, coming to today´s topic water as part of nutrition. I saw a study that rehydrating after sport can be done with water (better than sports drink) and even better with....wait for it....milk. Wow, I never see a person in a fitness-studio taking a sip out of a baby-bottle with milk, although they should know better. Did you know that Coca Cola built a house in India with water-saving-abilities, like collecting rain-water, for example. That´s green-washing because Coca-Cola needs two liters of water to produce one liter of Coca-Cola-soda. Sell that to the people of India, where in some regions water is a rare good. I try to drink two liters of water per day, have to force myself to drink that on a work-day, because I don´t have to eat during work and neither do I miss something to drink. So I put a bottle of water on my table to remind me to drink.
11/26/2014
Day10
Today I had to spend 7 hours on the road in my car. I only had to cover 440 Kilometers but 200 of them were not on the Autobahn and on my way back there were several traffic jams.
So I could only do my 10.000 steps today, but I will try to do a workout later, when the kids are in bed (and when I can watch football on TV, Champions-League).
So today I´m gonna tell you about my philosophy of eating, which is an interval-diet. I drink my water in the morning, but I don´t eat until 1.00 or 2.00 p.m. and then I only eat in a window of up to 8 hours, making it a 16/8 interval diet. My philosophy is, that the body needs the extra hours to digest and that people working on the fields didn´t have breakfast but fasted until noon, the first meal of the day. Interval fasting doesn´t mean I can eat all the calories that I want. I think that I take in less calories than by eating three times a day. Currently my weight goes up. I really believe that is because I build up musculature.
11/25/2024
Day 9
Today I can add my first of my 1hundredFriends4Peace. I will write about him on the FriendsPage.
Today I did my 10.000 steps, my 30 Minutes workout, and thanks to Sebastian I added a 100-Second-Plank. If you need proof of that you can watch it here:
This week, the second week of 1hundred4Peace, I will philosophize about nutrition.
And what a better way is there to start your week and your day with one glass of water. USA Today and the Mayo Clinic are of the same opinion:
Water every morning first thing has health benefits, experts say
Wow, this makes me an expert, too ;-), doesn´t it?
11/24/2024
Day 8
Today I added a 15 minute workout to my daily routine of 10.000 steps. As you can see I reached an average of 9.34 Kilometres daily.
And today I have to do something for the peace in the family. I need to wash around one hundred kilos of clothing (well, there are three girls in our family) and we have to sort our papers. It´s the third time this year, but still it´s a lot of work, sorting everything and adding it to the folders and stuff. Well, you know what I mean. That is also something for the inner peace, well, when it is done, of course.
11/23/2024
Day 7
Sorry but today I´m not as straight as the days before. I post this before I make my 10.000 steps today. But that is because I´ll get visited in one hour and I don´t know, wether I can post this day.
The second, not so straight thing is, that I did something special yesterday that I want to count for today.
Yesterday a friend of min
He not only had his birthday party, but he released his first album. And I added something to his party in my metal-persona Dr. Roarschach. And I got touched at least 100 times. Not only did I greet every guest and every person there but we said goodbye and I got a lot of hugs. Touching others is easy, getting touched is easy too, you just have to be aware of it.
Day 6
After my vaccination yesterday I walked for 3 hours today and added a sport-session of 15 minutes in a public sports-court offered by Bayer04 Leverkusen.
For today´s 1hundred4peace activity I greeted more than a hundred people. Nearly 20 % greeted back, 80% didn´t react. I think that changed because of Corona, when we were supposed, to keep a distance. But isn´t that horrible. 80% of the people I greeted didn´t great back. They didn´t make eye-contact. Well I know that women don´t need to and see me, but men should focus me. This is a sign fear is rising, in my opinion. And that is why there is a need for change in our society.
11/22/2024
Day 5
Today I got myself vaccinated. So I have to pause my sporting activities today.
Nonetheless I did my 10.000 steps and declared it as non-sport.
I also posted something on google-maps, earning more than 100 points. I think that this is also part of this project, because posting something on google-maps might help other people. Well, of course I get misused by google-maps, because the invested time doesn´t get paid. And so I have to tell me, I help other people by posting something interesting on google-maps.
11/21/2024
Day 4
After my 10.000 steps for the day I filmed my workout posted it on youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gakr2maDMV8 and tried to contact Sascha Huber, who inspired my workout.
I tried to contact our mayor, Uwe Richrath and the MC Steppenwölfe, cause I want to be driven around Cologne and Düsseldorf, 100km4Peace.
11/20/2024
Day 3
Today apart from my 10.000 steps I did something nice. I told more than an hundred people how special they are. Sometimes indirectly by saying: "Thanks for your help. That is something really special and usefull for me." At work this is possible especially because I work in a hospital.
And you dear reader, thank you for reading this. It really means a lot for me.
11/19/2024
Day 2
Today I started my day not only with 10.000 steps, but also a Sascha Huber workout. I think, that I am going to post my interpretation of his workout, soon.
I cycled 50 kilometres today. That´s why so many calories were spent.
Met a nice person again today and hope I can direct him to care for him.
While walking and cycling I could plan a little. Have to create, a youtube, insta and x-presence. And I have to activate some friends.
11/18/2024
Day 1
Today I started with my project.
I started by breathing 100 times with the 4-7-8 technique.
4 intervals of inhaling, 7 intervals keeping the breath in and 8 intervals of exhaling slowly.
Each day I´m gonna make 10.000 steps (100 x 100).
And I realized that I need help to make my project known I need 1hundredFriends4peace.