The situation in the morning: the chancellor's right to undisturbed wanderings

A chancellor on the move

In the past few days, have you ever wondered what the chancellor is actually doing at the moment?

He's

.

In the Allgaeu.

The

must be very beautiful, my

are there right now too, which is why I have to water their flowers every day and wonder how many flowers a single couple can actually have.

But that's not the point here.

But about

and his vacation.

What does Scholz do in the Allgäu?

He

, among other things.

I know that because I saw a video about it yesterday or the day before, a

caught him, a reporter asked him questions like what the holiday was like.

Scholz kept his

and even greeted politely, but then quickly announced that he would now like to continue hiking alone.

I think he has every right to do so.

Of course, one can argue that a Chancellor is somehow

, especially when

is raging in Europe, the country is running out of gas and many people are running out of money.

But even a Federal Chancellor has the right not to have a

held in front of his face for a few days, especially if he is not slightly sweaty and in the outfit from the last “Globetrotter” purchase.

A chancellor may never be completely private, but he still has the right to some

.

Especially since you can rely on Scholz to take

with him on vacation anyway.

There are and were politicians with whom one could not be quite so sure.

Hannelore Kraft, for example, the then Prime Minister of North Rhine-Westphalia, was hanging out on a

in Brandenburg years ago while a severe storm was raging in her state, in

, in which two people died.

But the social democrat stayed where she was, which she later explained by saying that she had been on the houseboat for a week without

.

By the way, her successor Armin Laschet from the CDU had fallen into the pool while on vacation years earlier.

Then he had no more reception.

Such things are not to be expected from Scholz, he would be more likely to

carry one or two files around in his hiking backpack in addition to

With this in mind: Happy Holidays!

• Chancellor's summer vacation: Scholz spends a few days in the Allgäu

You can find more news and background information on the war in Ukraine here:

• End of the grain blockade in sight, Selenskyj sees military successes - that happened in the night:

  In the dispute over the wheat exports blocked by Russia, there should be a solution today.

  And: Moscow accuses the EU of endangering the global economy with the sanctions.

  The overview.

• What weapons Kiev needs now:

  The EU has increased its financial package for new weapons for Ukraine.

  Western rocket launchers and self-propelled howitzers are now having an effect.

  But what else helps the country against the Russian invaders? 

• The gas is flowing again – but for how long?

  With the restart of deliveries through Nord Stream 1, Germany can breathe a sigh of relief.

  But how much gas is arriving now?

  And what does that mean for the winter?

  Answers to the most important questions.

The very personal incidence

For a long time, the first thing I read in the morning was the overview of the latest

: incidence, R value, new infections and unfortunately also deaths, the daily data package on the pandemic, so compact and handy that the fates behind it are unrecognizable were.

When reading it, there was either a sense of

or

, depending on where

we were on the

Yesterday morning I found out: I don't do it anymore, I haven't for a while.

On the one hand, that's because I'm just tired because this

doesn't end, because it just keeps going.

When I was doing sports, I once had a

who, whenever you had done as many push-

or ran as many laps as he had planned, would add ten push-ups or one more lap.

At some point the first ones didn't feel like it anymore and left.

That's how it feels now, except that you can't just leave a pandemic like this and walk away.

But

you can

Does quite well, at least early in the morning (although, I realize, it's about as mature as a child to cover its eyes and think no one will see it).

On the other hand, I have to admit that I no longer really trust the numbers.

I know it's difficult

to argue

But I now know a lot of people who, after a positive rapid test, didn't do a

at all, but quietly

themselves for a few days until it was over.

At the same time, more people are or were around me in the past few days and weeks than ever before in the past two and a half years - while the

is high, but not record-breakingly high.

From where I know this?

Because I consciously read the corona numbers for the first time in a long time.

I'll do it

now, I promise.

Doesn't help, the whole thing will probably go on for a while.

I'll start this morning.

• Reporting gaps on the weekends: The creeping farewell to the daily corona numbers 

Appointment with an old friend

This afternoon, just before the weekend begins, I have an appointment at the

.

Not with the chancellor, who, as attentive readers will hopefully know, is on vacation.

But the head of the Chancellery is there and holding the fort, the man's name is

.

I look forward to the appointment.

I've known Schmidt for many years, he's a smart, mostly stimulating conversationalist, but conversations with him get a little

after a certain point .

Basically, Schmidt thinks pretty much everything that Olaf Scholz says and does is

(at least that's the impression he gives to the outside world).

I usually see things a little differently or at least more

, which is why we haven't really come to a common denominator for years.

I still remember how we met in the

on election night in 2017 and had a somewhat louder discussion about the media, the election campaign and the big picture.

Nevertheless, we still talk to each other and actually quite like it.

I'm telling you this because I don't think many people really understand how we

work here in Berlin, how we gather our information, create the basis on which we write articles and form our own opinions.

We do this, among other things, through talks like with Schmidt, they are called

talks .

Such conversations are usually not quoted, or only after consultation, which, contrary to what is sometimes assumed of us, in no way means that we would conspire with politicians and put our

together - but that we listen to different perspectives and then ours to develop your own.

So I'm not going to march out of the

this afternoon and plaster the Straße des 17. Juni with

.

But maybe I'll have heard a thought or two worth pondering.

Or maybe I learned something I didn't know before.

Then the appointment would have been worth it.

• SPD string puller Wolfgang Schmidt: The man behind Scholz 

Creative Hunger

's music

.

In case the name doesn't tell you, Jack White used to have a fairly well-known band called

.

If that doesn't mean anything to you either, I would recommend all the more the

that my colleague Andreas Borcholte conducted with White.

The man has a lot to say.

in some respects

.

He likes it analogue instead of digital, holds up the good old

in the streaming age and, among other things, told my colleague that he still doesn't have a

.

"But it's gotten pretty hard to do without, especially on this tour of Europe at the moment," says White.

»Since the pandemic, you have to have a QR code scanned in the restaurant, I can't communicate properly with my children.

It is almost impossible for me to conduct my business in this way.«

Can I introduce myself.

What I can't quite imagine is

for five days like White did before he wrote the

for his new

»Entering Heaven Alive«.

"After three days of fasting, I got an energy boost that I could use to write songs," he says.

»It was as if something completely new came out of me.«

Maybe I should try it out before the next »Lage«.

But it's due tomorrow.

• Musician Jack White on the vinyl boom: »It's not nostalgia.

  This is happening right now!« 

Here is the current quiz of the day

The starting question today: What is the name of the founder of the #MeToo movement?

Winner of the day...

...

Economics Minister Robert Habeck has just announced that private pools may no longer be heated with gas in the future, because gas is known to be scarce at the moment.

At the same time, Habeck weighed things down before the social indifference could lead to revolts: He doesn't think "that the police will visit all pool owners and see if the pools are warm," he said.

Collective relief from Munich-Bogenhausen to Berlin-Grunewald.

Irrespective of this, I think that anyone who owns or owns a pool can generally count themselves among the winners.

Even if the water stays cold.

Ice bathing is supposed to be healthy.

The latest news from the night

• "He has lied.

  He bullied.

  He betrayed his oath.”

  The committee of inquiry into the Capitol attack is demanding severe consequences for ex-President Donald Trump and his helpers.

  A witness also reported that Mike Pence's security guards were scared to death.

• DFB team in the semi-finals after beating Austria:

  The German soccer players are in the semi-finals of the European Championship.

  Lina Magull scored the lead, the DFB selection survived three Austrian goals from aluminum – and then used a goalkeeper error.

• 18 people killed in a police operation in Rio:

  Almost 400 officers were deployed in a poor district of the Brazilian city of Rio de Janeiro to take action against a criminal gang of thieves.

  At least 18 people died.

• Second ex-policeman sentenced to prison in the George Floyd case:

  It was already clear that Thomas Lane was guilty.

  Now the sentence in the second trial of George Floyd's death has been announced: The ex-policeman has to go to prison - but much shorter than colleague Derek Chauvin.

• It is a historic election for India

  : With Droupadi Murmu, a representative of an indigenous minority has taken over as head of state for the first time.

  Prime Minister Modi speaks of a "ray of hope".

The SPIEGEL + recommendations for today

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  After his death, that's gone.

  Is this a defeat for the #MeToo movement?

• Waking up with Layla:

  Summer is the time for folk and rifle festivals.

  In my home village I wanted to show the children how beautiful customs can be.

  Then came Layla (and it got hotter).

• Why we see a memory positively - or negatively:

  In our memory bad experiences cavort next to nice ones.

  But what decides which storage facility they end up in?

  Researchers have now found an answer. 

• Bye, Uwe:

  down-to-earth, honest, loyal: Uwe Seeler embodied all the values ​​that are preached in sport.

  It's hard to imagine someone like him in football today.

I wish you a good start into the day.

Your Christoph Hickmann