1. Cute idea
The ten gas savings bids will soon be complete.
Politicians have been preaching the first commandment »You shouldn't take a warm shower!« for a long time.
Numbers two, three and four "You should change the shower head!", "You should turn down the heating!" and "You should regularly defrost the freezer!" should have gotten around by now.
Cem Özedmir's "You should eat less meat!" to support the fight against Putin will probably only be heeded after the barbecue season.
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Prime Minister Kretschmann
Photo: Bernd Weissbrod / dpa
Easier to follow is the suggestion to save gas that another Green from Baden-Württemberg made today.
Prime Minister Winried Kretschmann thinks that you don't have to shower all the time: "The washcloth is also a useful invention."
Before him, Berlin's Green Senator for the Environment, Bettina Jarosch, had said something similar: "I only wash my cats in the morning." This not only saves water, but also time and energy.
My colleague Isabell Huelsen, Head of the Economics Department, commented two months ago: »The shower head as a weapon in the gas war against Putin?
How cute.« Even if Germany were to collectively change the fittings or use the washcloth more often: »The gas storage tanks won't be filled if nothing more comes from Russia.
The share of private households in gas consumption in summer is just around ten percent.
If ten percent were saved as a result of a collective effort, the overall effect would still be small," says Huelsen.
In addition to appeals for voluntary energy saving, the government now wants to increase the pressure with a series of measures.
A corresponding regulation is to come into force from September, which stipulates, among other things, that retailers should keep the doors of their shops closed, advertising must not be lit at night and private swimming pools should no longer be heated with electricity or gas.
According to the new Energy Saving Ordinance, the workplace may only be heated to a maximum of 19 degrees.
Anyone who gets cold in winter should remember an idea from ex-Chancellor Angela Merkel, who advised schoolchildren who were freezing in the classroom at the beginning of the corona pandemic: "Maybe you do a little squat or clap your knees Hands."
Read more here: Government sets up energy saving plan for the coming months
2.
Crisis Communication
One wrong sentence and your career is over.
Or a few missed sentences and the trouble is great.
This is exactly what the Federal Chancellor is experiencing, who did not contradict when the President of the Palestinians, Mahmoud Abbas, delivered an anti-Israeli tirade in the Chancellery and in the process put the Holocaust into perspective.
Today, for the second time, Olaf Scholz had to face the questions in the Hamburg investigative committee about the Cum-Ex scandal.
They investigate whether he or other leading SPD politicians influenced the tax treatment of the Warburg Bank.
(More on the chronology of events surrounding the Warburg affair can be found here.)
"The suffering figure" is the title of the new SPIEGEL.
You can get the issue digitally here and from Saturday at the kiosk
"Political communication is the most dangerous way of speaking and remaining silent," writes my colleague Dirk Kurbjuweit from our Berlin office.
In the SPIEGEL cover story, Kurbjuweit examined the rhetorical tricks the economics minister used to try to win over Germans in the crisis.
Habeck appears to many to be the better chancellor.
The ZDF political barometer regularly measures how satisfied Germans are with their top political personnel.
At the bottom of the rankings are Friedrich Merz (CDU), Markus Söder (CSU) and Christian Lindner (FDP).
Robert Habeck is enthroned at the top, followed by his Green party colleague Annalena Baerbock.
So what makes Habeck different from the others?
Above all, he brings a new tone to politics, writes title author Dirk Kurbjuweit.
"For 16 years, Germany was ruled by a chancellor who refused open communication, who shied away from debates, who hardly allowed any insight into her inner life, who publicly used frozen language," he analyses.
Scholz followed Angela Merkel, who didn't do much differently, who avoided warming words despite the war, inflation, corona and climate crisis.
Germany was "under sugared, as far as the speeches by its top politicians are concerned".
According to Kurbjuweit, Habeck's strength is "that he can reconcile many things within himself, the cottony musings, the pithy character of the combatant, the patience of the explainer, the determination of the doer".
One problem, however, lies in the frequency with which Habeck gives the contrite doubter and sincere political explainer.
Julian Müller, a sociologist, and Astrid Séville, a political scientist, with whom Kurbjuweit analyzed Habeck's appearances and speeches, believe "that public doubt will wear off, that one day it will only be annoying and will be considered a scam".
His spokeswoman rejected SPIEGEL's request to talk to Habeck about his way of communicating, arguing that the minister had more important things to do at this time.
That may have been honest, but maybe it was also a bit of a fib.
In any case, it is a clever, communicative evasive maneuver.
Read more here: The five faces of Robert Habeck
3. No experiments
In southern Germany it will be very uncomfortable in the next few hours.
Streams could rise, basements could fill up.
The weather expert Jörg Kachelmann, who regularly writes about the weather for us, warns: »Please do not experiment!« There will be »not the Ahr flood, but you have to be careful not to stand around in the basement and see whether it’s already soup or not drive the car into the underground car park so that it doesn't get wet.
Such German virtues can be deadly."
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Mangfall Mountains in Bavaria
Photo: Uwe Lein / dpa
Heavy storms had already raged in Austria yesterday.
Two girls died at a bathing lake in Carinthia.
Further north, three other people were killed by a tree in Gaming, Lower Austria.
Storms and thunderstorms paralyzed traffic in many places.
There were power outages.
First the forest fires in eastern Germany, then the low water on the Rhine and the still mysterious fish kill on the Oder.
Now threatening storms in the south.
Climate change is starting to make me afraid of the word »summer holidays«.
The six weeks between July and August used to be among the best of the year.
Now with every weather forecast comes the oppressive feeling of watching the world go under.
Meteorologists still use the term "bright" when they want to express that the weather is primarily determined by sunshine.
Soon they will have to look for a new adjective.
Read more here: No experiments, please!
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What else is important today
Federal government supports Palestinians with 340 million euros:
After the Holocaust statement by Palestinian President Abbas, there were calls for financial consequences.
But the federal government continues to provide humanitarian aid to the Palestinians.
FDP outraged by Kubicki:
There is "no good reason not to open Nord Stream 2," said FDP Vice Kubicki in an interview.
Many in his party see things differently, including General Secretary Bijan Djir-Sarai.
For the first time two women in Mossad top positions:
Two women take on management positions in the Israeli secret service.
As director, »A« is also supposed to take care of the Iranian nuclear problem.
Spain has a new »Stonehenge«:
An avocado plantation was actually supposed to be built on the site in Andalusia.
But nothing will come of it after archaeologists have examined the area.
My favorite story today:
"What are we doing this for, who needs it?"
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Russian soldier Filatev
Photo: private
For a long time, no interview on the suffering of the war in Ukraine has touched me as much as the conversation that my colleague Alexandra Rojkov had with a 34-year-old Russian paratrooper.
Pavel Filatev believed he was defending his country - and found himself engaged in a brutal war of aggression.
For which his army was also poorly equipped.
»
I sit here alive, but there were people in my company who died young.
And for what?
So that Ukraine gets worse?
What kind of stupid reason is that?' asks Filatev.
He decided to take an extraordinary step: he wrote a book about his experiences in Ukraine.
On 141 pages he gives an unembellished account of the problems facing the Russian army and his own abhorrence of the »special operation«.
Filatev's key finding: "We had no moral right to invade another country." A few weeks ago he put the book online for free.
Actually, the soldier originally wanted to stay in Russia and wait for his indictment.
This week he changed his mind and left his homeland.
"To support his story, Filatev sent photos and documents to prove his use," writes Alexandra.
“It would be the first time that a Russian soldier reported so openly about the attack on Ukraine.
Filatev published his book even though he knew that he might have to pay a high price.« Criticism of the Russian armed forces is punishable by up to 15 years in prison.
Read the full story here: »What are we doing this for, who needs it?«
And here is more news and background information on the war in Ukraine:
Guterres warns against disconnecting nuclear power plants from the Ukrainian power grid:
On his trip to Ukraine, UN Secretary-General António Guterres visited the port of Odessa and got an idea of grain exports.
He also responds to rumors that Russia is planning to shut down the Zaporizhia nuclear power plant.
Putin fan and rapper Timati opens the first coffee shop in Moscow:
He calls Vladimir Putin a "superhero" and praises Moscow for not having "gay parades" there.
Now the rapper Timati has presented the new logo of 130 former Starbucks cafes in Russia.
"Kill in the name of Russia and you will be free":
Putin's troops suffer heavy casualties in Ukraine.
To fill the ranks, the notorious Wagner Troupe searches for new fighters in penal colonies.
Money, amnesty and medals await the recruits – or death.
What we recommend at SPIEGEL+ today
How Lutz D. allegedly became one of the largest illegal drug dealers in the world:
Anyone looking for prescription drugs without a prescription can get them cheaply from questionable providers on the Internet.
A case from Germany gives deep insights into a billion dollar business.
"At first, security guards from the Russian embassy stood at our door":
Egbert Laege has been in charge of the former Gazprom Germania for the federal government for four months.
His task: save the company.
And keep the republic warm through the next winter.
The dubious business of the HSV board of directors:
HSV finally wants to go back to the first division, CFO Thomas Wüstefeld is supposed to raise the necessary money.
But the medical entrepreneur has completely different problems.
Business partners accuse him of fraud and disloyalty.
Which is less important today
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Photo: Steven Meisel / VOGUE / PA / dpa
Who wants to be beautiful
: After a failed beauty treatment, the former supermodel
Linda Evangelista, 57,
celebrates her comeback in "Vogue".
Apparently, a few tricks helped with the photo shoot for the cover.
Her jaw and neck were slightly pulled back with tape and rubber bands.
She is still concerned about the consequences of the procedure: »If I had known that the side effects include losing your livelihood and becoming so depressed that you hate yourself, I would never have taken the risk.«
Typo of the day
, now corrected: »Thank you, that there is still a lot to come.«
Cartoon of the Day:
Secret Weapon
And on the weekend?
Instead of an after-work beer, how about an after-work party in your living room at home?
After all, it's almost the weekend.
Finnish Prime Minister Sanna Marin shows how it's done in this video.
Since her party video was leaked, Marin has had to publicly justify that she didn't take any drugs, just drank alcohol.
But there remains a scandal that German Chancellor Olaf Scholz should envy.
My colleague Christian Teevs reports that he could not remember the content of his conversations as Hamburg mayor with the head of the bank from whom the city later did not demand back taxes worth several million euros .
If Scholz had partyed with the bankers based on the Finnish model, his memory gaps would be credible.
But as it is, they remain a bad joke.
Have a nice weekend,
your Anna Clauss
Here you can order the »Situation in the Evening« by e-mail.