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The situation in the morning: is he wearing one, is he not wearing one?

2022-08-29T03:51:43.950Z


The Chancellor is catching up with the mask question. The left senses an opportunity. And an old acquaintance repeats the mistakes of the past. This is the situation on Monday.


The mask question

A new week begins, and for most people it should start with the usual light

Monday blues

.

You know that.

The chancellor

won't be able to afford it, for him the week begins with the next trip.

It's not quite as long as the trip before.

This time he is only traveling for one day instead of three days, like last week.

But this time the goal is closer than Canada.

Olaf Scholz flies to

Prague

.

There he will give a speech at the

Charles University

and undertake a "European policy assessment," as his government spokesman put it.

Scholz will also meet Czech Prime Minister

Petr Fiala

.

There are important topics that they could talk about: the

cohesion of Europeans

in times of war and gas crisis, the security of NATO's eastern flank.

How long the war will last and how much more support can be given to Ukraine.

However, the first question that many in Berlin are likely to ask is a bit more banal: is he flying

with or without a mask

?

You remember, last week there was some excitement first in

Twitter Germany

and then in the rest of the republic as well, because

Scholz and his Vice Chancellor Robert Habeck

had flown to

Canada

without a mask .

The rest of the passengers in the government jet also did not wear mouth and nose protection.

Neither do I.

Now it's out: I was there, sat in the plane as a journalist,

without a mask

, for eight hours.

I'm not proud of it, but I also learned an important

lesson

from the whole thing , which has nothing to do with masks.

But with my view of politics.

It was the case that I didn't think about the missing mask at all until the

outrage from Germany

reached my consciousness with a slight delay.

Until then, the thought that there might be a problem here hadn't entered my mind at all.

In the days that followed, I often thought about why that was.

Especially since I had always been a rather conscientious

mask wearer

until then .

I've come up with a few approaches.

I came comparatively fresh from my vacation in

France

, where neither on the plane, nor on the train, nor in the supermarket, nor was a mask worth mentioning.

This may have contributed to the fact that I did not perceive the situation as unusual.

Also, and I'm not proud of that either:

herd instinct, so simple

.

Because nobody was wearing a mask, I didn't put one on either.

(I'm glad my kids don't read this column, who I keep telling them things aren't right because other people do them.) I'm not really satisfied with either of those things, but I don't have much more to offer.

Hence the lesson I have learned.

I have been reporting

on politics and politicians

for over 15 years .

During this time, I formulated the sentence in a number of editorial conferences and comments in the three-digit number that this or that should not have happened to the politician X or the press spokesman Y – after all, they are

communication professionals

.

They must be aware of the signal that this sentence or that action sends out.

I was often quite

adamant

about it .

What can I say?

There are many things I'm not very good at, such as

mental arithmetic or drawing animals

.

But I'm afraid I can communicate, at least professionally.

I'm a pro.

But in the situation, in the closed bubble of the government plane, I didn't see that the pictures from the plane could be a problem either.

I'll probably be a little less relentless in the future.

A little bit more humble.

Maybe things still have their good side after all.

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  • Why you (like most) know too little about the past:

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    This is important.

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A chance for the chanceless

I met Janine Wissler

, the federal chairwoman of the Left Party, in 2008.

At that time she had just entered the

Hessian state parliament

, at the age of 26.

And it triggered a kind of comforting horror, at least in the kind of journalistic colleagues who walked through Wiesbaden with their handkerchiefs.

The woman was a

Trotskyist

, such colleagues whispered – one had to be careful about that.

I wasn't quite so careful and met up with Wissler.

I wasn't terrified, I experienced her as suspicious, but I also found her clever.

It was already pretty clear back then that

Wiesbaden

would

not be the last stop

for them.

That's why I was amazed many years later how difficult it was for Wissler to find herself after moving to the federal level as

left-wing federal chairman

.

I had given her more credit for that, even if the circumstances were certainly not the best.

Today, however, Wissler has an appointment that made me sit up and take notice.

She presents a

campaign

with the following title: »Relieve people.

cap prices.

taxing excess profits.

I think that's exactly what a left-wing

opposition party

needs to do right now.

The social issue

is huge because of inflation and rising gas prices.

Out of consideration for the coalition partner FDP

, the SPD can

not answer them as decisively as they might like.

I found it irritating how little has been heard from the left about this so far.

I confess that I hope that Wissler will present something interesting and exciting today.

Something that goes beyond

polemics and bullying

.

Something to be taken halfway seriously.

That has nothing to do with the fact that I'm a fan of the left - but democracy lives, even if it always

sounds a bit like

social studies for seventh graders , from the

clash of ideas

.

No plan, no idea must remain without contradiction, there is no alternative.

Other sections of the left have said things of late that I found rather worrying.

Wissler's co-chairman Martin Schirdewan constantly announces a "hot autumn" of protests, MP Sören Pellmann calls for

Monday demonstrations

- because of the gas levy.

It's pretty wrong when a politician from the Left Party, which emerged from the PDS, uses the term Monday demonstrations, but it's not just about

lack

of style .

There are also plans on the extreme right in the fall to stoke people's

anger

against the so-called system.

When the extreme right and the extreme left join forces, things can get dangerous, as people in Germany know quite well.

Then rather discuss about an excess profit tax, like a

gas price cap

.

Opposition can also be

populist

, it just shouldn't become demagogic.

Maybe Janine Wissler will surprise me in a positive way?

  • Rapid decline in members on the left:

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Very old

When

Ursula von der Leyen

was still Defense Minister, I often accompanied her when she visited Bundeswehr bases in Germany or

German soldiers abroad

.

Now and then it was about the soldiers, most of the time it was about von der Leyen.

It often seemed as if the real purpose of the visit was for the minister to

say something to the

cameras in the right setting.

The sentences then usually sat perfectly.

Von der Leyen 's technical work

was not always so perfect

.

For example, she never really implemented her announcement that she would turn the inefficient

armaments

system upside down, and in the end she left behind a construction site.

It went like this again and again: The first announcement was still very loud, then it got quieter and quieter.

Before that could be noticed, the

next announcement

followed .

That's why I read the article by my colleague Ralf Neukirch about von der Leyen

's work as EU Commission President

with great interest .

Here, too, she had her moment when

pathos and big words

were required, von der Leyen worked there, she was good there.

She made sure that Europe appeared united after

Russia

's attack on Ukraine - but now, as my colleague describes it, she is falling back into the patterns and mistakes that are known from her in Berlin: Von der Leyen is pushing ahead without collusion, isolating herself with her

closest circle of confidants

, gets bogged down, doesn't deliver what she promised.

A lot of what I read there sounded pretty familiar to me.

It is said that people don't change

after a certain age

.

Ursula von der Leyen will soon be 64.

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Here is the current quiz of the day

The starting question today: Which politician has been in the German Bundestag for the longest time?

Winners of the day...

... are the

first graders

in Berlin.

They have their first day of school today, a week after school started for everyone else here.

When you go to school in Berlin, that's not a reason to be happy per se.

But at least the newcomers will meet their teachers and their classmates in person every day over the next few weeks, will make friends and fight over who gets to sit next to whom.

And picking up that very special

school smell

, which, strangely enough, hasn't changed in the last few decades, I convinced myself again over the weekend.

That's good, because during the

pandemic

there were first-graders who, at least temporarily, weren't able to experience any of this, but instead sat in front of the screen because the schools were closed.

If things went well, i.e. the school offered

digital

lessons.

When things were going badly, they filled out worksheets at home.

My youngest daughter started school on

Saturday

.

She was happy, it was a nice celebration, and in the school canteen you could eat a piece of cake in between.

There was a device I hadn't seen before, white and a bit bulky.

It was an

air filter

.

I was briefly irritated because the device

reminded me

that the pandemic is still not over, that nobody knows what

autumn and winter

will be like.

Then I was happy because I saw the

progress

.

Two years ago there was no such thing in school, at least not in ours.

Sometimes it's the little things.

  • Corona prevention: no more money for mobile air filters in schools and daycare centers

The latest news from the night

  • FDP calls for Habeck to change the gas levy – by Tuesday:

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    According to the FDP, the concept is full of "technical errors".

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    Minister of Justice Buschmann is now clearly reacting to this.

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I wish you a good start into the day.

Your Christoph Hickmann

Source: spiegel

All news articles on 2022-08-29

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