When The Traffic Lights Stopped

For a nation that’s supposedly laden with hard-headed common sense and a strong work ethic but is in fact more left-wing than anything else, Germany has slammed into the wall that bedevils similar political philosophies all over:  they’ve run out of other people’s money to spend.

And with what is so common among nations afflicted with a multi-party political system, their latest coalition government has therefore collapsed, crucified by essentially three factors: immigration (and growing popular resistance thereto), insane socio-economic policies fueled by Green eco-nonsense (e.g. an EV mandate which has led to closure of auto factories and concomitant unemployment), and a screaming insistence (via a cordon sanitaire* ) on preventing anything resembling a “Right-wing” party (the Alternative for Germany — AfD) from coming to power, either outright or even by parliamentary coalition.  In no small part, this is because the German Left persists in labeling anything not left-wing as “Nazi” or “fascist”, which tactic may be familiar to my Murkin Readers.

The Germans can’t embark on deficit spending so beloved of Leftist governments (e.g. the UK’s Labour Party and the U.S. Democrats), because the German constitution forbids it.  Even when they try all sorts of accounting legerdemain, the German courts wag their judicial finger and say, “Nein.”

Of course, the solution is simple:  firstly, end the flood of Merkel-enabled immigration (which is proving to be, surprise surprise, an economic drain on even the well-funded German welfare state, not to mention a social flashpoint as the Muslim immigrants are violent and not assimilating into the Kultur );  and secondly, the German government should end the slavish adherence to radical Green policies which, as anyone with common sense knows, are impractical, costly and doomed to failure.

Unfortunately, those initiatives seem to be precisely the two main policies of the AfD political platform.  Oops.

For a very clear analysis of all the above, feel free to wander over here.

And thennnnn… there is the looming prospect of a Trump Administration which will refuse to bankroll any of this shit, will insist on Germany spending more on their military NATO obligations (which they can’t afford to do)  — and all this with the Russo-Ukranian war raging right on their doorstep.

An historical aside:  the leftwing SDP (Social Democrat Party) has been a political disaster pretty much since its inception, despite being traditionally the largest political party in Germany.  They pretty much enabled Hitler’s rise to power in the 1930s by refusing to participate in any centrist government coalition, and they remain a political speed bump to this day.

The Krauts are in deep shit:  rocks are meeting hard places all over the polity, and it couldn’t have happened to a nicer bunch of eco-insane Socialists.


In this modern German context, a “cordon sanitaire”  is shorthand for “stop the AfD from coming to power, by any means necessary”.  Hence the parliamentary alliance between three parties with diametrically-opposed philosophies (that has just collapsed).

LOL Xi

Don’t make me laugh, asshole:

Chinese President Xi Jinping said Thursday Beijing and Washington must find a way to “get along” in a message to US president-elect Donald Trump, state media reported.

In his first message to Trump since the former president secured a second term, Xi said “history has shown that China and the United States benefit from cooperation and suffer from confrontation”, state broadcaster CCTV said.

“A stable, healthy and sustainable China-US relationship is in the common interest of both countries and is in line with the expectations of the international community,” Xi said.

He called for Washington and Beijing to “strengthen dialogue and communication” and “properly manage differences”.

Yeah, sure.  Stop trying to invade Taiwan, stop trying to colonize the entire SE Asia area, stop hassling India’s border, stop supporting Iran with arms and munitions, stop vetoing the US in the UN, and stop doing a few other things I can’t remember at the moment (but I bet Trump has a list).

Do all that, and we can talk.  No?

Then fuck you, you Commie shitbrain, and buckle in because it’s going to be a rough ride… for you.

New Ban?

This is an interesting development:

Australia will ban children from using social media with a minimum age limit as high as 16, prime minister Anthony Albanese said Tuesday, vowing to get kids off their devices and ‘onto the footy fields’.

Federal legislation to keep children off social media will be introduced this year, he  said, describing the impact of the sites on young people as a ‘scourge’.

The minimum age for children to log into sites such as Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok has not been decided but is expected to be between 14 and 16 years, Albanese said.

The prime minister said his own preference would be a block on users aged below 16.

Age verification trials are being held over the coming months, the centre-left leader said, though analysts said they doubted it was technically possible to enforce an online age limit.

Loath as I am to give any kind of credit to the OzGov, foul totalitarian nanny bastards that they are, I can’t help but wonder whether a) this can work and b) if it does work, will it benefit teens in any way?  Given that teens nowadays appear to have absolutely no problem in accessing porn — even porn sites protected by “age walls” — I’m somewhat skeptical about it all.

It’s probably just the usual “We have to do something!” posturing so common among all politicians.


(Just an aside:  Albanese’s “center-left” philosophy is somewhere around that of Bernie Sanders, politically speaking.)

Class, Explained

Some pleb has a go at the British class system — a system regarded with bemusement by most Murkins — and while we have few parallels with the Brits, the one we do regrettably share is the propensity of the well-to-do middle class to be involved in stupid shit like the Green movement and (lately) the Free Palestine demonstrations.

It’s a fairly lengthy viewing, but funny as hell — and from what I’ve seen of the system, fairly accurate.

Most telling, though, is the description of the rigidity of the thing:  the “bucket of crabs” analogy is very appropriate.

And we have shared the dolorous effects of the “outsourcing” of manufacturing and the jobs therein to foreign countries;  the only difference being that our corporations did it without any help from government.

When The Hatred Surges

Not talking about our local Commies and their HitlerTrump bullshit here.  Nope, we have to go Over There to see a bunch of gummint types having their asses handed to them by the voters, for once.

The Labour government’s decision to scrap its blanket 20mph speed limits in Wales just a year after they were introduced has sparked hope for the rest of the UK. 

Wales’ Transport Secretary Ken Skates admitted the policy was so unpopular even his own family had signed the petition against it.

This despite all the assurances that a 20mph (!!!!) speed limit would do so much to combat Global Cooling Climate Warming Change©.  Of course it wouldn’t (and won’t), just as our own imposition of a 55mph highway speed limit did nothing of the sort either.

I suppose retraction is better than a public hanging, after all — although that may be a contentious issue all by itself, especially among Stout Bulldogs of my acquaintance Over There.  (The Englishman, for one, is especially fond of the “heads on pikes” approach to curbing government excess.)

Now we’ll see if the Welsh example spreads to other Brit municipalities of similar stupidity.  But I wouldn’t count on it.