Tsunami Of Green Bans: German Economics Minister Plans End Of Gas, Oil Heating Beginning 2024!
By P Gosselin | No Tricks Zone | February 28, 2023
The Green Tyranny expands as the German government readies to ban oil and gas heat beginning 2024!
Economic “death blow”
Germany’s Minister of Economics, Robert Habeck, Green Party, is reported to be planning a ban of gas and oil heating – as early as 2024, according to the online BILD.
Heat in Germany will soon become a precious luxury, affordable by the rich only.
The proposed plan comes just after the EU Parliament voted to ban the registration of new fossil fuel cars beginning 2035.
According to Habeck’s draft legislation, homes and buildings would replace oil and gas heating systems with those operating with renewable energies, such as a heat pump.
The first step in Habeck’s plan is to be implemented as early as 2024. Only heating systems that produce heat from “at least 65 percent renewable energy” are to be installed.
Existing gas and oil heating systems will likely be allowed to continue operation, but only for a limited time.
The Berliner Morgenpost reports: “Green politician also wants to phase out gas and oil heating systems that have already been installed. Specifically, these should only run for a maximum of 30 years – after which time they should finally be phased out.”
For consumers this would mean that only a heat pump or district heating would be options, and so would mean the end of gas and oil heating.
Economic death blow
The latest proposal would mean another huge economic blow for citizens who are already reeling from high inflation, high interest rates and a shrinking economy.
German Bundestag Member Frank Müller-Rosentritt of the FDP Free Democrats tweeted: “Extremely increased interest rates and high construction costs are already causing housing construction to collapse. The death blow is now being dealt by the Green Minister of Economics with his ideas, which completely ignore reality and cause rents to explode.”
Green fairy tale world
Other politicians and interest groups have also come out blazing in criticizing Habeck’s draft radical measures. The association “Haus und Grund” (Home and Property) rejects Habeck’s plans, with association president Kai Warnecke speaking of a “law from the green fairy tale world”.
German Green Ministers Emitting The Most With Government Flights… Minister Baerbock 5000 Tonnes CO2!
By P Gosselin | No Tricks Zone | February 24, 2023
Recall how climate activists demand that ordinary citizens, i.e. “useless consumers”, limit their annual CO2 emissions to just a single measly tonne per person. Currently the average CO2 emissions per person in Europe are about 8 tonnes.
German government ministries run by the Green Party emit by far the most CO2 when it comes to government flights. AI generated symbol image, dall.e 2.
Climate activists, like the German Greens, you’d think, would thus themselves be practicing what they preach, at least limiting their emissions to some extent in order to set an example for the rest of us.
To find out whether or not the leading German Greens are preaching water and actually drinking it themselves, economics expert Tilman Kuban of Germany’s opposition Christian Democratic Union (CDU), asked the current Socialist-Green government to provide a breakdown of how many flights were made by the government ministries using the German Armed Forces’ Special Air Mission Wing during the current legislative period (December, 2021 to January, 2023).
For the sake of a political overview, there are basically major 6 parties active in Germany. From left spectrum to right: Die Linke, The Greens, The Socialists SPD, The Free Democrats FDP, the Christian Democratic Union CDU and the Alternativ für Deutschland AfD. Currently a leftist coalition made up of the SPD, FDP and Greens make up the government.
Germany’s online BILD daily crunched the numbers on the number of flights and the CO2 emitted by the different ministries and the people who head them.
62% of all CO2 emissions by government flights were generated by the Greens alone
According to the official government data, most of the 11,234 tonnes of CO2 for flights by government ministries so far in the current legislative period are attributable to the Greens: 6,900 tonnes of CO2. That is over 60 percent of the CO2 emissions of all ministerial flights.
Top frequent flyer/emitter: Annalena Baerbock
Number 1 among all the ministers is Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock (Green Party) with 67 flights, 5000 tonnes of CO2 and costs of around 7.6 million euros.
Second place goes Robert Habeck, Minister of Economics and Climate Protection (Green Party) with almost 1900 tonnes of C02 emitted on 32 flights (costing around 3.2 million euros).
In total, 250 flights were taken by the government ministries.
The government’s biggest CO2 emitter is Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) himself (not a minister). According to BILD daily: “The Chancellor’s office took 114 flights that emitted almost 7200 tons of CO2. Cost: more than 11.2 million euros.”
How US’ False Flags Record Prompts Public to Trust Hersh’s Nord Stream Bombshell Even More
Sputnik – 24.02.2023
Pulitzer-prize winning journalist Seymour Hersh previously teased about unveiling the mechanism of Nord Stream’s destruction. Despite the media silence surrounding his latest expose, the journalist’s research keeps attracting the public’s attention, as the US and its Nordic allies remain tight-lipped about the incident.
“In my view, Hersh is facing a reality which he has never faced before in his long and distinguished life,” Hans Mahncke, a US investigative journalist and lawyer, told Sputnik. “His life-long audience of traditional leftists has dissolved. Whereas a Hersh expose in the past would immediately cause a big furor both in media and politics, he is now being ignored. That is an entirely new situation for him. But it is not just Hersh. If the entire Edward Snowden story would play out now in 2023 instead of in 2013, no one would report it or care. This is the new reality we live in.”
Mahncke drew attention to “the complete disappearance of the old, anti-war left in the United States,” which he called “an extraordinary event which historians will study long into the future.”
“Some say that hatred of Trump caused this shift in that if Trump wanted peace, the left wanted war just to spite Trump, but the trend started under Obama and also captured Europe, where even the German Green Party, which used to be fervently anti-war, is now extremely hawkish. The exact reasons remain unclear, but there is no question that the Western anti-war movement is largely dead. In turn, the prospect of slithering into World War III is much higher now than at any time during the Cold War.”
Earlier this month, Hersh released a bombshell report on Nord Stream’s destruction on September 26, 2022, claiming that US Navy divers, with assistance from Norway, planted explosive charges at the pipeline under the cover of a NATO military exercise in the Baltic during summer 2022.
Observers warn that the destruction of the Nord Stream could be equated to a declaration of war, and yet it appears that Western leaderships are not interested in getting to the bottom of it.
West Surprisingly Uninterested in Investigating Nord Stream Sabotage
Earlier this week, Russia presented a UN Security Council draft resolution requesting that the secretary-general conduct an independent international investigation to verify the facts brought forward by Hersh. Moscow’s request for an independent investigation was prompted by doubts about the integrity and transparency of Denmark, Germany, and Sweden in their ongoing inquiries.
Permanent Representative of Russia to the United Nations Vasily Nebenzya has repeatedly noted that Moscow hasn’t been allowed to take part in the investigations by any of the three countries. He insisted they were “not only not transparent, but it is quite clear that they seek just to cover the tracks and stick up for their … American brother.”
For its part, the US reiterated its “concerns” with regard to the Nord Stream attack, and, simultaneously, bashed Hersh’s account of events as “false” and “fiction.” Sweden, Denmark, and Germany have yet to complete their separate probes into the blast: they signaled recently that “at this point, it is not possible to say when they will be concluded.”
When asked what they had found so far, the investigators told the UN Security Council on February 21, that they had established “that there has been extensive damage” to the pipelines “and that the damage was caused by powerful explosions due to sabotage.” Actually, this was already known roughly five months ago. Probably, the nations are keeping other findings close to their chests.
Sachs and McGovern: UN Probe is Global Priority
Remarkably, two American experts who testified at the UNSC meeting openly said that they do not buy into the West’s Nord Stream narrative. Jeffrey D. Sachs, a professor at Columbia University and specialist in global economy, stated on February 21 that “the investigation by the UN Security Council of the Nord Stream explosions is a high global priority.”
“There is only one detailed account to date of the Nord Stream destruction, the one recently put forward by investigative journalist Seymour Hersh, ostensibly based on information leaked to Hersh by an unnamed source,” stated Sachs. “The White House has described Hersh’s account as ‘completely and utterly false,’ but did not offer any information contradicting Hersh’s account and did not offer any alternative explanation.”
Retired CIA officer and political activist Raymond McGovern, who also participated in the UNSC summit, said that he “associate[d] [himself] completely with Sachs’ comments.”
Sachs was one of the first prominent American figures to suggest in the wake of the blasts that the Biden administration could potentially have been involved in the attack.
Growing Mistrust Towards US Government Machine
In his latest Substack report, Hersh shed some light on US-Norwegian military cooperation which started after the Second World War. He also shed light on the special role played by the CIA during the War in Vietnam and, especially, prior to the Gulf of Tonkin “false flag.”
“The problem of rogue US intelligence agencies has been around for a long time, as even John F. Kennedy noted,” Mahncke said. “After Nixon’s forced resignation, there was an effort to clean up these agencies, but not much changed in the short term and in the long run, we now have a situation where these agencies not only create mischief overseas, but also target domestic groups. That is what might bring real change, as at least half the country no longer trusts these agencies. While claims of Iraqi WMDs might have been readily accepted in the past, people now ask questions. Ironically, had US intelligence agencies not started targeting its own citizens, the fake narrative that Russia bombed its own pipeline might have prevailed.”
Indeed, it seems that Americans’ trust in their security services and federal government has been shattered by the Trump-Russia hoax, Big Tech’s collusion with the feds to censor free speech in the US, and the manhunt for January Sixers, to name but a few.
Earlier this month, extensive research by Jeff Gerth debunked the US media’s journalistic malpractice in covering Russiagate, while the Twitter Files released by Elon Musk last year told the story of information manipulation and machinations by the FBI and other agencies in coordination with Big Tech and Big Media. Apparently, the potential release of 41,000 hours in footage from January 6, 2021 protests would answer the question whether the crackdown against January Sixers was justified.
However, the reported “fakes” and “hoaxes” created and peddled by the feds did not start with Trump’s ascendance to power. Back in 2015, Seymour Hersh played down the “glorious” Obama-era story of the capture and elimination of “Terrorist No 1” Osama bin Laden.
Osama Bin Laden’s Death
According to the US government’s account of events, the US tracked Bin Laden to a compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan; conducted a secret Navy Seal raid which resulted in the terrorist’s death; after that, Bin Laden’s body was treated with respect and buried at sea. Still, Hersh suggested, citing his sources, that in reality, Pakistani intelligence services captured Bin Laden in 2006 and kept him in prison.
In 2010, Pakistan agreed to give Bin Laden away to the US under the guise of a staged military raid. US Navy Seals met no resistance at Abbottabad on May 2, 2011 and killed Osama in his bedroom in cold blood. His body was “torn apart with rifle fire” and his remains were “tossed out over the Hindu Kush mountains” by Navy SEALs during their flight home. There was no burial at the sea since “there wouldn’t have been much left of Bin Laden to put into the sea in any case.”
Hersh’s version of Bin Laden’s death looks especially tragic given that 18 years earlier, on December 6, 1993, Osama bin Laden was described as “every inch the mountain warrior of mujahedin legend”; a “shy man” dressed in “his gold-fringed robe”; a man who helped the Afghans win a war against the USSR. This is how Osama was portrayed by The Independent at the time.
Khan Sheykhoun False Flag
In 2017, Hersh challenged the US official narrative about a chemical incident in the town of Khan Sheikhoun that was used by the Trump administration to justify the April 6, 2017 US cruise missile strike on Syrian government forces’ al-Shayat air base.
Hersh’s account of events showed that not only was there no evidence to back Washington’s claims about Syrian government forces’ alleged “chemical attack” on Khan Sheikhoun, but that the US military and intelligence apparatus were not aware of such an “attack” before the cruise missile strike was ordered. In reality, the Khan Sheikhoun chemical incident was staged by al-Nusra* terrorists, according to the Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist.
The aforementioned cases raise the question: what else could the US government and its agencies be hiding?
Meanwhile, Hersh’s latest expose describes a case that appears to be far more dangerous than the My Lai massacre or the Khan Sheykhoun false flag.
“We are now in a far more dangerous situation than at any time in the Cold War,” warned Mahncke. “Western elites claim that Russia in 2023 is akin to Germany in the 1930s. That is nonsense. The situation we are facing is far more akin to the pre-World War One situation in Europe. It’s as if reason has been abandoned and the entire Western establishment is itching for war.”
Germans demand investigation of Nord Stream sabotage, end of US occupation
Free West Media | February 23, 2023
After the sensational revelations by US investigative reporter Seymour Hersh about the perpetrators of the Nord Stream attacks on September 26, 2022, the German government has remained silent. It does not want to comment on Hersh’s research results, according to which the pipelines were blown up by Americans and Norwegians.
The Scholz administration certainly has not drawn any conclusions from the revelations.
The German public obviously sees things very differently – at least if one wants to believe a voting simulation by the Dutch portal “Restart Democracy”. There, the Rudulin Foundation, which by its own admission is committed to more co-determination and a “truly democratically oriented society”, asked 6425 German citizens to vote between February 10 and 17.
Almost 100 percent voted to convene a Nord Stream investigative committee. The question was: “Do you vote for or against the convening of the Nord Stream committee of inquiry?”
Markus Bönig, Director of the Rudulin Foundation, underscored the difference between a survey and a vote: “Voting by voters is an important instrument of the joint declaration of intent. It is used for decision-making and choice, so that power is actually and directly exercised by the people,” explained Bönig.
Surveys, on the other hand, only draw a non-binding opinion of a comparatively small group of registered people, according to Bönig.
Peace demonstrations reflect the mood
In addition to the big peace demo on Friday in Dresden (with HC Strache and Björn Höcke) and on Saturday in Berlin (with Sahra Wagenknecht and Alice Schwarzer), there will be another peace demo in Ramstein on Sunday under the motto “Close Airbase Ramstein – Ami [Americans, ed.] go home!”
The call from the organizers states: “As a broad, non-partisan protest alliance, we have registered a large peace demonstration for February 26, 2023 on the square in front of the train station in Ramstein. We demand the immediate closure of the US airbase, the complete withdrawal of all US troops, taking all weapons stationed here with them.
“The danger that Germany will be drawn into a third world war is growing daily. The recent decision to deliver heavy tanks to Ukraine also ensures that Germany is increasingly becoming a participant in the war. One of the centers for war, suffering and also for crimes against humanity is the US Airbase in Ramstein. Here we would like to send a clear signal for peace on February 26, 2023.”
Their goals include:
- The closure of the US airbase in Ramstein and the withdrawal of all foreign troops from Germany
- A sovereign German foreign policy
- No to arms shipments
- A return to diplomacy
- An end to sanctions
- No to foreign deployments of the Bundeswehr
The peace demonstration will start at 12 pm on the square in front of the station in Ramstein. The square is located opposite the Ramstein Miesenbach train station on Bahnhofstrasse. There will be a pavilion on the site of the opening rally, where initiatives and organizers can display their information material.
In addition to an opening rally, there is a large demonstration in the direction of the airbase, where another rally will be taking place. Participants who cannot complete the route for health reasons will be able to remain at the site where sanitary facilities will be available.
The West severely miscalculated the geopolitical ramifications of the war in Ukraine
The EU, and not Russia, has weakened since the start of the special military operation
By Ahmed Adel | February 24, 2023
Although many remember February 24 as the first anniversary of the war in Ukraine, Russia’s special military operation is actually the next phase of a wider conflict that began in 2014. This is a key point often overlooked because the narrative built in the West is that Russia’s intervention was an unprovoked invasion with the sole purpose of territorial expansionism. The international community, which the West incorrectly refers to itself as, has rejected this narrative. To the disappointment of Western leaders, most of the world has instead deepened their ties with Russia.
However, the “unprovoked invasion” narrative has been exposed in the West also as a fallacy. It is recalled that former German Chancellor Angela Merkel admitted in December 2022 that “the 2014 Minsk agreement was an attempt to give time to Ukraine.”
“It also used this time to become stronger as can be seen today. The Ukraine of 2014-2015 is not the modern Ukraine,” she said, adding that “it was clear to everyone” that the conflict had been put on hold, “yet this was what gave Ukraine invaluable time.”
Merkel’s statement confirmed that the Minsk Accords, a series of agreements which sought to end the Donbass war, was only intended to give the Ukrainian state more time to militarily strengthen. It also proves that the Western party of the Minsk Accords never intended to use this mechanism to find peace and address the concerns of local residents.
Therefore, the Russian intervention was not necessarily a surprise, and perhaps the West were even expecting it.
However, what was an absolute surprise for the West was the geopolitical and economic ramifications – all to the detriment of the West and to the advancement of Moscow.
It cannot be denied that sanctions had an impact on the Russian economy, but the European Union has demonstrated that it is nothing more than a political dwarf that has no autonomy from Washington. Sanctions have a limited effect on Russia given that it is a completely self-sustainable country, unlike Syria and Iran (which are also heavily sanctioned but without the capacity for self-sustainability).
Rather, the sanctions have actually accelerated the de-Dollorisation of the global economy and deepened the economic crisis in Europe.
Evidently, there was naivety in the West, as there was a false belief that Russia would capitulate to sanctions pressure. Instead, Europe is experiencing an economic crisis that has crushed the Middle Class through a cost-of-living crisis. Meanwhile, Russia has greater prospects for recovery compared to Germany and the UK.
According to a January forecast by the International Monetary Fund, Russia’s economy will grow faster than Germany’s while Britain’s will contract. This is a far cry from the eminent collapse of the Russian economy that was predicted when hundreds of international companies, such as McDonald’s and Boeing, withdrew from Russia and Russians were blocked from using Western financial institutions.
It is recalled that in March 2022, US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen boasted that “the Russian economy will be devastated.” Eleven months after Yellen’s statement, the IMF predicts that the Russian economy will start growing again in 2023, expanding by 0.3% and then 2.1% in 2024. Although 0.3% growth is paltry, it is still surprisingly higher than Germany’s 0.1%, a phenomenal situation considering that it is Berlin imposing the sanctions, not Russia on Germany.
The UK is in an even worse situation. Its economy is expected to contract by 0.6%.
India and China are helping Russia alleviate the stress of decoupling from Western financial institutions and trade exchanges. Many experts believe that the 21st century is the “Asian Century” and expect the world’s major financial centres to shift from the West to the East. In this light, Russia’s exclusion from the West has left it with no choice but to strongly project to the East, something that India, China and other countries have enthusiastically taken advantage of.
The 20th century was dominated by the bipolar system and a short-lived unipolar system. Although the 21st century is multipolar in nature, the overwhelmingly dominant economic and military powers are expected to be the US and China, with a host of other Great Powers, such as Russia and India, fully capable of defending their own interests.
What the West does not realise is that in such a global system, it is Russia that hugely influences whether the US or China will triumph. Russia has effectively been given no choice but to pivot towards China. Future generations in the West will learn that this was a strategic blunder – and all for the illiberal sake of defending a neo-Nazi regime in Kiev.
The war in Ukraine was expected to be another advancement of “liberalism” and Western internationalism. However, what has transpired instead is the weakening of Western hegemony. The US expected most countries to fall in line and impose sanctions against Russia, however, this did not trend in Asia, the Islamic World, Africa, or Latin America.
Although the West is persistently and arrogantly defending the Kiev regime against the reality that Russia will triumph in the war, it continues to ruin its own reputation in the eyes of the actual international community by lambasting countries, such as India, for not following their orders. This will have long-term negative ramifications for the West as its influence is weakening and mistrust is deepening.
Ahmed Adel is a Cairo-based geopolitics and political economy researcher.
Google Expands Campaign to ‘Inoculate’ People Against ‘Misinformation,’ But Critics Say It’s All About Money
By Suzanne Burdick, Ph.D. | The Defender | February 22, 2023
Google said last week it plans to expand into Germany its campaign to “inoculate” people against misinformation — as if it were a virus — after seeing “promising results” in Eastern Europe.
The campaign is based on an approach called “prebunking” designed to teach people how to spot false claims before encountering them, thereby “inoculating” them against the “disease” of misinformation “like a vaccine does” against a physical disease, Euronews reported.
The tech giant will release a series of short videos that highlight techniques — such as fear-mongering, scapegoating, false comparisons, exaggeration and missing context — that are commonly used to promote misleading claims.
The videos dissect these different techniques so viewers can more readily recognize them when consuming media.
Proponents of the campaign say it’s an “efficient way to address misinformation at scale.”
But some critics allege Google’s campaign is selectively targeting information related to corporate and government interests and is motivated by money rather than a sincere desire to protect readers from false information.
“They [Google’s leaders] want Google to be what they see as a safe place for advertisers,” said Clayton Morris, a former Fox News anchor who co-hosts the online news show “Redacted.”
Videos to run as ads on Facebook, YouTube, TikTok
Google’s “prebunking” videos will run as advertisements on Facebook, YouTube or TikTok in Germany. A similar campaign in India is also in the works, the AP reported.
Last fall, Google ran a test video campaign in Poland, the Czech Republic and Slovakia.
The campaign focused on inoculating viewers against “false claims about Ukrainian refugees” and showed techniques commonly used to support such claims, such as alarming or unfounded stories about refugees committing crimes or taking jobs away from residents.
The AP did not report the specific statements regarding Ukrainian refugees that Google deemed as false.
The videos were viewed 38 million times on Facebook, TikTok, YouTube and Twitter.
Researchers said people who viewed the videos were more likely to be able to identify misinformation techniques and less likely to spread false claims than people who hadn’t watched the video.
‘You can think of misinformation as a virus’
Alex Mahadevan, director of MediaWise, a media literacy initiative of the Poynter Institute, told the AP that the strategy was a “pretty efficient way to address misinformation at scale, because you can reach a lot of people while at the same time address a wide range of misinformation.”
In November 2022, Google and YouTube gave the Poynter Institute $13.5 million to strengthen its fact-checking efforts with $12 million earmarked to create a Global Fact Check Fund.
“You can think of misinformation as a virus,” Sander van der Linden, Ph.D., professor of social psychology in society at the University of Cambridge, told the AP. “It spreads. It lingers. It can make people act in certain ways.”
It also sometimes needs a periodic “booster,” according to the AP, because the effects of the videos eventually wear off.
Van der Linden assisted Google in developing its prebunking campaign and is presently advising Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram, the AP said.
Google announced its expanded campaign just before the Feb. 17 start of the Munich Security Conference.
According to the AP, the timing of the announcement reflected the heightened concerns of government officials and tech companies regarding the impact of misinformation.
“There’s a real appetite for solutions,” Beth Goldberg, head of research and development at Jigsaw, a unit of Google that “explores threats to open societies,” told the AP. “Using ads as a vehicle to counter a disinformation technique is pretty novel. And we’re excited about the results.”
Google has not announced plans to expand its campaign to the U.S., so it remains unknown if and when the California-based company will apply its misinformation prebunking tactics on its home turf.
‘Prebunking’ campaign more about promoting ‘corporate and government interests,’ say critics
Commenting on Google’s latest announcement, “Redacted” co-host Natali Morris said, “It’s clear the corporate idea of disinformation is really only related to corporate and government interests — not at all to human interest.”
The topics addressed by Google’s misinformation campaign, such as COVID-19 and climate change, are topics “that will either give governments or corporations more power,” Natali said.
Meanwhile, other topics of human interest — such as child trafficking — remain untouched by Google, she said.
Clayton Morris, who co-hosts “Redacted” with his wife Natali, said he believed Google’s efforts to fight misinformation are motivated by money.
For example, Clayton said, companies like Pfizer and Moderna spend billions of dollars in advertising and Google wants to be an “advertiser-friendly environment” so it “pushes down” information and opinions that criticize the companies’ pharmaceutical products.
“Imagine if Pfizer execs are sitting there and they’re thinking about where to put their ad dollars and they start seeing Google search results that are like Pfizer this, Pfizer that … that’s why they [Google] downrank all of this stuff to push that stuff away and they continue to make their good ad revenue,” he said.
Now the pharmaceutical companies don’t even have to produce ads anymore because Google is essentially doing it for them, Natali added.
“Imagine what a prebunking video would look like around a COVID vaccine,” she said.
Suzanne Burdick, Ph.D., is a reporter and researcher for The Defender based in Fairfield, Iowa. She holds a Ph.D. in Communication Studies from the University of Texas at Austin (2021), and a master’s degree in communication and leadership from Gonzaga University (2015). Her scholarship has been published in Health Communication. She has taught at various academic institutions in the United States and is fluent in Spanish.
This article was originally published by The Defender — Children’s Health Defense’s News & Views Website under Creative Commons license CC BY-NC-ND 4.0. Please consider subscribing to The Defender or donating to Children’s Health Defense.
German inflation pushes higher
RT | February 23, 2023
Germany’s inflation rate rose 8.7% on the year in January and 1% on the month, the Federal Statistical Office (Destatis) reported on Wednesday.
According to data that confirmed provisional results, consumer prices, harmonized to compare with other European Union countries, jumped by 9.2% year-on-year. Compared with December, prices increased by 0.5%.
“Following a slowdown at the end of last year, the inflation rate thus remains at a high level,” said Destatis President Ruth Brand. “We are observing price rises for many goods and, to an increasing degree, also for services. Households paid higher prices in particular for energy and food also in January,” she added.
The report indicated that prices for energy products in January were 23.1% higher in annual terms despite relief measures. A particularly large increase was again recorded for household energy prices, which were up 36.5% on the year, Destatis said.
Food prices soared 20.2% in January from a year ago. “The rate of food price increase thus was more than twice the overall inflation rate again,” according to the report.
Service prices were up 4.5% in January 2023 on the same month of the previous year. Above-average price increases were recorded for the maintenance and repair of dwellings (+16.9%), and catering services in restaurants, cafes, and the like (+10.9%).
The EU’s largest economy suffered record inflation last year due to a surge in energy prices brought about by a drop in natural gas deliveries from Russia amid Ukraine-related sanctions. Issues with pipeline maintenance and the sabotage of the Nord Stream pipelines further exacerbated tight supplies. Economy Minister Robert Habeck said Germany would avoid a sharp economic decline but is set to enter a technical recession.
Top politician calls on Scholz to ‘stop’ German foreign minister
Bavarian Prime Minister Markus Soeder at a Political Ash Wednesday event in Passau, Germany, February 22, 2023. © Global Look Press / IMAGO / Frank Hoermann / Sven Simo
RT | February 22, 2023
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz must “stop” Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock before she becomes a “security risk” and pushes Berlin towards a conflict with Moscow with her “thoughtless statements,” Bavaria’s Prime Minister Markus Soeder said on Wednesday during a German political festival.
The foreign minister and her party – Alliance 90/The Greens – are talking themselves into a “war frenzy” amid the ongoing conflict between Russia and Ukraine, Soeder told a crowd of cheering supporters during what is known in Germany as Political Ash Wednesday. Having originated in Bavaria, the 100-year old event allows German politicians to vent and pull no punches about the perceived shortcomings of their political rivals.
Soeder referred in particular to when Baerbock told the European Council back in January that the EU was “fighting a war against Russia,” words that sparked uproar at the time. In mid-February, Baerbock herself conceded that the remark was a mistake.
“A foreign minister has to be careful what she says,” Soeder warned during the event in Bavaria’s Passau, adding that “an escalation of words can quickly lead to the escalation of violence.” Germany is helping Ukraine but is not at war with Russia, he maintained.
“Mr. Scholz, finally stop Ms. Baerbock,” Soeder said, adding the foreign minister’s “thoughtless statements” are often “to the detriment of our country.”
Baerbock has emerged as one of the most hardline supporters of Kiev in the German government, repeatedly arguing for increased military aid to Ukraine and criticizing Chancellor Olaf Scholz for supposedly not doing enough. She has also supported tougher sanctions against Russia and opposed any compromises with Moscow.
In October 2022, she said that any concessions to Russia in the ongoing conflict would be “naïve.” The minister also maintained that the West should not settle for any peace agreement that would result in Ukraine losing to Russia any territory that it recognizes as Kiev’s.
Soeder, who has been a prominent figure in the German opposition, previously criticized Berlin for prioritizing military aid to Ukraine over the nation’s own security. In particular, he argued that Germany should not have sent IRIS-T air defense systems to Ukraine and should have instead used them to enhance its own national defense.
West unwilling to cooperate on Nord Stream probe: Russian diplomat
Press TV – February 22, 2023
Russia’s ambassador to the United Nations has once again accused the United States of being behind the explosions on Nord stream gas pipelines in September last year, saying the national investigations of Germany, Denmark, and Sweden into the sabotage are aimed at protecting Washington.
Vasily Nebenzia made the remarks at a UN Security Council session in New York on Tuesday, stressing that Western countries were showing no intention of cooperating with Moscow in an inquiry into the blasts.
“We have strong reasons to doubt the effectiveness, transparency, and impartiality of investigations that are being carried out under some national jurisdictions,” Nebenzia said, adding, “We do not see our partners being eager to cooperate.”
The senior diplomat also noted that “the so-called investigations by Scandinavian states and Germany into the incident not only lack transparency but are aimed at covering up the tracks and exculpating the big American brother.”
Nebenzia said Russia was not allowed to partake in the probe, and all its requests “are ignored with arrogance.”
Nebenzia further explained that Germany, Denmark, and Sweden had ignored Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin’s communications last October regarding the participation of Russian energy giant Gazprom and other relevant agencies in the investigations.
He said, “Since we talk about a crime that was committed by means of an explosive device, which makes it subject to the International Convention for the Suppression of Terrorist Bombings of 15 December 1997, we expect that all states that have to do with the incident, namely the US, Norway, Denmark, and Sweden, will fulfill their obligations under this document.”
“But leadership of these states do not show any political will or rather do not have any,” the Russian diplomat said.
On September 26, 2022, a series of explosions took place on the pipelines, knocking out three of the four strings of the Nord Stream network, off the coast of the Danish island of Bornholm in the Baltic Sea.
Two of the pipelines, known collectively as Nord Stream 1, had been providing Germany and much of Western Europe with cheap Russian natural gas for more than a decade. A second pair of pipelines, known as Nord Stream 2, was not yet operational.
Following the blasts, Denmark, Germany, and Sweden conducted investigations into the incident. The preliminary results of a joint probe by Sweden and Denmark showed that the explosions had been “intentional sabotage,” but responsibility was not assigned to any party.
American journalist Seymour Hersh recently claimed that the bombing of the pipelines had been directly ordered by US President Joe Biden and carried out by the CIA with the help of the US Navy.
The White House rejected the report as “utterly false and complete fiction.”
Mass demo in Munich against war
Free West Media | February 21, 2023
While Annalena Baerbock and US VP Kamala Harris discussed the further escalation of the war in Ukraine at the Munich Security Conference convened in the Bayerischer Hof, thousands demonstrated peacefully against war on the Königsplatz.
Several demonstrations took place in Munich on Saturday on the fringes of the Security Conference directed against the meeting itself. The organizers of one group, Munich Stand Up! counted between 20,000 to 25,000 of their participants.
Protesters followed the call by the Munich AfD on Saturday morning to the Old Botanical Garden, where they could be seen with peace signs and Russian flags.
According to the police, there was a scuffle and verbal confrontations with a small group of left-wing counter-demonstrators. They shouted “Fascist pack” and “Nazi plague”. Around noon, many participants in the AfD demo joined the protest on the Königsplatz, the largest gathering.
Right and left come together
Regardless of whether they were right-wing or left-wing: in terms of symbolism, both groups held flags displaying peace signs and Russian colours.
Slogans criticized NATO and the press as “warmongers” or drew parallels with the Corona pandemic, which many believe had been staged for nefarious purposes. The speakers included the left-wing politician Dieter Dehm and the former CDU politician Jürgen Todenhöfer.
Dehm spoke of “Ukrainian killer gangs and Nazi fascists” while Todenhöfer said in his speech: “The West wanted this war.” He accused the federal government of “madness”.
The final rally of the big “Anti-SiKo-Demo” took place on Marienplatz. As every year, the Munich “Action Alliance against the NATO Security Conference” had called for the demonstration. The opponents, who came mainly from the left-wing spectrum, had gathered at the Stachus shortly after noon.
The demonstrators called to “Create peace without weapons” on posters. Rainbow flags with the words “Pace” (Italian for peace) were displayed next to the dove of peace.
Confronting Ukraine supporters
As in previous years, peace demonstrators walked through the city center, where they passed a gathering at Odeonsplatz – a small band of supporters of Ukraine.
On the stage in front of the Feldherrnhalle, the members of the Bundestag Anton Hofreiter (Greens) and Marie-Agnes Strack-Zimmermann (FDP) spoke, and again called for the escalation of the war in Ukraine. Jamila Schäfer (Greens) expressed her satisfaction that the government had now initiated the delivery of battle tanks.
When the two protest camps met, it remained peaceful. However, it got a bit loud because both sides started chanting their slogans.
Some Ukrainian supporters burst into tears when they saw the peace posters: “Negotiate instead of shooting” was written on them.
Nazis for Ukraine
At the Feldherrnhalle, the site of Hitler’s putsch in 1923, the war supporters demonstrated for the Zelensky regime.
President Zelensky has banned all opposition media and parties in Ukraine and is openly cooperating with neo-Nazi militias and, according to recent photographs taken by die Associated Press, also with ISIS commanders.
Before the conference, he had even demanded the delivery of banned cluster bombs.
Thousands of police officers
According to the police, around 4,500 officers from Bavaria and other federal states as well as 300 federal police officers were on duty around the conference. At the international meeting of experts from Friday to Sunday, the main focus was on arming Ukraine. In addition, there were also debates about other conflicts such as in the Middle East, Yemen or Iran.
In support of the conference therefore, a few people demonstrated loudly for regime change in Iran in the morning on Odeonsplatz. The country’s green, white and red flag flew over the heads of people who want a pro-US regime and called on the European Union to designate the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps as a terrorist organization. The “National Council of Resistance of Iran” had called for the protest.
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From the Archives
The great ADHD swindle
By Daniel Ken | TCW Defending Freedom | May 20, 2023
Over more than two decades in the classroom I’ve taught thousands of children and teenagers: some were lovely and lots were hard-working. On the other hand, quite a number were disruptive and argumentative, and a number were violently opposed to learning. But I don’t think I’ve taught more than a handful of kids who could be properly described as having the symptoms of ADHD. And that handful could just as easily have had something else wrong with them. Because here’s the thing: despite the fact that the best part of a million children are medicated for the condition, ADHD doesn’t exist.
There’s no definitive medical test for it, experts can’t agree on what it actually means, and most of the symptoms disappear if the child in question has lots of exercise, good diet and, crucially, a set of clear behavioural boundaries, preferably set early in childhood and, for the boys at least, enforced by a stable adult male living at home. … continue
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