« Jan Ross of Die Zeit: Americans Destined to be Losers | Main | Reader's Digest Acknowledges the European Media's Slant »

Comments

Yup, same old same old. Or check this one out at Die Zeit (normally quite a serious paper): http://www.zeit.de/2008/41/USA-Krise . We're on the retreat again and having a crisis or something and the Germans are really concerned about what will become of us now that our "imperialistic moment" has passed. Hilarious.

And they have the chutzpah to label this article "The End of Arrogance." How do you say schadenfreude in German? Oh, Yeah.

They try to remind themselves "Still, this is no time to gloat."

http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,581502,00.html

OT: Can anyone give me a rough translation of this?

http://www.zeit.de/1982/30/Politik-ist-keine-Wissenschaft?page=all

Note from David: Pamela, the article - from 1982! - describes the studying conditions at the American University in Beirut (AUB). Fighting between different Arab factions and Israel forced the University to close. The report is somewhat biased against Israel.
The author, Karin Storch, could possibly be identical with Karin Storch, Tel Aviv correspondent of (German public tv outlet) ZDF. See http://www.pressetreff.zdf.de/viewbody.asp?bodyid=11053
She was in Beirut in 1982, according to
http://lexikon.meyers.de/wissen/Karin+Storch+(Personen)
I don't follow Karin Storch's reporting on Israel, but a superficial check of her reports at zdf.de reveals no anti-Israel bias.

We've been told many times that anti-Americanism is only a reaction to Bush's foreign policies, nothing more. My rhetorical question is then: why this outburst of anti-Americanism?

Did Bush try to invade some EU banks? I haven't read the Spiegel, but probably not.

The EU hypocrisy is again on full display. The American locusts were busy engineering the system, that is until the EU locusts showed the American locusts how the game is being played. And when the EU locusts started getting severely beaten, the crying started. "Oh, the Americans fooled us, they unloaded their junk on us, and we, brainless EU locusts had not choice but to buy".

Will the European countries *ever* face their own failures without reflexively pointing at America?

@whatdoiknow
Der Spiegel is neither representative of german media nor germany in general.
I'm following the coverage of the current financial turmoil on german tv and press. From what I watch and read, people point out that the crisis started in the US but don't blame the US for what is happening in the german financial markets right now. Surely you will find exceptions, but the the overwhelming majority of journalists/polticians/etc are not pointing at America.
So I don't see the "outburst of anti-Americanism" you mention.

@David

*smooch*

"So I don't see the "outburst of anti-Americanism" you mention."

It's difficult to notice an outburst when normal, day-to-day anti-American propaganda is already at a very high level. Which it is.

@indie80

“Der Spiegel is neither representative of german media nor germany in general.”

Nice try, indie80, but most of the commenters here have been around for a while. They’ve seen German anti-Americanism entirely similar to that in Spiegel documented on this site in a wide range of publications spanning the political spectrum from the “left” to the “right,” at least as those terms apply in Germany, not to mention TV. It’s quite true that German anti-Americanism is more subdued now than it was a few years ago. American racists and German bigots both have a tendency to crawl deeper into their holes when they felt the light of publicity shining on them.

Turning for a moment to the American mainstream media, they have been “vassals” and “poodles,” as Spiegel would put it, of the Obama campaign to an extent that has surprised even me. Not to be outdone, Spiegel has taken a fawning attitude towards Obama that demonstrates the truism that, to paraphrase Marx, “the leftist ‘progressives’ of the world have no country.” Even articles about “science” are no exception. The following charming “news” appeared in an article about meteorites:

“Unter Astronomen kursieren inzwischen Witze über den Asteroiden. So solle das Objekt zusätzlich zu den bisher verwendeten Bezeichnungen 8TA9D69 und 2008 TC3 noch einen weiteren, griffigeren Namen bekommen. Alain Maury, einer der in Fachkreisen bekanntesten Asteroiden- und Kometenexperten, zitierte in der Minor Planet Mailing List einen Kollegen: "Ich würde diesen Asteroiden nach Alaskas Gouverneurin Sarah Palin benennen. Warum? Er ist klein, nicht besonders hell und wird keine besonders großen Spuren hinterlassen."

“Außerdem könne sich der Präsidentschaftskandidat John McCain, dessen Stellvertreterin Palin werden soll, wahrscheinlich daran erinnern, wann der Asteroid entstanden ist. Diese Himmelskörper stammen übrigens in der Regel aus der Frühzeit des Sonnensystems und sind damit etwa viereinhalb Milliarden Jahre alt.”

My translation:

“Meanwhile, astronomers have been exchanging jokes about the asteroid. It seems the object is to be given another name in addition to its previous designations of 8TA9D69 and 2008TC3. Alain Maury, one of the most well asteroid and comet experts among specialists in the field, quoted a colleague in the Minor Planet Mailing List: ‘I would name this asteroid after Alaska’s governor Sarah Palin. Why? It’s small, not very bright, and won’t leave much of a trace behind.’”

The next paragraph, added by Spiegel’s jolly author:

“One might add that presidential candidate John McCain, Palin’s running mate, can probably remember when the asteroid was formed. As a rule, such heavenly bodies originated in the early solar system, and are, therefore, four and a half billion years old.”

Droll, no? Such a light, almost Parisian touch. German humor at its best.

Droll, no? Such a light, almost Parisian touch. German humor at its best.

Yes, and do you remember the one about the Belgian and the Panzer Army? Ha-ha-ha!

Helian, Mike H:
We are apparently in agreement that German humor is not one of Germany's prime exports. It does not travel very well. To me, German humor goes over like the proverbial lead balloon. The old saw about heaven being a British policeman, hell being a German policeman, might be changed to hell being a German humorist.(My mother maintained that Dutch policemen and customs officials were more German than the Germans.)

One version I heard of the joke stated that heaven is a Japanese wife and an American house. Hell is a Japanese house and an American wife. Or perhaps hell is an American house with a sub-prime mortgage.

What?!? No Hitler on the cover? I am shocked!

Anyone check out the WaPo yesterday? They had an article about the "causes of the financial crisis" filling more than two entire pages, and managed to never once mention Fannie or Freddie. It was an ideological double back flip of amazing virtuosity, even for the WaPo. Maybe they'll get the Nobel Prize in Economics for it next year.

Funny the way Europeans are reacting to the stock market hoo-raw.

I took advantage of the low market to add another $2000 to my IRA/mutual funds. The number of shares that will buy in this market will increase my portfolio substantially when this market glitch straightens out.

You see, one of the problems of this kind of market is the psychological impact. People look at their 401k's and IRA and see that the value has dropped.

What they don't get is that they still own the same number of shares-- the value of the shares has dropped.

Therefore, it is time to buy. Your dollar will buy more now.

I also had my regular monthly contribution tripled, while I was visiting my broker.

Should be interesting :).

Hmmm, I see that I've managed to clone myself. I wonder where I'm from? Maybe Texas, or is it Idaho?

Now that you mention it, I don't remember the one about the Belgian and the Panzer Army. Perhaps you can fill us in.

@LCmamapajamas

Did you see Leno's monologue last night?

"I talked to my broker today. I said 'JUMP, you bastard!' "

Too funny.

But you're absolutely right. We're self-employed so we have strict limits on our SEP/IRA contributions, but I'm gonna dig up a few grand and get me some bargains for a private account.

Is it still possible to invest in pork bellies?

Helian: Is it still possible to invest in pork bellies?

Yes, if you have the stomach for it. Not everyone has the intestinal fortitude to invest in pork bellies.

@Helian
Is it still possible to invest in pork bellies?

You want to invest in Barnie Frank??!!

The Education make people quite confident to find out the solution of every problem very efficiently. Now there is solution with the recession, we have to investigate it...Problem never comes without solution....Expatriate

The comments to this entry are closed.

Mission

The Debate

Blog powered by Typepad

April 2023

Sun Mon Tue Wed Thu Fri Sat
            1
2 3 4 5 6 7 8
9 10 11 12 13 14 15
16 17 18 19 20 21 22
23 24 25 26 27 28 29
30