I am very concerned about Germany. Democracy is becoming more and more a facade. Over the last 7-9 I am following what's going on: a minority is pushing through it's intentions. Industry has always been a strong factor, but nowadays political decisions are nearly entirely driven by industrial, financial and trust intentions. These economical sectors are heavily inter-webbed with politics in Germany and in the European Union. Political corruption takes place in the highest ranks and the the only consequences are those suffered by population, not those who caused it.

In two days there will be elections for the next president in France. The French election campaigns are heavily focused on interior aspects: most of the French people don't want to drop social aspects entirely or be unprotected from the financial powers outside their countries. Even the favorite candidate Nicolas Sarkozy, which has a neo-liberal consultant, has some aspects (i think 3 or 4) in his 'program'. He wants to protect French economics (as he has good very friends in these milieus) and increase 'buying power/capacities'. Germany in opposite concentrates on Export and economical liberty (=without responsibility). 

You know, in Germany, there is only one truth. One 'reality' - everything else is wrong. Of course this is not true but that's the 'official' german politics, media and economics point of view. Therefore they also call the French people dreamers. Like always you hear from everywhere in Germany the same statements from politicians and media (no diversity): "Dreaming is Ok, but they should start to see the reality!". Their reality is the the so called "Globalization" - which of course mainly means financial, economical globalisation because many other aspects of society are not standardized across the world.

Germans, from my perspective, seem to be more conformists than the French people. French seem to have a bit more of revolution in their veins. French media is also much more critical towards government. In Germany the media adopts information from the government without verification or happily self-censor them selves in order to be political correct.

Therefore, from a European point of view,  there is a heavy need of a counter-weight in Europe to the German's heavy weight, to bring in some balance. I fear that, though Sarkozy is probably going to negotiate hard i.e. about being less strict with the stability of the the Euro or taxing financial business, he is in general still very close to the neo-liberal perspective. And probably also therefore still the favorite of the Chancellor of Germany.

In addition to that, Sarkozy is also a hardliner in terms of security. In Germany the last two ministers of interior are crazy. They want security(-state/complete-control) at all costs. They completely forget Germany's past and that in a state there also only humans working. Centralization of power and information above a certain level is dangerous because abuse, power-greed etc will always happen.

Ségolène Royal is the other French candidate. One of her weak points is, that she is less a communication/media master than Sarkozy. But she makes still a strong impression on me. I am not sure how good she could hold against Germany's position, but - though she has a very generalized and less left-winged program - she has a unusual perspective. It might worth to give her a chance. I know that many people in France want "a change" and put their bet on Sakozy. In Germany, recently we had plenty of changes - so called "Reformations" - I am sure that these are not you want in France!

We will see what happens - in either way it might be interesting, if promises are not dropped like in Germany. Here, usually is goes this way:

• "We won't do that!"
• "We won't do that, though we should."
• "We don't want to do that, but it looks like we have no choice…"
• "We didn't had a choice, it had to be done."

Some time ago I came across an interesting video showing a possible future - google and amazon fusioning to one company. If you have ~8 minutes, then watch this little movie:

english : http://idorosen.com/mirrors/robinsloan.com/epic/
deutsch: http://media.aperto.de/google_epic2015_de.html

I don’t know if I already saw this video some years ago or if it was some other ‘visionaire’ video going in that same direction. My thought was - if everything is connected and propagates very fast through the net (grid), what happens if somebody, having access to the system, manipulates it by inducting information.

In today’s speculative financial market opinions and hopes do have a heavy impact. The product is not so important, unfortunally. "Image is all". If you have access to grid-computing, could you calculate where to implant an "information-virus"? Already heard of viral marketing? What about viral information? Digital information set free for a specifique, manipulative purpose? From that perspektive, the title of this posting feels different - personalized content … uhm, from who? A variation of perspective:

A nice voice informs a man in his comfortable seat: "Calculations done. Solution found." A little smile appears on the man’s face. He just loves these moments … he hesitates … not because he is unsure, nooo, he just want to stretch this moment - this moment of intense feeling. Execute. The man watches fascinated in real-time how his newest info-implant is spreading and morphing in the web. The progress looks identique to the simulation milestones. In a few hours he will have changed history - *again*. He just loves this feeling … it’s an addicting process … a game … he turns his seat around to grab a nice handmade cigar to even more enjoy his feeling of beeing god on earth.

Welcome to Google Epic 2016 - personalized content.

Got a link from a friend about a well done video:

Video about Trusted Computing

I don’t know how one can justify the death of many children with the kidnapping of 3 soldiers. I don’t know why one declares the intention to bomb a country, that just got a new freedom and needs time develop, back into the state it was 50 years prior as ’selfdefending act’.

In addition to that, I am very shocked and sad that Germany again is playing an evil role by providing states in war with military high tech. At the end of the 90ies germany delivered 3 submarines of type "Dolpin" to Israel nearly for free. Basically already these ones could be loaded with long-range rockets with nuclear heads. Now Germany again is going to deliver high-tech submarines: this time even with very innovative engines. And also this time the german tax payer is going to sponsor it - one third of the 1 billlion EUR that these two new submarines are going to cost.

(In germany, recently some towns increased their university fees for students. For those not having the familiy help, studying will get hard with more time invested in part-time jobs to finance the studies. The increase of fees is justified by saying that germany has no money anymore. No wonder!)

Especially with the cruel german history, germany shouldn’t be allowed to export any military items or tech. Normally the german government should feel obliged to speak out against violant and illegal acts wether they are done by the USA (who helped freeing germany from the Nazis) or Isreal (which have been such a big victim of Nazi Germany). No country, no state no organisation is immune. The arrogance to be believe that one is immune and always right, doing the right thing, is fatal. Germany - especially the governmnet - has to learn that instead of agreeing to averything due the special relations, it should help other to see when their culture and civilation is in danger. And of course germany must stop producing weapons and must stop transforming their army from a defending unit to an intervention unit (which is the european tendency). 

Don’t you agree? 

Sources (german):
http://www.uni-kassel.de/fb5/frieden/regionen/Israel/u-boote2.html
http://www.tagesschau.de/aktuell/meldungen/0,1185,OID4969854_REF1,00.html
http://www.friedenskooperative.de/ff/ff03/5-53.htm
http://www.uni-kassel.de/fb5/frieden/themen/export/u-boote-israel.html

English 

If you are living in Germany and wonder why politics are heading the same directions for years though it doesn’t handle any negative causes or you have the feeling that all the political discussions are one-sided and unequlibrated then you should read the book "Machtwahn - Wie eine mittelmäßige Führungselite uns zugrunde richtet" from Albrecht Müller. It’s a very good book that shows the links between economy/industry, "science", media and politics. The network elements are named (persons, institutes etc). I am certain that in other european countries there are similar networks especially as financial power is usually a global, cross-border power. So if you are not in Germany but german-speaking, I suggest you too, to read that book. More details below but only in german, sorry.

Deutsch

Ich empfehlen jedem deutsch-sprachigen oder jedem in Deutschland lebenden das Buch "Machtwahn - Wie eine mittelmäßige Führungselite uns zugrunde richtet" von Albrecht Müller. Das Buch spricht endlich öffentlich aus, was der eine oder andere vielleicht ‘irgendwie fühlt’ aber die Mechanismen als Ganzes nicht erfäßt, da Hintergrundinformationen fehlen. Und man darf sich da auch nichts vormachen: sich wirklich zu informieren heißt recherchieren = kostet sehr viel Zeit (nur Zeitung lesen oder Tagesschau sehen bringt nicht wirklich was). Und wer hat diese schon? Wer wirklich wenig Zeit hat, der soll einfach mal ab Seite 308 an 20 Seiten lesen und dann entscheiden ob er das Buch ganz lesen möchte.

Das Buch benennt Personen, Firmen und Institute und zeigt die Verbindungen zwischen diesen auf. Wer erarbeit politische Richtungen im Vorfelde? Wer engagiert mit einem bestimmten Ziel PR Agenturen, um die Zustimmung der Bevölkerung zu gewinnen? Wie werden Begriffe umdefiniert, damit sie als neue Schlagwörter Argumentation und Vielfältigkeit ablösen? Inwiefern sind wichtige politsch engagierte Professoren finanziell Abhängig und daher nicht ‘neutral’ ?

Der potentiellen Bedrohung der Demokratie durch Terrorismus wird viel Platz in Politik und Medien zugewiesen, doch der Bedrohung einer Umstruktuierungs-Bewegung von Oben-Nach kaum. Obwohl sie alle Menschen Betriff und die Menge der Nutznießer im Vergleich zur Bevölkerungsanzahl gering ist.

Bitte nimmt euch die Zeit das Buch zu lesen - ohne Aufklärung ist eine Demokratie machtlos.

Das Buch:
"Machtwahn - Wie eine mittelmäßige Führungselite uns zugrunde richtet" von Albrecht Müller
ISBN: 3-426-27386-1
Verlag: Droemer
Erscheinungstermin war: 21.03.2006

(Buch z.B. via online Buchhandel erhältlich)

Im Web:
Website vom Autor: NachDenkSeiten

Interview mit dem Autor auf Telepolis

Über Albrecht Müller auf Wikipedia