And away they go.

Germany's head of state started the countdown to a general election on Friday by dissolving the country's lower house of parliament, the Bundestag.

"I have decided to dissolve the 20th German Bundestag to fix the date for an early election for February 23rd," German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier said in a speech and added that "political stability in Germany is a precious asset."

Steinmeier's decision follows a request to do so after Chancellor Olaf Scholz lost a vote of confidence in the legislature on December 16.

Steinmeier set the date for the new election for February 23.

Recently deposed Chancellor Olaf Scholz, the Social Democrat (SPD) leader, still thinks he has a shot at regaining his perch, but the chances of that are as slim as they were for him surviving the no-confidence vote that cost him the job in the first place. The candidate the Christian Democrats (CDU) have up as their choice for chancellor, Friedrich Merz, is polling in a stronger position than Scholz and is already looking at who he'd form a government with.

Strangely, no one wants to talk about the most popular candidate in the country, who would be Alice Weidel, head of the pesky popular and populist Alternativ for Germany (AfD) party.

Will the EU step in to try to nullify the election when Germans vote overwhelmingly for AfD?

— Abha (@pr_abha_) December 27, 2024

As all of the plans for outright banning AfD have fallen through - so far - in order to keep them from spoiling the monopoly the mainstream parties have on power, the SPD, CDU, and Greens have settled on a strategy of ignoring whatever happens with the AfD, even if it includes go-along-to-get-along until they can manufacture something more permanent to take the upstarts out of the game for good.

...Scholz, a Social Democrat who will head a caretaker government until a new one can be formed, lost a confidence vote in parliament earlier this month after the departure of Finance Minister Christian Lindner's Free Democrats left his unwieldy governing coalition without a legislative majority.

The vote also kicked off election campaigning in earnest, with conservative challenger Friedrich Merz, who surveys suggest is likely to replace Scholz, asserting that the incumbent government had imposed excessive regulations and stifled growth.

The conservatives hold a comfortable lead of more than 10 points over the Social Democrats (SPD) in most polls. The far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) is slightly ahead of the SPD, while the Greens, a coalition partner, are in fourth place.

The mainstream parties have refused to govern with the AfD, but its presence complicates the parliamentary arithmetic, making shaky coalitions more likely.

Mostly ceremonial, German President Steinmeier, doing his part to ensure that German politics remain predictably sclerotic and manageable, added a familiar authoritarian warning to his speech dissolving the parliament.

 We have heard this song before, no?

🇩🇪 Following the collapse of the government and the call for early elections in Germany, President Steinmeier stated:

"Platform X is a danger to democracy." pic.twitter.com/zO5GQ0SLCa

— Update NEWS (@UpdateNews724) December 27, 2024

Yet another power-hungry fascist warning the peasants not to indulge themselves in anything other than the pablum the state dribbles out to them.

The hierarchy must really be sweating that Weidal chick and her appeal to regular Germans. I can't imagine why.

How many were killed and injured at the Christmas Market by the terrorist in the speeding car? The ones Germans cannot complain about?

The migrants that, oh, NOW, they probably should take real precautions to protect citizens from?

Germany: Magdeburg admits massive security miss as the government scrambles to secure country from future attacks

Known for openly promoting the acceptance of migrants, Germany's interior minister now says: “It is clear that we must do everything we can to protect the people of… pic.twitter.com/iOKmjJbnr5

— Remix News & Views (@RMXnews) December 23, 2024

The immigrants changing the face of their very country? How odd the ruling elite is only beginning to notice the change themselves.

Ten years ago, this town in central Germany was aging, rapidly depopulating and almost universally white. Today, its population has stabilized, is younger and includes people from 92 countries.

Some longtime residents have welcomed the change, but for many others, it’s happening too fast. In May, conservative Mayor André Knapp was re-elected with more than 82% of the votes after a campaign critical of immigration, which he blamed for a rise in local crime. In September, the Alternative for Germany, or AfD, a far-right party that advocates mass deportations, won its first state election in Thuringia, where Suhl is located.

“Of course we need immigration, we need foreign workers, but we can’t have a situation where our town is getting completely overwhelmed,” said Knapp. 

...Germany has long been one of the world’s most welcoming nations to migrants. Between 2013 and 2023, 6.43 million more people settled in Germany than left, according to Germany’s Federal Statistics Office—the biggest inflow of any country outside the U.S., according to the United Nations. 

...In Germany, 42% of people under age 15 were either foreign-born or had at least one foreign-born parent—Germany’s definition of a statistical category it calls “people with a migration background”—as were 37% of people ages 15 to 24, according to government data for 2022.  

...More than 60% of the people in Germany who depend on government benefits for income are foreign-born or are second-generation migrants. Noncitizens, who make up 15% of the population, perpetrated 41% of all crimes in 2023, up from 28.7% in 2014, according to police statistics.

...When the refugees first began arriving in 2015, “there was a lot of compassion” in town, said Karin Hornschuh, an 82-year-old who leads volunteers who organize sports activities and games for the center’s children. These days, she said, support for her efforts has all but disappeared. “Some people say they are being invaded,” she said.

No wonder X is inconveniencing them.

Then there are the self-inflicted wounds from selling German souls and their standard of living to the Climate Cult. The sky-rocketing price and unreliability of electricity. When power generation, the very fuel that drives your industrial base and employs your citizens, becomes too expensive and too erratic to plan for, businesses cut back, leave the country, or simply wither and die in place.

...The phase-out of nuclear power has left Germany incapable of being self-sufficient in energy, especially during Dunkelflaute. The country imports electricity on a massive scale from France, Denmark and Poland, and has to use coal and lignite to produce electricity. Germany's massive imports of electricity also lead to colossal increases in electricity prices for its neighbors.

The prices are indeed staggering. In 2024, the household price of electricity in Germany was the highest in Europe, at €400/MWh, reaching peaks of €900/MWh during Dunkelflaute episodes, compared to a much lower European average. By comparison, the average price in nuclear-powered France and Finland was €250/MWh over the same period (2024). And, in the United States, rates are 30% lower than in France. How is all that "sustainable" for Europe?

But this is "for the planet", right? Not even close. Despite its commitment to so-called green energies, Germany still has a high carbon footprint due to its increased reliance on coal and lignite to make up for energy shortfalls. In 2024, the country remains the second-largest emitter of CO₂ per unit of energy produced in Europe, with a significant proportion of electricity coming from fossil sources. Ten times more CO₂ per unit of energy produced than France.

Germans see this happening - the world is watching Germany collapse under the weight of the virtue-signaling, socialist status quo the CDU/SDU/Greens are desperate to maintain through any means necessary.

Mass exodus of companies shows Germany is ‘bankrupt’

The mass exodus of companies from Germany has shown the country was now effectively “bankrupt”, the head of an industry organisation has said.

Dirk Jandura, the head of the Federal Association of Wholesale, Foreign Trade and Services (BGA), added that he expected more firms to leave over high costs in 2025.

“The large companies are relocating, the medium-sized companies are suffering or closing down. This is a declaration of bankruptcy for Germany as a business location,” the BGA president told the German-language branch of Reuters on December 26.

The German economy is in tatters. While Merz blames Scholz for campaign purposes, he conveniently leaves out the part where he was part of the triumvirate coalition that Scholz led into this disaster, along with Bond villain doppelganger and Green leader Robert Habeck.

Germany’s economy continues to tumble, with the Ifo Employment Barometer falling to its lowest level in four years, matching the coronavirus low of 2020. Meanwhile, bankruptcies are growing by double digits

Germany’s economic crisis is defined by a lack of orders, high labor and energy costs, and high regulation, which has led companies to cut staff and delay hiring, leading to the Munich-based Ifo indicator to fall to 92.4 in December, after hitting 93.3 in November. The data used is gathered from a survey of managers across Germany.

“Fewer and fewer companies are adding staff,” said Klaus Wohlrabe, who leads Ifo surveys. “In contrast, the proportion of companies that want to cut jobs is increasing. Almost all sectors are considering job cuts.”

I'm sure that information gleaned on X would debunk Merz's talking points effectively if Germans didn't already know what was happening.

The United States and others also see Germany as a military paper tiger thanks to Scholz and Co., which, in a dangerous world, engenders no warm fuzzies.

...But despite these lofty aspirations, the German government’s turning point has largely consisted of spinning its wheels. The $100 billion fund will be spent in two to three years with no additional funds having been allocated. This lack of long-term planning has hampered industrial and private sector efforts to increase the country’s defensive production capacity. Beyond this, the agreed-to brigade in Lithuania remains unfunded, although Lithuania has begun work on the required construction. Similarly, without dramatic increases in funding, Germany’s substantial aid to Ukraine has hollowed its own defensive capabilities. According to a report by the Kiel Institute for the World Economy, it would take Germany one hundred years to return to 2004 levels of military readiness at current levels of funding.

So, while it's really no wonder that polls reflect a surging AfD...

AFD can receive 40% and all the others will make one big coalition, they will do everything possible to, so that AFD will get no power.

Germany needs to wake up and stop voting for CDU or SPD or GRÜNE…. they are all one big party.

— Sass (@antonnft6) December 25, 2024

...they do not reflect the machinations to deny that party what they earn at the ballot box. For instance, the CDU ran with the CSU in one region - another one of those deals with the devil similar to what we saw in France in the spring - giving them the edge over AfD's clear majority.

Kicking and screaming in frustration, German authorities and fired ex-EU commissioner Thierry Breton are trying to go after Musk for anti-trust violations because of real violations?

Eh...no. Because he had the nerve to publicly endorse AfD.

 There's nothing like being too obvious, guys.

Breton and Germany’s Wiese push for anti-trust measures against Musk over his AfD backing

Elon Musk, billionaire tech magnate turned potential US government official, has ignited controversy in Europe after publicly endorsing Germany’s populist-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party.

On December 20, Musk reposted a video by German right-wing influencer Naomi Seibt on X and captioned it with: “Only AfD can save Germany.”

His endorsement drew immediate backlash, with Thierry Breton, former EU Commissioner for the Internal Market, accusing Musk of foreign interference.

Besides having to fight off a populist voter insurgency and the free flow of information, the Teutonic tyrants also have a looming Trump presidency to fret over. 

"Why must everything conspire to cloud our plans?" wailed the German president.

Life is hard enough without these threats to democracy.

...“Especially in difficult times like now, an effective government and reliable majorities in parliament are needed for stability,” Steinmeier said Friday in a televised statement, cautioning that the next government will have “major challenges” to deal with.

...Steinmeier, whose role as head of state is mostly ceremonial, didn’t mention Donald Trump by name, but the US President-elect’s imminent return to the White House is another source of uncertainty looming over Europe.

The German president warned about the threat of external influences to democracy, be they “covert, as was evidently the case recently during the elections in Romania, or open and blatant, as is currently being practiced particularly intensively on the X platform.”

All wanna-be fascists work out of the same handbook, I swear.

The next few weeks should be very interesting.