Lone Candle
Champion of Truth
When we talk about parts of Germany being “left behind”, we are talking about first-world problems. These areas are still wealthy by world and historical standards. But, their wealth and economic growth is smaller than the big cities.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DoQgoV-T8wM
The AfD wants Germany to distance relations with Europe and the United States while getting closer to Russia and China. This is weird for a party that claims to want Germany first and to focus on distinct German culture and values. Shouldn’t authoritarian Asiatic empires be the opposite of German values and culture? And don’t other European countries and the US have much closer values and culture? Long-term, and worst case scenarios, China and Russia are empires that would force the world under their authoritarian heel if they could. Despite America’s many flaws and self-interests, its goals are freedom, trade, and defense. True imperialism is antithetical to its ethos. When the AfD says German values, it seems to mean no immigrants and: imperial, anti-enlightenment, anti-Western, and fundamentally unChristian values.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZFmpxuNxycM
The AfD has completely polarized a German town where disputes used to be easily resolved over a beer. They take over German villages as a strategy, first just establishing a base in a pub or something, then spreading their message, then polarizing the town by: ending trust, lying about anyone who speaks out, and suing and criminally reporting people who are against them. They also threaten opponents, especially AfD apostates. When dealing with external and internal opponents, the party focuses on threats and insults over discussion of the issues.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gedOEGjyMHA
In interviews, AfD supporters spout straight up Russian fake news propaganda. Others have the same complaints heard by Trump supporters in the US.
Interviewer interviews AfD supporters and asks them what about your life personally is going wrong that makes you like the AfD, and they talk about immigrants, the EU, etc, but when he asks again about their life personally, they have nothing to say. Another interviewer had the same experience with Trump supporters–they rave about whatever concern is in the right-wing zeitgeist at the moment, but have nothing to say about how their life is bad that makes them want to vote for Trump.
Back to Germany, people often are concerned about immigrant crime, but outside of a few highly publicized attacks, these attacks are rare.
Interviewees are straight up ignorant about the horrible things Hitler did.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l2SjWowpynY
The AfD is heavily supported by Russian propaganda. The AfD is against stopping Russia from conquering Ukraine.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NwgFeOJH6tk
US sanctions have stopped Russia from rebuilding the Nord Stream pipeline.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r06_2ooytHk
China is screwing Europe economically. The US could have worked with Europe to counter China’s cheating, instead, Trump declared economic war on everyone at once, and bowed to China because China was too strong for Trump to take on alone.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-d3dZojivjI
The US will have much more difficulty projecting power without bases in Germany.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KK42sboyBCk
All realistic deals on the table that Iran might agree to look an awful lot like the deal Obama got without the costs and risks of war. Trump is reluctant to agree to such a deal because it will essentially be an admission that Obama and Kerry were right all along–this was the best deal possible and better than no deal or war.
Reporting was that Trump could have gotten such a deal before the war began, but Trump rejected it because he thought he was a great deal-maker who could do better than Obama. He was wrong, and we got war because of it.
Germany is starting to massively increase its military power. Europe needs German power. Once Germany has this power, some Germans will want to use it in ways that are not in America’s interest. We need Germany to pull its own weight, but we need to keep that weight on our side, and to do this, requires keeping America’s commitment to Europe strong and clear. German power is much less dangerous when embedded in a NATO structure that includes the United States.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nZM2x485OJs
Because the US has proven itself an unreliable arms supplier over Ukraine, offering weapons and then suddenly taking them away, Germany has decided to replace the US as a major arms supplier to Europe. This will result in a loss of US sales and negotiating leverage over European countries.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UteYRnpyMX4