German health minister calls US billionaire’s intervention weeks before election ‘undignified and problematic’
Summary
Elon Musk sparked outrage in Germany by endorsing the far-right, anti-immigrant Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) party on his platform, X, claiming “only the AfD can save Germany.”
The AfD, which polls second ahead of Germany’s February snap election, has been labeled extremist by German intelligence.
Political leaders accused Musk of election interference, while others criticized his remarks as harmful. Musk later doubled down, calling for Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s resignation.
Musk’s comments align with his past support for far-right and anti-immigration figures across Europe and beyond.
I genuinely apologize for my ignorance. Germany looks like a damned paradise of free healthcare and other social welfare programs from the States. What issues are you facing over there?
Matches up with history. Hitler had a giant portrait of Henry Ford in his office. American racism, genocide, and capitalism was a major inspiration for the Nazis
We're running into the paradox of tolerance real quick here folks. Democracies need to legislate limits to the political influence of rich idiots and soon, otherwise we'll all end up like the US.
Well, funny thing is we do have rules about what you can and cannot say, in Europe. I'm looking forward to him discovering those little subtleties, since he clearly cannot shut his trap.
These are rules that are supposed to already exist though. Foreign political influence is always considered a bad thing by the country receiving it. The UK and Germany should have strong protections against it but apparently they don't.
lol as if they don't like them. they themselves are rich idiots, the only difference is that ironically they don't have as much political influence as unelected rich idiots.
There is nothing surprising about a white South African promoting a racist political party. White South Africans are the most openly and unabashedly racist people on the planet.
You should be more undersantding. Since Trump is now enraged because people call Musk the President, Musk needs to find a backup country where he'll be called the leader before Trump kicks him out. That's all just risk mitigation!
You know what bothers me? Musk knows hes bullshitting everyone and it seems like its fucking laugh to him. Remember when the hyper rich built libraries and funded colleges and, i dunno, just gave back? To think, just a few short years ago, he was presenting as some kind of visionary. Turns out, hes just a capitalist asshole.
It doesn’t matter to him. All he knows that he’s a Dark Enlightenment fascist white supremacist. The poors and non-whites must die. Fascist governments must be in power everywhere so he can have his world where he is king, he has robots to do his bidding and can try to live forever.
He knows what benifits him. That's the entirety of his motivations. Evil greedy assholes are quite dull, he just knows what makes him more money and more power.
To be honest the ending for rich capitalist(the same that helped Hitler in power) in west Germany was pretty good. They profit heavily during the war and afterwards the mostly just kept there companies continuing to profit.
No country is safe from Elon Musk's election interference. It's urgent that we boycott Twitter and Tesla. If you have a Twitter account do the following now:
Send a DM to your favorite accounts and urge them to stop using Twitter.
(If you haven't already) register for Bluesky.
Make a Tweet saying you are no longer using Twitter.
Tell your friends to follow the same instructions.
These could take as little as five minutes of your time but it will make a huge difference because of the ripple effect. When one person leaves it will automatically incentivize your friends to follow you. You have the power to make a difference.
Either is better than X/Twitter for now. Bluesky is "easier" for many people. I prefer Mastodon myself, but there's a bridge so I can follow Bluesky profiles (and vice-versa) which is nice.
An apartheid-loving nazi calls for the nazi party to be the savior of Germany? Never would I have guessed.
The information, I as a not very politically interested German (understatement) have: We are holding re-elections on Feburary 23rd because the current government imploded. Basically, the rich guys' party doesn't want to make rich guys pay taxes and being children about it, most other parties seem desperate at this point, else they wouldn't have challenged that much. They have never cared that much, so I have no idea what changed. The populist nazi party Musk cheers for has a lot traction because people are beyond stupid and self-centered and I fear that they will get a significant amount of votes. Maybe they don't win outright, but they will realistically take second place. I regard everyone that considers to vote for AfD as a nazi.
I think the real problem is that most parties in Germany that held some power in the last decades did little to nothing to actually improve the economic situation of the "normal" people. For many it stayed the same, for many others it declined significantly starting with Corona and then with the energy crisis that contributed heavily to the inflation.
Paired with us being one of the few nations that raise no taxes at all on wealth but just on income the disparity between the rich and the poor is growing. So people have only the parties that haven't held power yet to turn to.
I think it's at least partially some weird form of misplaced hope that something will change for the better in the chaos that would be a AfD government.
But you are correct, supporting the AfD is directly benefiting Nazis. And while I don't think that all AfD supporters will always be Nazis, they currently are.
But that sounds like the other usage of shit. It can mean nothing or it could man a lot. I mean with the shut the fuck up (which is more impactful than STFU) connotation the meaning isn't lost but it's a more confusing statement.
Scholz didn't resign, he called for and lost a vote of no confidence, so the parliament will be dissolved by the German prime minister and new elections are due in late February, where Scholz can (and likely will) throw his hat in the ring again.
No, that's exactly how resignation works for a chancellor in Germany. The only alternative would be for a new chancellor to be elected by the Bundestag (parlament), but since no candidate would have a majority he resigned by triggering a vote of confidence.
vietnamese people think elon musk and donald trump are right about everything because they are smart because they are rich and because america is a democracy
they are deified, basically. just like ho chi minh
Why do Putin and the billionaires he shepherds think that all this far-right democracy killing shit is so super duper? I marvel that they never seem to stop and think "this could eventually go badly for me."
They want every place to be like Russia. It's always been their main contention that democracy is just a sham and basically everyone is a fascist. This is one of the main reasons for invading Ukraine because he couldn't tolerate a democratic nation as his neighbour. It'll give the plebes ideas, you know.
Because Putin wants Russia to be the geopolitical superpower it was in 1960. It's a hell of a lot easier to tear the rest of the world down than it is to build up Russia.
That's part of why he's so eager for war. The last big shakeup of the global order was WWII. He doesn't have the patience to accomplish geopolitical power closer to the way China is, by slowly building up their economy over decades.
And he's right that a bunch of people dying often helps the economy. The black plage was 1350, followed by the Renaissance around 1400-1600. We're familiar enough with post WWII.
But that's the dumb and evil way to grant power to labor. You can create more demand for labor without literally killing half your laborers. And it turns out having a real, healthy middle class is great for the economy.
Personally, I believe you could accomplish a similar effect by having a ridiculously high minimum wage and mandating a maximum of 32 hour work weeks. Seems like it might be worth experimenting with when the alternative "fix" is to kill half your people.
How's the actions of the top US billionaire who just practically bought the American government the fault of Putin? Nah man, the US has to shoulder the responsibility for unleashing this fucking plague on the rest of the world.
It should be unsurprising that he's trying to destroy other major economies around the world, seeing as that's the policy of those who he's aligned himself with politically.
Elon Musk sparked outrage in Germany by endorsing the far-right, anti-immigrant Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) party on his platform, X, claiming “only the AfD can save Germany.”
I do not understand the outrage on this (regard Musk being Far-Right supporter), everyone knows Musk has become an immensely Extreme Far-Right supporter and leans heavily into Fascism. He support all the Right/ Far-Right political parties and people.
“only the AfD can save Germany.”
As usual, his claims are immensely wrong, stupid and idiotic. I mean, the afD literally tried to do a coúp in Germany;
The AfD, which polls second ahead of Germany’s February snap election, has been labeled extremist by German intelligence.
Unfortunately shows that lots of people in Germany are supporting Far-Right/ Nazism ideas, tactics and ideology. Especially since it has been proven that many of the afD are Nazi-supports (especially the leaders);
The case involved Björn Höcke's use of "Everything for Germany!" in a 2021 speech. While prosecutors said he knew it was originally a Nazi slogan, Höcke claimed it was an "everyday saying".
This text is to separate the quote of the article and the quote from OP's post.
Political leaders accused Musk of election interference, while others criticized his remarks as harmful.
Accussed? If I remember, he did interfere with the election in America by trying to 'purchase' votes (Insanity that this is allowed);
I do not understand the outrage on this (regard Musk being Far-Right supporter), everyone knows Musk has become an immensely Extreme Far-Right supporter and leans heavily into Fascism.
It doesn’t have to be surprising to outrage people though.
What clearer and more obvious sign does one need to call him a Nazi? Disabling his right-wing ex-twitter propaganda network in Europe (and other civilized places) should be a top priority.
Late on Friday, after at least two people were killed and scores wounded in a suspected terror attack on a Christmas market in the German city of Magdeburg, Musk doubled down, tweeting: “Scholz should resign immediately. Incompetent fool.”
This text is to separate the quote of the article and the quote from OP’s post.
I can see how people might get a bit NIMBY about islamic terrorism.
But the thing about that is, news come out that the person who did the terrorist attack on the Christmas Market is anti-islam, pro-israel and pro-Wilders (leader of the Far-Right PVV Dutch party).
Taleb’s X account is filled with tweets and retweets focusing on anti-Islam themes and criticism of the religion while sharing congratulatory notes to Muslims who left the faith. He also described himself as a former Muslim.
From article 2:
“The real hero is this man,” he added, quoting a tweet from Geert Wilders, the far-Right Dutch politician, that read: “Islam is a lie. Mohammed is a criminal. The Koran is poison.”
The man suspected of driving a car into a Christmas market in Germany is an exiled Saudi doctor who praised far-Right politicians for combating the “Islamisation” of Europe and pledged to take “revenge” for the “harassment” of female refugees.
In one tweet he wrote: “I have to admit that I was deceived by western Leftists. I thought they welcome refugees because they care for human rights. But my experience in Germany showed me that they welcome refugees because they want to Islamise Europe.”
He also voiced support for Elon Musk, Tommy Robinson and Alternative for Germany, the far-right anti-immigration party.
I think that's enough quotes from the article to show, he's immensely anti-islam. So, I'm confused as to why Musk blames Chancellor Olaf Scholz.
That is a bizarre twist... So a former Muslim who now hates Islam wants to pose as an islamic terrorist, hoping nobody finds out he's anti-islam afterwards, I just don't understand his plan. If he's right about the state of islamic terrorism (which I wouldn't know since I don't live there) he shouldn't have to contribute to it for people to notice