“Sie sind in der Festung drin. Diese Festung fällt nicht morgen oder übermorgen,
aber wir wissen, sie fällt. Nicht
in fernen Generationen, sondern wir alle, wir wollen es noch erleben, daß sie fällt.
-- Otto Bauer, Vienna, March 1927
It has been a month of awkward anniversaries.
=> Germany celebrated its reunion, in the midst of what
feels like a national implosion.
=> The U.N. marked its 70th year of increasing
uselessness.
=> And today, Austria feted its national day, while a
ragtag army of intruders swarmed across its undefended national borders, the police and politicians looking on helplessly. As for the Army, it has been gynecized into imbecility:
Was macht das für
Landesverteidigung zuständiges Bundesheer währenddessen?
Es beschäftigt sich mit einem
Gender-Sprachleitfaden aus dem SPÖ-Frauenministerium, der überall für
Kopfschütteln sorgt.
(Worte wie Mannschaft, man, jeder, jemand und niemand sollen
nicht mehr verwendet werden.)
Unglaublich...
The eve of the celebrations (such as they were) were
besmirched by an astonishing outburst against Austria’s neighbors, by the
Interior Minister Madame Mikl-Leitner:
Deutschland übernimmt nach Angaben
von Innenministerin Johanna Mikl-Leitner (ÖVP) "aktuell einfach zu wenig
Flüchtlinge”.
Now that is chutzpah in high-heels and a cocked hat: Germany, the cul-de-sac into which the
rest of the world is pouring its wretched-refuse, with Austria acting as the
Schleuderer-in-Chief !
~
For just a moment, it looked as if, although Mutti Merkel
has yet to come to her senses and defend her country's borders, Mutti Mikl just might finally have
caught on:
Österreichs Innenministerin spricht
von einem Zaunbau.
But no such luck.
She still has not the gumption to suggest such a procedure for
Austria; rather, “let Ivan do it”:
Sollte die EU-Außengrenze in
Griechenland nicht rasch geschützt werden, sei ein Zaunbau an Sloweniens Grenze
zu Kroatien "überlegenswert".
~
Actually, Miss Mikl showed a certain pragmatism, in passing
the buck only as far as the next
statelet over, Slovenia. After
all, it is in Slovenia’s own interests
that she defend her borders, keeping out the unwanted. Whereas Merkel made a
Canossa-trek all the way to Turkey, to implore Erdogan to do the dirty-work in
her stead.
Now, let’s reason this out logically. Whereas Norway, Finnland, Sweden,
Denmark, Germany, Germany, Austria, Slovenia, Croatia, Macedonia and Greece (to
name the ‘extended West-Balkan route’, the Appalachian Trail of in-migration)
would each like to keep the migrants out (but lack the will to do so), Turkey by no means wishes to keep them in, which is what Merkel is asking. Turkey doesn’t want the Syrians and she
doesn’t want the Kurds, nor any other migrant band that uses Anatolia as a
way-station. Hence, whereas a
nudge might induce overstressed Slovenia to guard its entrance-gates, Merkel
would have to pay Turkey very dearly, to close its exits. Thus
keeping the steam inside the kettle.
And this she has proposed to do, via three inducements. …
* Mucho moolah.
Unfortunately, this one’s no longer such a breeze, since Germany paid to
bail out Greece yet again; and as
there will be a bill coming due for all those immigrants, a bill with (to use
the chancellor’s chiselled phrase) “keine Obergrenze”.
* No more visas required for Turks to enter Germany. (Turkey already does a land-office
business in fake Syrian passports; now fake Turkish passports will also be in demand.)
* A promise to speed Turkey’s entry into the European
Union. (This, at a time when
Erdogan has been sliding ever deeper into dictatorial excess, and where civil
war seems to loom.)
A more reckless piece of diplomacy would be difficult to conceive.
[Update 28 October 2015] Gingerly advancing a toe towards
what eventually needs to be done:
Angesichts des Flüchtlingsandrangs
will Österreich seine Grenze zu Slowenien offenbar teils auch durch einen Zaun
sichern. Österreichs Innenministerin Johanna Mikl-Leitner sagte am Mittwoch dem
Sender Ö1, es gehe aber nicht darum, die Grenze "dicht zu machen".
Vielmehr solle ein "geordneter, kontrollierter Zutritt" geschaffen
werden.
A reader wryly comments, in reference to the increasingly
urgent polemics from the Bavarian CSU-chef:
Grenzzaun zu Slowenien
Na also - offenbar war der Klartext
von Seehofer doch nicht vergebens.
Another, more wryly still:
wozu brauchen die nen Zaun, die
schicken die Flüchtlinge ja eh gleich weiter nach Deutschland. Wollen die jetzt
auch noch den Sprit für die Busse sparen, die die Flüchtlinge an die deutsche
Grenze karren. Da regt sich diese fragwürdige Innenministerin auf, das
Deutschland zu wenig Flüchtlinge aufregt, und sie offensichtlich dann gar meine
mehr
[Note to anglophones:
Sprit = fuel.]
 |
|
Nun denn, wir bauen
doch ‘nen Zaun --
aber doch nur 10 cm hoch ! |
Dazu:
Am Nationalfeiertag lobte die
Staatsspitze in ihren Festreden in höchsten Tönen, wie sich das Land in der
Flüchtlingskrise bewähre. Diese Bewährungsprobe besteht aus Improvisation und
fußt auf der Annahme, dass Deutschland unbegrenzt alle Menschen aufnimmt, die
sich über die Balkanroute durchgeschlagen haben. Bislang tut dies die
Wirtschaftsgroßmacht auch; doch der Konsens in der Berliner
Regierungskoalition, mit dieser Praxis fortzufahren, erscheint zunehmend brüchig.
~
~ Sigmund Freud und Sherlock Holmes: ~
~ ~ Seelen-vertausch!
~ ~
~
[Update 28 Oct 2015]
Einführung in die Flüchtlings-Semantik
Mikl-L, responding to an interviewer, with a (probably
unintentional) double-entendre.
Könnte Österreich in eine Situation kommen, in der es die Grenze nach
Slowenien doch völlig dicht machen müsste?
Daran denkt keiner.
The intended conveyed-meaning is: “No, of course not, nobody would ever want to do that.”
The literal, yet repressed (subconscious) meaning: “Nobody is thinking of that -- not
entertaining the possibility” (because they have their head in the sand; yet it still might come up and bite
them on the ass).
[Update 29 October 2015] Flüchtlings-Semantik : Weiteres zum Thema
A mincing minuet, choosing euphemisms:
A mincing minuet, choosing euphemisms:
Innenministerin Johanna
Mikl-Leitner (ÖVP) bleibt dabei: An der Grenze im steirischen Spielfeld müsse
es Befestigungen geben.
Einen Vergleich mit Ungarns Zäunen
weist sie strikt zurück.
Angesichts der Debatte um die Lage
in Spielfeld – die steirische Integrationslandesrätin Doris Kampus etwa
verwahrte sich strikt gegen "Zäune", kann sich aber ebenfalls
bauliche Maßnahmen am Grenzübergang selbst vorstellen
Recall the polemics, a few years ago, over whether Israel’s
divider against the Palestinians was a “fence” (good) or a “wall” (bad). But now we are more delicate: it’s between a “fence” (bad) and “temporary
constructional measures” (acceptable).
 |
| Ceci n’est pas une clôture |
For a superb gallery of political fences in history:
*
Falls Sie im
Doktor-Justiz-Sammelsurium
weiterblättern
möchten,
Bitte hier
klicken:
http://worldofdrjustice.blogspot.com/search/label/Mitteleuropa
http://worldofdrjustice.blogspot.com/search/label/Mitteleuropa
http://worldofdrjustice.blogspot.com/search/label/Deutschtum
http://worldofdrjustice.blogspot.com/search/label/Sigmund%20Freud
http://worldofdrjustice.blogspot.com/search/label/Sigmund%20Freud
*
[Update 30 October 2015] In fairness, and hewing to the principle that what’s sauce
for the goose is sauce for the
gander (or, the people who live in glass houses, should not throw stones), we
must concede that the United States, in addition to being often unwilling to
defend its borders, has long been too feckless even to protect the White House
with an adequate fence. This
latter saga is less well known to our European readers; read about it here.
[Update 31 Oct 2015] Austria, too, is running out of bears:
Dazu, letzlich, diese Ministerin:
http://www.welt.de/politik/deutschland/article148281032/Die-Flucht-Fahimis-aus-der-Schlangengrube.html#disqus_thread
[Update 31 Oct 2015] Austria, too, is running out of bears:
 |
| Spielfeld (Steiermark), 31 Oktober 2015 |
http://www.welt.de/politik/deutschland/article148281032/Die-Flucht-Fahimis-aus-der-Schlangengrube.html#disqus_thread
[Update 10 November 2015]
NDLR, explaining the latest euphemism:
Kein Wort von Mikl zu Zaun
Zu einem Bericht des
"Kurier", wonach sie am slowenischen-österreichischen Grenzübergang
in Spielfeld einen 25 Kilometer lange Sperre,
vulgo Zaun, hochziehen will, erklärte Mikl-Leitner nur: "Ich werde zu
dem Konzept nichts sagen."
A reader comments:
Die BMI führt sich auf wie eine
spätpubertierende Klassensprecherin. Dauernd irgendwelche eigenartigen
Wortspenden absondernd, droht sie mit einem Zaun, um zuletzt mit einem
schmallippigen Grinsen anzumerken, dass die bösen Buben schon sehen werden was
passiert.
[Update 11 November 2015] Okay, it has gotten too complex for me to follow. A rough outline.
(1) Deutscher Innenminister de Maizière announces -- on what turns out to be his
own hook -- that, henceforward, Syrian Eindringlinge will be (save in exceptional cases) granted only a “secondary”
asylum, with a time-limit and no right of family reunification.
In itself, that move, while significant, does not affect
Austria, and Austria does not react.
However, swiftly thereafter, Merkel’s Sprachrohr Altmeier says: Nothing of the kind. And de Maizière rapidly retracts.
Now: At first
blush, this makes de Maizière look like a fool, and as though he had been
punked by Altmeier. But … by that
rash act, he successfully, subtlely, altered the terms of debate. A sort of knight-sacrifice in the
Great Game.
(2) Yesterday, de Maizière (or, as the press reported it, “Germany”)
unlooses a bombshell: the Dublin
agreement (arbitrarily and de factco swept aside by Merkel and indeed all the
other states on the immigrational Appalachian Trail) is once again in effect,
even for (purported) Syrians.
Meaning, basically, that they get summarily sent back to whatever
European country first admitted them (modulo unimportant provisos).
Now, this would be a very big deal, the tipping-point for
the whole European migrant crisis;
yet few media reported on it -- I first learned of it, actually, from
the Austrian media. For: the immediate effect of such a change in policy, would
primarily impact Austria.
Quite interestingly -- and to her credit -- Mikl-L rushed
into print hailing the decision, which she called long overdue.
Now, saluting a Zaun,
such as that reprobate Orban (boo! boo!) quickly and manfully erected, is taboo; so why would M-L make so bold as to
salute one? Isn’t she a coward,
like virtually every other European politician? -- Well, doch; but consider.
Once Germany closes its border (or enforces Dublin, which amounts to the
same thing), Austria must needs swiftly
do likewise. Hence, to
reduce the inevitable heat from doing so, praise the Germans for doing it
first. Otherwise you are in an impossible
position.
But! The
proposal to enforce Dublin, turns out to have been another de-M. smoke-signal
or trial-balloon: He (reportedly)
had not pre-cleared this bold and major move, neither with the Kanzlerin nor
Altmeier nor anyone else. Loose
cannon, off the reservation? And
yet the blowback within Germany
was surprisingly mild. As
though all factions, from the
Chancellor to the Greens, were, if not actively welcoming, at least seeing what
anemometrical indications they might receive from said smoke, said balloon.
(3) And now -- Slovenia,
the third domino in line, before the
second (Austria) has fallen, and before the fall of the first (Deutschland) has
been confirmed, begins building -- not “announces” its intention to maybe being
discussions re (etc etc), but actually hands-on, soldiers-on-the-Grenze, build
-- a border fence. Which, if it were done correctly and
were effective, would actually relieve Austria of the necessity of building one
of its own. So-o … will Mikl-Leitlein therefore backpedal? -- Stay tuned.
.
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