Früher war alles.

Früher war alles.

Deutschland dreht frei. Und auf der Stelle. Also ist Deutschland ein Bohrer.
Nur: wonach wird gebohrt?

Eine Zeitreise mit Kai Blasberg und einigen Fragen.
Ich bin ja nun langsam in dem Alter, wo man das Vergangene glorifiziert, das Gegenwärtige erträgt und das Zukünftige in seiner Bedeutung negiert.
Mein Vater ging mir so lange ich denken konnte mit seinem ,,das was zählt, ist Erfahrung" auf den Sack.
Ich widersprach ihm nicht selten mit dem Hinweis, dass auch Nichts eine Erfahrung sei.
Die Zukunftskompetenz meines leider viel zu früh verblichenen Namensgebers litt ein wenig, als er zu Beginn des Jahrtausends weissagte: ,,Internet hat keine Zukunft".
Trotzdem weiß ich heute natürlich, dass Erfahrung wertvoll ist, insbesondere für die eigene Gelassenheitskultur.
Ups.
Entschuldigung.
Gelassenheit ist etwas unmodern in diesen Tagen. Jahren. Dekaden.
Gelassenheit steht uns nicht gut zu Gesicht.
Wir, die Deutschen, wir kennen Gelassenheit nur aus den Erzählungen der Anderen.
Böse ausgedruckt: unser Seelenzustand changiert ohne Pause zwischen Hambacher Fest und Auschwitz.
Ok. Überspitzen gehört zum Handwerk. Erst recht ohne Bleistift.
Und jetzt höre ich meine Frau wieder sagen: Das versteht doch keiner.
Komischerweise versteht ausgerechnet die mich am besten, die mir ständig erzählt, dass man mich nicht versteht.
Sie suchen nach einem Sinn dieser Zeilen.
,,Selbst in Schuld" hätte ich als Kind gesagt.
Womit wir wieder beim Bohren sind:
wir Deutschen suchen, bohren nach dem Grunde. Dem Sinn. Dem Fehler.
Helfen Sie mir nur ganz kurz beim Erklären meiner dieswöchigen Frage:
Was ist hier los? Was ist passiert?
Und gehen wir zusammen mit Herbert Grönemeyer händchenhaltend ins Jahr 2014.
Geben wir es zu: es fühlt sich wie gestern an.
Jeder meiner in der Regel über 30-jährigen Leser war auch damals schon erwachsen.
Und doch: 2014 ist eine andere Epoche.
Wenn wir unseren Unfrieden verstehen wollen, hilft uns die Erinnerung an 2014:
Ja klar: Die deutschen Fußballer waren die besten der Welt.
Angela Merkel wurde mit dem Slogan "Sie kennen mich" wiedergewählt.
Mercedes baute gute und schöne Autos.
Die Briten dachten nicht an Brexit.
Und jeder, der Donald Trump sagte, dachte an lächerliche Fernsehshows und auftoupierte prostituierte Ehefrauen.

2014 schickte unser Freund, der Menschenschlächter Vladimir grüne Männer auf die Krim.
Und wir den Frank-Walter, der in Minsk irgendetwas tun sollte.
Vor allem aber die Pipeline retten.
Wir Deutschen hätten dem Baltikum, den Polen und den Ukrainern mit einem Erstschlag gedroht, wenn sie Nordstream 2 kritisiert hätten wie viele Jahre später.
2014 war die AfD abgenippelt, weil es noch keine Fluchtmenschen gab und 2014 waren die gesellschaftsrelevanten Empörungshöhepunkte Männer namens Edathy und Tebarz van Elst. Wenn denn solche Figuren ein Geschlecht haben.
Vor zehn Jahren ging Uli Hoeneß in den Knast und die Moralischeren unter uns dachten:
Das war es jetzt für ihn.
Ich wurde für den Grimme-Preis nominiert und fuhr Motorrad und einen gelben Porsche.
2014 hieß Corona Ebola und war in Afrika.
Lettland bekam den Euro und Griechenland hatte Schäuble überlebt.
Israels Präsident hieß Schimon Peres.
Und Erdogan wurde das gerade erst in der Türkei.
Es gab eine Bewegung, die montags im Osten rumkrakelten. Pergola oder so ähnlich.
Irgendwie will man wieder 2014 sein.
Sind unsere Probleme wirklich größer geworden oder taugen unsere Filter nichts mehr? Saugen wir uns zu viel an Informationen rein oder ist es wirklich alles schlechter? Schlimmer? Teurer?
Oder ist das, was wir uns immer erhofften, einfach nur nicht gekommen?
Wird uns zu viel vorgegaukelt und wir raffen es langsam?
Oder bewegt sich die eine Hälfte der Republik gar nicht, weil bräsig, dick, überversorgt, die andere Hälfte aber zu viel, weil Abstrampeln extrem viel Energie kostet?
Sind wir einfach nur 10 Jahre älter und stimmt das, was alle über das älter werden sagen und sagten?
Ist die Party vorbei?
Oder war es nie eine?
Oder finden wir Partys schon immer einfach nur kacke?
Das erfolgreichste Lied 2014 war ,,Happy".
Der erfolgreichste Kino-Film, die empathische Geschichte ,,Honig im Kopf".
Die beste Serie war ,,Borgen", ein Politdrama aus Dänemark, in der es um die Menschen in der Politik ging. Ohne Affengesichter wie die obengenannten.
Olaf Scholz war das, was er kann: Bürgermeister.
Ok. Ich weiß, was Sie jetzt sagen wollen.

P.S.
Lasst uns das Gefühl 2014 behalten.
Denn nochmal 10 solche Jahre werden wir nicht bestehen.
Aber eins sollten wir von 2014 auf jeden Fall lernen:
Es war das erste Jahr ohne FDP im Bundestag.
Das kommt bald wieder.

14.03.24
*Kai Blasberg war 40 Jahre in den privaten Medien in Deutschland beschäftigt
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Datenschutzhinweis
The same faces always follow me on the streets of Berlin: Marie-Agnes Strack-Zimmermann in the Christian Lindner memorial black and white; Sahra Wagenknecht, who has only mastered a single facial expression in photos for fifteen years and is not running at all in the European elections; or Katharina Barley, who is apparently so unknown as the top candidate for the European elections that Olaf Scholz is standing by her side on the posters, so that the passing mob at least develops a rough idea of what this mysterious Ms. Barley is all about.

However, it's also exciting who doesn't advertise with the faces of their candidates: the CDU knows full well that it can't win much ground with the likeness of Ursula von der Leyen. The Christian Democrats are focusing on their core competence: airy casings that somehow sound delicious, the potato soup among the slogans, consisting of empty carbohydrates and still warm. "For a Germany in which we live well and happily" was the motto of the 2017 federal election. Today: "For a Europe that protects and benefits." Sexy.

First and foremost, we are dealing with great theater. The Germany in which we live so well and happily believes that its population has very little influence over their own interests. We are free to change staff every four years, although the overall shifts are rather manageable in most cases due to the five percent hurdle - much more than that is up for debate. Once they have made themselves comfortable in their seats, the politicians primarily do what they want. If they do nonsense, you have to wait until the next election to be able to sanction them for it. The population is only allowed to participate in the debate on Twitter or TikTok.

There are no means of driving out a politician who throws his principles and election promises overboard in a very short space of time - otherwise the Green faction in the Bundestag would be significantly smaller today. In addition, there is the planned electoral law reform to reduce the size of the Bundestag, which, however, primarily targets direct mandates from smaller parties. Here alone one could speak of a gross break with the will of the voters, after all, the common voter is not just there to shift percentages, but to make his or her voice heard.

The structures at the European level in particular are almost absurdly opaque. At five-year intervals, citizens are counted to cast a vote primarily in favor of leaving them alone for the next five years. There is a good tradition of deporting failed or simply annoying former federal politicians to Brussels in order to keep them busy there with twice the workload of meeting weeks and thus practically silence the local discourse. Meanwhile, the future of all of us is being decided in Europe - and we know next to nothing about it! Via text message, Ursula von der Leyen is costing taxpaying EU citizens billions and billions of euros for a vaccine that over time turned out to be significantly less effective than was initially assumed. A single company benefited greatly from the biggest crisis since the Second World War.

One hears again and again that the legislative periods, especially at the federal level, are too short to actually change anything. We should only elect the German Bundestag every five or even six years to give the poor politicians the time to implement their plans in peace. The logical error here is obvious: governments are completely free at any time to make future-oriented decisions, the benefits of which will only become apparent long after the current legislative period - but they consciously decide against it in order to promote populist fast food based on surveys. to pursue politics that are intended to maintain one's own power.

It is better to push the unpleasant things into the next legislature. After all, you want to decorate yourself with immediate, small successes. However, why this should be a problem for voters is completely unclear. Shouldn't we expect more from our elected representatives to get off their high horse and commit themselves to the German people instead of just keeping their own chair warm? Is it the voter's fault if Lauterbach pulls off a patchwork bureaucratic monster of cannabis legalization in order to be celebrated as a pioneer?

In his well-read pamphlet "Screw Selflove, Give Me Class War," the author Jean-Philippe Kindler describes our democracy as "capitalism with elections." So while the personnel changes, politicians, as soon as they get into positions of power, despite all the loud promises of unshakable ideals, end up serving the corporations. This is rarely as obvious as when the FDP leads the finance ministry. The AfD, which sells itself as social, also repeatedly talks about not wanting to tax wealthy people or companies more heavily under any circumstances. Commitment to the needs of the much-discussed (and rarely actually addressed) "little man" on the ass. In view of the draft law on the Promotion of Democracy Act, which, depending on its interpretation, can also be misused to stifle criticism of the government by citing a threat to the state. Imagine if such a law were in force under an AfD-led government.

Anyone who walks through the streets in Berlin is stared at by posters with slogans such as "Give Prosperity a Voice" (CDU), "Against Hatred and Incitement" or "For Moderation, Center and Peace" (both SPD) - absolutely meaningless turnip stew formulations - or: "Education: first line of defense of democracy." Of course a poster from the FDP, whose top candidate Marie-Agnes Strack-Zimmermann cannot deviate from the war rhetoric even when it comes to educating people to become politically informed, responsible citizens . But it is of course welcome that the FDP wants to work for better education, because things are extremely bad in Germany. There are even said to be well-known female politicians in government parties whose reading skills are apparently so limited that they consider Mother Courage to be a positive identification figure.

As I said, it is true that most governments achieve little that will change the world in the four years they are given. However, that doesn't mean you shouldn't try. Unfortunately, we are observing a completely discouraged government that is not providing any answers to pressing questions about the future. In a rule by the people, we would actually be counted on to assert our civic duty beyond the ballot box to vote on individuals. We have the instrument of the referendum for this purpose. But anyone who walks across the streets in Berlin and observes election posters cannot help but remember the last referendums here in this city:

On May 25, 2014, a referendum was held on the development of Tempelhofer Feld. The development of the popular park planned by the Senate should be prevented by the plebiscite. A majority voted for the referendum and thus for the preservation of Tempelhofer Feld as a local recreation area and historical site. There were last headlines about the planned development of Tempelhofer Feld in autumn 2023, so the referendum is up for discussion.

The referendum on the expropriation of the real estate group Deutsche Wohnen took place during the 2021 federal election. The aim was to break the dominance of corporations like Deutsche Wohnen in order to prevent rents from skyrocketing and to maintain Berlin as a reasonably affordable place to live. As a basic service, apartments should be rented out by the city at controlled prices so that there is no Darwinian struggle for the scarce living space. The referendum received widespread support from the electorate. It has not yet been implemented and is no longer even discussed.

The last Berlin plebiscite was "Berlin 2030 climate neutral". The aim was to formulate a law that would oblige Berlin to comply with certain emission saving measures. The initiators must also have been very aware that the feasibility was only moderately good; the idea was certainly not least to be able to hold the city accountable for past failures. But none of that matters, because the referendum was actively sabotaged by the city of Berlin by not holding it parallel to the repeat election in February 2023, but more than a month later, even though it would have been possible to hold it in February.

The reason that referendums are often combined with elections is that they can increase participation. The only time the German Michel tends not to go to his polling station is for a referendum. If the plebiscite is added when an election is coming up anyway, it will have a huge impact on the number of participants. Scheduling the referendum on the climate law for Berlin on a separate date inevitably meant that the necessary quota was not reached. Here the population was partially denied the opportunity to make their own voice audible in a simple and low-threshold manner.

When Hubert Aiwanger said that the people should "take back democracy," it was treated like a despicable threatening gesture given his unjustifiable missteps in his previous life. But we need to think seriously about the state of a democracy in which we give power to people who can then act with impunity against the will of the voters and even ignore it when it is officially stated. The idea of representative democracy is noble and shows a belief in the good in people, but does not take into account the corruptibility of politicians, which always has to be taken into account in capitalism. When Julia Klöckner, then Minister of Food, praises Nestlé, it should be clear to every responsible citizen that something is wrong here. Whose interests should be represented here?

It is only worth arguing about longer terms of office if at the same time it enables greater participation of the population in other democratic processes. Imagine if we were now tied to the traffic lights for a total of six years instead of four and were practically at its mercy for the entire period when it comes to potentially existential debates such as arms deliveries or military conscription. Stability in a democracy can only exist if the population actually trusts the government and can intervene when that trust wanes. When politicians no longer just use easily digestible phrases and populist theses for election campaign purposes, only to be unable to be warned to comply once they are elected. When corporations, lobby associations and shady interest groups are disempowered. If this succeeds, a government no longer has to be so afraid of the Internet that it would need a law to promote democracy.

05/06/24
*Bent-Erik Scholz works as a freelancer for RBB