Folks, it’s happening again. Germany—the economic powerhouse of Europe, the land of engineers and precision—has fallen flat on its face. Why? Because its leaders are chasing a climate dream that’s got more holes in it than a Swiss cheese. Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s coalition just imploded, and the reason is as simple as it is obvious: climate policy lunacy meets fiscal reality.
The German government went green alright. It went green as a tree frog, all while dumping logic and accountability out the window. Scholz kicked out his finance minister, Christian Lindner, for daring to do his job—keeping the books balanced and calling out the green pipe dream for what it is. So now the government’s in shambles, and it’s all because of the unhinged climate crusaders.
Here’s what went down.
Scholz’s Coalition: A Train Wreck Waiting to Happen
Scholz was sitting on a three-party coalition made up of his center-left Social Democratic Party (SPD), the eco-zealous Greens, and Lindner’s Free Democratic Party (FDP), which is actually trying to keep Germany’s economy from spiraling into oblivion. The alliance wasn’t exactly built on a rock-solid foundation; it was a Frankenstein’s monster of climate obsessives, social spenders, and a few people who could still do basic math.
Scholz and his Green pals wanted a Germany running on sunshine, unicorns, and the faint hope that solar panels would magically start generating power 24/7. Lindner? He’s a business-minded guy who realized that paying for this nonsense was going to hammer German industry, drive energy prices into the stratosphere, and leave average Germans with electricity bills that could buy a decent used car.
So, Lindner, as finance minister, tried to put a stop to this runaway train of green spending. He defended Germany’s “debt brake” law—yeah, you heard that right, they actually have a law to prevent the government from going nuts with the credit card. But the Greens wouldn’t hear it. Their climate ambitions were “non-negotiable,” meaning Lindner had to go. Scholz, ever the genius, gave Lindner the boot, and boom—the coalition collapsed, just like every house of cards built on wishful thinking eventually does.
The Green Agenda: Just How Bad Are We Talking?
Here’s a reality check for the folks pushing the Green Gospel: Germany is in a tough spot because its so-called “energy transition,” or Energiewende in their high-falutin’ German, is a flop. The Greens have been in the driver’s seat, shoving Germany off of reliable energy sources like coal and nuclear and onto renewables that simply can’t meet demand.
- Unreliable Power: Germany’s power grid has been wobbling around like a toddler on stilts. Wind and solar only work when Mother Nature feels like it, and guess what? Winter is coming. As renewable energy fizzles, Germany’s been forced to import coal-fired power from Poland and nuclear energy from France, which is rich given that the Greens want both of those options gone. A little ironic, don’t you think?
- Skyrocketing Prices: Energy prices are through the roof, but hey, that’s what happens when you swap out cheap, reliable power for pricey, unreliable green dreams. Germany’s average citizens are getting hammered by higher bills, and industry? Let’s just say manufacturers are looking at relocating faster than a college kid headed to Cancun for spring break. Good luck being Europe’s “economic engine” when factories start fleeing to places that can keep the lights on without bankrupting them.
- Social Impact: This green fantasy is hitting Germany’s working class the hardest. The well-off folks who don’t mind splurging on “eco-friendly” gadgets are doing fine. But lower-income families are shelling out more just to keep warm. And the response from the Greens? More taxes, more spending, more pain for people who can least afford it—all in the name of “saving the planet.” If you think they’re upset now, wait until winter when they’re paying triple for heating.
Europe’s Noticing – Is This the Beginning of the End for Green Utopia?
The collapse of Scholz’s government isn’t just a German problem; it’s a flashing red warning for Europe as a whole. Brussels has been shoving similar climate goals down everyone’s throat. They love talking about a green Europe that’s going to be all “carbon-neutral” and “sustainable,” but when push comes to shove, they’re all about making you pay the price while they collect virtue points. Germany was the model for this fantasy, but now? It’s the cautionary tale.
- The EU’s Own Coalition Problem: With Germany’s collapse, European leaders are looking at this and maybe—just maybe—questioning if it’s worth tearing down their economies for carbon targets. They’ve been running on the same unworkable assumptions as Scholz’s coalition. Countries like France, Italy, and Poland will have to ask themselves if they’re ready to go down with the ship or start questioning the EU’s blind climate fanaticism.
- Economic Self-Harm: Germany’s economic issues will likely spread, especially with key industries struggling under the weight of energy costs. The more the EU doubles down on the green agenda, the faster Europe loses its competitive edge. It’s a bad sign when your big “climate leader” is importing coal power because it turned its back on everything that actually works.
- The Rise of the Right: In Germany and across Europe, the populist right is licking its chops at this mess. People are sick of politicians who preach green dreams while everyday folks shoulder the costs. The opposition parties—especially those to the right of the SPD—now have a golden opportunity to ride the wave of public discontent. With Germany’s “Green miracle” exposed as a mirage, it’s only a matter of time before people demand leaders with a shred of common sense.
The Bottom Line: Germany’s Collapse Is a Reality Check
The fall of Scholz’s government is a textbook example of what happens when idealism replaces logic. Germany went all-in on a climate policy that ignores reality and punishes regular people, and now they’re paying for it. Without Lindner’s fiscal sanity, Scholz’s government threw the doors open to limitless spending on unproven green policies. And what did they get? A broke coalition, an economy in trouble, and an energy sector on the verge of collapse.
It’s time to stop pretending that throwing money at solar panels and wind turbines is a substitute for a stable energy policy. Germany just proved that, and Europe better be paying attention. Scholz’s green agenda may have sounded like the way forward, but now we see where it really leads—to higher costs, angry citizens, and a government in tatters.
If there’s any lesson to take from this, it’s that energy policy needs to be grounded in reality. Maybe next time, Germany will remember that an economy runs on reliable energy and balanced budgets—not on wishful thinking and political posturing.
I have no sympathy for Germany, this is what its people have voted for. Now they have it … and they don’t have their impossible wet dream either.
Streetcred,
not really their fault when they have been misled over climate and misled over the capabilities of renewable electricity.
Renewable? I think the word you are looking for is intermittent.
‘unreliable’
Expensive!
Elections have consequences! With America now unleashing fossil fuel development under Trump, the EU and it’s green agenda will be under significant political pressure. Going to be interesting!
Intermittent, unreliable, expensive and not environmentally friendly
+ destabilizing the grid
It didn’t take most people on this blog long to figure out it was all a scam to be be resisted.
If it’s taken most of the German (and others) population this long to figure it out they deserve all they get.
On the upside, America will shortly be the centre for all German car manufacturing.
It didn’t take most people on this blog long to figure out it was all a scam to be be resisted.
If it’s taken most of the German (and others) population this long to figure it out they deserve all they get.
On the upside, America will shortly be the centre for all German car manufacturing.
no excuse for being misled- especially a nation famous for science and engineering
Misled? Mais Non. They have deluded themselves. There is no one else to blame. The Greens were elected by democratic process.
or should I have said aber nein?
Failure to apply critical thinking is their fault.
Carl Sagan did a video interview 20 years ago that predicted what we are now experiencing.
Yes, it is their fault. They allowed to have been misled and misled themselves. ( If we recall pre WWII politics, they are notoriously good at this.) As adults they should be held accountable and responsible for their actions.
It is their fault if they believe what a politician says without fact-checking them.
There is plenty of analyses by engineers and non-CAGW scientists that prove renewables will not work in a modern economy. Even Germans have access to the internet to see the failures in other countries trying to be uber-green.
The Germans have voted for this nonsense for decades and pushed green everything long before Co2 became a bogyman; they reap what they sow, I have no sympathy.
Yes it is. Had they not voted on droves for the Green Party they would not have had any representatives in government. Fail to score 5% of the votes and you get none. Too late some of them are realising this in the east as the Green vote collapsed.
We need to be more realistic in our attitudes toward those that have fallen under the spell of the corporate media narrative! This has been just another in the long list of PSYOPS being run on the populace to strengthen the corporate power structure!
Even well educated and seemingly intelligent people can fall prey to the mind viruses that are being spewed by the MSM, like a mosquito fogger truck in summer! We are going to have to deprogram these mind-control victims, or we will have to isolate them from polite society. Perhaps some Soviet style apartment buildings in Greenland, where they can wait for the Climate Apocalypse in safety!
How come everyone (almost) on this blog figured out the scam years ago?
We gravitated here? the splinter in our minds drove us here?
It doesn’t take much of a BS detector to lead you here :<)
Soros funded mind viruses.
Fortunately the US has Musk to provide the financial counter punch.
With balance comes justice, success, growth, and all the good things we hope and dream for.
One needs to be careful. They are a delusional, dangerous and aggressive majority. Even those who do not have a financial interest in the matter do not accept well the idea they have been fooled. Perhaps deal with them one at a time.
In the spirit of realism…I seem to remember some all powerful European corporate-like institution holding court for hundreds of years in Europe before sanity mostly returned…some In…Inquest…no…Inquiry…no, wait, I have it…the Inquisition, representing the interests of the Catholic Church.
Unfortunately, secretiveness, withholding of information, persecution, and even brutality can hold sway for a very long time…and the Europeans, while having an affinity for it, have no monopoly on it.
But, about inquisitions, let’s see…inquisitions were permanently established (check), bureaucratically organized (check), appointed (check), and supervised tribunals of experts…no, wait, CLERGY (check). They were charged with discovery and extirpation (what a word!) of heterodox scientific…wait, there I go again…religious opinion and practice in Christian Europe.
Counter-reformation, against the doctrines of the faith, targeting some notables like…hmmm, says here on my trustworthy wiki-media…Copernicus (posthumously)? Galileo? I don’t know if I’ve ever heard of them.
So…I would propose to my echo chamber…aren’t we all just as likely to see belief in climate change grow rather than diminish in the coming years? The clergy, for decades…even centuries, built upon (among other things) what everyone saw…a bright object in the sky that seemed to circle us all…implying we were the center of everything.
With climate, like the lay people and clergy of medieval and Renaissance Europe, aren’t Europeans and North Americans predisposed to believe in the ever changing climate? I mean, winter/summer, day/night…these are the things that are experienced all the time and we have a special affinity for that which we experience…
Keep embracing that which is evidence-based but don’t be surprised when others call you foolish…
Situation in Europe November
And still in the UK Millivolt will blunder on down the same road despite the lesson of Germany staring him in the face.
The jihad faithful can’t conclude its’ the wrong path to spiritual salvation just because a few had to fall on their own swords. Or maybe that is actually the proof of concept?
jihad faithful…. seems like the most accurate description posted in years.
Yes, the phrase “climate jihad” needs to be popularized as a synonym to Net Zero. It is a religion after all.
Since one of their goals is to reduce world population, the green jihadists may consider victims part of the plan, sort of like Pol Pot did.
He’s clearing his desk as we speak.
When Germany starts sucking up France’s excess energy and Britain is left with an empty jar full of dead lightning bugs, then we will see.
Fortunately, for now, we have just enough gas and other reliable sources to make do without the transfers, if we have to, how long that will last is another matter.
Ed Milliband AKA Richard Cranium
Oh, well done, took me a minute.
It is clear that politicians now feel the heat of those who point out the many painpoints the Greens cause. Because the reality is felt and there is no denying it. Voters/ citizens have turned off. Politicians are still clinging on to the Green deal, COP etc despite the pushback.
Trump has tipped the balance. At least the US wont be putting their weight behind the green double down tactic for a while and i dont think things will improve for the Greens after 4 years. You simply cannot force things without creating a pushback. The Greens have a fascistic mindset.
The german political system was set up by the US after ww2 trying to create stability but making it hard to change governments.
We will see..
Add on top of this, that Trump expects the EU to do a much larger proportion of the funding for the Ukraine war…
… basically saying, “why should the US continue to to all the funding.”
Or, given our fiscal reality, all the borrowing and money printing for that matter.
All those billions given away that will never return is an other problem for the German and European economy. The ECB will have to print/inflate like there is no tomorrow destroying everyone’s savings in the process.
Clean up in aisle 4 will also cost billions.
Europe must defend itself- while America worries about China.
Trump has been saying that, with much reported success, since 2016.
I think this article* will be illegal in Australia if the Australian government’s MAD (Misinformation And Disinformation) bill passes in the senate next week. Germany may be in tatters, but it’s pretty good compared to where Australia is headed.
*Actually, I think every WUWT article will be illegal.
Are we absolutely sure it isn’t the voice of the Great Satan? Some think it is.
Mike – are you daring to suggest that Australia is heading where Germany went 90 years ago?
Yes ! Why do you think they unarmed their population. How did they handle the coronavirus situation.
These are the real nazi’s.
It’s the same as the Dems or UK Labour here with the stinking woke Labor Federal Govt wanting to define misinformation and disinformation to their own liking and control the message. The US has the formal stumbling block of the Bill of Rights but like Britain Australia only has historical practice and acceptance to fall back on and Charlies head of course. We’re not as bad as Starmer and Co yet but you can see the attraction for local lefty Labor (they couldn’t spell proper English originally you’ll note).
Nevertheless you can appreciate how the Dems and their lefty media chums and unelected bureaucrats gaslighted Americans and loathed Elon for taking on Twitter and freeing it up as well as their Trump derangement syndrome. So freedom of speech can exist in pretty calligraphy only and barely in practice from time to time with recent woke ascendancy and Groupthink. To the usual suspects Trump is truly akin to Hitler for upsetting their cosy echo chamber and their heads are exploding all over tiktok as a result. Let’s just say some adult introspection and Voltaire’s insight will take some time to sink in.
It is difficult to free fools from the chains they revere.
Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities.
It is time that people start to understand who are the real nazi’s in this world. Hitler was a socialist even the party name tells you that NSDAP that stands for National SOCIALIST German Workers’ Party Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei.
It are the Scholzs and the Starmers and the ‘Greens’ who are the real nazi’s on this planet. They are anti human They think there are too many of us on this planet They burn the books.
If it looks like a duck, swims like a duck, and quacks like a duck, then it probably is a duck.
also LibDems and ProgDems are Nazi-ish.
Hopefully you have a VPN. Not perfect, but something.
Thx. I sometimes see a msg saying my VPN is active. I have no idea how it got in or how to talk to it. I’ll have to read up …..
Personally I use PIA (Private Internet Access) which is easy to install and use (which they all should be) but almost uniquely, PIA does not retain any records of your browsing habits, which many do.
https://www.privateinternetaccess.com/offer/best?coupon=bing-brand&campaign=430002420&adgroup=1153388613016143&keyword=pia&ms=bb&msclkid=e2b4bb681db81ec44566dc479ae54e77
people who could still do basic math
With education level dropping and children who can’t read or do math this is very promising for out future politicians that has to write laws and keep the books balanced.
VW shutting down factories, suppliers cutting jobs, in France Michelin closing factories.
There’s a reason why I’ve been saying for years that we’re way past the turning point. It will go only downhill from now on. The only way to save something is cancelling the green deal, building coal- and gas power stations (faster than nuclear) and deregulate. Best case scenario this takes 5 years, and then see what’s left of the economy. Germany’s downfall will impact most EU countries.
For the people in Brussels I have no hope. They’re doubling down on their green policies. The UK just announced to raise taxes and spending another 20 billion on green technologies. These people just don’t learn. We have many examples. In The Netherland some cities are banning all ICE vehicles all while the whole EV story is a failure. Or pushing through for EV trucks. In Belgium they’re building battery storage, which we already know is not a solution. There’s no money but they keep spending as there’s no tomorrow.
“they keep spending as there’s no tomorrow.”. For a moment I wondered whether you meant “as if there’s no tomorrow”, but only for a moment.
He had me at “….out future politicians” 😇
Shouldn’t poke fun though, we are all guilty of our own blunders.
Nah it’s all going swimmingly to plan with the EV green jobs-
Volkswagen CFO says 64% drop in profits shows ‘urgent need’ for cost cuts – MarketWatch
Factory built Small Modular Reactors (SMRs) could be built much faster than large bespoke designed reactors.
That is often claimed. Where are these SMRs ? All over the world in submarines is often claimed. Where are they powering a grid ?
Actually Russia.
The UKs hopeful is going through design approvals. No point in building something that wont be allowed to operate. Another 2 years of approvals and box ticking looms. Meanwhile RR is setting up its supply chains.
You will see SMRs operational in about 5 years time.
International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) says “Both public and private institutions are actively participating in efforts to bring SMR technology to fruition within this decade.” (Sept. 2023)
Being in good health and with some luck, I may see these things go on-line. Will I see 10 or 100 in 5 years? Meanwhile, I expect the atmospheric concentration to go up by about 3.5 (+/-1) ppm /year. Gaia doesn’t care.
We shall see what we shall see. We have seen many promises to achieve certain goals within a decade or “this decade”… mass EV adoption… manned flight to Mars…
These promises however are being made by sober nuclear engineering firms. Not politicians. There is almost a conspiracy of silence at the political level in case anti nuke groups organize and flood the infosphere with greencrap.
If Sholz huffed and puffed a bit more we might get some wind power.
The dunkelflaute goes on
winds picking up in UK . felt like winter with the wind chill today.
Kemi Badenoch had it right:
Tory MP and candidate for future British Prime Minister Kemi Badenoch has likened net zero to “unilateral economic disarmament.” Is this right?
https://www.grcworldforums.com/esg/is-net-zero-really-unilateral-economic-disarmament/6102.article
It appears she has backed off from this outlandish view (in BBC rhetoric) to a more reasonably Climate Friendly™ perspective before she got the Tory leader’s job. But hopefully she will find her mojo following Trump’s annihilation of US globalists.
It is only unilateral if the BRICS cartel plays along. Obviously they are not interested in curbing their carbon combustion. In fact, they are going as hard as they can to increase it.
And in the spirit of Libertarianism I’m cheering them on, or the world would already be in the stone age.
Kemi is a player. And smart. She has taken the ‘politics is the art of the possible’ to heart. She can only do what her party and its sponsors will let her.
Unfortunately the UK is going the same way. With Red Ed Microbrain (the Net Zero nut) in charge of energy, we are doomed.
Sadly, the Free Democrat Party sits on only 5 percent in the opinion polls, which means that they are in danger of losing all of their seats at the next election.
You mean you didn’t hear the exclamation “Oh Sh*t!” coming from Ed’s office in the wee small hours of the 6th of November in Britain?
“If there’s any lesson to take from this, it’s that energy policy needs to be grounded in reality.”
Grounded in reality!? Most of Western elites have taken up living in La La Land! They believe that a man can wake up one morning and decide that he is a woman, and that eating lots of grain only fattens livestock, never humans!
This whole Climageddon Hoax is actually rather pedestrian when compared to all of the other fantasies that Western governments try to sell their acolytes! Deadly and destructive, no doubt; but rather pedestrian in how easy it is to sell to the ignorant and the insane; large percentages now of our recent college attendees!
Story Tip
Claire Coutinho has been appointed Shadow Energy Secretary in the UK, under Badenoch.
She has just published a piece in the Telegraph, some exerpts below. The ground is shifting. The Conservative Party is waking up at last, after having colluded with the green net zero mania while in office, they are finally admitting that its a slow motion train wreck. Going to be interesting.
Even in a world where we unfeasibly build everything on time, despite going at a speed never before seen in this country, while battling with global supply constraints and shortages of skilled workers, Ed’s plans would only make sense for bill payers if he triples our carbon price, and gas prices are 42pc higher than his own departmental forecasts.
I imagine that at this point most people will have come to the sane conclusion that we should think again, but in case you’re still clinging on, perhaps you think it would be worth it to rid ourselves of “volatile gas pricing” as Ed likes to say.
Well there’s a problem here too.
If we can’t build the vast amount of offshore wind we would need to, then the Neso’s second pathway means that gas will price the system 47pc of the time compared to a counterfactual of 58pc of the time.
For all the risks and costs that I’ve set out, does that seem worth it to you?
Most alarming of all, we are currently experiencing a period of very little wind and sun. This is happening across Europe. Despite having 30 gigawatts (GW) of installed wind capacity in Britain, at times it has been producing less than 1 GW of electricity.
Ed might just double that to 2 GW by 2030, at huge expense to bill payers, but what will replace the 60pc of our supply that we’ve been getting from gas?
Well, in those periods he’ll be asking or paying the equivalent of 10m homes to “shift demand” to reduce the pressure on the system. He’ll be asking factories, warehouses, and families to use energy not when they need to or want to, but according to when the wind blows.
I don’t think anyone in this country would define that as energy security.
If it happens not because energy is abundant but because it is scarce, then we have a word for that and it’s not “demand flexibility” – it’s blackout.
I was brought in to be energy secretary last year to reset the Conservative approach to energy and to make sure that we prioritised bills and living standards above a religious approach to net zero.
Unfortunately for too long we were an unthinking part of the congregation, but in Ed Miliband we are now being led by the archbishop.
The truth is now obvious for all to see: bills are set to soar under Labour’s approach and it’s not even clear that Miliband will be able to keep the lights on in Britain.
It’s time for Keir and Rachel to rein in their fanatical Energy Secretary, build more nuclear, back our domestic gas production and prioritise cheap power for 2030.
“”It’s time for Keir and Rachel”” And they are determined to make the most of it.
People will soon remember that Keir was the bright democratic spark who dreamed up the idea of a second referendum on Brexit. Now he is in charge he will bend over backwards for the approval of Bruxelles.
A bit effing late when, after 14 years of government, in its dying days the Tories appoint Claire to resist what they themselves had ushered in under the loony toon Theresa May, who passed NetZero into law and laid the ground for socialist ideologues to impose their disgusting authoritarian regime on the country.
Where were your letters to the Telegraph in 2019 when you were first elected as MP for East Surrey Claire?
The treacherous Tory party deserves to die a death for betraying the country since the clown Cameron was elected to continue Blair’s work.
Better late than never.
HotScot, everything you say is correct and reasonable, but … a party is made of people. The Tories have been rodent droppings for all but 17 of the last many thousands of days. But the last UK general election swept many of the worst of them out of their silent seats of power within the party and the next generation of Tories has started taking control. As the people change, so the party changes. Nigel Farage has done a fantastic job for Britain, not once but twice, and Britain should remain ever grateful to him, but IMHO it’s Kemi Badenoch on whom our hopes should be placed for the future of a changed Tory party and a changed UK.
The face of the party may change, but the backroom boys never change.
Badenoch is a DEI hire. She’s a day late and a dollar short. The prediction was she would terrorise Starmer at the ballot box but she fell miserably at the first hurdle during PM’s Questions.
I was a card carrying member of the Conservative party since I was first able to vote. Thatcher was the last conviction politician we had, every PM since, Cameron, May, Johnson, Truss and Sunak have all been self serving idealogues no better than the socialist Blair they followed.
Our country has gone to sh*t. Our justice system has deteriorated to the point of being a complete joke. Whilst the JSO, Hamas, BLM, antifa, LGBTQ+ and radical feminist mobs are welcome to protest freely and violently on our streets, hard working farmers are not supported by the NFU to protest for their rights, and we can be in no doubt if they turn up independently they will be treated as far right activists, confronted by riot police, and incited to violence.
The vile Tories spent 14 years encouraging all this, by way of appeasement, and the even worse Stalin government is now doubling down on it by encouraging it.
Those of us opposed to the climate madness now have to look to Donald Trump and hope he can drag us from the mire the Tories created, and that Minibrain is now wallowing in.
The Tories betrayed us with Brexit. The nation voted for it, May watered it down and Boris danced on its grave. So much for effing democracy. The Tories sh*t on it and flushed us all away. Treacherous cowards with many bleating now that they fought courageously for Brexit, but only Lee Anderson had the courage to join the man that fought for Brexit for his entire political career, Nigel. The rest are still hanging grimly on to their comfortable seats in the shires uttering not a word of support for farmers that is any more sincere than their support for Brexit.
I hope Reform UK blow them away forever in the next election.
Maybe the USA will adapt Great Britain as a colony?
/humor
USA has already adapted most of Europe and half the world as colony. No humor.
Germany has a tradition of electing governments who destroy the country.
Unfortunately, they aren’t the only utter idiots in Europe going along with the climate scam.
Reality check? Except in the UK where reality has been expelled and we have Net Zero zealot Ed Minibrain determined that the UK will beat Germany to self-inflicted economic ruin.
Both should apply for Statehood in the USA. With Trump in office, it might be possible.
Canada, too. Maybe Mexico.
Call it the United Free States of the World or something like that, but a real threat to the One World Order. Definitely not part of the UN.
Next up, the UK.
The first 100 days of the Starmer government with the deranged Beaker tribute act, Ed Miliband, has been an unmitigated disaster, with the early part of the second 100 days faring little better.
Only 16 x 100 day periods to go until the end of this actively authoritarian, socialist government at the next election. Assuming they make it that far, which Starmer and Miliband most certainly won’t.
Disclosure: I was once a Marxist. It began in the early 1970’s when I was around 14 years old. An older and better informed schoolfriend explained the concept to me when walking home from school. I was entranced, and it made a lasting impression, for about 5 minutes until I came to my senses and though bollox, WTF are you smoking you utter lunatic.
The trend throughout Europe and the EU is to more conservative, thoughtful, and responsible governments. From Poland to the Netherlands to France. Germany seems a likely candidate. For some reason, the UK is now out of step with the continentals with its labor government, but it seems rather likely that as reality sets in, the Labor government cannot last. A coalition of moderates (“Tories”) and the more conservative parties seems to be more representative of British voters.
And of course, the United States just swung rightwards again, after four years of feckless self destructive insanity from the leftwingnuts. The US election results will certainly influence voters in the UK and elsewhere in Europe.
Reality has a way of catching up. Always.
For some reason, the UK is now out of step with the continentals with its labor government
It was two things. One, a vagary of the British voting system, which allows huge majorities of the legislature with a minority of total votes cast.
(source: perplexity.ai)
The second thing was a national mood of ‘send the bums home’, and this is probably largely attributable to the fact that the Conservatives were governing like Liberal Democrats. Complete with green energy fantasies.
It’s Covid mainly, whoever was in charge during the pandemic, on either side of the political spectrum across Europe, got hammered, not so much because of what they did, but purely because they were in charge when the pandemic hit.
its because of what that did in response to the scamdemic… lockdowns, face diapers, jabs and the rest of it.
never forget, never forgive
It’s hard to see what they could’ve done differently, in the UK anyway.
40,000 in hospital with the virus at the peak, that was about 45% of all available hospital beds, that’s not modelling, that’s the health service on the verge of collapse.
Face masks were always optional in reality, vaccines probably saved ~400,000 – 500,000 lives and certainly shortened the pandemic by maybe a year or more.
The idea that we could’ve just carried on as normal is delusional.
No. but you coulkd have followed Swedens lead and be no worse off in terms of deaths and way better off in terms of mentaland economic health
Quite a few differences between Sweden and the UK, other than just the Covid response.
One of the big ones is that every year, from January to April, large numbers of us jet off to Italy/France to go skiing, or Spain for some winter sun. The epicentre of the European outbreak was Italy, with other big outbreaks in Spain and France.
The Swedes don’t do this.
The upshot of the above is that the UK imported the virus on approximately 1,500 separate occasions in February/March 2020, which meant that the virus was scattered all over the country and the cases were doubling every 4 days or so.
I don’t know what the comparable figures were for Sweden, but I’ll wager that they were far lower than the UK.
Another major difference, Sweden doesn’t have an absolute shambles of a health service like the NHS, so had a bit more resilience to start with.
Finally, rather than compare Sweden to the UK, you might want to compare Sweden to the other Nordic countries, who fared far better, in fact my understanding is that even the Swedes now believe that they got it wrong.
This was inevitable. And it is only the beginning. VW is closing three plants and over 10000 jobs. That will get things going. BASF is refusing to invest in more German chemical capacity—probably coming to the US under Trump. Things in Germany will have to get a lot worse before it comes to its senses; Energiewende is a decades old religion there.
Rhetorical question:
How does this affect America’s Climate Warriors striving to serve Climate Justice to the “underserved” communities in this country?
Seems, just maybe, that the voters in those “underserved” communities are aware of the risks of this madness.
The left destroys everything it touches. It is always so, and incapable of doing anything else.
Let us be clear. The ordinary person in the middle and lower orders of society, other than those who have believed in the propaganda and the education concerning the global warming/climate change horror story, have had absolutely no real input to what their elite were taking them. Theirs was a focus on ordinary life and their own economic world, far from the insidious impositions on them ….. until their national economy started faltering and their living standards started to nosedive. Of course the German psychology is one of hierarchal obedience, so the damage to manufacturing and commerce progressively became worse without serious challenge. Reality is now on the March, as imposed hurt has gone too far. Society will want to correct the unfolding disaster imposed on them. That will take time, once the right leader with a strong team picks up the reins. Time will tell.
Well, we just voted out the party of The Green New Deal, which was as much the product of Shiesskopfs as the Energiewende. Green fanaticism is common in the West, and Canada and the UK may have a change of government related to their incumbent governments appealing to The Green Blob.
It is embarrassing that the German people would allow this to go on for so long. Fire up all fossil fuel and nuclear generators, build new fossil fuel and nuclear generators, remove all mandates for wind, solar and EVs and remove all wind and solar from the grid.
In fairness, I can recall many of the good people here on WUWT, criticising the crazy policies of the Loonie Greens, in articles and comments, many, many years ago. Their predictions have played out very accurately indeed. Green politics are doomed to fail as they are not based in the real world. Their fantasies have destroyed the potential of society. The German Economy was once the envy of the World. Good strong solid industrial and efficient. Now, it has been crippled by the ideologies of the Green Climate agenda. I don’t think anyone here will be surprised.