Skybird
01-20-11, 07:56 AM
For the next days, the program can be listend to from the archive here (45 min).
http://www.bbc.co.uk/podcasts/series/whys
I apologize for his hard German accent, it either is terrible or extremly funny, depending on the mood you're in. :DL A bottle of single malt may help to survive it.
Thilo Sarrazin has been finance senator of Berlin, taming some of the debt burden there, then became member of the board of director of the German Federal Bank. He is known for his laconic humour and his preference to bring complex and controverse issues to the point in a brief, often sarcastic sentence or metaphor, for which some love him, others hate him and wish him everlasting hellfire. He published a book entitles "Germayn does itself away", which if I recall correctly has become the most sold nion-fictional title in Germany since worldwar. There he adresses the failing integration problems and demographic collpase in Germany, and he does so on basis of the official statistics of the federal offices to which he had access due to his job. For most politiians, propagandists, the left and most of the media he is a persona non grata, he got mobbed out of the job, condemnded by Merkel who said she does not know his book, will not read his book, but that his arguments are unacceptable, and the newly elected German president further helped to mobb Sarrazin in a clear act of overstepping his duties in his new office (and also not knowing his book). However, the support for Sarrazin in the German population is overwhelming, he also gets a lot of support from Turkish abd other Muslim migrants, telling him that he is absolutely right in his conclusions about the reasons for the failing of Muslim integration.
Somewhere in the program a caller tells him that he is no expert for Islam. He agrees, but says that he is in expert fopr statistics, necessarily. And that is the point about his book. He bases his conclusions on hard, proven numbers.
book (http://www.amazon.de/Deutschland-schafft-sich-unser-setzen/dp/3421044309/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1295527992&sr=8-1) (over 450 customer ratings, which is very much for a book at German Amazon store. 330 rate it with 5 stars, 60 with 4 stars, some 60 give it 3, 2 or 1 stars).
Newspapers thnat printed excerpts of the book said that around 85-90% of readers feedback they received wehere in explicit defence of Sarrazin, while it must be 90% of politicians and media that are condemning Sarrazin. Tells you something about the width of the gap between the rulers and those they rule. The support on the street for Sarrazin'S book I also would generally estimate to be around 75-80%, too. A rfecent study done in Germany and France reveals that clear majorites of people in both countries also consider Muslim integration in both countries to be a failure. High numbers (don't remember whether it was one third or two thirds) also said they see Islam as a threat.
Anyhow, the German "scandal" has been taken note of beyond Germany's borders, and if you are interseted in learning a bout the man a bit, this is a comfortable opportunity. I so far have read only two chapters of the book which I got copies of, I then bought it earlier this month and plan to read it when I have read down the stack of books on my table. First view tells me that he knows his numbers very very well.
But for some, it cannot be what shall not be.
BTW, Sarrazin is an example for highly successful integration himself, because his family immigrated to Germany. He can hardly be accused of demanding from migrants what he and his family has not delivered themselves. For his frozen mimics he is not responsible, it is a paralysis due to a nerval disease he had.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/podcasts/series/whys
I apologize for his hard German accent, it either is terrible or extremly funny, depending on the mood you're in. :DL A bottle of single malt may help to survive it.
Thilo Sarrazin has been finance senator of Berlin, taming some of the debt burden there, then became member of the board of director of the German Federal Bank. He is known for his laconic humour and his preference to bring complex and controverse issues to the point in a brief, often sarcastic sentence or metaphor, for which some love him, others hate him and wish him everlasting hellfire. He published a book entitles "Germayn does itself away", which if I recall correctly has become the most sold nion-fictional title in Germany since worldwar. There he adresses the failing integration problems and demographic collpase in Germany, and he does so on basis of the official statistics of the federal offices to which he had access due to his job. For most politiians, propagandists, the left and most of the media he is a persona non grata, he got mobbed out of the job, condemnded by Merkel who said she does not know his book, will not read his book, but that his arguments are unacceptable, and the newly elected German president further helped to mobb Sarrazin in a clear act of overstepping his duties in his new office (and also not knowing his book). However, the support for Sarrazin in the German population is overwhelming, he also gets a lot of support from Turkish abd other Muslim migrants, telling him that he is absolutely right in his conclusions about the reasons for the failing of Muslim integration.
Somewhere in the program a caller tells him that he is no expert for Islam. He agrees, but says that he is in expert fopr statistics, necessarily. And that is the point about his book. He bases his conclusions on hard, proven numbers.
book (http://www.amazon.de/Deutschland-schafft-sich-unser-setzen/dp/3421044309/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1295527992&sr=8-1) (over 450 customer ratings, which is very much for a book at German Amazon store. 330 rate it with 5 stars, 60 with 4 stars, some 60 give it 3, 2 or 1 stars).
Newspapers thnat printed excerpts of the book said that around 85-90% of readers feedback they received wehere in explicit defence of Sarrazin, while it must be 90% of politicians and media that are condemning Sarrazin. Tells you something about the width of the gap between the rulers and those they rule. The support on the street for Sarrazin'S book I also would generally estimate to be around 75-80%, too. A rfecent study done in Germany and France reveals that clear majorites of people in both countries also consider Muslim integration in both countries to be a failure. High numbers (don't remember whether it was one third or two thirds) also said they see Islam as a threat.
Anyhow, the German "scandal" has been taken note of beyond Germany's borders, and if you are interseted in learning a bout the man a bit, this is a comfortable opportunity. I so far have read only two chapters of the book which I got copies of, I then bought it earlier this month and plan to read it when I have read down the stack of books on my table. First view tells me that he knows his numbers very very well.
But for some, it cannot be what shall not be.
BTW, Sarrazin is an example for highly successful integration himself, because his family immigrated to Germany. He can hardly be accused of demanding from migrants what he and his family has not delivered themselves. For his frozen mimics he is not responsible, it is a paralysis due to a nerval disease he had.