Archive: https://archive.is/2025.03.21-101658/https://www.ft.com/content/bf9dde37-2dc8-44df-b5f5-ef5dece888f6
On Friday, the constitutional reform secured the support of more than two-thirds of the seats in the Bundesrat, the upper house that represents Germany’s 16 federal states.
The changes, which were approved by the Bundestag earlier this week, loosen the country’s constitutional borrowing restrictions to allow unlimited defence spending and create a special €500bn, 12-year vehicle to modernise the country’s infrastructure.
No, it’s not just random “idiots.” Someone just submitted this to !dach: https://www.t-online.de/id_100620746/ (German).
The article makes it clear that there are near-direct personal lines between pro-Nord Stream law firms and Merz. Merz himself is a former lobbyist for BASF, which used to be heavily involved in importing Russian gas through its Wintershall subsidiary.
In addition, overall corruption will be front and center in the new German government. Merz is a former lobbyist; the projected new minister of agriculture, Felßner, is an agricultural lobbyist; the projected new president of Bundestag, Klöckner, is known for being overly friendly with Nestlé; Spahn is known for having sunk billions into FFP mask deals that included networks close to CxU; Dobrindt started the toll project that was non-compliant with EU regulation and sunk hundreds of millions […] A bunch of power-hungry asshats that played obstructionist opposition for 3 years, so they could come into power and direct positive cashflows into their own pockets and ruin trust in democratic systems at the same time. SPD will have a hard time reigning in “deregulation” of anti-corruption measures as well.
That money and the weapons it buys can be used against anyone, not just Putin. It might just be another vehicle for corruption.
They’re always moving the line a little bit, finding out what they can do.