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Angela Merkel’s record on environmental policy has been a disaster

theguardian.com

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Re: Angela Merkel’s record on environmental policy has been a disaster

#91

Post by qznc »

readittwice wrote: post #77
lispm wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's actually the opposite of the perception of Angela Merkel in Germany. In Germany she is seen as populist, because she changes her mind quite often or waits until the public opinion is clear. Only in the refugee crisis, she was seen as following moral principles having not made any concessions to right wing politics (which earned her a lot of respect and a lot of hate). Make no mistake, generally her team is ver…

Merkel perceived as populist in Germany? I've heard a lot about Merkel but this is new. Do you have a poll or anything to show this is really the case and not just your (or your friends/relatives) opinion? Who of Germany's politicians would you call then less of a populist?

There might be a misunderstanding about the word "populist". Looking at Wikipedia:

Populism is a mode of political communication that is centred around contrasts between the "common man" or "the people" and a real or imagined group of "privileged elites", traditionally scapegoating or making a folk devil of the latter.

Merkel does not scapegoat elites.

Re: Angela Merkel’s record on environmental policy has been a disaster

#92

Post by cygx »

mfukar wrote: post #72
ahartmetz wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

According to environmentalists in Germany, nuclear and pro-environment are indeed mutually exclusive. But I prefer not to copy all of my opinions from the group I most agree with. FWIW I think nuclear is good in principle, but neither states nor companies have proven responsible enough to handle it. So I'm kind of against nuclear but not in this dogmatic way. The practical difference is that I think there should be f…

> FWIW I think nuclear is good in principle, but neither states nor companies have proven responsible enough to handle it. So the currently operating nuclear plants that have gone without incident are dismissed? Why so?

Their design is still fairly naive in dealing with worst-case scenarios (eg lack of core catchers).

Re: Angela Merkel’s record on environmental policy has been a disaster

#93

Post by toyg »

dom0 wrote: post #63
lispm wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Electric ground transportation is the future. You can already use trains in a large scale: most larger European cities are well connected and have extensive local transport systems. Next the public sector will invest a lot of money into electrical busses and their infrastructure. E-Bikes are already very popular. Cars will take a few more years... Merkel's government had ambitious goals, but industry and public was…

+1 Many people commute by train from the "suburbs" or the smaller cities sprinkled around the larger cities, partly because it's convenient, partly because traffic is really bad in major cities.

> partly because traffic is really bad in major cities.

This is particularly relevant in the European context, where most cities were not built for cars and now cannot be significantly altered.

Re: Angela Merkel’s record on environmental policy has been a disaster

#94

Post by daemin »

_Codemonkeyism wrote: post #3

Basically Germany will miss the goal of a 40% reduction by 2020 with only reducing CO2 by 30%. Beside coal/gas power, mostly from closing nuclear power plants. For example a quarter of CO2 emission in Berlin is coming from two Vattenfall coal power plants. Other effects are larger increase in people and economic growth. I have been buying renewable energy for 15 years, but not many/not enough people in Germany care.…

Closing all of the Nuclear power plants after Fukushima was a bit of a dumb reactionary move. It's shifted power generation from emission free Nuclear to dirty emission heavy coal, which emits more radioactive Uranium into the atmosphere than a Nuclear plant (or so I am led to believe).

It's basically paying lip-service to being environmentally friendly so that you can feel good about yourself while doing nothing productive. Kind of like having separate bins for recycling, green waste, and general rubbish in the home/office but in the end just emptying all of them into the same place.

Re: Angela Merkel’s record on environmental policy has been a disaster

#95

Post by qznc »

oarfish wrote: post #22
dvfjsdhgfv wrote: post #2

As a person, she's extremely obstinate. For a leader, this trait can be advantageous - after all, who wants a leader who changes their minds all the time - but for the rest of Europe it's a curse. Somehow she is unable to admit she made some serious mistakes, and we're all suffering because of it.

Well it rather seems she changes her mind all the time. You can find various compilations of instances where she doubled back on earlier statements (sometime from years ago, but still). I get the impression she is extremely opportunistic, at least on a larger scale.

Is that a bad thing? As the chancellor for all of Germany, her job is to act in favor of as much of the population as possible.

Re: Angela Merkel’s record on environmental policy has been a disaster

#96

Post by pgeorgi »

toyg wrote: post #93
dom0 wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

+1 Many people commute by train from the "suburbs" or the smaller cities sprinkled around the larger cities, partly because it's convenient, partly because traffic is really bad in major cities.

> partly because traffic is really bad in major cities. This is particularly relevant in the European context, where most cities were not built for cars and now cannot be significantly altered.

> now cannot be significantly altered

And why should we? (as in: I consider car-friendly cities a bug, not a feature)

Re: Angela Merkel’s record on environmental policy has been a disaster

#97

Post by mfukar »

cygx wrote: post #92
mfukar wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> FWIW I think nuclear is good in principle, but neither states nor companies have proven responsible enough to handle it. So the currently operating nuclear plants that have gone without incident are dismissed? Why so?

Their design is still fairly naive in dealing with worst-case scenarios (eg lack of core catchers).

I'm not sure what that means. Are you pointing out a severe deficiency that makes their whole operational record somehow moot?

Re: Angela Merkel’s record on environmental policy has been a disaster

#98

Post by odiroot »

dvfjsdhgfv wrote: post #2

As a person, she's extremely obstinate. For a leader, this trait can be advantageous - after all, who wants a leader who changes their minds all the time - but for the rest of Europe it's a curse. Somehow she is unable to admit she made some serious mistakes, and we're all suffering because of it.

But Merkel does indeed change her mind all the time. Not even trying to be judgmental but her politics are really populist. She has not a clearly defined platform, just whatever is agreeable with the electorate.

Re: Angela Merkel’s record on environmental policy has been a disaster

#99

Post by lispm »

readittwice wrote: post #77
lispm wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's actually the opposite of the perception of Angela Merkel in Germany. In Germany she is seen as populist, because she changes her mind quite often or waits until the public opinion is clear. Only in the refugee crisis, she was seen as following moral principles having not made any concessions to right wing politics (which earned her a lot of respect and a lot of hate). Make no mistake, generally her team is ver…

Merkel perceived as populist in Germany? I've heard a lot about Merkel but this is new. Do you have a poll or anything to show this is really the case and not just your (or your friends/relatives) opinion? Who of Germany's politicians would you call then less of a populist?

It's a slightly different kind of populism. Some called it 'Regierungspopulism'. She orientates her policy towards the public opinion of the majority of the people and aims to maintain her power. She looks very carefully what the public opinion is, when it changes and then works in that direction. Opponents claim she is a populist of the middle. She is not so much driven by a program or an ideology, but she does what is popular at any one moment. As I already mentioned this view of her was then questioned during the refugee crisis where she not did support the willing to help part of the population, but also defended this when there was a more critical opposition rising, including in her own party and the sister party.

Re: Angela Merkel’s record on environmental policy has been a disaster

#100

Post by pgeorgi »

daemin wrote: post #94
_Codemonkeyism wrote: post #3

Basically Germany will miss the goal of a 40% reduction by 2020 with only reducing CO2 by 30%. Beside coal/gas power, mostly from closing nuclear power plants. For example a quarter of CO2 emission in Berlin is coming from two Vattenfall coal power plants. Other effects are larger increase in people and economic growth. I have been buying renewable energy for 15 years, but not many/not enough people in Germany care.…

Closing all of the Nuclear power plants after Fukushima was a bit of a dumb reactionary move. It's shifted power generation from emission free Nuclear to dirty emission heavy coal, which emits more radioactive Uranium into the atmosphere than a Nuclear plant (or so I am led to believe). It's basically paying lip-service to being environmentally friendly so that you can feel good about yourself while doing nothing pro…

> Closing all of the Nuclear power plants after Fukushima was a bit of a dumb reactionary move. It's shifted power generation from emission free Nuclear to dirty emission heavy coal

There was a plan in place since 2002 to shut down all nuclear plants by about 2020 (plus/minus some, since the criteria was amount of power emitted per plant).

That plan was cancelled in 2010 by Merkel, replaced by a more generous plan (deadline: 2022) a year later after Fukushima.

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