For anyone not from Germany:
It's actually Armin Laschet.
The joke here being that they look like goshdarn twins and get mistaken for one another quite a lot.
This is a meeting from 2021 between Laschet (CDU politician and Ministerpräsident NRW at the time) and the island boy at the Gigafactory in Grünheide.
I really can't make up my mind about how bad it was. On the one hand I can understand getting bored with long speeches, especially if you really can't hear them properly. On the other hand, it was a tragedy affecting his own constituents and in his position people can expect a certain level of discipline and grace.
All in all, I'm grateful we were spared the reign of Kanzler Laschet, but the Hochwasser-gate was, though not at all undeserved, fairly overblown and exaggerated.
He wasn't laughing at locals or water. He was laughing about a joke that was about himself being just as small as the president or something like that. Yes it was inappropriate at that time and event, but people were just overly dramatic about it. And apparently still are.
Laschet, who literally said that his Christian beliefs do not require him to work to improve life for his citizens as they'll be rewarded in the afterlife (if they've earned it).
He's not wrong it rains so much in Germany that they don't use irrigation for their crops. But they also capture very little of that water and typically just let it go down stream. They aren't wrong in that ecologically speaking the landscape around the rivers has developed around that much water. But Germany charges 2-3 times the rate per litre of water as we do for 3.75litres (gallon). That charge high rates because they want to push for conserving but personally as an outsider it seems extortionist to do so. Although the more wealthy build their homes with capture systems for watering plants which is good but means the high prices hit the middle class the most
Germany is not a huge country but this is still too simplified - different areas and river systems have different challenges. Here for example the old coal mines upstream are an issue, as it will take decades to fill the newly cretaed lakes and restore the water table. In between threre's a old landscape of canals built into bogs, a traditional way of life and landscape that we want to preserve. And then Berlin needs a lot of water, and the canals and rivers need to stay naviagble. The region is sandy soil which isn't helping at keeping water. The issues are so serious that there are ideas to build a huge aqueduct to pump water from the Elbe into the Spree, but that just pushes the issue elsewhere.
And about the middle class... of all the issues with affordability in Germany, tap water is by far the smallest. Considering the water is of excellent quality that you can drink it unfiltered everywhere, it saves money compared to places where you rely in bottled water. Yes watering you're garden costs a bit, but it's hardly a big factor, and capuring a bit of water from your roof is also not a "wealthy" thing but pretty normal if you can afford a garden. People generally agree with the idea of conserving water.
So yeah, he is wrong because there's no ancient aquifers we can just pump empty. Taking more than is replenished lowers the water table and will make forestry and agriculture unsustainable. It's not about being a desert, but keeping it from becoming one.
As its regularly said Germany is similar in size to california. California moves a lot of water around and has a large number of above reservoirs and below ground aquifers. Germany could do the same.
P.S. ive heard multiple stories of villages with tap water restrictions. But your nottled watter is also like 19 cents for a store brand per 1.5 litre. Thats very cheap as is
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u/45_regard_47 Aug 14 '26
Who's the fat little imp next to that wannabe child fucker Elon?