The BEST Guide to POLAND
Unanswered  |  Archives [3] 
  
Account: Guest

Posts by Bratwurst Boy  

Joined: 2 Apr 2007 / Male ♂
Last Post: 1 hr ago
Threads: Total: 8 / Live: 4 / Archived: 4
Posts: Total: 12231 / Live: 4486 / Archived: 7745
From: Berlin, Germany
Speaks Polish?: No
Interests: his helmet

Displayed posts: 4490 / page 115 of 150
sort: Latest first   Oldest first   |
Bratwurst Boy   
8 Dec 2010
News / "To understand Poland you must understand Frederic Chopin" (Stratfor Friedman) [74]

Where Friedman is wrong:

From the point of view of Germans - and the least interesting views are expressed by the increasingly weak elite

Crap! The EU is darn good for german interests! We are an export nation which flourishes on open borders, free movement, one currency!
Most of our export is with the EU...it's been GREAT for Germany!

But the period in which EU subsidies will flow into Poland is coming to an end, and problems with Poland's retirement system are looming.

Only if they mess it up...doesn't look like it now.

I completely agreed that the Germans do not covet Polish sovereignty. I also said that intentions don't matter.

But what else does?

Yes, I know that neither Germany nor Russia intends Poland harm. But an elephant doesn't necessarily plan to harm a mouse. Intentions aside, the mouse gets harmed.

What crap! What is he implying here? Poland the mouse is doomed whatever the neighbours do?
Just because they exist??? What does he mean with "harmed".

If Germany bets wrong on the European Union, it will survive. Will Poland?

More crap!
He likes to swallow in misty descriptions...what does he mean with "surviving".

Finally, the Poles must maintain their relationship with the global hegemon.

And out comes the american nationalists! We are leaving the time of the US as the global
hegemon...he seems to deny/ignore that development too!

But in the end, the United States has fought three times in the 20th century to prevent a German-Russian entente and the domination of Europe by one power

Absolutely crap on all counts!!!
This man is ridicoulous.

WWI was fought on behalf of GB and is seen as a big stupidity now by most. Also Germany
and Russia had been enemies then, no entente.

WWII was fought against the Nazis after they declared war on them. Russia had been
allies...no Russian-German entente then either!

He should read up about the most recent NATO summit in Lisbon where Russia is no longer the enemy but a partner and big cooperations are subscribed.

Also the US can very well live with a dominant power in Europe as long as this power is another democratic country. Or as Kissinger once asked so famously for a phone number to call in all things Europe.

They have no problem with a number in Berlin at all!

The Germans and Russians are not monsters at the moment, nor do they want to be. But as Chopin makes clear.

Well...then what about your USA, dear Mr. Friedman. If you believe countries are beings which can't help themselves and are victims of a certain fate you surely would agree that the US can become a monster too, regardless of it's intentions...

Crap!
Bratwurst Boy   
8 Dec 2010
News / "To understand Poland you must understand Frederic Chopin" (Stratfor Friedman) [74]

his analysis of EU, german and polish situations is spot on.

That what I mean...there is personal bias and wishful thinking and then there is objective evaluation.

That you declared Germany dead for as long as I have known you is no secret either. Of course you will like those parts of Friedmans "analysis" which fit you where you will deny others.

That's also only wishful thinking and personal bias. Don't mix them up!

Which bits according to you is he wrong about?

Okay...gimme some time...I'm giving you the quotes
Bratwurst Boy   
8 Dec 2010
News / "To understand Poland you must understand Frederic Chopin" (Stratfor Friedman) [74]

The Chopin quote wasn't by me...the mods put it in there.
I don't have a problem with Chopin...but with Friedman! ;)

He's 100% spot on about EU and Germany though.

Well Sok, you can't have it both ways....he is wrong on the EU and Germany too!
He is consistently wrong...not only on certain topics! ;)

He is the Ambrose Pritchard of the geopolitics. Whenever I read economy "wizard" Pritchard I know I only have to take the exact opposite of his opinion, analyses and predictions and I will

be mostly right! :)
(I do that for years now)
Friedman is to take similiar! ;)
Bratwurst Boy   
8 Dec 2010
News / "To understand Poland you must understand Frederic Chopin" (Stratfor Friedman) [74]

I think he genuinely wants Central Europe to do well, especially Poland.

Maybe...but then he should stop talking about Polands impending, inescapable doom.

He believes with American military aid Poland can achieve great things

Maybe...but then he better stop talking about Polands failure in believing in far away countries alliances and help. He himself agreed that Poland can't be helped from far away...

promotes the idea of "expect the unexpected".

Actually he doesn't! He talks more about the "same old". As if WWII would be upon us again, totally ignoring the groundbreaking changes which happened.

He is definitely a person that thinks outside the box.

Maybe....but if he only would stop selling his fantasies and personal opinions as "analysis"!

(We have better analysts here on PF)
Bratwurst Boy   
8 Dec 2010
News / "To understand Poland you must understand Frederic Chopin" (Stratfor Friedman) [74]

If there is anything to take away from all this, it's that no developed countries will ever enter conventional warfare again

Well..that's exactly what Friedman denies.

He is quite sure the next Molotov-Ribbentrop pact is only a matter of time because we can't help it...being neighbours on the great northern plain, it's our fate!

Gah!

What crap!!! :(
Bratwurst Boy   
7 Dec 2010
News / "To understand Poland you must understand Frederic Chopin" (Stratfor Friedman) [74]

Do you guys think it's true that the Northern European plain will never truly be a place of perpetual peace (as he claims)?

Sometimes I think he talks wishful thinking, seriously.
I doubt he wishes for us to live in perpetual peace. He is decidedly anti-european, he wishes for
Europe to split...

I don't trust him.
Bratwurst Boy   
7 Dec 2010
News / "To understand Poland you must understand Frederic Chopin" (Stratfor Friedman) [74]

But what strikes me the most in Friedman thinking is kind of archaizm in it.

!

As I'm writing this it becomes clear to me that oversimplification in Friedman analysis lies in thinking about Poland, Germany and Russia as a separate blocks. The current reality is different though.

Absolutely....
I don't know in what world Friedman lives in but it's not mine nor yours!

But what struck me positively was that he hadn't found much support for his generic, archaic thinking by the contemporary Poles he spoke with. He was dumbstruck by that!

Maybe him commenting from far away America might have something to do with it...
Bratwurst Boy   
6 Dec 2010
News / "To understand Poland you must understand Frederic Chopin" (Stratfor Friedman) [74]

I'm no fan of Friedman and he wallows in clichès and stereotypes with the occasional
wrong fact thrown it but that is for the Poles to decide.

Read for yourself:

To understand Poland, you must understand Frederic Chopin. First listen to his Polonaise and then to his Revolutionary Etude. They are about hope, despair and rage. In the Polonaise, you hear the most extraordinary distillation of a nation's existence. In the Revolutionary Etude, written in the wake of an uprising in Warsaw in 1830 crushed by Russian troops, there is both rage and resignation. In his private journal, Chopin challenged God for allowing this national catastrophe to happen, damning the Russians and condemning the French for not coming to Warsaw's aid. Afterward, Chopin never returned to Poland, but Poland never left his mind.

stratfor.com/analysis/20101202_geopolitical_journey_part_7_poland
Bratwurst Boy   
24 Nov 2010
History / Roman Dmowski-Patriot, Nationalist, Anti-Semite? [252]

True Jews numbered a lot less in Germany than in Poland, yet they were half of all doctors, lawyers, business owners, Germans felt the same as Poles did in the pre war days.

Nope, they weren't...the pre-war Jews made not even 1 percent of the german population (and not everyone of them belonged to the elite) so they can't be "half of the doctors, lawyers, business owners etc".

That's another myth...similiar to the myth that they were the reason for Germany's fate.

Since the far majority of the Jews lived in the bigger towns, but the majority of the Germans of that time still lived in the rural parts chances were that most Germans never met a Jew personally.
Bratwurst Boy   
24 Nov 2010
History / Roman Dmowski-Patriot, Nationalist, Anti-Semite? [252]

Not at all.
I'll use your favorite Wiki to prove you wrong:

A definition of anti-semitism? Okaaay...thank you, I didn't know about it!

Heh:)

Just look at at the propaganda and you will see the arguments against Jews are all the same,
even today, even here in this thread!

"Some nifty, manipulative people only out for their own gain to the disadvantage of the non-Jews..."

Sounds familiar?

"Sucked dry"

Nazi propaganda

Tell me again where the difference is to Dmowskis propaganda?
Bratwurst Boy   
24 Nov 2010
History / Roman Dmowski-Patriot, Nationalist, Anti-Semite? [252]

On the contrary to Jozef Pilsudski Dmowski thought that Jewish long run objectives are absolutely not in line with national Polish agenda so Jews were his #1 enemies.
Not in the Nazi sense of subhumans but as a very dangerous factor of Polish political arena.

Absolutely the same, there are no differences!
You are searching for drawstrings here Borrka...

Just look at Nazi anti-Jew propaganda...it's because of their anti-german plans (objectives) that they were declared enemies of the german people by the Nazis.

google.com/images?hl=en&q=Nazi%20jew%20propaganda

"Bolschevists, communists, warmonger, nifty exploiter of the hard working masses, political manipulators"...exactly the same stuff!
Bratwurst Boy   
15 Nov 2010
History / POLES NOT KEEN ON REPRODUCING? WHY ARE THERE SO MANY GERMANS AND RUSSIANS? [67]

Germany assimilated Slavic lands and people so naturally all Germans are part of Slavic.

That works both ways! :)
Alot of Poles have at least partly german heritage. As I said before, this part of Europe is heavily mixed for millennia.

And there are about the same number of Germans living outside of Germany as inside...a steady immigration over the centuries made sure of that. (Alone 25 Million in the US)

I just recently watched pics about villages of german immigrants in southern Brazil...they kept to a traditional lifestyle as even the modern Germany-Germans don't do anymore. It was nice to see little blond girls and boys speaking and writing german in their german schools and running around with lederhosen under palm trees! ;)

So I'm not concerned about Germans "dying out".

With Poles it is similiar...they too wander around alot...

Germans in Brazil:

Germans Poles
Bratwurst Boy   
14 Nov 2010
History / Are Poles happy with the current Polish borders? [134]

Lwów and Grodno were turned into dumps by our eastern neighbours, you're calling for Poland to give away regions it rebuilt for the past 65 years in exchange for dilapidated dumps that our former eastern provinces became in the past half century? Thats just silly.

Not if your heart is innit....
You would do so gladly! :)

Borders are a thing of the past anyhow (at least between us)
Bratwurst Boy   
13 Nov 2010
Life / I saw Polish nationalism today [263]

Well yes, but let's not forget that they razed Carthage to the ground!

See...but when Germans do raze something into the ground it's a bad thing! No fair!!! *grumble*
Bratwurst Boy   
13 Nov 2010
Life / I saw Polish nationalism today [263]

I agree with that...the context is everything!

3000 year old germanic runes are just that, part of my heritage but when I additionally would run around as skinhead, showing the Hitlergruß then it is Nazi and I can't blame someone for thinking that...that is part of my heritage too, I can't change that.

(I still wonder what Poles get out of it...on the other hand russian neo-nazis are the same...)

Until then, they should remember that beneficiis enim humana vita constat et concordia

Yeah...surely....during breaks in conquering, exploiting and enslaving other peoples....

(Don't like Romans)
Bratwurst Boy   
13 Nov 2010
Life / I saw Polish nationalism today [263]

There is a fighting Christian heart beneath that Christian exterior! :)

Good to know....nowadays one could think they forgot how it goes...;)
Bratwurst Boy   
13 Nov 2010
Life / I saw Polish nationalism today [263]

Usually, I am staunchly against shooting people as if they were rabid dogs, but for those
sickf*cks I would make an exception.

There is a fighting pagan heart beneath that christian exterior!
Bratwurst Boy   
6 Nov 2010
News / Polish Lithuanian Diplomatic War? At last. [534]

Did someone else post the economist article on polish/lithuanian ******** already?

Poland, Lithuania, spiralling downwards

economist/blogs/easternapproaches/2010/10/polish-lithuanian_theatre_absurd

POLAND'S row with Lithuania rivals the Macedonian-Greek "name" row for intensity of emotion and bafflingness to outsiders. A recent blog post on this has attracted more than 200 comments, which are worth reading if only to see the gulf between the two sides. In short, Poland thinks that it has done a great deal for Lithuania in recent years, and its good will has been met with rebuffs and duplicity, particularly in the treatment of the Polish minority there, and also in the obstacles created for the country's biggest foreign investor, PKN Orlen, which owns the loss-making Mažeikiai oil refinery.

*nods*
Bratwurst Boy   
5 Nov 2010
News / Polish Lithuanian Diplomatic War? At last. [534]

Yeah...looks like it! :)

Hopefully :)

I meaned "cleared up" between Lithuania and Poland, not being rude to my fav polish poster! ;)
Because as I say if Lithuania has accept that then they HAVE TO follow EU law...not their choice anymore and Poland can go to court over that and will win!

We don't want our governments
to act like skinheads, now do we? :)

Never!
Bratwurst Boy   
5 Nov 2010
News / Polish Lithuanian Diplomatic War? At last. [534]

Does Poland deny German minority any rights guaranteed to them by bilateral deals and EU laws?

Well...admittedly I'm no expert at polish-lithuanian history but here the question also stands if Poles are an autochthone minority in Lithuania and hence deserving minority rights. We discussed the differences with the german and polish minorities in Germany and Poland already. Minority is NOT minority.

Is that cleared up?
Because of the polish minority falls under the EU right than Lithuania will have to follow and any polish walk to the EU court will be successful.

Are there any movements from Warsaw?

What are we even talking about him.

Nun ja...this thread is 10 pages long already and yes, these things have been mentioned and belong to the overall poisoned relationship...
Bratwurst Boy   
5 Nov 2010
News / Polish Lithuanian Diplomatic War? At last. [534]

50 long decades would be 500 years - you are exaggerating a bit today ;)

Erm....math had never be my strength!

So don't tell me it's exactly the same situation.

I'm not telling anything....but I can't help comparing the polish-lithuanian arguments with the polish-german ones...

For me the Poles seem to play the same role to the Lithuanians (and the Ukrainians before that) as the Germans do to Poles....and Poland tries to justify it's actions as Germans (me) do....till to the somewhat arrogant position of the allegedly stronger and more mature civilization looking down on the "eastern peasants" and the modern revanchists who "want back what was stolen from them".

You just has to exchange the nationalities sometimes and it's eerie....
Bratwurst Boy   
5 Nov 2010
News / Polish Lithuanian Diplomatic War? At last. [534]

only those who wanted to leave did.

What do you think made them "want to leave"? Polonization was enforced and even their existence was denied by the government.

....Practically all through the years until the Polish communist regime was ousted, the existence of Germans remaining in Poland was denied. Polish prime minister Tadeusz Mazowiecki, in office 1989-91, was the first to recognize the German minority officially..