Albert Schweitzer

How am I supposed to have sympathy for a population that increasingly prefers communist or right wing parties? The problem is that they can complain as long as they want to but it wont change anything about the lives. Nor do protest help, the only one who can make your own life better is yourself and a prosperous economy. To let the economy prosper you need to reduce labour costs. Unfortunately we dont have the money right now to reduce these costs without cutting elsewhere too. I worked long enough in the tourism sector to know that with a little discipline you can EASILY find a job as a waiter. NO PROBLEM, but I guess most of these east german fellow are too proud to do that job. And why working 30 days if you would only earn a few euros more? My sympathy has ended, time to play tough on them! I grew up in a very wealthy family but still I wasnt girly enough to not do the LOWEST jobs in a hotel. It taught me a lesson. Either they learn to find a job or they starve to death. Keep the social welfare for those that realy need it. And yes, if a architect cant find a job anymore with 40 then he has to go back finding something else. Only proaction makes you get a job... time to learn that.

religion is a good question but a) who cares? b) there are no muslims or buddhists on this forum! Drivers license? a) depending on age b) not realy interesting Maybe I am the only one being this way but I would prefer questions such as a) are you happy with your constant profession b) do you stem from a wealthy background or not c) From your present point of view, would you like/ have liked to constantly join the army? d) would you prefer to live on the countryside or in a city? stuff like this..

nah...lets try to mix political factors with irrelevant stuff. So you could say that the average european, not being religious, prefers dark haired women. Or that the average american being ProBush loves SUVs and thinks smoking is evil! That would be a cool profiling!

Raedor, I am not insulting the people of the former GDR, that is nonesense and you know it. I know lots of people that packed their things and went elsewhere to look for a job or education. And I guess so did you. These people are 50% of the working population of Berlin and I wouldnt dare to insult them at any way. I dont even insult unemployed people. WHAT I HATE however is the constant feeling that there must be someone to blame for the misery and that voting in protest does anyone harm. Schroeder doesnt care if these people vote for the former communists, the CDU doesnt care and so do most people outside the state. The only ones that will suffer from it are the actual voters. PDS has absolutely NO competence in attracting foreign companies, they have NO competence in attracting wealthy people or create the right cultural environment to upgrade cities. Gotta go!

Ares, I am all willing to have a decent discussion, but please stop comparing rifles to cars, this not only reminds me of NRA extremists (which I believe you are not) and secondly the comparison is inadequate. You know that in a modern western country most people need cars. We need them to travel, to work and for keeping up our complicated lifes. In most western nations people possess cars and with them cause far less lethal accidents than if they would all possess guns. Secondly a car CAN cause death but it is not build to do just that. Car accidents happen but the industry is doing the best to one day reduce the risk of lethal accidents to the minimum. And I may hope that in 10 years from now most BMWs and Mercedes will be damm safe and lethal accidents very unlikely. In most cases an accident will cause yourself being hurt too so people are being a bit more careful, wherease rifles let you hope you dont get hurt. Guns however will be developed into the opposite direction, they are being made more and more lethal each day. AND finally in most western countries people need to take a test before they can possess a car. Criminals can steal cars but they can rarely use them to threaten others. Furthermore we are not talking about guns here but about automated rifles. Those shouldnt be used for hunting (unethical) and they are not very good weapons for self defense. They can be used for sports and I dont want to take that right away from you. But dont you understand that foreigners are somewhat surprised that everyone can buy an war-rifle in an ordinary shop? Me personally I am only surprised to hear that people buy automated rifles for self protection. This realy is paranoia.

Rook, you are telling me that automated rifles are being used for hunting? Why dont you use an RPG instead? Freaks! --- Phantoms are things that do not exist. Automated rifles are being used in crimes and drive by shootings are fact and not fiction. You may question the frequency but definetly not the existance. --- An automated rifle for self defense? Could you please draw a scenario in which an automated rifle would be a favourable tool for self defense? --- Your example of pots and pants is sweet but slightly inadquate. I keep my pots in the kitchen cause that is where I use them and where they can do no wrong. I need pots for a daily living and I know that anyone stealing my pots wont kill anyone and I know that my children profit more from my pans than they can do harm. Or do you come along with the argument "pots dont boil noodles, it is criminals that boil them"

Montagsdemo! Â Â No kidding but they moved through the street where our company is. (Rosenthaler) 50% of them wave the former DDR-flag, some are from ATTAC (protest against everything) and the rest was alternative people demonstrating agains the "Rich Motherf..." I mean, what is the message of this demonstration? Â Our boss told us that is forbidden to throw cigarettes from our balcony here, except if the Montagsdemo is passing by!

Yes, sure, but you know that accidents happen. To buy a rifle in the US you dont have to take an intelligence test and I may assume some pretty paranoid people buy rifles and also some pretty irresponsible ones too. Furthermore, the more automated weapons are being traded the more opportunities there are to steal them. May it be in the shop, may it be in a private house, out of a truck or whatever, or maybe even sold and declared stolen. Young criminals that have some money extra will switch from a Magnum to an AK. And any drive-by shooting will turn into a much more dangerous game when there is a 30 bullets in the air ready to kill innocent bystanders. On the other hand I dont see the gain. What is the gain of keeping an automated rifle at home? Do you want to have it to show it around, to sleep next to you during the night? Explain to me the gain? And why cant a shooting range store more than 3000 rifles? Absoluetly no problem. You could easily put them into a large room and let them be administered by a store keeper. But fact is, most american weapon owners dont want to leave their rifle at the shooting range, I dont know why but they dont want to. Maybe they want to clean it during the evening, to show it to their neighbours or maybe they even feel safer. Only children take their toys home, famers keep their tools in the store.

Joltan, the logic of your argumentation is totally correct and if this would be a real productive discussion I would be more objective. BUT, I am not complaining about the vote, it was nothing but a rebellion against SPD and CDU (strongest national parties). But the intention behind the election is clear: "F.UCK YOU WEST GERMANY!"

The only difference between them and me is that THEY want ME to pay more taxes to finance their unemployment. I live in Berlin so I have a pretty good feeling of what their attitude is like. I feel insulted when they openly tell me that I MUST share my money because WE live in a social state. One day the sympathy has to end. I can assure you that if you shorten their money and they would have to starve they would quickly do something about it. And I worked in other countries before to be able to judge... life sucks.. you got to work to survive and you must fight to find a job... if you cant find one then move to Africa or Brasil but dont settle untill you find one. In the west we have people that are unemployed too. But most of them blame the bad economy, they blame the bad educational system, they blame bad economical politics, but they dont blame the greedy rich people that MUST share their money. And yes, there is thousands of hard working people here in Berlin that work for LESS than the unemployment money. Simply because they want to work, they want to improve and they dont want to complain or parasite. And MANY moved here from the former Eastern States. (just like the girl I like most) But there is a group that can only complain.. may the rot in hell! Cheers!

halelulja! But back to the topic. You are saying that a rifle is safest at home in a weapon safe? Out of pure logic I would assume that a sports-club has a better protection system. That the rifle cannot get lost or stolen out of your car, that your children might not be able to steal the key or find the code. Accidents will increase, that is for sure, the only question is whether they show a significant increase. But of course the other question that remains is, whether criminals will now have an easier life finding automatic rifles. Every weapon that can be sold on the free market can also be stolen from the free market. And an AK in the wrong hands is a dangerous risk. A handgun will no longer protect you against it. But if you now answer "but an M16" can protect me, well then you have what I call an escalation of armament!

You wouldnt believe but they dont even have OFP there, I mean look at Bastlers Maniac Locator ! No, back on the track... This election wont change much. The movement of competent easterners going to the west will continue. History since 1989 has shown that some eastern cities are able to survive and flourish a little, like Rostock.. and others are simply getting worse every day. The smart part of the population leaves those cities and tries to find education&profession elsewhere. What remains are ugly ruins of communistic multi-flat buildings and people without jobs have to live in them. It is a sad life I tell you. I mean look at those images and decide yourself... would you like to live here? So what remains are mostly frustrated people that complain that we westerners dont give our money to them, that is how it used to work in communism. Now the west is pretty much financially drained off and we dont want to finance them anymore, nor do we want to share everything with them. So far they didnt have to learn their lesson. Now the message from ALL ruling parties is: "you got 2 healty legs and 2 healty arms", go find a job or you will soon have to starve a little more. Of course the valid reply is.. I am cant find a job, keep sharing your money with us, you have enough anyway. People dont get that because of this problem communism broke down. NO MORE MONEY TO SHARE.

Can I just ask one essential question? What is the use of having an automated rifle at home? Why cant it be stored at the local sport shooting range? And if a gun is no longer good enough for protection, dont you see the escalation of armament?

Golf rules! I love it!

Point 1: Only in 1 state the extreme right is gaining ground. Point 2: No more than 9% of the voters went for the right wing party in that state. In healthy states they dont even get 1% Point 3: This party is under constant observation by our secret service. The most extreme comment they dare to say publicly is "we dont want german money to be invested in foreign countries" Point 4: It is a damn poor and useless state anyway! Point 5: During the election the exteme left won even more votes. In other words, it was a vote against the ruling parties and most people rather prefered to move left than right. Point 6: Germany is the country with the weakest right wing parties in europe. They have been stronger in the past and are loosing ground ever since.

So in short. Statistical comparisons are pure bullshit and made for mentally disabled people like NRA members. Secondly the logic, that a gun protects you stands against the argument that "criminals always carry weapons". And we know that 2 people being armed will shoot rather than droping their guns. Cant hear this bullshit anymore. What reasonable argument could there be to ever defend the right to carry around automatic rifles. It is the old story of unemployed redneck farmers that still fear the communist invasion and the scientology member willing to defend his country against the "evil muslims".

Never realy watched Baseball, I guess I dont even know the rules. Â But congrats. Baseball looks cooler than American Football anyway ! Â

Went to watch the movie yesterday. I was impressed, Der Untergang is no regular movie. The film isnt organised in the typical greek tradition of theatre plays. It basically has no real train of actions, it is not building up any tension towards the end, there is no battle of good against evil, there is no narator or character you are able to identify yourself with... nothing like that. It is just a naration of known facts of the last days inside the Fuehrer Bunker and the battle inside Berlin. BUT never before Hitler has been shown in such an accurate an believable way. Â I cant describe it here but he is not shown as an exaggerated cartoon, he is not made deliberately evil.. but you can feel the brutality inside him. Never before I have seen a film about Hitler and afterwards said: "he could have been like this". If you got the chance to watch it, do it. But dont expect to come out of it and say.. "wow, that was a movie"... as I said... it wasnt meant to make make corporate hollywood rich but there was a serious intention behind it. And no, it is far from being "low budget". from the movie Goebbels shooting his wife

and the dogs are used to return ducks that have been shot out of the sky. Very useful... and they help you to find wounded animals in case the first bullet wasnt lethal. wounded and bleeding animals "schwitzen" which in english corresponds to a "sweating" animal, leaving traces for a dog to find them. Sweat = blood in the hunters language

lol, I picked 900 just because I felt like it Maybe I am like Luke Skywalker, the force is sleeping within me without me knowing it. ***runs around the room and tries to lift things through mindcontrol***

Yes... Placebo.. the last picture is from the short scenes I was talking about. Good source-research from your side, I am impressed!

Foxes are to be found in Germany everywhere too. But it seems we started a better birth control decades ago. Maybe someone should teach you brits that foxes naturally live in communities of around 6-7 animals and only the superior foxes (male and female) will have sexual contact. So a known fact is that if you hunt down one of them the organisation of this community changes and ALL female animals will have children during the following year. So your stupid foxhunt actually has the opposite effect. When you terminally stopped hunting them in 2001 because of the food&mouth desease their population actually decrease by 4.5%. SURPRISE !!!

I had mine tested at the Institute of Psychology in Zürich Switzerland. My parents wanted me to visit a famous guy there to find out what job in what sector I should pick. I had a score of 128 in Raven and Thurstone but I KNOW that I am not very smart and I KNOW but I guess it doesnt need more than an IQ of 95 to know that those tests are bullshit anyway.

no question that foxes need to be killed regularily each year, just like rabbits and old deers. But it is about the way you do it.

135 too. Nothing realy challenging in there. But I didnt get this one with he likes 400 but not 100, he likes 100 but not 99 ... can anyone explain that to me