Latest / 20 Percent Berlin Podcast / #42: Merz resigning? Elif or Evers? F*ck Lufthansa

Transcript

#42: Merz resigning? Elif or Evers? F*ck Lufthansa · 20 Percent Berlin Podcast

0:00
SPEAKER_00: Hello and welcome to the 20 Percent Berlin podcast,
0:02
SPEAKER_00: the companion podcast to the 20 Percent Berlin newsletter.
0:06
SPEAKER_00: I am co-writer Andrew Bulkeley and I'm joined this week as always by...
0:10
SPEAKER_01: Maurice Frank.
0:12
SPEAKER_00: How are you doing Andrew?
0:13
SPEAKER_00: You're kind of in a good mood today.
0:14
SPEAKER_00: What the hell's going on?
0:15
SPEAKER_00: I am in a good mood.
0:15
SPEAKER_00: I was just on vacation for a week in Paris, the city of love.
0:20
SPEAKER_00: All right.
0:20
SPEAKER_00: Where you have to say, where are you from?
0:22
SPEAKER_00: Berlin.
0:23
SPEAKER_00: Berlin.
0:24
SPEAKER_01: Berlin?
0:25
SPEAKER_00: Berlin.
0:25
SPEAKER_00: I don't know.
0:26
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it was good.
0:27
SPEAKER_00: Uh...
0:28
SPEAKER_00: I was surprised by two things.
0:31
SPEAKER_00: First off, getting coffee, because Paris, it was never bombed.
0:36
SPEAKER_00: It looks like it's looked for basically 100 years, which sometimes is a little weird.
0:40
SPEAKER_00: It's kind of steampunky.
0:41
SPEAKER_00: Everything looks like the World Exposition in 1900.
0:45
SPEAKER_00: But so we started to go get coffee every morning and we're naturally attracted
0:50
SPEAKER_00: to their Instagram cafes.
0:52
SPEAKER_00: Like all of these third wave coffee places,
0:54
SPEAKER_00: I guess they're called, where they roast their own beans and they have the same.
0:57
SPEAKER_00: And you can go there any city in the world.
0:59
SPEAKER_00: They all look the same.
1:00
SPEAKER_01: Don't go there.
1:01
SPEAKER_01: No, we didn't.
1:01
SPEAKER_00: But it was shocking.
1:02
SPEAKER_01: Go to a brasserie where they have like a big metal counter.
1:06
SPEAKER_00: Exactly.
1:06
SPEAKER_00: That's what we did.
1:07
SPEAKER_00: But we were like naturally drawn to these Instagram cafes.
1:09
SPEAKER_00: And it's almost offensive in Paris because everything's so old and like Paris-y.
1:13
SPEAKER_00: Whereas here you're glad the building got renovated or it's not a dinner kebab or a nail salon.
1:19
SPEAKER_00: So it was weird to me that you could feel the difference
1:21
SPEAKER_00: between these Instagram cafes and like the brasseries where you get a little tartine
1:24
SPEAKER_00: or whatever.
1:25
SPEAKER_00: It's called a mini baguette for breakfast.
1:27
SPEAKER_00: And, uh, no,
1:29
SPEAKER_01: no, no.
1:30
SPEAKER_01: That's like apple pie.
1:31
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
1:31
SPEAKER_00: Anyway, we had the little fake baguette thing and they eat breakfast and smoke a cigarette.
1:36
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
1:36
SPEAKER_01: Nice.
1:38
SPEAKER_00: And, uh, so that was nice.
1:40
SPEAKER_00: Then the cycling thing,
1:41
SPEAKER_00: because Paris is now known for cycling and,
1:43
SPEAKER_00: You know,
1:43
SPEAKER_00: I was picturing it like here when they put in a new bike path and it's all nice
1:46
SPEAKER_00: and clean.
1:47
SPEAKER_00: No way, man.
1:47
SPEAKER_01: It's just like some painted lines.
1:49
SPEAKER_00: It's a part of the infrastructure, man.
1:51
SPEAKER_00: It looks like when they built the roads, they built those bike paths.
1:54
SPEAKER_01: Oh, really?
1:54
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
1:56
SPEAKER_00: It's just there now.
1:57
SPEAKER_01: But everything's a lot narrower there anyway.
2:00
SPEAKER_01: I guess it's sort of like, yeah, it's a little bit more intense.
2:02
SPEAKER_00: Well,
2:02
SPEAKER_00: but they would get rid of a lane of parking or a lane of traffic and put a bike lane
2:06
SPEAKER_00: in there.
2:07
SPEAKER_00: And the thing I think that really worked in Paris,
2:09
SPEAKER_00: which is what will never happen here,
2:11
SPEAKER_00: is it's like they sort of told the car drivers,
2:13
SPEAKER_00: no, you have to deal with the cyclists.
2:14
SPEAKER_00: The cyclists are now a part of the infrastructure.
2:17
SPEAKER_00: This isn't just some green voter riding to work because he thinks he's improving the world.
2:21
SPEAKER_00: Like this is a part of Paris now.
2:23
SPEAKER_01: You know what I like there as well is that it costs more to park your SUV than
2:28
SPEAKER_01: if you have a smaller car.
2:30
SPEAKER_00: That's a good policy.
2:32
SPEAKER_00: A good start in Berlin would be if parking really costs something.
2:34
SPEAKER_00: Okay, if you go to my neighborhood, I pay, what, 12 euros a year to park there or something?
2:38
SPEAKER_01: I think it's 20 for two years.
2:39
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it's ridiculous.
2:40
SPEAKER_01: It's just stupid.
2:42
SPEAKER_00: That should be more.
2:43
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and then I'm all for bigger cars, like paying more.
2:45
SPEAKER_00: It's funny because Paris is smaller than Berlin.
2:48
SPEAKER_00: Like a normal-sized Toyota seems big in Paris.
2:50
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
2:51
SPEAKER_00: Whereas here, you're like, that just fits.
2:52
SPEAKER_01: You know what I like?
2:53
SPEAKER_01: You'll just be in some completely random neighborhood that looks kind of run down,
2:57
SPEAKER_01: but then suddenly there's a street market with oysters.
3:00
Yeah.
3:01
SPEAKER_00: Food.
3:01
SPEAKER_00: I mean, we were talking about before we started the food.
3:03
SPEAKER_00: Oh, like we got off the train.
3:06
SPEAKER_00: We came back.
3:06
SPEAKER_00: We got off the train yesterday.
3:07
SPEAKER_00: My wife and I were both like, where do we eat?
3:08
SPEAKER_01: And we were just like, yeah, where do we eat?
3:11
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I'm not a big oyster eater.
3:14
SPEAKER_00: I did not have snails.
3:16
SPEAKER_00: I did not have snails.
3:17
SPEAKER_00: I think we did okay money-wise.
3:20
SPEAKER_00: Because the thing is, you know, Berlin is so expensive now.
3:22
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I know.
3:23
SPEAKER_01: It's not really that much worse.
3:24
SPEAKER_00: What are we going to save?
3:26
SPEAKER_00: You know, it was 40 bucks for us both to eat.
3:28
SPEAKER_01: So you got yourself a beret and a striped shirt?
3:31
SPEAKER_00: Got a beret, a striped shirt.
3:32
SPEAKER_00: I make jokes about pigeons.
3:34
SPEAKER_00: I don't know, the le pigeon is like a big thing there.
3:35
SPEAKER_01: I don't know.
3:38
SPEAKER_00: It was nice.
3:39
SPEAKER_00: But those were the two things, the Instagram cafe and the cycling.
3:41
SPEAKER_00: I thought it was this utopian cycling thing.
3:44
SPEAKER_00: And also, like in Holland, I feel like when the light turns red, most of the cyclists stop.
3:49
SPEAKER_00: They don't dare, man.
3:50
SPEAKER_00: Nope.
3:51
SPEAKER_00: There's just like, they just go, it's more cycling anarchy than in Holland.
3:57
SPEAKER_01: You said the word anarchy.
3:59
SPEAKER_00: Oh, no, I'm not allowed to say anarchy.
4:01
SPEAKER_01: That's because you're a boomer, man, and you're trying to prevent world revolution.
4:05
SPEAKER_00: It's so weird how many people,
4:06
SPEAKER_00: what we're talking about is,
4:08
SPEAKER_00: I used the word anarchy in the last newsletter,
4:09
SPEAKER_00: and there was a big comment on our Substack that we should not say anarchy
4:15
SPEAKER_00: because that's just another example of the man putting the man down.
4:20
SPEAKER_01: Look at you with your button down shirt.
4:22
SPEAKER_01: You are the man.
4:22
SPEAKER_01: It's H&M.
4:23
SPEAKER_01: Man.
4:25
SPEAKER_00: And I get tired of writing 20% that people are always like,
4:29
SPEAKER_00: you can't use that word because, dude, anarchy.
4:33
SPEAKER_00: Then I was like, I'm going to look up the definition because I'm not always right.
4:36
SPEAKER_00: I have words that I think I know the meaning of and I don't actually.
4:40
SPEAKER_00: And so I don't always think I'm right.
4:41
SPEAKER_00: So I looked it up and the very first thing is like, anarchy means basically anarchy.
4:45
SPEAKER_01: Okay.
4:46
SPEAKER_00: So yeah, so I shouldn't say anarchy, but it is, no, I should say, I will say anarchy.
4:49
SPEAKER_00: I don't care about the comment.
4:51
SPEAKER_00: It is anarchy, man.
4:52
SPEAKER_00: The bikes, it's crazy.
4:54
SPEAKER_00: Like, that's why I was going to write a tweet.
4:55
SPEAKER_00: I was going to be like, oh, thanks, Anahil Doggo.
4:57
SPEAKER_00: Now I don't only have to look out for cars, I have to look out for bikes.
5:01
SPEAKER_00: Oh, and what I really like about Paris, your cargo bike, forget it.
5:05
SPEAKER_01: It's too narrow.
5:06
SPEAKER_00: Nobody's going to use it.
5:07
SPEAKER_00: What the hell is your problem with my cargo bike?
5:09
SPEAKER_00: I hate cargo bikes.
5:09
SPEAKER_00: It's such an example of pencil outback mothers for me.
5:12
SPEAKER_00: Let me take up the entire bike path.
5:15
SPEAKER_00: Let me take up the entire bike path because I am more important than you.
5:18
SPEAKER_01: The bike paths need to be wider.
5:20
SPEAKER_01: That's the problem.
5:21
SPEAKER_00: The thing they have in which we wanted to bring them here.
5:24
SPEAKER_00: They used to be Surly.
5:25
SPEAKER_00: They used to only be made by Surly or these longer bikes
5:28
SPEAKER_00: where you could put they were originally made that you could put a surfboard on
5:30
SPEAKER_00: the back behind you.
5:32
SPEAKER_00: Then they adjusted them so you could put a kid behind you on the bike.
5:34
SPEAKER_00: So now they've got them where you can put like two kids behind you on the bike.
5:37
SPEAKER_00: That's what they all have.
5:39
SPEAKER_00: And it makes much more sense.
5:41
SPEAKER_01: What about, did you go up to Sacre Coeur?
5:43
SPEAKER_00: We did go up to Sacre Coeur.
5:44
SPEAKER_01: I mean, it's a touristy as hell, but it's a great view.
5:46
SPEAKER_00: My wife was like,
5:47
SPEAKER_00: let's go up there in the day because if you go up there at night,
5:49
SPEAKER_00: everybody's up there with their bucket and red wine and you can't see a thing.
5:53
SPEAKER_00: And so we went up there during the day, 10 times worse.
5:58
SPEAKER_00: Because that's when all the cruise people go up there,
6:00
SPEAKER_00: the people on the river cruises, the bus tourists from America, packed.
6:04
SPEAKER_01: It was so packed.
6:06
SPEAKER_01: I sadly went to the Starbucks in Montmartre just to get Wi-Fi, which was just so pathetic of me.
6:11
SPEAKER_01: And that there is even a...
6:13
SPEAKER_01: The Starbucks there is shocking.
6:15
SPEAKER_01: It's terrible.
6:16
SPEAKER_00: Anyway, you're walking by all these nice little shops,
6:18
SPEAKER_00: little boutiques, and then suddenly Starbucks.
6:21
SPEAKER_01: This is a Berlin podcast, Andrew.
6:23
SPEAKER_01: Sorry.
6:24
SPEAKER_01: I'm going to have to rein you in, and I would like you to announce our sponsor for this issue.
6:29
SPEAKER_00: We do have a sponsor for this issue,
6:30
SPEAKER_00: and it's actually a very good sponsor, and I'm glad to have them.
6:33
SPEAKER_00: It is Democrats Abroad.
6:35
SPEAKER_00: Living abroad doesn't mean sitting out.
6:37
SPEAKER_00: If you're a US citizen in Berlin, you can still vote no matter how long you've been away.
6:43
SPEAKER_00: VoteFromAbroad.org walks you through requesting your ballot by email
6:46
SPEAKER_00: and getting it back on time wherever you are in Germany.
6:49
SPEAKER_00: It takes about five minutes.
6:50
SPEAKER_00: No guesswork, no excuses.
6:52
SPEAKER_00: Start at VoteFromAbroad.org.
6:55
SPEAKER_00: VoteFromAbroad.org.
6:57
SPEAKER_00: That's hard to say.
6:58
SPEAKER_00: VoteFromAbroad.org.
7:01
SPEAKER_00: Also, the problem is we're reaching an age where we would probably say abroad to mean a woman.
7:06
SPEAKER_01: Okay, speak for yourself, Boomer.
7:08
SPEAKER_01: A dame, a dame.
7:10
SPEAKER_01: Tell me, Andrew, are you registered for the midterms in the US?
7:13
SPEAKER_01: I am, I am registered.
7:14
SPEAKER_00: I'm registered in Oregon and Oregon makes it super easy to just vote.
7:17
SPEAKER_01: Just faxed in your registration?
7:19
SPEAKER_00: I can even email it.
7:20
SPEAKER_00: I can email my vote.
7:21
SPEAKER_01: You can email your vote?
7:22
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
7:23
SPEAKER_01: That sounds sketchy.
7:25
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, but they check things.
7:26
SPEAKER_00: And actually,
7:26
SPEAKER_00: I do know that they check signatures because a friend of ours who remained nameless,
7:31
SPEAKER_00: she actually signed her son's ballot and turned it in for him last time
7:35
SPEAKER_00: because he's one of those forest firefighters.
7:38
SPEAKER_00: He doesn't parachute in, but basically almost parachutes in.
7:41
SPEAKER_00: So he was fighting forest fires.
7:42
SPEAKER_00: So he's like, here, mom, vote for me.
7:44
SPEAKER_00: She signed his name and they were going to charge her with voter fraud.
7:49
SPEAKER_01: Okay.
7:49
SPEAKER_00: So they actually check when you email things and they do check stuff.
7:53
SPEAKER_01: Can I just mention my event on Wednesday the 16th?
7:56
SPEAKER_01: I wish you would.
7:57
SPEAKER_01: I am doing a 20% Berlin news quiz on Wednesday
8:02
SPEAKER_00: the 16th of September.
8:03
SPEAKER_00: In the loudest venue in Berlin.
8:05
SPEAKER_01: In the loudest venue in Berlin.
8:06
SPEAKER_01: But it's a good time, right, Andrew?
8:08
SPEAKER_01: Come on.
8:09
SPEAKER_01: Back me
8:09
SPEAKER_00: up here.
8:10
SPEAKER_00: No, we may or may not have comedy on Sunday.
8:12
SPEAKER_00: We're a little low on ticket sales there.
8:14
SPEAKER_01: Okay.
8:15
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
8:16
SPEAKER_01: So let's get into the news, man.
8:18
SPEAKER_00: Today we want to talk about, on the national front, Chancellor Matz.
8:22
SPEAKER_00: It's weird, naturally you want to say Chancellor Angela Merkel still.
8:25
SPEAKER_00: But it's Chancellor Friedrich Matz.
8:26
SPEAKER_00: His position, not so stable.
8:30
SPEAKER_00: Looking very iffy.
8:31
SPEAKER_00: We want to talk about that locally.
8:32
SPEAKER_00: We have the election coming up, which is sort of related to why Matt's is a little bit unstable.
8:36
SPEAKER_00: The election on Sunday here in Berlin.
8:38
SPEAKER_00: Want to talk about the various coalition possibilities or what could happen with the election.
8:43
SPEAKER_00: Then we also wanted to talk about how you can now fly direct from BER to Dubai.
8:52
SPEAKER_01: Well, not yet, but it's going to happen shortly.
8:56
SPEAKER_00: And we also want to talk about,
8:58
SPEAKER_00: maybe if we get to it,
8:59
SPEAKER_00: if we have time,
8:59
SPEAKER_00: we can talk about how it's illegal to do short-term temporary furnished rentals,
9:06
SPEAKER_00: at least in small parts of Berlin.
9:09
SPEAKER_00: And then we'll do our favorite segment.
9:10
SPEAKER_00: I don't know why I say favorite segment.
9:12
SPEAKER_00: I don't know that it is our favorite segment.
9:14
SPEAKER_00: Bears needs two things we like about Berlin.
9:16
SPEAKER_01: Okay, so what's going on with British Mouths?
9:18
SPEAKER_00: First up, they're...
9:20
SPEAKER_00: Friedrich Merz's job appears to be on the line for the second time this summer,
9:23
SPEAKER_00: but now it's serious.
9:25
SPEAKER_00: The reason is, first, CDU did poorly in Sachsen-Anhalt.
9:29
SPEAKER_00: That's an understatement.
9:31
SPEAKER_01: They got creamed, man.
9:34
SPEAKER_00: Historically low.
9:36
SPEAKER_00: And now on this Sunday,
9:37
SPEAKER_00: we aren't just voting in Berlin,
9:39
SPEAKER_00: also the far northern state of Mecklenburg, Western Pomerania, MeckPom.
9:44
SPEAKER_00: We all just call it MeckPom.
9:46
SPEAKER_00: They are voting.
9:47
SPEAKER_00: And the polls right now suggest that the CDU won't even make it into the parliament.
9:51
SPEAKER_00: The first time the CDU,
9:53
SPEAKER_00: the Conservative Party of Germany,
9:55
SPEAKER_00: the Tories of Germany,
9:56
SPEAKER_00: the Republicans of Germany,
9:58
SPEAKER_01: But they're also, to be fair, like the backbone of the Federal Republic of Germany.
10:03
SPEAKER_01: They've basically run the show since World War II.
10:06
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and they may not make it into a parliament.
10:09
SPEAKER_00: Which is insane.
10:10
SPEAKER_00: At 4%.
10:11
SPEAKER_00: So the CDU is kind of like, maybe Matz is a problem.
10:14
SPEAKER_00: Matz has come out with this idea.
10:16
SPEAKER_00: He wants to fire the labor minister,
10:19
SPEAKER_00: Babel, Boss Babel, He wants to fire the boss, the woman with two last names.
10:27
SPEAKER_00: He wants to fire her because she's apparently opposing several of
10:30
SPEAKER_00: the reforms he wants to make to the retirement system.
10:32
SPEAKER_00: She's like, I'm not going to do this.
10:34
SPEAKER_00: And that's holding up his plans, which is making him look bad.
10:37
SPEAKER_00: So his idea is let's fire her.
10:39
SPEAKER_00: If they fire her, though,
10:40
SPEAKER_00: the SPD is going to pull out of the coalition,
10:42
SPEAKER_00: which means the CDU will have to try a minority government,
10:46
SPEAKER_00: which would ultimately mean that they probably need votes from the AFD occasionally
10:50
SPEAKER_00: to get something through.
10:52
SPEAKER_01: Wow.
10:53
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, there's a lot there, Andrew.
10:54
SPEAKER_00: So, but the other, so that's the first option.
10:57
SPEAKER_00: The other option is the CDU says, Freddy, we're done with you.
11:00
SPEAKER_00: Everybody hates you.
11:01
SPEAKER_00: He has polling the lowest of any chancellor ever.
11:05
SPEAKER_00: Get out and replace him probably with Hendrik Wüst from Dusseldorf.
11:12
SPEAKER_01: Who's kind of a moderate CDU guy, wouldn't you say?
11:16
SPEAKER_00: He's kind of nice.
11:17
SPEAKER_00: He's kind of like, you know, he's like the guy in the office.
11:19
SPEAKER_00: Good looking fella.
11:20
SPEAKER_00: Too conservative for you, but you'll have beers with him.
11:23
SPEAKER_00: He'll order a wine, but...
11:27
SPEAKER_01: About Merz, the thing is, I think he's just not a good leader.
11:32
SPEAKER_01: He's a bad communicator,
11:33
SPEAKER_01: and he's also bad at what politicians need to be able to do,
11:38
SPEAKER_01: and that is maintain party discipline.
11:42
SPEAKER_01: Not only are the SPD refusing,
11:47
SPEAKER_01: changing their mind about the reforms,
11:49
SPEAKER_01: some of the Leaders in the CDU are saying,
11:53
SPEAKER_01: especially in the East,
11:54
SPEAKER_01: maybe we do want to stick with the pension age, keep it to
12:00
SPEAKER_00: 63, for example.
12:02
SPEAKER_01: Basically, they're afraid of the AFD.
12:04
SPEAKER_01: And so they're just all over the place.
12:08
SPEAKER_01: If you're going to do a reform like that, you need to make sure you have everyone on board.
12:13
SPEAKER_01: And there's no going off message.
12:16
SPEAKER_01: It's not going to help.
12:17
SPEAKER_01: If he wobbles now,
12:18
SPEAKER_01: the AFD is just going to get stealing even more votes from the CDU, don't you think?
12:23
SPEAKER_00: When he just reacts like a whiny bitch, anytime anybody questions him, he just...
12:27
SPEAKER_00: He just freaks out and screams at the people.
12:30
SPEAKER_00: It's almost like Trumpian.
12:31
SPEAKER_00: It's not in that brutal, like,
12:33
SPEAKER_00: I'm going to eviscerate you,
12:34
SPEAKER_00: but he just freaks out of like, how dare you question what I'm telling you?
12:38
SPEAKER_00: I know what I'm talking about.
12:40
SPEAKER_00: And that's not what you want in a leader.
12:41
SPEAKER_00: You want a leader who's like,
12:42
SPEAKER_00: listen, I appreciate your position, but this is why my position is better.
12:46
SPEAKER_00: And he just doesn't do that.
12:48
SPEAKER_00: And realistically,
12:49
SPEAKER_00: he has had two weeks since the vote in Saxony-Anhalt to come out with an idea,
12:54
SPEAKER_00: a change to the way they're going.
12:57
SPEAKER_00: Here's my promise.
12:58
SPEAKER_00: Here's what I learned from that election.
13:00
SPEAKER_00: Here's what I'm doing differently.
13:01
SPEAKER_00: He had two weeks to do that.
13:02
SPEAKER_00: He did not do that.
13:02
SPEAKER_00: He came out and said, what I'm doing is right, and we're going to just keep doing it.
13:07
SPEAKER_00: And I need to...
13:07
SPEAKER_01: I mean, I think that's okay if you make an argument for it.
13:11
SPEAKER_01: I don't know.
13:11
SPEAKER_01: I think that's okay.
13:12
SPEAKER_00: But he's not making an argument for it.
13:14
SPEAKER_00: He's not winning people...
13:15
SPEAKER_01: He's a shit communicator.
13:17
SPEAKER_01: He's not an inspiring person.
13:19
SPEAKER_00: But that implies that what he's trying to do is right.
13:23
SPEAKER_01: I'm not sure.
13:24
SPEAKER_01: You know what?
13:25
SPEAKER_01: These reforms,
13:27
SPEAKER_01: for example,
13:27
SPEAKER_01: in the health reforms,
13:30
SPEAKER_01: you can argue about the individual measures, but they do need to save some money.
13:34
SPEAKER_00: Something needs to happen,
13:35
SPEAKER_00: but now where's your big idea to do that rather than you're all just going
13:38
SPEAKER_00: to suffer, which is what he says, basically.
13:39
SPEAKER_00: He comes out and says like,
13:41
SPEAKER_00: you need to work longer,
13:42
SPEAKER_00: you need to work harder, and you need to stop being so sick.
13:44
SPEAKER_01: Okay, that's not part of the reform, though.
13:46
SPEAKER_01: The reform is, okay, you have to register, call in sick from day one.
13:52
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, but that's your need to work harder.
13:56
SPEAKER_00: Fair enough.
13:57
SPEAKER_00: I think part of being a politician- I'm not
13:59
SPEAKER_01: saying I agree with him.
14:00
SPEAKER_01: I'm saying he does need to stick to his guns.
14:04
SPEAKER_01: I think people respect it when you stick to your guns.
14:06
SPEAKER_00: Oh, he is, but the way he does it is just like, you're the ones fucking up, not me.
14:10
SPEAKER_00: There's no us in him.
14:12
SPEAKER_00: There's no us.
14:12
SPEAKER_00: It's all you.
14:14
SPEAKER_00: Yes, he has no
14:15
SPEAKER_01: empathy and he's not good at connecting with people.
14:19
SPEAKER_01: The one thing I was a little surprised that he said in parliament
14:24
SPEAKER_01: the other day was he accused the AFD of wanting to commit ethnic cleansing.
14:31
SPEAKER_01: He said that in parliament and I was like, wow.
14:33
SPEAKER_01: He does these things occasionally.
14:36
SPEAKER_01: That's some very strong language.
14:37
SPEAKER_01: Ethnic cleansing.
14:39
SPEAKER_00: He also canceled an appointment with Trump because Trump congratulated AFD, so he canceled.
14:44
SPEAKER_00: So he does occasionally do the right thing.
14:45
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I don't know if that will help him.
14:48
SPEAKER_01: I mean, a lot of people said it was overblown.
14:50
SPEAKER_01: It's not constructive.
14:53
SPEAKER_01: Well, you get to this whole, yeah, like how do you deal with, how do you deal with the AFD?
14:58
SPEAKER_01: Like just saying, insulting them and calling them out on their racism.
15:04
SPEAKER_01: It's good, but it actually, you need to come up with something like your own vision.
15:09
SPEAKER_00: This is what I learned in Paris, I think, is where's the vision?
15:14
SPEAKER_00: Anna Hidalgo came out and said, we're going to ride bikes now.
15:17
SPEAKER_00: Here it is.
15:18
SPEAKER_00: Nobody has an idea.
15:19
SPEAKER_00: I think that's what's lacking is Trump.
15:23
SPEAKER_00: Mads needs to come out and say,
15:24
SPEAKER_00: here is my vision for how we're going to reform the retirement fund.
15:30
SPEAKER_00: Here's my vision for it.
15:31
SPEAKER_00: Yes, you're all going to get 20% less retirement, but here's this.
15:37
SPEAKER_00: And there's none of that.
15:38
SPEAKER_00: There's none of these like,
15:39
SPEAKER_00: we're going to reform healthcare,
15:41
SPEAKER_00: but it's all these like little like, well,
15:43
SPEAKER_00: you have to call,
15:44
SPEAKER_00: you have to get a doctor's letter from the first day rather than,
15:47
SPEAKER_00: I don't know,
15:48
SPEAKER_00: like everybody has to go get a preventative checkup once a year and it's going to
15:53
SPEAKER_00: in a public clinic and you're going to have to wait in line in your underwear for
15:55
SPEAKER_00: an hour.
15:55
SPEAKER_01: He's a crap salesman.
15:57
SPEAKER_01: Basically.
15:58
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, but you need a good idea.
15:59
SPEAKER_00: You need a solid idea behind it.
16:01
SPEAKER_00: I don't think he even has that.
16:03
SPEAKER_00: And the funny thing is,
16:03
SPEAKER_00: if you fire him now,
16:04
SPEAKER_00: if he goes,
16:05
SPEAKER_00: all this work they did on the reforms from last spring,
16:08
SPEAKER_00: all of the money they spent on it, all of the retreats they did, that's gone.
16:11
SPEAKER_01: They're
16:13
SPEAKER_00: going to have to start over.
16:14
SPEAKER_01: I mean, the one thing that shows a little bit of promise, I think, Carsten... First?
16:21
SPEAKER_01: No, the other guy, the digital minister.
16:23
SPEAKER_01: I think he's got some kind of good ideas.
16:29
SPEAKER_01: The Deutschlandstack, do you know about that?
16:30
SPEAKER_01: They want to basically create this whole ecosystem of software to digitize all of Germany.
16:37
SPEAKER_01: And he's on the right path.
16:39
SPEAKER_01: I think he's just going to come across a lot of resistance and it won't get implemented, but...
16:43
SPEAKER_01: He's trying.
16:44
SPEAKER_01: Everyone was always like,
16:45
SPEAKER_01: oh my god, I can't believe they hired a businessman to reform German administration.
16:50
SPEAKER_01: But maybe, I don't know.
16:51
SPEAKER_00: That's the right way to go.
16:52
SPEAKER_00: He's okay.
16:52
SPEAKER_01: I think this guy's okay.
16:53
SPEAKER_01: He's not a member of the CDU even.
16:56
SPEAKER_00: Oh, then he's got my vote.
16:57
SPEAKER_00: Then I'm with him.
16:58
SPEAKER_00: I mean, the little tiny things they've done to digitize things have worked so well.
17:02
SPEAKER_00: Why are you questioning it at this point?
17:05
SPEAKER_00: I mean, my citizenship application,
17:07
SPEAKER_00: which I don't think went smooth, but it went a lot smoother because it was digital.
17:11
SPEAKER_00: And I could just do stuff on the computer.
17:12
SPEAKER_00: Like that's so much better.
17:14
SPEAKER_00: Everything should be that way.
17:15
SPEAKER_00: And then we can just fire a bunch of these bureaucrats.
17:17
SPEAKER_01: Well, they're going to retire and then there won't be enough actual people.
17:21
SPEAKER_01: You're going to need AI to process forms, basically.
17:25
SPEAKER_01: Good.
17:26
SPEAKER_00: Good.
17:27
SPEAKER_00: I'm not against AI.
17:28
SPEAKER_00: Everybody seems to hate AI.
17:29
SPEAKER_00: Like I use it as an assistant.
17:30
SPEAKER_01: I think it's good to use it for stuff like that.
17:32
SPEAKER_01: It's like my personal assistant that I never had.
17:36
SPEAKER_01: Don't use that American AI though, Andrew?
17:38
SPEAKER_00: KI?
17:39
SPEAKER_00: I use that word Swiss Lumo from Proton AI.
17:42
SPEAKER_01: Oh, nice.
17:43
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
17:44
SPEAKER_00: I like what they're doing in Switzerland.
17:46
SPEAKER_00: Even though I hate Switzerland, I hate what they're doing in Switzerland.
17:48
SPEAKER_00: I like this one.
17:49
SPEAKER_00: All right.
17:52
SPEAKER_00: Well, what's up next?
17:53
SPEAKER_00: So we've got the election on Sunday.
17:54
SPEAKER_00: The first ever German election I can vote in.
17:56
SPEAKER_00: Very proud of that.
17:57
SPEAKER_00: Who are you going to vote for?
17:59
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it's going to be all greens.
18:00
SPEAKER_01: Let's be honest.
18:00
SPEAKER_00: In my heart,
18:01
SPEAKER_00: I'm sort of an SPD guy because I like,
18:04
SPEAKER_00: I don't think the greens are always tied to reality.
18:06
SPEAKER_00: But the SPD is.
18:08
SPEAKER_01: Is anyone tied to reality?
18:10
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that's the problem.
18:11
SPEAKER_00: So I think we're just going to go green and stick with that.
18:16
SPEAKER_00: But so we are facing two options here in Berlin as well.
18:20
SPEAKER_00: The Berlin election is not affecting Mets because the CDU is solid here.
18:24
SPEAKER_00: They're always at 20% about whatever.
18:27
SPEAKER_00: They're not moving.
18:27
SPEAKER_00: The link is also at about 20%.
18:30
SPEAKER_00: So we're faced with either we go back to having a Die Linke,
18:33
SPEAKER_00: left-wing, Greens,
18:35
SPEAKER_00: Environmental,
18:36
SPEAKER_00: and SPD coalition, which would then be a far-left coalition like we had, or...
18:43
SPEAKER_00: Dilinka, the federal Dilinka, says we have to socialize these apartments.
18:48
SPEAKER_00: We have to take these apartments back from commercial landlords.
18:52
SPEAKER_00: And we will only enter a coalition that promises to do that.
18:55
SPEAKER_00: And if the SPD and the Greens say that we're not going to promise that,
18:59
SPEAKER_00: which they've said they're not going to promise that,
19:00
SPEAKER_00: then Dilinka cannot get in the coalition, which means we stay with what we have.
19:04
SPEAKER_00: Oh, no, we go to CDU, SPD, and the Greens.
19:06
SPEAKER_01: They're going to change their mind after the results come in.
19:09
SPEAKER_00: Dilinka.
19:10
SPEAKER_00: Every one.
19:11
SPEAKER_00: They're all going to say, okay, we will expropriate the apartment.
19:13
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, because like, yeah.
19:16
SPEAKER_01: No, I think it's all, I mean, this is all just like campaign talk.
19:20
SPEAKER_00: So you think it will be linker?
19:21
SPEAKER_00: We're going to have Elif Arab.
19:24
SPEAKER_01: She could be the mayor.
19:26
SPEAKER_01: I think Volt,
19:27
SPEAKER_01: if they get into the 5%, I think they could also be in that part of that coalition.
19:31
SPEAKER_00: I was wondering if we could talk about the election without you talking about Volt.
19:35
SPEAKER_01: No, the last election they got 4.8, so they could easily get 5%.
19:41
SPEAKER_01: And they're sort of progressive, and so they might be open for a coalition with anyone, really.
19:48
SPEAKER_00: Well, not anyone, you can't say, because there's the other 20%.
19:51
SPEAKER_00: There's the other 20%.
19:53
SPEAKER_01: I mean, I guess one option would be CDU AFD, and they're not going to do that in Berlin, no way.
19:59
SPEAKER_00: I mean, the weird thing is the CDU,
20:00
SPEAKER_00: the head of the Young Conservatives in Mechpalm,
20:03
SPEAKER_00: I think it was last night, said the CDU should start coalitions with the AFT.
20:09
SPEAKER_01: Oh, boy.
20:10
SPEAKER_00: Interesting times.
20:11
SPEAKER_00: Here we go.
20:12
SPEAKER_00: But not in Berlin.
20:13
SPEAKER_00: It's not going to happen in Berlin.
20:15
SPEAKER_01: You know, after all these comments on our Instagram, I...
20:20
SPEAKER_01: People saying, yeah, we're saying much of nonsense about the expropriation of the apartments.
20:28
SPEAKER_01: So I took another look at it.
20:30
SPEAKER_01: And I have to say, they almost had me sold.
20:32
SPEAKER_01: I read all the entire website of Deutsches Wohnentechnen.
20:39
SPEAKER_01: In a way, I understand where they're coming from.
20:42
SPEAKER_01: And it does make sense to have a lot of apartments under state control.
20:47
SPEAKER_01: 100%.
20:48
SPEAKER_01: And it would give them more leeway in how to reduce rental prices and
20:55
SPEAKER_01: Where I'm not totally convinced is the financing, you know?
21:01
SPEAKER_01: So they're still kind of vague on how much money they will pay for these,
21:05
SPEAKER_00: how many flats is it?
21:06
SPEAKER_00: 140,000 or something?
21:08
SPEAKER_00: It's not going to happen.
21:09
SPEAKER_01: It's like,
21:09
SPEAKER_01: they're like,
21:10
SPEAKER_01: well, it's going to be between one symbolic euro and 36 billion euros, you know?
21:15
SPEAKER_01: And they say, yeah, we'll pay for it.
21:18
SPEAKER_01: We'll finance it through the rental income.
21:21
SPEAKER_01: Sure.
21:21
SPEAKER_01: Sure.
21:22
SPEAKER_01: But I just don't really see that happening because they want to pay under market value.
21:31
SPEAKER_01: Far under market value.
21:32
SPEAKER_01: And that's just going to be like a slew of lawsuits.
21:34
SPEAKER_00: That is not going to happen.
21:35
SPEAKER_00: And that's what they don't understand.
21:36
SPEAKER_00: To begin with, I'm not sure that the constitutional court would even approve the expropriation.
21:41
SPEAKER_00: Everybody's like, oh my God, it's in the constitution.
21:43
SPEAKER_00: Expropriate, that is nothing new.
21:46
SPEAKER_00: Eminent domain.
21:46
SPEAKER_00: That's the way you do it.
22:01
SPEAKER_00: And so saying that you can go out to these guys just
22:04
SPEAKER_00: because you hate Deutsche Wohnen,
22:05
SPEAKER_00: who's now Wanovi,
22:06
SPEAKER_00: it does not mean you cannot pay them market value for those apartments.
22:10
SPEAKER_00: It's not going to happen.
22:11
SPEAKER_00: And I don't think the constitutional court will approve that because a company also has rights.
22:15
SPEAKER_00: Property rights are also a part of the German constitution.
22:18
SPEAKER_00: And you can't deny them their rights, their property rights.
22:22
SPEAKER_00: The only way it happens is you pay market value for this thing.
22:25
SPEAKER_00: First,
22:25
SPEAKER_00: you've got 10 years of lawsuits before you finally get the point of being able
22:28
SPEAKER_00: to spend $34 billion.
22:30
SPEAKER_00: So now you're going to spend $34 billion on these apartments.
22:32
SPEAKER_00: You could have built a bunch of apartments the last time.
22:34
SPEAKER_00: And if you're so hot on using eminent domain,
22:36
SPEAKER_00: then why don't you use it to buy all the vacant land where you can build now?
22:40
SPEAKER_00: Use it for that.
22:42
SPEAKER_00: Vacant land.
22:44
SPEAKER_01: Or also,
22:45
SPEAKER_01: you know,
22:45
SPEAKER_01: I think some of the link has a good idea that they want to set up a renter's office
22:50
SPEAKER_01: where,
22:50
SPEAKER_01: which really like put more,
22:52
SPEAKER_01: hire more people that are really looking into renter's rights.
22:55
SPEAKER_01: You know, making sure that existing laws are getting abided by.
22:59
SPEAKER_00: I mean, that's a disease in Berlin is that nothing is enforced.
23:04
SPEAKER_00: Nothing is enforced.
23:04
SPEAKER_01: Right.
23:05
SPEAKER_01: But there's been several lawsuits over the last year or so
23:08
SPEAKER_01: where people have had their rents reduced.
23:12
SPEAKER_00: Why not just do that on an industrial scale?
23:14
SPEAKER_00: There's a cottage industry.
23:16
SPEAKER_00: You like Connie.
23:16
SPEAKER_00: I hate Connie.
23:18
SPEAKER_00: There's a cottage industry of people suing landlords to lower the rent.
23:21
SPEAKER_01: Right.
23:22
SPEAKER_00: I just think they're parasites.
23:23
SPEAKER_01: Why don't more people do that?
23:25
SPEAKER_00: Because you're terrified.
23:26
SPEAKER_00: It's hard to get an apartment.
23:27
SPEAKER_00: And that's also what I don't like about this whole Deutsche Wohnen thing is that
23:31
SPEAKER_00: that is just a symptom.
23:32
SPEAKER_00: The problem is, I mean,
23:33
SPEAKER_00: the real problem is, the real problem is too many people are moving to Berlin.
23:36
SPEAKER_00: We need to stop allowing people to move to Berlin.
23:40
SPEAKER_00: We can't do that.
23:40
SPEAKER_00: So what we need is just build more apartments.
23:42
SPEAKER_00: Just build more apartments.
23:44
SPEAKER_00: We're not doing that.
23:45
SPEAKER_01: But how?
23:46
SPEAKER_01: The thing is, it's hard to make cheap apartments.
23:49
SPEAKER_01: That's the whole thing.
23:51
SPEAKER_01: That's why we have a crisis is because the cost of building has gone up so much.
23:56
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, but that's like running a railway.
23:58
SPEAKER_00: Railways just do not work profitably in private hand.
24:01
SPEAKER_00: They're better in public hand.
24:03
SPEAKER_00: So do that with apartments too.
24:05
SPEAKER_00: Start building them.
24:06
SPEAKER_01: I mean, you have like four or five state-owned housing companies.
24:10
SPEAKER_01: Just plow money into them.
24:11
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
24:12
SPEAKER_00: Just build a ton of apartments.
24:13
SPEAKER_00: And then you're beating the investors at their own game because eventually
24:16
SPEAKER_00: the market turns soft.
24:17
SPEAKER_00: You've got too many apartments.
24:18
SPEAKER_00: Prices fall.
24:20
SPEAKER_01: This is what happened when I moved here in 1999.
24:23
SPEAKER_01: They had built so many new flats in the nineties that it was like,
24:29
SPEAKER_01: you just live wherever you wanted.
24:31
SPEAKER_00: I was writing articles about Texas Pacific group, a private equity company in Texas.
24:36
SPEAKER_00: Where were you going with this?
24:38
SPEAKER_00: They were cutting off the tops of the Plattenboden, the prefab housing in East Berlin.
24:43
SPEAKER_00: They were taking like two stories off so that they could lower the supply and raise rents.
24:50
SPEAKER_00: They were eliminating apartments.
24:51
SPEAKER_00: They were getting rid of apartments.
24:53
SPEAKER_01: I remember at some point they were thinking
24:56
SPEAKER_01: about just demolishing whole apartment blocks in the east
24:59
SPEAKER_01: because there were just too many flats.
25:00
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
25:01
SPEAKER_00: And that's why they sold all those apartments to Goldman Sachs back then.
25:04
SPEAKER_00: Because nobody thought anybody
25:05
SPEAKER_01: wanted them.
25:06
SPEAKER_01: Andrew, can you tell me who sold those apartments to Goldman Sachs?
25:09
SPEAKER_01: It was...
25:10
SPEAKER_01: Die Linke.
25:12
SPEAKER_01: It was also the SPD.
25:13
SPEAKER_01: It was like the Die Linke housing guy.
25:16
SPEAKER_00: It was also Zaretzin.
25:18
SPEAKER_01: Right.
25:20
SPEAKER_00: It was SPD.
25:21
SPEAKER_01: Right, but they had a coalition with the Link at the time.
25:24
SPEAKER_00: We forget those details.
25:25
SPEAKER_00: I mean, that's the problem with the Link is that you have to forget so much
25:28
SPEAKER_00: to actually like them, like how they started.
25:31
SPEAKER_00: Remember the PDS?
25:33
SPEAKER_00: Yes.
25:33
SPEAKER_00: I mean, it's like you have to go back.
25:35
SPEAKER_00: And then that's the Rosa Luxemburg Stiftung.
25:37
SPEAKER_00: How much of that money is Stasi money?
25:40
SPEAKER_00: Anyway, that's just completely unfounded criticism.
25:43
SPEAKER_01: That sounds like a conspiracy theory.
25:45
SPEAKER_01: The Rosa Luxemburg Stiftung?
25:47
SPEAKER_01: Where'd they get their money?
25:50
SPEAKER_01: They get it from the taxpayer, like all those Stiftung things.
25:53
SPEAKER_01: Think tax in Germany get money
25:55
SPEAKER_00: from us.
25:55
SPEAKER_00: We should be a think tank.
25:57
SPEAKER_00: We should be the 20%.
26:00
SPEAKER_01: Do we have a coherent thought between us?
26:03
SPEAKER_00: You can't even speak a coherent sentence, so I think the answer is no.
26:07
SPEAKER_00: So you think we're going to get the Red Red Green Coalition back?
26:10
SPEAKER_00: It's going to be Elif, Mayor Elif?
26:13
SPEAKER_00: I think it will be Mare Elif.
26:14
SPEAKER_00: How fun is that?
26:15
SPEAKER_00: Because no German can say that name.
26:17
SPEAKER_01: I think it's great that somebody with a Turkish background could finally be Mare.
26:23
SPEAKER_01: That's cool.
26:24
SPEAKER_00: We were talking about this before we turned it on.
26:26
SPEAKER_00: I like her too.
26:27
SPEAKER_00: I like her style.
26:27
SPEAKER_00: I like the way she talks.
26:28
SPEAKER_00: I like her ideas.
26:29
SPEAKER_00: I just don't like everything Dilinka is doing.
26:31
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I know.
26:32
SPEAKER_01: I think I'm okay with her being mayor.
26:34
SPEAKER_01: I think they're going to fail with the Aikton thing, but
26:39
SPEAKER_00: that's just my opinion.
26:40
SPEAKER_00: That's also why I think they shouldn't even try it.
26:41
SPEAKER_00: You know what?
26:42
SPEAKER_01: I think they should try it because
26:46
SPEAKER_01: the citizens of Berlin did sign up for it with a referendum.
26:50
SPEAKER_00: The thing is you could promise the citizens of Berlin that they get a free car.
26:53
SPEAKER_00: They would vote for it, you know?
26:55
SPEAKER_01: I mean, that's actually,
26:56
SPEAKER_01: I talked to a politician of a party I won't name the other day,
27:01
SPEAKER_01: and she said that, yeah,
27:03
SPEAKER_01: basically,
27:03
SPEAKER_01: Die Linke is just, it's kind of like Trump offering 5,000 euros every voter.
27:08
SPEAKER_00: The funny thing is, I bought my car with my Trump refund during his last presidency.
27:15
SPEAKER_01: Okay, you heard it here.
27:16
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
27:18
SPEAKER_00: So if we talked about the other thing,
27:20
SPEAKER_00: one other thing to talk about in the election was that it came out last week
27:23
SPEAKER_00: that Stefan Koch,
27:24
SPEAKER_00: the SPD mayoral candidate,
27:26
SPEAKER_00: is being investigated for corruption in his old state of Nordrhein-Westphalia
27:31
SPEAKER_00: in Hanover.
27:33
SPEAKER_00: Weird timing.
27:34
SPEAKER_00: Weird timing.
27:35
SPEAKER_00: That one came out right before the election.
27:38
SPEAKER_01: I don't know why they fielded this guy.
27:41
SPEAKER_00: Well, it's irrelevant.
27:41
SPEAKER_01: He's from Hanover.
27:42
SPEAKER_01: I mean, he has like no connection to Berlin, really.
27:45
SPEAKER_00: It's weird who the SPD fields as their candidates.
27:48
SPEAKER_00: Like, remember Müller?
27:49
SPEAKER_00: He was even our mayor.
27:51
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
27:51
SPEAKER_00: Dude was like a wet washcloth, as the Germans say.
27:54
SPEAKER_01: I miss Wovie, kind of.
27:57
SPEAKER_00: Yes and no.
27:58
SPEAKER_00: He's full of shit, but I kind of like his charisma.
28:00
SPEAKER_00: He was fun.
28:00
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, he was fun.
28:02
SPEAKER_00: He was that generation of Blair, Clinton, Schwerdahl, those guys.
28:06
SPEAKER_00: And to be fair, of the four of them, he's the only one who's not a total dirtbag.
28:11
SPEAKER_01: Right.
28:12
SPEAKER_00: But he's that generation of charismatic leader.
28:15
SPEAKER_00: It was fun.
28:16
SPEAKER_00: Vovie was fun.
28:17
SPEAKER_00: But you're mayor of the city in crisis.
28:21
SPEAKER_00: The only thing that works in that city is culture.
28:23
SPEAKER_00: What do you appoint yourself as?
28:25
SPEAKER_00: Culture minister.
28:28
SPEAKER_00: Although he did.
28:28
SPEAKER_00: He hired Saracen knowing everybody would hate him and Saracen liked to be hated.
28:32
SPEAKER_00: So that's for old people.
28:35
SPEAKER_01: That's right.
28:36
SPEAKER_01: Who the hell is Saracen?
28:37
SPEAKER_01: That's a whole other podcast.
28:38
SPEAKER_00: He was the finance minister.
28:40
SPEAKER_00: He's SPD, but he also happens to be a Nazi.
28:42
SPEAKER_00: Yes.
28:42
SPEAKER_01: Yes.
28:43
SPEAKER_00: So this,
28:44
SPEAKER_00: so Stefan Koch apparently gave a buddy of his some information about a tender for
28:48
SPEAKER_00: a vacant hospital,
28:49
SPEAKER_00: real estate, told his buddy, here's what you need to bid on it so you can get it.
28:53
SPEAKER_00: The guy did not win it.
28:54
SPEAKER_00: It's come out that maybe, I don't know that Stefan actually did this.
28:57
SPEAKER_00: That's what he's being accused of.
28:59
SPEAKER_01: He's actually being investigated by, by state prosecutors.
29:01
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
29:02
SPEAKER_00: they searched his house.
29:04
SPEAKER_00: So it's weird.
29:04
SPEAKER_01: Not a great look if you're running for office.
29:07
SPEAKER_00: But at the same time,
29:07
SPEAKER_00: it's irrelevant because he doesn't have a chance in hell of becoming mayor.
29:11
SPEAKER_01: Right.
29:11
SPEAKER_00: Just doesn't look good for you.
29:12
SPEAKER_00: And it looks like it may have cost him one or two percent.
29:14
SPEAKER_01: He's kind of vain, too.
29:15
SPEAKER_01: Like, I watched an RBB report of him campaigning.
29:21
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
29:21
SPEAKER_01: And he just randomly said to the camera, I look like Tom Cruise, right?
29:27
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
29:29
SPEAKER_01: Fuck you.
29:29
SPEAKER_00: Are you kidding me?
29:31
SPEAKER_00: That's so lame.
29:32
SPEAKER_00: He does give you that air of like, of course you're interviewing me.
29:35
SPEAKER_00: I can't believe you waited so long to interview me.
29:37
SPEAKER_00: We should have been doing this yesterday.
29:39
SPEAKER_01: A little bit overly self-confident.
29:41
SPEAKER_00: Whereas the green candidate always looks like he's about to bust out
29:44
SPEAKER_00: in tears every time they hear him.
29:45
SPEAKER_00: Werner Graf.
29:45
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, he's just a mess.
29:48
SPEAKER_00: What up, Stefan Evers?
29:52
SPEAKER_00: Avers is like Graf, so the guy at the Green Party who looks like he's about to fall apart.
29:55
SPEAKER_00: Avers is like his... Of the CDU.
29:57
SPEAKER_00: Avers of the CDU is like his older brother who's going, who's studying business.
30:02
SPEAKER_01: He's not, he doesn't look old.
30:03
SPEAKER_01: He's like one of these young guys that looks old.
30:05
SPEAKER_01: A little bit like Philip Amtour.
30:08
SPEAKER_01: Like there are these guys in their thirties who dress like people in the 1950s
30:12
SPEAKER_01: with like, I don't know.
30:15
SPEAKER_00: They're like, you're trying extra hard to look conservative.
30:18
SPEAKER_00: Does your grandfather know you raided his wardrobe?
30:22
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
30:22
SPEAKER_00: He just, there's no, there's no real flash to him.
30:25
SPEAKER_00: I guess he's nicer than Wegner, our current mayor.
30:28
SPEAKER_01: He's like, he wants to expropriate clan families.
30:32
SPEAKER_01: Do you see that ad they have out on the streets?
30:34
SPEAKER_01: Expropriate the clans?
30:35
SPEAKER_00: Well, I mean, they already are.
30:36
SPEAKER_00: They took the one villa in Klein-Machnell.
30:39
SPEAKER_01: I mean, it's a little populist, if you ask me.
30:41
SPEAKER_00: But it's kind of funny that they're sort of referencing the link.
30:45
SPEAKER_00: All the CDU stuff is all this, like, guarded racism.
30:48
SPEAKER_00: Or FTP, the one of, like, good German, good jobs.
30:53
SPEAKER_01: I mean, it does help to speak German if you want to get a job.
30:58
SPEAKER_01: It is pretty shitty of them to just bring it up in a campaign.
31:02
SPEAKER_00: Because you're saying like, okay, this person has a doctor,
31:04
SPEAKER_00: has an expert in their field, but I don't quite understand what they're saying.
31:08
SPEAKER_00: This guy didn't even finish high school, but I can understand.
31:10
SPEAKER_00: So you're in.
31:11
SPEAKER_00: Let's go.
31:12
SPEAKER_00: You're running the nuclear program now.
31:14
SPEAKER_01: Like, it's just a dumb...
31:16
SPEAKER_01: There is no nuclear program.
31:17
SPEAKER_00: Dog whistles for the right wing.
31:19
SPEAKER_01: Fair enough.
31:20
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I mean, yeah, there's a lot of dog whistles in the CDU and the FTP campaigns, for sure.
31:25
SPEAKER_00: We could probably do a special on the clans in Berlin.
31:27
SPEAKER_00: I hate the clans.
31:28
SPEAKER_01: Anyway...
31:30
SPEAKER_01: Why some people say that the word clan is racist?
31:33
SPEAKER_01: I don't really understand that.
31:34
SPEAKER_00: I was one of those people who said it forever.
31:36
SPEAKER_00: I still kind of think it because you're referring to like when you say clan,
31:40
SPEAKER_00: you're picturing bad ones in the desert.
31:42
SPEAKER_01: I'm picturing the Ku Klux Klan.
31:44
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
31:44
SPEAKER_01: The Klan, it comes from Scotland, right?
31:46
SPEAKER_00: Yeah,
31:47
SPEAKER_00: but really what they mean when they say clan is like a group of turbaned Arabs in
31:52
SPEAKER_00: the desert living in tents.
31:55
SPEAKER_01: Somehow they're backwoods or something because they have big families.
31:58
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and then it's always these Arab families.
32:01
SPEAKER_00: But it's like saying Italian crime families.
32:04
SPEAKER_00: So I always wrote Berlin crime families.
32:06
SPEAKER_00: Mafia, people get upset about saying mafia is racist too.
32:11
SPEAKER_01: Okay.
32:12
SPEAKER_00: But I've gone over to just saying clans.
32:13
SPEAKER_00: I don't think the clans actually care.
32:15
SPEAKER_01: I don't think they care at all.
32:16
SPEAKER_00: I don't think Remo or Abu Shaker is out there going like...
32:18
SPEAKER_01: I think clan is just a big extended family.
32:21
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, but that's what they're saying.
32:22
SPEAKER_00: And they're just crime families.
32:23
SPEAKER_00: They're not necessarily...
32:25
SPEAKER_00: There are a lot of cousins involved always.
32:28
SPEAKER_00: And I have friends who have those last names,
32:31
SPEAKER_00: Remo or whatever, and they're not a part of the family.
32:33
SPEAKER_00: They're not a part of the clan and they're kind of annoyed.
32:36
SPEAKER_00: They get tired of being shoehorned.
32:39
SPEAKER_00: Like, no, I don't drive a Black Benz.
32:42
SPEAKER_00: Just because my name is Remo.
32:44
SPEAKER_01: Okay.
32:45
SPEAKER_00: All right.
32:46
SPEAKER_00: Do you want to talk about not the election?
32:47
SPEAKER_00: Do you want to talk about something else?
32:49
SPEAKER_01: Well, this is related to the election.
32:50
SPEAKER_01: I mean, it's related to the big issue in the election, which is housing.
32:54
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
32:55
SPEAKER_01: So a Berlin court ruled that districts like
33:00
SPEAKER_01: the Pazirka can prohibit temporary furnished rentals.
33:05
SPEAKER_01: Which is a loophole that allows landlords to charge higher rents.
33:10
SPEAKER_01: So basically you can do a contract, like a two-year temporary contract for your furnished flat.
33:16
SPEAKER_01: And then charge people like 25 euros per square meter per month.
33:21
SPEAKER_00: Because there's this logic that it's only temporarily rented,
33:23
SPEAKER_00: so you don't have the security,
33:24
SPEAKER_00: so you can charge more,
33:25
SPEAKER_00: plus you're furnishing it, so you can charge for the furnishings.
33:29
SPEAKER_01: So this court said that this is not okay, especially in milieux.
33:40
SPEAKER_01: Which are these sort of special zones where the government wants
33:44
SPEAKER_01: to maintain what they see as a healthy social mix.
33:49
SPEAKER_01: So there's not too many rich people, not too many poor people.
33:53
SPEAKER_01: And so what happened was basically a Neukölln landlord sued after
33:58
SPEAKER_01: the district had forbidden her from renting out 15 furnished apartments temporarily
34:05
SPEAKER_01: at between 23 and 32 euros per square meter.
34:09
SPEAKER_00: Which is double to triple the normal price.
34:12
SPEAKER_01: That's like 100 square meters would be like 3,000.
34:14
SPEAKER_01: Jesus.
34:16
SPEAKER_00: I mean, the apartment above me is a temporary rental.
34:18
SPEAKER_00: And we had some really cool renters down on the ground floor.
34:21
SPEAKER_00: We'd say first floor in America, the ground floor.
34:24
SPEAKER_00: Shout out, Dick.
34:26
SPEAKER_00: And he actually, we also know their owner, the guy who owns the apartment.
34:30
SPEAKER_00: He kicked them out.
34:31
SPEAKER_00: He sort of said like, oh, my son might move in, might not.
34:34
SPEAKER_00: They didn't want to have a long legal battle.
34:35
SPEAKER_00: So they're like, we'll just leave.
34:36
SPEAKER_00: We'll just leave.
34:37
SPEAKER_00: And he did it intentionally so he could convert it to a temporary apartment
34:40
SPEAKER_00: and charge way too much.
34:42
SPEAKER_00: Now there's a woman from New York down there.
34:43
SPEAKER_00: She's like, I can't believe the rent is so cheap.
34:47
SPEAKER_00: You're the problem lady.
34:48
SPEAKER_01: For the 32 square meters per square meter.
34:52
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
34:52
SPEAKER_00: That's probably what he's charging him.
34:54
SPEAKER_01: So the rent in this place in Neukölln,
34:57
SPEAKER_01: in this part of Neukölln
34:57
SPEAKER_01: where this land lady was renting out 15 furnished apartments was actually only 10
35:03
SPEAKER_01: euros 37 per square meter.
35:06
SPEAKER_00: Unfurnished.
35:07
SPEAKER_01: According to the Meatspeaker.
35:08
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
35:09
SPEAKER_01: Crazy.
35:09
SPEAKER_00: All right.
35:10
SPEAKER_00: The thing is,
35:10
SPEAKER_00: I didn't think people were that greedy until that happened here on the ground floor.
35:13
SPEAKER_00: I'm like, oh, there are just greedy douchebags.
35:15
SPEAKER_00: Above us,
35:16
SPEAKER_00: it's a professor at an Ivy League school in New York,
35:20
SPEAKER_00: of which I guess there's only one.
35:22
SPEAKER_00: Oh, no, there's two, so we don't know which one it is.
35:24
SPEAKER_00: Anyways, a professor there.
35:25
SPEAKER_00: They're only here at Christmastime and a couple weeks in the summer, so they use it then.
35:30
SPEAKER_00: Otherwise, they just rent it out expensively, and we never know who our neighbors are.
35:34
SPEAKER_01: My question is, why do all these well-off people still want to come to Berlin?
35:39
SPEAKER_00: So that you can go clubbing for a weekend.
35:42
SPEAKER_01: Why don't they go to rich people places like Paris or Madrid, Rome?
35:48
SPEAKER_00: It's funny because we were looking at all the real estate ads in Paris.
35:51
SPEAKER_00: It could get worse in Berlin.
35:54
SPEAKER_00: You can buy a 14 square meter place for $200,000.
35:58
SPEAKER_00: But the fact that there are even our 14 square meter apartments.
36:01
SPEAKER_00: But we were like, oh,
36:01
SPEAKER_00: maybe we buy one of those and we'll just have a weekend place in Paris, you know?
36:05
SPEAKER_01: Just do it.
36:07
SPEAKER_01: Forget about it.
36:08
SPEAKER_01: That would suck.
36:09
SPEAKER_01: Stay in a hotel.
36:10
SPEAKER_00: That's the thing.
36:10
SPEAKER_00: By the time you get to, well, you don't have any equity in it, but yeah, I don't know.
36:14
SPEAKER_00: They just do.
36:15
SPEAKER_00: They like it here.
36:17
SPEAKER_00: Well, his wife is German.
36:18
SPEAKER_00: No, she's not.
36:19
SPEAKER_00: He's German.
36:20
SPEAKER_00: He's German.
36:21
SPEAKER_00: She's American.
36:23
SPEAKER_00: So, you know, he's coming home to see his family, I guess, but they're not from Berlin.
36:26
SPEAKER_01: I think they also need to crack down on empty flats.
36:30
SPEAKER_00: They can just look in the,
36:32
SPEAKER_01: like, look, they have every, everyone has to register, right?
36:35
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
36:35
SPEAKER_01: And they also have a database of all the flats.
36:37
SPEAKER_01: So they can just be like, okay,
36:38
SPEAKER_01: these are,
36:39
SPEAKER_01: they just need to link two databases and say,
36:41
SPEAKER_01: there's nobody living in this flat because they haven't angemelded.
36:45
SPEAKER_01: So let's go send a letter to the landlord and say, you'll get fined unless you rent it out.
36:52
SPEAKER_00: Well, but now we're back to the issue of things don't get enforced in Berlin.
36:55
SPEAKER_01: Right.
36:56
SPEAKER_01: Okay.
36:56
SPEAKER_01: But that like just some AI app, you could vibe code that in a weekend, man.
37:00
SPEAKER_00: Jesus, listen to you.
37:03
SPEAKER_00: I do sometimes wonder how frustrated are the people in the IT department in Berlin
37:06
SPEAKER_00: of like, here's an idea.
37:08
SPEAKER_00: And then, then everybody else is here's 16 reasons why you can't do it.
37:11
SPEAKER_00: And you're like, Oh my God, I could have done this this afternoon.
37:14
SPEAKER_00: We would have solved the problem.
37:16
SPEAKER_01: Like, No,
37:18
SPEAKER_01: because, I mean,
37:19
SPEAKER_01: in Copenhagen,
37:20
SPEAKER_01: for example,
37:20
SPEAKER_01: where I have some knowledge of the rental market,
37:22
SPEAKER_01: it's illegal to have your flat empty.
37:26
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I'm not that.
37:27
SPEAKER_00: Like, somebody has to live there.
37:28
SPEAKER_00: It's illegal here, too.
37:30
SPEAKER_00: Okay, but they don't enforce it.
37:31
SPEAKER_00: Well, it's the same problem.
37:31
SPEAKER_00: I mean, that's the only thing is, like,
37:33
SPEAKER_00: that's sort of why you want a conservative government,
37:34
SPEAKER_00: because then they push enforcement of things
37:36
SPEAKER_01: like that.
37:36
SPEAKER_01: That's the thing with Germany.
37:37
SPEAKER_01: They make too many rules.
37:39
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
37:40
SPEAKER_00: Like, only make a rule if you can enforce the rule.
37:43
SPEAKER_00: Well, we just raised the fines on dumping, illegal dumping.
37:47
SPEAKER_01: Right, and then cigarette and throwing a cigarette butt on the ground.
37:49
SPEAKER_01: Have you seen any change in people, in smokers' behavior?
37:52
SPEAKER_00: No, and I was actually,
37:53
SPEAKER_00: I consciously looked at how filthy the streets are in Paris,
37:56
SPEAKER_00: and I would say it's kind of like here.
37:57
SPEAKER_00: There's mattresses on every block.
37:59
SPEAKER_00: There's an Ikea schrank disassembled, dumped in a corner on every block.
38:03
SPEAKER_01: Right, but then there's some little charming cafe and like a really good bakery.
38:07
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, but I was just like, these are big city problems.
38:09
SPEAKER_00: It's not unique to Berlin that there's trash everywhere.
38:13
SPEAKER_00: All right, should we move on to...
38:17
SPEAKER_01: Do you have any more stories?
38:18
SPEAKER_00: Wait, that's all my stories.
38:19
SPEAKER_00: I got a story.
38:19
SPEAKER_00: All right, do another story.
38:21
SPEAKER_01: So, you know, it's funny.
38:22
SPEAKER_01: The other day,
38:23
SPEAKER_01: last podcast,
38:24
SPEAKER_01: I talked about the Mughal Torm and I climbed up there and I looked over towards
38:27
SPEAKER_01: the airport and looking from there, you realize how small the airport is.
38:31
SPEAKER_00: Oh, that's right.
38:31
SPEAKER_00: We do have another thing.
38:32
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
38:33
SPEAKER_01: The airport,
38:34
SPEAKER_01: like it feels kind of big when you're in it,
38:36
SPEAKER_01: but compared to any other major airport, it's tiny.
38:39
SPEAKER_00: No, it feels big because the roof is high and you go up those big escalators.
38:41
SPEAKER_01: Right.
38:42
SPEAKER_00: It doesn't have that many gates.
38:43
SPEAKER_00: In any other airport, you go through four of those buildings.
38:47
SPEAKER_01: Right.
38:47
SPEAKER_01: And you're taxiing like half an hour past all these buildings.
38:50
SPEAKER_00: And then some of the gates aren't even gates.
38:52
SPEAKER_00: There's just a door in a hallway.
38:53
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
38:54
SPEAKER_00: There's one, I don't know, it's a gate number one or something.
38:56
SPEAKER_00: There are no seats.
38:57
SPEAKER_00: There's just a desk and you walk out.
38:59
SPEAKER_00: I don't know.
39:00
SPEAKER_00: It feels like it's an overflow gate that's being used as a main gate.
39:03
SPEAKER_01: Anyway, so...
39:05
SPEAKER_01: So Berlin is just a very provincial place when it comes to air travel.
39:09
SPEAKER_01: And air travel is down by hugely since pre-COVID times when we were having
39:15
SPEAKER_01: about 40 million passengers per year.
39:19
SPEAKER_01: Now it's around 28 million, I believe.
39:21
SPEAKER_00: Well, we were a little spoiled that you just took the ring bond over to Tegel.
39:23
SPEAKER_01: Right.
39:25
SPEAKER_00: And then you basically got off the ring bond onto your airplane.
39:27
SPEAKER_01: Right.
39:27
SPEAKER_01: And one of the issues is that there are not many long haul flights.
39:31
SPEAKER_01: It's just weird destinations.
39:33
SPEAKER_01: So Emirates,
39:37
SPEAKER_01: the airline from United Arab Emirates,
39:39
SPEAKER_01: has just secured German traffic rights for daily flights between Dubai and Berlin.
39:49
SPEAKER_00: It's a little bit complicated.
39:50
SPEAKER_00: They had the right to land at four airports.
39:52
SPEAKER_00: Right.
39:53
SPEAKER_00: Frankfurt, Munich, Düsseldorf, and Hamburg.
39:55
SPEAKER_00: I think it was any four airports.
39:57
SPEAKER_00: They could do any four.
39:58
SPEAKER_00: I don't know that for sure.
39:59
SPEAKER_00: It was a little bit complicated.
40:00
SPEAKER_00: I was trying to find out about it.
40:01
SPEAKER_00: Because it isn't like they didn't say you can now do Berlin, Dubai.
40:03
SPEAKER_00: They said now you have a fifth airport.
40:05
SPEAKER_00: Pick a fifth airport.
40:06
SPEAKER_00: So everyone's like, what's going to be Berlin?
40:08
SPEAKER_01: Right.
40:09
SPEAKER_01: I mean, this whole thing is part of this big investment package, you know.
40:12
SPEAKER_01: So, Mats went to the UAE and there's this sort of bilateral deal where it's like
40:18
SPEAKER_01: a 40 billion euro deal between Germany and the UAE.
40:22
SPEAKER_01: Apparently, they're going to invest a bunch of money.
40:25
SPEAKER_01: In German industry and defense and stuff.
40:28
SPEAKER_00: This is really nothing new.
40:29
SPEAKER_00: The UAE sovereign wealth funders are called the investment fund of the UAE's government.
40:34
SPEAKER_00: They bailed out Daimler Chrysler after Daimler made the mistake of buying Chrysler.
40:38
SPEAKER_00: They're the ones that saved the company.
40:40
SPEAKER_00: They're a little like Blackstone where...
40:43
SPEAKER_00: Meretz used to work and that they have their fingers everywhere.
40:45
SPEAKER_00: They own 10% of everything.
40:48
SPEAKER_00: I looked it up.
40:49
SPEAKER_00: I mean, this is big.
40:51
SPEAKER_00: $40 billion is big because up until now, they've only invested $38 billion.
40:55
SPEAKER_01: But maybe it's good to have some direct flights to rich places.
40:58
SPEAKER_00: It is good.
40:59
SPEAKER_00: And the reason why Berlin has such a small airport and
41:02
SPEAKER_00: the reason why we don't have such long-haul flights is because Lufthansa funded
41:07
SPEAKER_00: or helped fund the expansion of the Munich airport into a huge airport.
41:12
SPEAKER_00: And Lufthansa was like, we're not doing that again.
41:14
SPEAKER_00: And now they're whining that they gave that flight to a different airline.
41:17
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, they're just trying to protect all of their flights, protect their markets.
41:21
SPEAKER_01: And they want us, they want we Berliners to just fly to Munich or Dusseldorf or Frankfurt.
41:27
SPEAKER_00: We want to fly anywhere else.
41:29
SPEAKER_00: I always fly to Amsterdam.
41:30
SPEAKER_00: Right.
41:31
SPEAKER_00: Or weirdly,
41:32
SPEAKER_00: or luckily,
41:32
SPEAKER_00: actually because of Daimler Chrysler,
41:34
SPEAKER_00: again, there was a direct flight from Berlin to Portland.
41:37
SPEAKER_00: That was cool.
41:38
SPEAKER_01: No, I guess it's Frankfurt, Portland.
41:40
SPEAKER_00: Anyway, I could get to Portland.
41:41
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
41:42
SPEAKER_01: It's crazy how these basically West German companies don't take Berlin seriously.
41:46
SPEAKER_01: It's like a big city.
41:47
SPEAKER_01: It's like, if you take Brandenburg, it's like six, seven million people living here.
41:53
SPEAKER_00: Well, they just already invested all their money.
41:55
SPEAKER_00: That's what it's about.
41:55
SPEAKER_00: It's like, we already invested this money in Munich.
41:57
SPEAKER_00: If we start investing in Berlin, we're going to have to take it away from Munich.
42:01
SPEAKER_01: Okay.
42:02
SPEAKER_00: And you know, Germans love Munich over Berlin.
42:06
SPEAKER_01: Okay.
42:07
SPEAKER_01: I mean, but then
42:08
SPEAKER_01: don't whine if like a foreign airline picks up that slot.
42:13
SPEAKER_00: It is.
42:13
SPEAKER_00: I mean, that's our job is Lufthansa to whine.
42:16
SPEAKER_00: I'm not going to fly to Dubai anytime soon.
42:19
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, but it's a stepping stone to Asia.
42:21
SPEAKER_01: If you want to go to Thailand or something.
42:24
SPEAKER_00: Everybody loves to go to like Indonesia and Thailand.
42:26
SPEAKER_00: That's just not my thing.
42:26
SPEAKER_01: Okay.
42:28
SPEAKER_01: I've never been there.
42:28
SPEAKER_01: I would go to Helsinki.
42:30
SPEAKER_01: I want to go like hang out in the Alps.
42:32
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
42:33
SPEAKER_00: I had this argument with a friend of mine.
42:34
SPEAKER_00: She was like, I can't wait to get to Greece.
42:36
SPEAKER_00: I was like, Greece, I can't wait for it to become winter again.
42:39
SPEAKER_01: I mean, how do you feel?
42:42
SPEAKER_00: Do you care about long haul flights?
42:44
SPEAKER_00: No, your point, which I was argumentative about is completely right.
42:47
SPEAKER_00: I do care about long haul flights at BER.
42:49
SPEAKER_00: I wish BER was a real airport.
42:51
SPEAKER_01: A direct flight to Denver would be cool.
42:52
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
42:53
SPEAKER_00: Well, I don't need to go back to Denver.
42:54
SPEAKER_00: Direct flight to Portland would be great.
42:56
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I just said we had it, which I don't think we...
42:57
SPEAKER_01: I guess there's like one or two to New York.
42:59
SPEAKER_01: There's one to DC.
43:01
SPEAKER_00: God, remember Air Berlin?
43:02
SPEAKER_00: Oh, the Air Berlin days.
43:05
SPEAKER_00: Tegel to New York.
43:06
SPEAKER_01: Beautiful.
43:09
SPEAKER_01: Rest in peace.
43:10
SPEAKER_00: I don't miss Tegel as much as I miss Air Berlin.
43:12
SPEAKER_01: They had good chocolate.
43:13
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, the chocolate
43:14
SPEAKER_01: hearts.
43:16
SPEAKER_01: To be fair, Lufthansa also gives you some chocolate.
43:19
SPEAKER_00: But it's not that...
43:19
SPEAKER_00: It's not a heart.
43:21
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
43:21
SPEAKER_00: You know, it's just not a heart.
43:24
SPEAKER_00: All right.
43:25
SPEAKER_00: Should we move on to our final?
43:27
SPEAKER_00: We're extending the length of our podcast.
43:29
SPEAKER_00: We've heard our listeners say they liked longer versions.
43:31
SPEAKER_00: So we're just babbling more now.
43:34
SPEAKER_00: So babble away.
43:36
SPEAKER_00: I always say this is our favorite segment.
43:37
SPEAKER_00: I don't necessarily think that is our favorite segment,
43:39
SPEAKER_00: but it's two things we like about Berlin.
43:41
SPEAKER_00: We call it Bear's Knees because of the bee's knees,
43:45
SPEAKER_00: which is great things, but it's the Bear's Knees because it's Berlin.
43:48
SPEAKER_00: We spend the whole podcast complaining about Berlin, so now we'll tell you two things we like.
43:51
SPEAKER_00: I'll start this week.
43:54
SPEAKER_00: I had a great falafel.
43:56
SPEAKER_00: A good falafel to me is not that cheap pita crap you can buy at the grocery store,
43:59
SPEAKER_00: but they're like tortillas.
44:00
SPEAKER_00: They are basically like tortillas to me where they rip it in half and
44:03
SPEAKER_00: then we add hummus without even me asking.
44:07
SPEAKER_00: I don't know if that's how they do it.
44:09
SPEAKER_00: I've never been to the Middle East, so I don't know what a real falafel sandwich is like.
44:13
SPEAKER_00: That's what I like.
44:14
SPEAKER_00: And I like that weird little pickled, what is it?
44:18
SPEAKER_00: It's pink.
44:18
SPEAKER_00: I don't know what it is.
44:19
SPEAKER_01: Pickled onion, no pickled reddish.
44:21
SPEAKER_01: Pickled reddish, reddish thing.
44:22
SPEAKER_01: I like that.
44:23
SPEAKER_01: I've been to Egypt and the falafel I had there was,
44:26
SPEAKER_01: there were,
44:27
SPEAKER_01: you'd buy them from street carts and there was no, there were no fresh vegetables.
44:31
SPEAKER_01: There were only pickled vegetables because they had no refrigeration in the street carts.
44:35
SPEAKER_00: That sounds kind of dope.
44:36
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
44:37
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
44:38
SPEAKER_01: That's where that comes from.
44:39
SPEAKER_01: Okay.
44:39
SPEAKER_01: Traditionally, there was no fresh lettuce or tomatoes or whatever.
44:44
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
44:45
SPEAKER_00: Well, so I went, I was actually, did I have a gig?
44:48
SPEAKER_00: It feels like I was doing a pod.
44:49
SPEAKER_00: I was doing, I had some big thing.
44:51
SPEAKER_00: I don't remember what it was where I was actually getting paid to do comedy.
44:53
SPEAKER_00: And I was like, I got to eat.
44:54
SPEAKER_00: And they're like, I'll go over to this place over there.
44:56
SPEAKER_00: So I walked over there.
44:57
SPEAKER_00: It's called Sister, the World of the Chickpea.
45:00
SPEAKER_00: Cicer.
45:01
SPEAKER_00: Cicer, I think that's what it's called.
45:02
SPEAKER_00: C-I-C-E-R.
45:04
SPEAKER_00: It's on Weserstraße 213.
45:08
SPEAKER_01: It's a totally random falafel joint, but it's good.
45:10
SPEAKER_01: Is it really special?
45:11
SPEAKER_00: No, it was like I walked in there and it was funny.
45:13
SPEAKER_00: I looked at the Google reviews.
45:14
SPEAKER_00: They're like, oh, they're super friendly in there.
45:15
SPEAKER_00: I walked in and the guy was like, he basically was like, because it was like 1030.
45:19
SPEAKER_00: You could tell he was like, oh, God.
45:23
SPEAKER_00: All right, what do you want?
45:24
SPEAKER_00: I also think when you eat a falafel or a kebab,
45:28
SPEAKER_00: have you ever noticed it's important who makes it?
45:31
SPEAKER_00: Do you have a kebab place where you walk in and you're like, oh no, he's making it?
45:34
SPEAKER_00: No, I'm not eating it.
45:36
SPEAKER_01: This is also one of my pet peeves about fast food and bakeries in Berlin.
45:44
SPEAKER_01: They have the glove in one hand and then no glove in the other hand,
45:47
SPEAKER_01: but they just touch the food with both hands and they touch the money
45:51
SPEAKER_01: with both hands.
45:52
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, they pick their nose with the glove on.
45:54
SPEAKER_01: Probably roll a
45:56
SPEAKER_00: cigarette with the glove.
45:56
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, totally.
45:58
SPEAKER_00: The glove is there to protect them, not you.
45:59
SPEAKER_01: Well, actually the other day I was at this pizzeria
46:02
SPEAKER_01: and they were literally just like eating pizza in front of us.
46:04
SPEAKER_01: Like the cook was eating pizza.
46:06
SPEAKER_01: You can't do that.
46:07
SPEAKER_01: You can't eat food in front of the customers while making their food.
46:13
SPEAKER_00: The clubs are falling onto your food.
46:15
SPEAKER_00: I went into a bakery one day and the woman, you'd be like, I want that loaf.
46:19
SPEAKER_00: She would lick her fingers and Get the bag,
46:21
SPEAKER_00: open the bag with her licked fingers,
46:22
SPEAKER_00: and then touch the loaf with her licked fingers.
46:26
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, but the whole thing about like licking, I never got that.
46:29
SPEAKER_01: You have to lick your fingers before you like open something.
46:33
SPEAKER_00: Haven't you noticed as you got older, you don't have as much oil on your fingers sometimes?
46:38
SPEAKER_01: I don't do that.
46:39
SPEAKER_01: I don't lick my fingers.
46:39
SPEAKER_00: I don't lick my fingers either, but like when I turned like 50,
46:41
SPEAKER_00: I was like, oh, that's why my grandmother was licking her fingers.
46:44
SPEAKER_01: Wait, too much oil or
46:45
SPEAKER_00: not enough?
46:45
SPEAKER_00: No, not enough.
46:46
SPEAKER_00: Your hands are drier than they used to be.
46:49
SPEAKER_00: You know where you notice it is when you're trying to order at Burger King or whatever?
46:53
SPEAKER_00: Those things don't always work.
46:54
SPEAKER_01: Those screens.
46:55
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
46:56
SPEAKER_01: You know, if you think about it, it's kind of gross as well.
46:58
SPEAKER_01: Like you should wash your hands after
47:00
SPEAKER_00: you use those.
47:01
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
47:03
SPEAKER_00: So anyway, so I went to this chickpea place.
47:04
SPEAKER_00: And so my point is,
47:05
SPEAKER_00: like, a lot of times the guy making the falafel doesn't really know what he's doing.
47:08
SPEAKER_00: And for some reason, it doesn't taste right.
47:10
SPEAKER_00: It did taste right.
47:11
SPEAKER_00: I was like, okay, he didn't want me there, but he made me a good falafel.
47:14
SPEAKER_00: And it is a place where, like, when I'm working at home, I'll be like, should I go over there?
47:19
SPEAKER_00: Which would be like a 25-minute drive for me.
47:20
SPEAKER_00: Of course, I'm going to drive over there.
47:22
SPEAKER_01: Is it that good?
47:23
SPEAKER_01: It's that good.
47:24
SPEAKER_01: But you would go to an icon from Pennsylvania.
47:25
SPEAKER_01: It's that good.
47:26
SPEAKER_00: There's another good falafel is, what was it?
47:30
SPEAKER_00: Lebanon in the 70s, Beirut in the 70s, over by Boxhagener Platz.
47:35
SPEAKER_00: It's the same kind of falafel.
47:36
SPEAKER_00: Those dudes, I've had a couple of fights, a couple of disagreements with them.
47:40
SPEAKER_00: And so I don't want to go there.
47:42
SPEAKER_01: About food?
47:43
SPEAKER_01: What?
47:44
SPEAKER_00: No, it was like...
47:45
SPEAKER_01: How do you get in a fight at a falafel restaurant?
47:48
SPEAKER_00: One time it was about money, where he's like, okay, it's five years.
47:50
SPEAKER_00: I'm like, I paid you when I ordered.
47:51
SPEAKER_00: He's like, no, you didn't.
47:53
SPEAKER_00: Because you know that thing where there's like 20 people ordering
47:55
SPEAKER_00: and they don't write anything down.
47:56
SPEAKER_00: They're just convinced they're going to remember it.
47:58
SPEAKER_00: They're like, I'm a pro here.
47:58
SPEAKER_00: I know what I'm doing.
47:59
SPEAKER_00: So he was doing that thing where I was like, number one, I'm going to have to order again.
48:02
SPEAKER_00: And then so I was like, he's like, your falafels are ready.
48:04
SPEAKER_00: Didn't you have a falafel?
48:05
SPEAKER_00: I was like, yeah.
48:06
SPEAKER_00: And then he goes, it's five euros.
48:07
SPEAKER_00: I was like, I gave you the money when I ordered.
48:08
SPEAKER_00: He's like, no, you didn't.
48:09
SPEAKER_01: All cash business.
48:10
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
48:11
SPEAKER_01: Of course I did.
48:12
SPEAKER_00: So then in the end, he was just like, just take it.
48:14
SPEAKER_00: Then I'll just give you a free one this time.
48:16
SPEAKER_00: And he's all insulted.
48:16
SPEAKER_00: I'm like, dude, I paid you.
48:18
SPEAKER_00: The other time I ordered, then he's like, I was like, I'll be sitting out front.
48:22
SPEAKER_00: He's like, that's fine.
48:23
SPEAKER_00: And then, uh, like whatever leaf Aranda or whatever came in, it was obviously a buddy of his.
48:28
SPEAKER_00: So they started talking after 10 minutes of them just standing there chatting.
48:31
SPEAKER_00: I was like, dude, where's my falafel?
48:33
SPEAKER_00: He's like, I'm making your falafel.
48:34
SPEAKER_01: I'm just talking to like, this is not the one you're recommending.
48:37
SPEAKER_00: But when they make, no, this is a different one.
48:39
SPEAKER_00: This is Beirut in the 70s or whatever by Boxy.
48:42
SPEAKER_00: They make a great falafel there too,
48:43
SPEAKER_00: but the guys, I don't eat there anymore because of the guys.
48:46
SPEAKER_00: The sister place, it was all fine.
48:49
SPEAKER_00: I'm recommending it.
48:50
SPEAKER_00: Go there.
48:51
SPEAKER_01: Okay.
48:52
SPEAKER_00: But yeah, no, I seriously, some days I will be like, dude, do I drive over there?
48:55
SPEAKER_00: Go get this falafel.
48:59
SPEAKER_01: That was pretty long-winded.
49:01
SPEAKER_00: Well, you made me talk about it.
49:02
SPEAKER_01: Okay.
49:03
SPEAKER_01: My Bear's Knees is also a restaurant.
49:06
SPEAKER_01: It's a place called Zee Roze.
49:08
SPEAKER_01: It's like a kind of an old school vegetarian lunch buffet place,
49:16
SPEAKER_01: but it's not really,
49:16
SPEAKER_01: it's like the kind of buffet where you,
49:18
SPEAKER_01: where the stuff is behind glass and then you point at stuff.
49:21
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
49:22
SPEAKER_01: And they,
49:23
SPEAKER_01: so you say you pay like 12 euros and then you get to choose three,
49:28
SPEAKER_01: three dishes, three sides, no, no, three main dishes.
49:31
SPEAKER_00: And they pile it onto a plate and it's all vegetarian.
49:35
SPEAKER_01: It's stuff like moussaka, potato, gratin potatoes,
49:42
SPEAKER_01: lasagna.
49:44
SPEAKER_00: Vegetarian lasagna.
49:45
SPEAKER_01: It's sort of like, I don't know, Turkish, Mediterranean, Greek stuff.
49:51
SPEAKER_01: And then you get a salad too on top of that.
49:54
SPEAKER_01: They just pile the salad on top of it.
49:55
SPEAKER_01: If you're hungry, it's amazing.
49:58
SPEAKER_00: Can I say that sounds like my kind of place?
49:59
SPEAKER_00: Because what I like is when you just combine three different things on your plate
50:02
SPEAKER_00: and stuff it in your big fat mouth.
50:04
SPEAKER_00: I don't know why I love that.
50:06
SPEAKER_00: And in the end, you've only got a little bit of everything, so you just got to go for it.
50:09
SPEAKER_01: It's great.
50:11
SPEAKER_01: It's not trendy.
50:13
SPEAKER_01: It looks like it opened 20 years ago.
50:14
SPEAKER_01: It's at Zutkoitz.
50:17
SPEAKER_01: It's a really nice place.
50:18
SPEAKER_00: I did not know there was anything at Zutkoitz.
50:20
SPEAKER_01: Okay, there's like one drawback.
50:23
SPEAKER_01: They get Zoodkoits.
50:26
SPEAKER_01: I'm sorry.
50:27
SPEAKER_01: Not Zoodkoits.
50:28
SPEAKER_01: Zoodstern.
50:29
SPEAKER_00: Forget about Zoodkoits.
50:30
SPEAKER_01: Zoodstern and Koits back.
50:32
SPEAKER_00: Zoodstern.
50:33
SPEAKER_00: Very different.
50:34
SPEAKER_01: So they have one drawback is that they take cards, but they only take the Giro card.
50:40
SPEAKER_00: Which don't even exist anymore.
50:41
SPEAKER_01: They do.
50:42
SPEAKER_01: They do.
50:42
SPEAKER_01: They do.
50:43
SPEAKER_00: We only accept diners.
50:44
SPEAKER_01: I paid with my Giro card.
50:45
SPEAKER_00: I didn't have one anymore.
50:47
SPEAKER_00: Had you been visiting Ben?
50:48
SPEAKER_00: Is that why you were there?
50:50
SPEAKER_01: No, I just had a meeting with somebody else.
50:55
SPEAKER_00: I love your dot and shoots when it comes to business meetings.
50:58
SPEAKER_00: Well, I was having a business meeting.
50:59
SPEAKER_00: With who?
51:00
SPEAKER_00: Well, it was just a meeting.
51:01
SPEAKER_00: It's always like the German in you comes out, just dot
51:04
SPEAKER_01: and shoots.
51:05
SPEAKER_01: So yeah,
51:05
SPEAKER_01: and then actually the guy I was with,
51:06
SPEAKER_01: who's actually from England,
51:07
SPEAKER_01: he was like,
51:08
SPEAKER_01: complained,
51:08
SPEAKER_01: just like he went into a rant at the woman about how they don't take proper cards
51:13
SPEAKER_01: and how it's all about tax evasion.
51:15
SPEAKER_01: And then he asked for a receipt and then we got a receipt.
51:18
SPEAKER_00: I don't think it's always about tax evasion.
51:20
SPEAKER_00: People love to rip that out.
51:21
SPEAKER_01: Well, I guess with a Visa card, you need to pay like 3%.
51:24
SPEAKER_00: I don't even think it's that.
51:25
SPEAKER_01: I think sometimes it's just like- And with the Giro card, it's only like 1.5%.
51:28
SPEAKER_00: If I have cash, I can pay the cook under the table.
51:30
SPEAKER_00: I mean, it is like,
51:32
SPEAKER_00: I just think sometimes I understand the tax,
51:33
SPEAKER_00: but I understand the cash only thing,
51:36
SPEAKER_00: but I don't understand why you're prescribing how your customers give you money.
51:40
SPEAKER_01: But there's this new rule that just passed the Bundestag,
51:45
SPEAKER_01: I believe,
51:46
SPEAKER_01: where businesses,
51:48
SPEAKER_01: public facing businesses have to accept at least one digital payment.
51:54
SPEAKER_00: I think that's right.
51:55
SPEAKER_00: I don't understand.
51:56
SPEAKER_00: You want my money.
51:57
SPEAKER_00: Like I'm saying, I have,
51:58
SPEAKER_00: I understand why businesses might want to do it,
52:00
SPEAKER_00: but on the other hand, I don't, because you want me to give you your money.
52:03
SPEAKER_00: Why are you telling me how I should give you my money?
52:06
SPEAKER_01: There's this thing,
52:07
SPEAKER_01: like these ATMs I use sometimes,
52:09
SPEAKER_01: like these are really annoying ones that you get at Speaties.
52:12
SPEAKER_01: And one of them the other day, it said, it was kind of desperate.
52:15
SPEAKER_01: It said on the screen, cash is freedom.
52:18
SPEAKER_01: Freedom to like tax evade.
52:21
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
52:21
SPEAKER_00: No, I believe in that too.
52:22
SPEAKER_00: I have that little libertarian inside me that says cash isn't free to,
52:25
SPEAKER_00: but it just, why are you prescribing how I give you my money?
52:28
SPEAKER_00: Don't you just want my money?
52:30
SPEAKER_00: And I can, there are businesses here that I don't go to because they don't accept cards.
52:33
SPEAKER_00: I don't have cash on me that much anymore.
52:35
SPEAKER_01: Me neither.
52:36
SPEAKER_00: So like, and I'm not going to go to an ATM, like just take my card, man.
52:40
SPEAKER_00: So I, but I get why they're doing it.
52:43
SPEAKER_00: All right.
52:43
SPEAKER_00: So Zerose.
52:44
SPEAKER_00: Zerose is one of those German words I love because in English we just say lily pad,
52:48
SPEAKER_00: which doesn't, you know, it's cute, it's quaint, but a Zerose.
52:52
SPEAKER_00: Like I would not get a tattoo of a lily pad, but I would get a tattoo of a Zerose.
52:57
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
52:58
SPEAKER_01: A lake rose.
52:58
SPEAKER_00: A lake rose.
52:59
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
53:00
SPEAKER_00: Which doesn't sound good in English.
53:01
SPEAKER_00: That's great.
53:02
SPEAKER_01: You're a vegetarian kind of, right?
53:04
SPEAKER_00: Basically.
53:05
SPEAKER_00: Oh, don't try to be vegan in Paris.
53:06
SPEAKER_00: Forget about it.
53:07
SPEAKER_00: Holy crap.
53:09
SPEAKER_00: They're doing you a favor when it's vegetarian.
53:12
SPEAKER_01: Right.
53:12
SPEAKER_01: They kind of roll their eyes.
53:14
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
53:15
SPEAKER_00: It's nuts.
53:16
SPEAKER_00: I was surprised.
53:16
SPEAKER_00: I get upset in Germany that it's hard to be vegan here.
53:20
SPEAKER_00: Paris, there's just no chance.
53:21
SPEAKER_01: Berlin is one of the vegan capitals of the world.
53:23
SPEAKER_01: I guess so.
53:23
SPEAKER_01: I didn't realize that.
53:24
SPEAKER_01: It is.
53:26
SPEAKER_00: And you know where you can be vegan?
53:28
SPEAKER_00: At Cicero, the world of chickpeas.
53:31
SPEAKER_01: Seerose, more vegetarian, but I probably have some vegan options.
53:36
SPEAKER_00: I just love a plate full of stuff.
53:37
SPEAKER_01: Go there, man.
53:38
SPEAKER_01: You'll love it.
53:40
SPEAKER_01: You'll love it.
53:42
SPEAKER_01: All right, Morris.
53:44
SPEAKER_01: Okay.
53:47
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that's just as annoying as me calling you Morris.
53:49
SPEAKER_00: That's true.
53:50
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I have a news quiz on Wednesday, September 17th, the 16th.
53:57
SPEAKER_01: And if you're American, go to votefromabroad.org,
54:00
SPEAKER_00: our sponsor today.
54:01
SPEAKER_00: And if you buy tickets to the Comedy Night on Sunday,
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SPEAKER_00: that just increases the chances that it happens.
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SPEAKER_00: Where can they find those tickets?
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SPEAKER_00: At downstairscomedyclub.shop.
54:11
SPEAKER_00: Sorry, we don't say dot anymore.
54:13
SPEAKER_00: Downstairscomedyclubshop.com.
54:17
SPEAKER_01: Please leave a favorable review or a rating on
54:24
SPEAKER_00: whatever platform you listen to this to.
54:27
SPEAKER_00: I love you guys.
54:27
SPEAKER_00: Thanks for hearing.
54:28
SPEAKER_01: Bye.
54:28
SPEAKER_00: Cheers.