![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
dream_labyrinthSo, the Polish government thinks they should be allowed to add the deaths of the Second World War to their population when it comes to determining their influence in the European Union.
They have been stalling the process of agreeing on a European Constitution for weeks as they are pretty much the only country in the Union that doesn't like the system that has been created to make sure that neither can the big countries overrule the small ones nor vice versa. The idea basically is that it takes both a majority country-wise as and a majority population-wise to ensure that decisions made really are in the best interest of everybody.
Poland's latest idea amounts to something like this: if it hadn't been for the many deaths in WWII, the Polish population would be about twice it's size, therefore they should have a greater influence.
Many, many politicians and commentators almost fell off their chairs laughing.
Now, there were a number of comments read in the International Press Review of a major German news station, but the one that took the cake was from the French newspaper Le Progrès.
This is the original comment:
Vive la Pologne ! Si elle n'était déjà dans l'Union, il faudrait l'inviter d'urgence à Bruxelles, au Conseil. Car la Pologne assure le spectacle, avec ses jumeaux Kaczynski - Lech et Jaroslaw, têtes de poupon et entêtement de vieillard. A ce Conseil s'est déplacé Lech, qu'on dit plus conciliant, mais comme nul ne parvient à les distinguer. La Pologne nous est indispensable surtout parce qu'elle nous ressemble : dévoreuse de subventions agricoles, jalouse de la puissance allemande, très chatouilleuse sur sa fierté nationale. Mais nouvelle venue dans le club, elle fait tout avec excès, sans les formes façon Quai d'Orsay. A côté de la Pologne, la France apparaît ainsi modérée, raisonnable, coopérative, en un mot européenne. Et tout le monde oublie que si l'Europe en est là, au fond du trou, c'est à cause du « non » français. Il est vrai motivé par la peur du plombier polonais
FRANCIS BROCHET
My French isn't nearly good enough to translate this into English, but fortunately I got to listen to the German version, so I can at least give you parts of it (I am assuming that "Vive la Pologne" is pretty self-explaining):
If [Poland] wasn't already in the Union, they'd have to be invited to the summit in Brussel. Because Poland provides the spectacle, with the Kaczynski twins, Lech and Jaroslaw ...
Poland is irreplacable for is, mainly because they resemble us: eating up agricultural subventions, jealous of the German power, very sensitive where national pride is concerned. But the new arrival in the club, Poland takes everything too far, without the style of the Quai d'Orsay [the French foreign ministry]. Next to Poland, France seems moderate, reasonable, cooperative, in one word, European. And all the world forgets that Europe is in this mess because of the French "no" to the costitution...
Now, the funny thing is that this is true.
To Germany, France felt almost as isolationist as Great Britain, only less open with it. And now suddenly it's Poland that's blocking everything and France can lie back and shake their wise head with the rest of the European Union.
I got a good laugh out of this driving home from work.
Note: Nothing in this post is intended to hurt the feelings of any nationality. If you are Polish or feel pissed on the behalf of the Polish because I'm laughing my head off at the crazy ideas of the brothers Kaczinsky, sorry, but I'm entitled to have my opinion even if it means laughing like crazy about your opinion. After all, you're perfectly free to voice your own and laugh back.
They have been stalling the process of agreeing on a European Constitution for weeks as they are pretty much the only country in the Union that doesn't like the system that has been created to make sure that neither can the big countries overrule the small ones nor vice versa. The idea basically is that it takes both a majority country-wise as and a majority population-wise to ensure that decisions made really are in the best interest of everybody.
Poland's latest idea amounts to something like this: if it hadn't been for the many deaths in WWII, the Polish population would be about twice it's size, therefore they should have a greater influence.
Many, many politicians and commentators almost fell off their chairs laughing.
Now, there were a number of comments read in the International Press Review of a major German news station, but the one that took the cake was from the French newspaper Le Progrès.
This is the original comment:
Vive la Pologne ! Si elle n'était déjà dans l'Union, il faudrait l'inviter d'urgence à Bruxelles, au Conseil. Car la Pologne assure le spectacle, avec ses jumeaux Kaczynski - Lech et Jaroslaw, têtes de poupon et entêtement de vieillard. A ce Conseil s'est déplacé Lech, qu'on dit plus conciliant, mais comme nul ne parvient à les distinguer. La Pologne nous est indispensable surtout parce qu'elle nous ressemble : dévoreuse de subventions agricoles, jalouse de la puissance allemande, très chatouilleuse sur sa fierté nationale. Mais nouvelle venue dans le club, elle fait tout avec excès, sans les formes façon Quai d'Orsay. A côté de la Pologne, la France apparaît ainsi modérée, raisonnable, coopérative, en un mot européenne. Et tout le monde oublie que si l'Europe en est là, au fond du trou, c'est à cause du « non » français. Il est vrai motivé par la peur du plombier polonais
FRANCIS BROCHET
My French isn't nearly good enough to translate this into English, but fortunately I got to listen to the German version, so I can at least give you parts of it (I am assuming that "Vive la Pologne" is pretty self-explaining):
If [Poland] wasn't already in the Union, they'd have to be invited to the summit in Brussel. Because Poland provides the spectacle, with the Kaczynski twins, Lech and Jaroslaw ...
Poland is irreplacable for is, mainly because they resemble us: eating up agricultural subventions, jealous of the German power, very sensitive where national pride is concerned. But the new arrival in the club, Poland takes everything too far, without the style of the Quai d'Orsay [the French foreign ministry]. Next to Poland, France seems moderate, reasonable, cooperative, in one word, European. And all the world forgets that Europe is in this mess because of the French "no" to the costitution...
Now, the funny thing is that this is true.
To Germany, France felt almost as isolationist as Great Britain, only less open with it. And now suddenly it's Poland that's blocking everything and France can lie back and shake their wise head with the rest of the European Union.
I got a good laugh out of this driving home from work.
Note: Nothing in this post is intended to hurt the feelings of any nationality. If you are Polish or feel pissed on the behalf of the Polish because I'm laughing my head off at the crazy ideas of the brothers Kaczinsky, sorry, but I'm entitled to have my opinion even if it means laughing like crazy about your opinion. After all, you're perfectly free to voice your own and laugh back.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2007-06-22 01:59 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-06-22 02:40 pm (UTC)There is a well known German saying, "Glaube keiner Statistik, die du nicht selbst gefälscht hast" - Don't believe in any statistics you didn't falsify yourself.
I would say that Poland used that as their basic principle, except the origin of that quote is Josef Goebbels and I suppose the Kaczinskys would resent me linking them to him...
no subject
Date: 2007-06-22 03:46 pm (UTC)Dr Joe was the first Spin Doctor.
On a WW2 note, I just downloaded "Sink the Bismarck" and was stunned to learn it sunk the HMS Hood from 15 miles away. It gives me the heebie jeebies to think what modern Ships can do.
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=_EdngnDdjCo
would you please translate what the NewsReel guy said at the beginning of the clip. He speaks too fast for my flimsy grasp of German.
I did look up the ship on WICKIpedia and learned it had eight 15 inch guns and achieved a speed of 30 knotts in trials.
no subject
Date: 2007-06-22 04:47 pm (UTC)Especially considering that the song was created at a time when Germany was no longer the dangerous enemy but the valued stronghold against the Communist invasion.
(Which reminds me of a conversation I had with a comrade a while ago about the trouble between the US and Russia at the moment, and that it looked like the Cold War all over again. And then we looked at each other with a wide grin and said, in almost the exact same words, Yeah, but if they fight this time at least it won't be on our front lawn! It's an interesting situation,a ctually. We're so used to being the country that's going to take the most damage if the two world powers collide.)
Here's the news reel translation. I couldn't understand enough of the bits of Hitler's speech they put in at the end of the song, though.
Hamburg, 14th February 1939.
Today, our beloved Führer honoured with his presence the baptism of the mightiest battle ship that the world ever saw. 50,000 tons large, half a metre of the hardest tank steel around the ship and 8 guns of 42 centimetre calibre make this ship into* an unsinkable fortress. The battle ship Bismarck was handed over to its elements by the granddaughter of the iron chancellor [meaning Bismarck]. This new proof of German power will show the world that the German fleet is able to take on any enemy.
*he actually says "machen dieses Schiff in eine unsinkbare Festung" - make into... - even though that is rather bad German. He should have said "machen aus diesem Schiff eine unsinkbare Festung" - turn this ship into an unsinkable... (You'd think they learnt the lesson of not calling a ship "unsinkable" when the Titanic went down!)
no subject
Date: 2007-06-22 04:55 pm (UTC)Though I think he heavily borrowed from the Gentleman Soldier (http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=vO5894s7-9U).
no subject
Date: 2007-06-22 05:02 pm (UTC)Thanks for the excellent translation of Newsreel guy
I can never understand a WORD Hitler says.
Maybe its because he is often shouting, but as Mel Brooks says in the Producers "Hitler was a great painter.... Yes he could paint an ENTIRE appartment in just 2 days
Nun muss ich ins Bett gehen
Guten Tag und vielen Dank!