“Co-say.” Having a voice in a decision.
(MIT shprock eh.)
“Co-say.” Having a voice in a decision.
(MIT shprock eh.)
Free open-source software intended to support das Delegated-Voting. Wikipedia says that in addition to helping “find decisions” and “find opinions,” this software can help efficiently channelize different competencies about a topic.
Update on 17 Dec 2012: According to Oliver Wenzlaff’s 2012 book Piratenkommunikation, the software is now being used by Pirate parties in Austria, Switzerland, Italy and Brazil, and the German Pirates have encouraged other German political parties to use it with some success in municipal SPD groups and FDP discussion. Wenzlaff writes that it has been called “das Perpetuum mobile der Partizipation,” participation’s perpetual motion machine.
Update on 10 May 2013: the Liquid-Feedback section of the German Pirate Party’s website: https://lqfb.piratenpartei.de/
(Doss likvid FEEDBECK.)
German Pirate Party names for a voting system under debate last winter that is intended to enable groups to reach decisions in a manner between direct democracy and representational democracy. This will be enabled by software. On each issue, large or small, you can vote directly or you can assign your vote to someone you think is more competent to decide the specific issue being voted on. Your assigned votes can be rescinded at any time. Das Delegated-Voting is intended to provide more direct, and thus more accurate, feedback to representatives. There would be no more waiting for “elections” and political terms to end; instead voting would be continuous.
According to Wikipedia, an “Internet and Digital Society” Bundestag committee decided in 2010 to use Adhocracy software to involve the public in Bundestag “work” in a Liquid-Democracy manner. Germany’s two conservative political parties (the conservative, apparently slightly shady, powerhouse CDU/CSU and the libertarian now-unpopular FDP) stopped the planned introduction of this software in January 2011, citing costs, but a beta version was put online in February 2011.
(Doss delegated VOTINGK, doss LIKVID democrrracy)
“Militant democracy,” what Germany has according to the German constitutional court. In such a system, the free democratic fundamental order cannot be ended by legal means. Even a majority of voters cannot decide to eliminate democracy or its most important elements, taking them away from future generations. The state may also act against individuals or groups who wish to harm German democracy, even before they do anything illegal. (Presumably this was behind Germany’s ban of Scientology.) Thus militant democracy itself impinges upon some fundamental rights and is the focus of much dispute.
(SHTRIGHT bar eh DAME oh crah TEE.)
There’s discussion in the German Pirate Party about the fact that the word “pirate” is masculine in German. Rather than go with the usual, ungainly, separative constructions “die Piratinnen und Piraten” or “PiratInnen,” people have suggested making the word neutral in this case. Or providing a dropdown menu in which you can select a gender for “pirate.” One quite popular suggestion is to change the word “pirate” to the neutral word “squirrel” in their articles of incorporation.
(Doss pee ROT.)
“Compulsory loan.” Idea under discussion of forcing German taxpayers who possess EUR 250,000 or more to loan money to the state. If the state’s economy then prospers, the bond would be paid back, perhaps even with interest. 8% of German adults would qualify for this, according to current stats.
(TSVONG z on lie eh.)
“Cousins economy.” Nepotism.
(FETT er n virt shoft.)
“Information economy.” An environment in which information is a kind of currency.
(In form ah TSEE OWNS virt shoft.)
“Notes economy.” Type of self organization system that leaves you drowning in a sea of notes, probably including, but not limited to, a cascade of sticky notes around your computer monitor.
(TSETT el virt shoft.)
“Education citizens,” a societal class that places a high value on education.
(BILL doong z burgher.)
A woman who has expertise in the construction industry. This includes craftswomen and engineers.
BAUFACHFRAU e.V. is an education nonprofit for women builders in Berlin, and Ideentischlerei is their interesting idea of “ideas cabinet-making” or “ideas joinery.” Tischler, the German word we translate as “cabinet maker,” actually means “table maker,” so the word also carries the association of sharing ideas across a table.
(Ee DAY en TISH ler eye.)
“Glassy subjects.” Idea that the government is opaque but its citizens are transparent.
(GLAY zer neh OON ter t ON en.)
“V men” are police snitches in certain milieux. For a long time I thought V in this case stood for Verfassungsschutz, but apparently it stands for Verbindungs- or Vertrauens-? In the latter case, the paid informants in the German right-wing scene who have supplied questionable information to the police might actually be called “confidence men.”
Update on 4 Sept. 2012: The Thuringian state Verfassungsschutz office apparently ignored its own rules for selecting V-people. German constitutional law requires V-people to be neither leaders nor criminals, “yet V-men in Thuringia often fulfilled both those criteria,” according to Der Spiegel. Furthermore, the Thuringian Verfassungsschutz paid for lawyers, cars, computers and workshop rent for these guys, “keeping the neonazis mobile” as left-wing Thuringian state parliamentarian Martina Renner (Die Linke) described it.
Update on 15 Sept. 2012: Not only police kept V-people. German foreign intelligence, domestic intelligence (state and federal), military intelligence, and police (state and federal) paid V-people for information. Vertrauen means trust or confidence. As Spiegel-Online noted in this excellent article about one of the Berlin police’s neonazi V-men, it is not always clear in these situations who is trusting whom.
Update on 4 Nov 2012: The new head of German Verfassungsschutz, Hans-Georg Maaßen, has called for a central national register of all V-people. This must replace the current system wherein each German state pays its own set of informants and is not required to share information about them, he told the Welt am Sonntag. “Central knowledge is indispensable for effective management of the federal and state V-people.”
Update on 8 Dec 2012: The central list of V-people will go active by 1 Jan 2013.
Update on 4 Feb 2013: There is an argument in the committee investigating the band of neonazi serial killers because a government office refused to have a V-man connected to the cell, “Thomas R.,” appear to testify before the committee. Apparently the bureaucrats running the V-people were and remain also assured complete secrecy and apparent immunity.
Update on 5 Feb 2013: Europol used V-people in its investigation of the UEFA and FIFA soccer betting scandal that so far has turned up at least 380 manipulated games around the world between 2008 and 2011, with profits of at least 8 million euros in Germany alone. In this investigation Europol also accessed phone conversations and evaluated 13,000 emails.
Update on 27 Apr 2013: As part of their 2013 election platform, the Green Party wants to get rid of all V-people.
(F OW! mon. F OW! frrr ow!.)
“Support payment,” “support installment payment.” At least two “high animals” at FIFA received bribe payments totalling 11 million euros, part of a bribe of 100 million euros given to FIFA by a media company in the 1990’s. Sepp Blatter knew about it. At the time, this was not illegal in Switzerland, but it is illegal now. The two known officials (a guy and his son-in-law) were prosecuted and found technically innocent. FIFA then made a seven-figure “support payment” “to keep the files in the prosecution’s filing cabinet,” which is why we’re only finding out about this now, thanks to journalist Jean François Tanda’s successful lawsuit to obtain access to the court files.
(Oon ter sh TOOTS oongs on tsoll oong.)
“Constitution Protection.” The name for a federal German police agency that has state branches. I don’t know much about it. The name might be intended to convey the idea that federal police are needed to keep a democracy from falling into dictatorship.
Wikipedia says the Verfassungsschutz offices are responsible for domestic intelligence, the Bundesnachrichtendienst for foreign intelligence, and the Militärischer Abschirmdienst for military intelligence.
Update on 28 August 2012: Interior Minister Hans-Peter Friedrich (CSU) has announced that he would like to reform the Verfassungsschutz, including a mandate that all state-level Verfassungsschutz organizations would have to send all their information to a central federal office (some state offices have already protested this) and that a central federal list be kept of all Verfassungsschutzmänner and -frauen who are providing information to these police in return for money. See V-Mann, V-Frau.
Update on 29 August 2012: The state and federal reps supposedly only discussed for one hour before agreeing on a framework for reform, which even the opposition SPD party now supports. Not only will state Verfassungsschutz offices be required to share all information with the federal office, but the federal office will be required to share all information with state offices as well (there are currently a total of 17 Verfassungsschutz offices). The state reps negotiated away Hans-Peter Friedrich’s proposal that the federal office be made the sole boss of investigations of (potentially) violent groups. Angela Merkel’s libertarianesque coalition partner, the FDP, criticizes that these changes are just moving furniture around and the old system, with its redundancies, remains the same.
(Fer FOSS oongs shoots.)
Blind in the right eye. The accusation that for years state and federal German police failed to catch right-wing neonazi serial killers because of internal police failures that have yet to be clarified. At least three, now four, high-level heads have rolled so far. Mysterious documents were mysteriously shredded. The investigating committee now claims the shredded files have been recreated, reviewed and weren’t mysterious.
Apparently some German police have been paying people in the neonazi scene for information for years. This has undermined evidence when neonazis were put on trial, made it difficult to outlaw neonazi political parties and dropped a lot of money into neonazi treasuries, while failing to provide good information about e.g. neonazi serial killers.
(OW! F day m reck ten OW! geh blinn d.)
“Everywhere is Duckville.” A loving tribute from Donaldists.
(Oober all isst Enten how’s en.)
Deutsche Organisation nichtkommerzieller Anhänger des lauteren Donaldismus,
the German Organization of Noncommercial Devotees of the True Donaldism.
A society of Donald Duck fans.
(Day. Oh. En. Ah. Elll. Day.)
In comics, this is a word written above a character that is acting out that word, i.e. *clearsthroatmeaningfully*, *wonderwtf*, *ponder*. Named after Dr. Erika Fuchs, the charming and inventive translator of Carl Barks’s Donald Duck comics.
(AIR ica TEEF.)
“Not proportional.” Improper. Like how a tiny number of Bundestag delegates amended a bill during the recent Italy vs. Germany match to permit their gubmint to sell the contact information—the names, addresses, phone numbers, &c.—people must provide when they mandatorily register their residence in Germany. The new law is required because in future residents are going to have to register their contact information with the federal government instead of the state ones. The “Italy” amendment flipped the default from “burghers must give permission before their data can be sold” to “burghers must forbid the selling of their data or their data will be sold.” The “score” of delegates added an excemption to even that: when people state that they do not want Angela Merkel’s government, and all governments after hers, to sell their personal data to address dealers and marketing firms, the government will still release this data to entities seeking to correct errors in their databases.
Update on 21 Sept. 2012: The Bundesrat stopped this law. It’s been sent back for rewriting.
(Oon fer HAIL t niss mace ick.)
“Metabolism!” Yell this when you feel strangely weak. Fan yourself with your hand. In France they might call it a liver issue.
(CRIES l ow! f.)
“Beer corpse.” A temporary condition induced by Oktoberfests, Schützenfests, Kirmess fairs, Kirschenfests, Leinenweberfests, Mandelblütenfests… People who have transitioned into the “beer corpse” state have to be carried to a special tent.
(BEER like ah.)
Bad beer or wine. Nasty brew. Swill, dishwater, gnat’s pizzle, camel micturation, acid rain.
(PLERR ah.)
Fusty, frowsty, moldy, muggy, musty, unventilated; in the case of beer, skunky beer.
(MEFF ick.)
“Off stood.” Beer in glasses that has stood around for too long. Its foamy top has begun to subside!
(OB geh STOND en.)
It’s a poolside bar. Bill Clinton says, “Here at Camp David we have a magic swimming pool. You run to the end of the diving board, leap high into the air, and call out the name of your favorite drink.” Bill Clinton demonstrates, calling “Whiskey!” as he catapults into the air. The entire pool turns into whiskey. Much fun ensues. Boris Yeltsin climbs unsteadily but determinedly up the diving board ladder, leaps, and yells, “Vodka!” The entire pool turns into vodka. Then it’s Helmut Kohl’s turn. He puffs even more slowly up the ladder, thinks, carefully jumps, and says, “Pilsner!” All the water disappears from the pool, and there’s a nasty incident. Bill Clinton turns to Boris Yeltsin and says, “Doesn’t everyone know it takes ten minutes to draw a good pilsner?”
“The blossom on the beer.” The foam atop, which should be at least 2 cm high. This is why it takes 10 minutes to draw a pilsner. Once in the glass, beer must be served quickly in German bars or its blossom will noticeably wilt.
(Dee BLOOM eh ow! f dame BEER.)
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