A Final Germany Dispatch: From Election Fraud To “Dog Heaven”

I should clarify this dispatch is technically from North America…as I’ve already crossed back over the Atlantic. (Very bittersweet, but exciting Atlanta things are to come.)

Here’s a round-up of some final stories from an incredible 2 months in Germany.

Echoes of the American Election Fraud Narrative in Germany: As a “survivor” of the 2020 presidential and 2021 Senate runoff elections in Georgia, I was quickly drawn to the story of how election fraud claims and distrust of vote-by-mail have spread in Germany ahead of its 2021 election. The scale is not comparable to the U.S., but there is a movement there, and that movement, as it turns out, has been influenced by the American claims of the last election. Even to the point of accusations of “rigged Dominion voting machines,” even though Germany doesn’t use voting machines at all.

I reported on this topic for PRI’s The World, here: https://www.pri.org/stories/2021-09-20/dubious-voting-fraud-claims-germany-spread-online-ahead-elections

The scene at a rally in Berlin for die Basis, a new right-wing party in Germany whose leaders have, among other things, repeated unsubstantiated claims of voter fraud and sown distrust in vote-by-mail. This rally was later broken up by police because attendees didn’t comply with the city’s mask regulations.

The scene at a rally in Berlin for die Basis, a new right-wing party in Germany whose leaders have, among other things, repeated unsubstantiated claims of voter fraud and sown distrust in vote-by-mail. This rally was later broken up by police because attendees didn’t comply with the city’s mask regulations.

An American Perspective on the German Election: In my first byline in German for my host newspaper, I wrote a comparative column about the differences that struck me about the German election.

In short…for many reasons, the German elections are much cheaper and simply calmer. I tried to understand why. https://taz.de/US-Amerikanerin-blickt-auf-die-BTW/!5798242/

(And no…I didn’t write it in German. A kind colleague translated it. 😊)

Finally…some hard-hitting journalism on why Germany could very well be “dog heaven.”

This is Mickey, one of the dogs I “interviewed” for a story for NPR about dog ownership and dog regulation in Germany. He was at a dog obedience class in Munich’s English Garden. The expectations for dog training in Germany are much higher than the U.S.

This is Mickey, one of the dogs I “interviewed” for a story for NPR about dog ownership and dog regulation in Germany. He was at a dog obedience class in Munich’s English Garden. The expectations for dog training in Germany are much higher than the U.S.

This story came about after anecdotal observations I couldn’t ignore about how much different dog life is in Germany than in the U.S. German dogs seem to be able to go almost everywhere: inside restaurants, the metro, most shops, even pharmacies. And they also rarely seem to misbehave. Rarely are pulling on leashes. Often, in Berlin especially, you see them walking calmly off leash down the sidewalk.

As it turns out, there are many reasons why, some of which are regulatory, and some of which are societal pressure.

Listen in to learn more: https://www.npr.org/2021/10/05/1043276625/life-is-good-if-youre-a-dog-in-germany