The Breaking Point? Germany's Asylum System Struggles to Cope

[unhappycamper]

http://www.spiegel.de/international/europe/german-asylum-system-stretches-to-breaking-point-a-1052546.html



As the migrant influx continues, the 'Refugees Welcome' high is beginning to wear off. People are beginning to wonder if Germany will really be able to cope with all the newcomers. And the system is already completely overwhelmed. By SPIEGEL Staff

The Breaking Point? Germany's Asylum System Struggles to Cope
September 11, 2015 – 07:00 PM

The images were almost surreal. There were people who had just completed a brutally difficult journey, exhausted, but happy. And there was the crowd, lined up on both sides, cheering and clapping as though they themselves had made the trip.

Such scenes have played out across Germany in recent days, and they are more than a little reminiscent of the finish lines at marathons in Hamburg, Cologne, Berlin and elsewhere. The mood was almost festive, euphoric. One could almost forget that the refugees arriving at train stations around the country were not running against the clock. They were running for their lives. The expressions on some faces made it clear that they hadn't yet been able to completely grasp what was happening to them.

The scenes, which included dozens of people holding up signs reading "Refugees Welcome," were quite remarkable. The Germans -- not all, but enough that they are now seen as being "the Germans" everywhere else in the world -- were celebrating the Syrians, the Eritreans, the Iraqis and the Afghans who had made it to their country. And they were celebrating themselves.

It is as though the Germans are standing up and saying: "We are not who you have long thought we were." We are not closed hegemons. We are open-hearted. It was half-truth and half-staged, but it was appealing enough that one could bask in the feeling without pangs of guilt. Even Chancellor Angela Merkel, the perennial skeptic, was moved.

[RJMacReady]

1. Thank 90% Dubya, 10% Obama For All Of This Misery

Well, the invasion of Iraq, and deposing of Sadaam Hussein, is really bearing fruit, is it not? The strutting, moronic illegal 43rd POTUS said "it was God's will for all people to be free". Lock up thrice convicted small time drug offenders for life, that is freedom. Invade Iraq, for no reasons other than he wanted to be known as a "war POTUS", and his Oedipal complex tinged modus operandi of always wanting to surpass his Father's "accomplishments, and of course establishing the world's largest embassy and permanent military bases, access to oil... Net result is over 3K dead Americans, tens of thousands physically or psychologically scarred, or horribly disfigured or maimed,and over a trillion dollars before it is all said and done, from this stupid, illegal war. But now, we see even more wonderful outcomes from this overt act of aggression, the refugee crisis. After two wars, civil strife between Shia and Sunni, and now ISIL taking over the country, people are fleeing in droves. The much vaunted "Arab Spring"- has left us with an unstable NTC/GNC coalition government in Libya, a disintegrating Syria, an unstable Yemen, and Iran's Hezbullah providing the only stable forms of security, food distribution, and at least a token response to Zionist expansion in the land seized after the 1967 war. Our Israeli friends have already bombed Syria numerous times, ( that we know of), hoping to bolster anti-Assad forces. Mr. Obama sought a resolution to use military force in Syria as he saw fit, but was thankfully denied. He shares in the blame for this refugee crisis as well. Since the CIA sponsored overthrow of the democratically elected Mossadegh in Iran decades ago to appease Big Oil, we have killed, bombed and generally meddled in the affairs of the populations of practically every country in the Middle Eastern Caliphate. Where is it safe to live there, in conditions other than squalid refugee camps? Egypt and Iran perhaps, but neither are shining beacons of humanity and hope either. All hands have blood on them. The Zionists, us, Hezbollah, the Palestinians, ISIL, the Syrians, Gaddafi, et. al. all are guilty of war crimes. Egypt seems the least guilty of all, but I'm sure they have done some dirt as well, if only to survive the chaos around them. So, thanks Dubya, Obama, Congress and Big Oil and Israel. You have the blood and misery of countless scores of people at your feet. You are to blame. That region will always be unstable, the Sunni/Shia hatred will see to that. Here's an idea: Eliminate our dependency on petroleum products, leave the Israelis to fend for themselves, and just BUG OUT. No good can come from our involvement there, none. The "Arab Spring" and freedom, W.M.D.s my ass, the entire Middle East is more unstable right now than during the brief 1967 war. We need to get out, and stay out. RJM