[VIDEO] REWIND: SNL Chevy Chase Classic ‘Generalissimo Francisco Franco is Still Dead’
Posted: November 26, 2016 Filed under: Breaking News, Entertainment, History, Mediasphere, Politics | Tags: Chevy Chase, comedy, Death of Fidel Castro, Fidel Castro, Generalissimo Franco, Havana, Little Havana, Miami, News for the Hard of Hearing, Saturday Night Live, SNL, SPAIN, Weekend Update Leave a comment
Spain’s Top Court Overturns Bullfighting Ban in Catalonia
Posted: October 21, 2016 Filed under: Art & Culture, Global, Law & Justice | Tags: Animalist Party Against Mistreatment of Animals, Associated Press, Bullfighting, Catalonia, List of municipalities of Spain, List of political parties in Spain, Madrid, People's Party (Spain), SPAIN, World Animal Protection 1 Comment
The ban had little practical effect as Catalonia had only one functioning bullring — in its capital, Barcelona — but neither is the court decision likely to greatly change things.
Spain’s top court on Thursday overruled a controversial local ban against bullfighting in the powerful northeastern region of Catalonia, saying it violated a national law protecting the much-disputed spectacle.
The Constitutional Court ruled that Catalan authorities generally could regulate such public spectacles, and even outlaw them, but in this case the national parliament’s ruling that bullfighting is part of Spain’s heritage must prevail.
Catalonia banned bullfighting in 2010. The decision was part of the growing movement against bullfighting, but it was also seen as another step in the Catalan government’s push to break away from Spain.
The ban had little practical effect as Catalonia had only one functioning bullring — in its capital, Barcelona — but neither is the court decision likely to greatly change things.
“There’ll be no bullfights in Catalonia regardless of what the Constitutional Court says,” Catalan Land Minister Josep Rulls said.
The World Animal Protection group described the decision as “outrageous,” adding that “cultural heritage does not justify an activity that relies on animal torture and indefensible levels of suffering.”
But the Fighting Bull Foundation of breeders, matadors, ring workers, aficionados and event organizers welcomed the news, warning that attempts to prevent bullfights in Catalonia would now be illegal…(read more)
Source: The Japan News
Spanish Poster for Alfred Hitchcock’s ‘Rear Window’, by Fernando Albericio, USA, 1954
Posted: August 15, 2016 Filed under: Art & Culture, Entertainment | Tags: Alfred Hitchcock, Cinema, Cinema of the United Kingdom, design, Fernando Albericio, François Truffaut, Illustration, Movies, North by Northwest, Poster Art, Psycho (film), Rear Window, SPAIN, The Birds (film), Thriller (genre), typography Leave a comment
Spanish one sheet for REAR WINDOW (Alfred Hitchcock, USA, 1954)
Designer: Fernando Albericio
Poster source: Heritage Auctions
[VIDEO] POW! Teenager Punches Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy in the Face
Posted: December 17, 2015 Filed under: Global, Mediasphere, Politics | Tags: A Coruña, Ana Pastor, Galicia (Spain), Mariano Rajoy, media, People's Party (Spain), Pontevedra, Prime Minister of Spain, SPAIN, Television, video Leave a comment
A young man punched Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy of Spain in the face during a campaign event on Wednesday 16th December 2015, leaving the stunned leader with broken glasses and bruises.
[VIDEO] Teso No Es Sangre, Es El Tomate! Tomato-Throwing Festival Celebrated in Spain
Posted: August 31, 2015 Filed under: Art & Culture, Entertainment, Food & Drink, Global | Tags: Buñol, Crowds, Food fight, Red pulp, SPAIN, Tomatina, Tomato, Valencia 1 Comment
More than 20,000 people pelted each other with tomatoes in this year’s Tomatina on Wednesday as the festival in Bunol, Spain celebrated its 70th birthday.
Cilla Black, Popular British Singer and TV Personality, Passed Away in Spain at Age 72
Posted: August 2, 2015 Filed under: Art & Culture, Entertainment, Mediasphere | Tags: Anyone Who Had a Heart (song), Barry McGuigan, Bobby Willis, Brian Epstein, British Academy Television Awards, Cilla Black, Holly Willoughby, Joan Collins, Law enforcement in Spain, Marbella, Piers Morgan, Presenter, Singing, SPAIN, Surprise, Surprise (TV series), Television Leave a comment
Early Sunday morning it was announced that Cilla Black, a popular British singer and television personality had passed away in Spain at age 72.
Black, who was an early contemporary of the Beatles had been ill for some time, and told the Mirror in 2014 that she was ready to go.
“Seventy five is a good age to go,” Black said.
“If things are starting to drop off – like the hearing – and I’ve got twinges in the morning, I do think that.”
[PHOTO] Salvador Dali
Posted: July 26, 2015 Filed under: Art & Culture, History | Tags: Photography, Salvador Dali, SPAIN, Surrealism Leave a comment
“The only difference between me and a madman is that I’m not mad.”
– Salvador Dali
Pundit Planet Bureau of Really Old Booze
Posted: July 20, 2015 Filed under: Art & Culture, Food & Drink, History | Tags: Antique, Photography, SPAIN, vintage, Wine Leave a comment
Costly Spanish ‘Ghost Airport’ Receives Only One Bid at Auction
Posted: July 18, 2015 Filed under: Economics, Global, Space & Aviation | Tags: Airport, Associated Press, Castile-La Mancha, Chinese language, Ciudad Real, Europa Press, Financial crisis of 2007–2008, Madrid, SPAIN, Tzaneen Leave a comment
MADRID—One of Spain’s “ghost airports”—expensive projects that were virtually unused—received just one bid in a bankruptcy auction after costing about €1.1 billion ($1.2 billion) to build. The buyer’s offer: €10,000.
Ciudad Real’s Central airport, about 235 kilometers south of Madrid, became a symbol of the country’s wasteful spending during a construction boom that ended with the financial crisis of 2008, the year the airport opened. The operator of the airport went bankrupt in 2012 after it failed to draw enough traffic.
Chinese group Tzaneen International tabled the single bid in Friday’s auction, Spanish news agency Europa Press said. The receiver had set a minimum price of €28 million. If no better bid is received by September, the sale will go through, the news agency said. Read the rest of this entry »
[PHOTO] of the Day: X-Ray Machine Reveals 8-Year-Old Boy Hidden in Woman’s Suitcase
Posted: May 8, 2015 Filed under: Breaking News, Global, Health and Social Issues | Tags: Canary Islands, Ceuta, Civil Guard (Spain), Ivory Coast, Law enforcement in Spain, Melilla, Morocco, Smuggling, SPAIN, X-Ray Leave a comment
CEUTA, Spain — A young woman faces charges after Spanish airport officials say they found an 8-year-old child concealed inside her luggage when she tried to cross the border Thursday morning.
“The operator noticed something strange, which seemed to be a person inside the case.”
Fátima E.Y, 19, was traveling from Morocco to Ceuta, a Spanish territory, when border patrol agents noticed her acting anxiously. “The operator noticed something strange, which seemed to be a person inside the case,” a Civil Guard spokesman told Spanish newspaper El Pais.
“…agents spotted the boy’s father trying to cross the border into Ceuta and arrested him as well. Authorities believe he likely paid the woman, who isn’t related to the boy, to smuggle him into Spain.”
After passing the pink suitcase through an x-ray machine, agents saw what appeared to be a human frame. Upon opening the case they found an 8-year-old boy identified as Abou, who told authorities he was from the Ivory Coast. Read the rest of this entry »
‘Involved in a Sexual Act with a Dog on a Bed of SS Helmets’: MACBA Barcelona Show Canceled Over Pornographic Artwork Ridiculing Spanish King Juan Carlos
Posted: March 22, 2015 Filed under: Art & Culture, Censorship | Tags: Agence France-Presse, Andy Warhol, Arab Image Foundation, Art Basel, Art history, ARTnews, Atul Dodiya, Barcelona, Barcelona Museum of Contemporary Art, Contemporary art, El País, Museu Nacional d'Art de Catalunya, SPAIN 1 Comment
“It’s a work of art inscribed in the great tradition of works about art and power.”
— Valentín Roma, one of the curators of the exhibition
MACBA director Bartomeu Marí proposed that the sculpture be removed. When the artist and the curators declined, he canceled the exhibition.
Lorena Muñoz-Alonso and Brian Boucher report: An artwork depicting the former Spanish king Juan Carlos and Bolivian Labor leader Domitila Chúngara involved in a sexual act with a dog on a bed of SS helmets has led the Barcelona Museum of Contemporary Art (MACBA) to cancel the exhibition “La Bestia y el soberano” (The Beast and the Sovereign) on the day it was meant to open (see After 20 Years, Portrait of Spain’s Royal Family Is (Nearly) Finished). The offending artwork, Not Dressed for Conquering, is a sculpture by Austrian artist Ines Doujak.
“I don’t want to spend time describing the piece, which I consider inappropriate and contradictory to the museum’s line.”
“It’s a work of art inscribed in the great tradition of works about art and power,” Valentín Roma, one of the curators of the exhibition told El País.
[Read the full text here, at Artnet News]
“Art has been caricaturing the archetypes of power for centuries, which is what Doujak’s work is doing” (see Why Self-Censorship of Controversial Artwork is Wrong).
“I have always fought to defend contemporary art and its role in the reality that surrounds us, but in this case, I completely disagree with the inclusion of this work in an exhibition that reflects on the concept of sovereignty in all its aspects.”
— MACBA director Bartomeu Marí
The exhibition was to include more than two dozen artists and artist duos or teams, including Juan Downey, León Ferrari, Genesis Breyer P-Orridge, Mary Reid Kelley, and Wu Tsang. In an open letter, the curators assert that the museum management was fully informed of the show’s theme and contents:
The curators never hid any information about the exhibition to the director of the museum: he was informed by Paul B. Preciado and Valentín Roma of the concept and the full list of works of the exhibition. The director had validated the project and not only its text and description but also the list of artists were already published in the MACBA’s internet page months ago.
MACBA director Bartomeu Marí claims he had not seen the artwork until Monday.
“I don’t want to spend time describing the piece, which I consider inappropriate and contradictory to the museum’s line,” Marí told El País. “I have always fought to defend contemporary art and its role in the reality that surrounds us, but in this case, I completely disagree with the inclusion of this work in an exhibition that reflects on the concept of sovereignty in all its aspects.”
The show was curated by Hans D. Christ and Iris Dressler, co-directors of Stuttgart’s Württemberg Kunstverein, along with writer Paul B. Preciado and Valentin Rome. Read the rest of this entry »
Bardo Museum Attack: ISIS Claims Responsibility for ‘Killing and Wounding Dozens of Crusaders and Apostates’
Posted: March 19, 2015 Filed under: Breaking News, Religion, War Room | Tags: Agence France-Presse, Bardo National Museum, EUROPE, Germany, Habib Essid, Italy, Japan, Poland, Prime Minister of Tunisia, SPAIN, Tunis, Tunisia Leave a comment
Randy Kreider and Rym Mumtaz report: ISIS today claimed responsibility for the Wednesday massacre at the Bardo Museum in Tunisia that killed 22 people, many of them Western tourists, and the two attackers.
“The blessed immersing operation led to killing and wounding dozens of Crusaders and apostates, and the failed security forces did not dare to approach but after the two heroes ran out of ammunition.”
— From an audio message disseminated on twitter accounts associated with ISIS
In a 3 minute, 10 second audio message disseminated on twitter accounts associated with ISIS, the terror group said that the two dead gunmen, who it named Abu Zakaria al-Tunisi and Abu Anas al-Tunisi, “launched and were heavily equipped with machine guns and hand grenades to target Bardo Museum.”
“The blessed immersing operation led to killing and wounding dozens of Crusaders and apostates,” the message said, “and the failed security forces did not dare to approach but after the two heroes ran out of ammunition.”
“Four of the arrests were directly related to the attack, and five others were made under strong suspicion of relation to the attack.”
— Aida Klibi, a spokeswoman for the Tunisian presidential office
ISIS also threatened more attacks to come, saying “what you have seen today is the first drop of the rain, Allah permitting. You will not enjoy security nor be pleased with peace while the Islamic State has men like these who do not sleep amidst grievances.”
The museum is a major attraction in Tunisia
The unverified claim, which is being analyzed by U.S. officials for authenticity, came after Tunisian authorities said they had arrested nine people in connection with the attack. Read the rest of this entry »
Researchers Believe They Have Identified Remains of ‘Don Quixote’ Author Cervantes
Posted: March 17, 2015 Filed under: Art & Culture, History, Science & Technology | Tags: Archaeology, BBC, Bone, Convent, Don Quixote, Madrid, Miguel de Cervantes, Modern novel, SPAIN Leave a comment
Cervantes died one year after his magnum opus, The Ingenious Gentleman Don Quixote of La Mancha, was published in 1615.
MADRID— Jeannette Neumann reports: Researchers announced Tuesday they believe they have identified some of the 400-year-old remains of Miguel de Cervantes, the author of “The Ingenious Gentleman Don Quixote of La Mancha,” considered the first modern novel.
“We are convinced that among these fragments, we have something of Cervantes. However, I can’t say that with absolutely certainty.”
— Francisco Etxeberria, a lead researcher on the project
Researchers said they weren’t able to individually or categorically identify Cervantes’ remains in a Madrid convent after four centuries of deterioration that have left many of the bones as fragments.
But based on a combination of historic documentation that details where Cervantes was buried and anthropological evidence about the age of the bones and clothing, researchers said they were mostly convinced they had found remains of Spain’s prince of prose.
“Between 1698 and 1730, researchers said construction to expand that church lead to the removal of 17 bodies nearby to what is now the crypt of the Convent of the Barefoot Trinitarians in central Madrid. Cervantes and his wife were among the 17 bodies that were moved.”
“We are convinced that among these fragments, we have something of Cervantes,” Francisco Etxeberria, a lead researcher on the project, said at a news conference Tuesday at Madrid’s city hall. “However, I can’t say that with absolutely certainty.”
Cervantes died one year after his magnum opus, which follows the adventures of the knight errant Don Quixote and his sidekick, was published in 1615. But only in the last 12 months has a serious hunt for his remains been launched. Read the rest of this entry »
[PHOTO] Women of the Antifascist Forces During the Liberation of Milan, 1945
Posted: January 28, 2015 Filed under: History, Mediasphere, War Room | Tags: EUROPE, Fascists, Italy, Liberation of Milan, Milan, Photography, SPAIN, Twitter, Women Fighters, WW2 2 Comments
[PHOTO] Books, Babes, Bullfights, Bravado; 20th Century Man, Ernest Hemingway
Posted: October 16, 2014 Filed under: Art & Culture, History, Mediasphere, Reading Room | Tags: 20th century, A Farewell to Arms, A Moveable Feast, Bullfights, Ernest Hemingway, Farewell to Arms, Henry Miller, Life Magazine, Literature, novels, Pamplona, Paris, Photography, Pulitzer, SPAIN, Sun Also Rises Leave a comment
From LIFE magazine
[Explore the vast Hemingway collection at Amazon]
Kevin D. Williamson: The Eternal Dictator
Posted: June 28, 2014 Filed under: History, Mediasphere, Politics, Think Tank, War Room | Tags: Franklin D. Roosevelt, Iron Curtain, Kevin D. Williamson, Oliver Cromwell, Rexford Tugwell, Roosevelt, SPAIN, Woodrow Wilson 2 Comments
Generalissimo Francisco Franco
The ruthless exercise of power by strongmen and generalissimos is the natural state of human affairs.
For National Review Online, Kevin D. Williamson writes: I’m 41 years old, which doesn’t feel that old to me (most days), but history is short. With the exception of those trapped behind the Iron Curtain, the world as I have known it has been remarkably free and prosperous, and it is getting more free and more prosperous. But it is also a fact that, within my lifetime, there have been dictatorships in Spain, Portugal, Greece, Poland, India, Brazil, Argentina, Chile, South Korea, and half of Germany — and lots of other places, too, to be sure, but you sort of expect them in Cameroon and Russia. If I were only a few years older, I could add France to that list. (You know how you can tell that Charles de Gaulle was a pretty good dictator? He’s almost never described as a “dictator.”) There have been three attempted coups d’état in Spain during my life. Take the span of my father’s life and you’ll find dictatorships and coups and generalissimos rampant in practically every country, even the nice ones, like Norway.“Rexford Tugwell, a key figure in Roosevelt’s so-called brain trust, was particularly keen on the Italian fascist model, which he described as ‘the cleanest, most efficiently operating piece of social machinery I’ve ever seen.'”
[Kevin Williamson’s book “The End Is Near and It’s Going to Be Awesome: How Going Broke Will Leave America Richer, Happier, and More Secure” is available at Amazon]
That democratic self-governance is a historical anomaly is easy to forget for those of us in the Anglosphere — we haven’t really endured a dictator since Oliver Cromwell. The United States came close, first under Woodrow Wilson and then during the very long presidency of Franklin Roosevelt. Both men were surrounded by advisers who admired various aspects of authoritarian models then fashionable in Europe. Read the rest of this entry »
Chilean Porn Star Offers Sex Marathon For Each Win from National Soccer Team
Posted: June 19, 2014 Filed under: Entertainment, Mediasphere | Tags: Australia, Breitbart.com, Chile, Netherlands, Pornographic film actor, SPAIN, Twitter 1 Comment
For Breitbart.com, Mary Chastain reports: It is all about sex. First there was speculation that the Netherlands beat Spain because the coach allowed players to visit with wives and girlfriends. Why did Chile beat Spain? A porn star offered a sex marathon for every win. (The picture in the link is NSFW)
Marlen Doll, one of Chile’s most popular porn stars, told people she would engage in an eight-hour sex marathon if the team beat Australia. They won and she conducted a twelve-hour orgy…(read more)
[BOOKS] Hotel Florida: Truth, Love, and Death in the Spanish Civil War
Posted: May 26, 2014 Filed under: Art & Culture, History, Reading Room, War Room | Tags: Ernest Hemingway, Francisco Franco, Gerda Taro, Hotel Florida, John Dos Passos, Martha Gellhorn, Robert Capa, SPAIN, Spanish Civil War 1 Comment
Ernest Hemingway and Martha Gellhorn, c. 1940 (Ernest Hemingway Collection / John F. Kennedy Library)
Whores de Combat: In search of adventure and engagement
“Hotel Florida: Truth, Love, and Death in the Spanish Civil War, by Amanda Vaill, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 464 pp.
For The American Scholar, Charles Trueheart writes: For its young cohort of reporters and photographers, and citizens of conscience, the Spanish Civil War was the place to be. It was not just the big war of the moment, although it was bloody enough, tearing Spain apart for three years (and for succeeding generations) and killing nearly 400,000 people. The conflict also bore the weight of a burgeoning global struggle, keenly watched and abetted by Hitler and Stalin, and was widely understood to be the harbinger of an inevitable world war.
“Hemingway had a clever phrase for the women who hung around the hotel, which may just as well have described the accredited reporters and photojournalists, day-trippers and do-gooders…whores de combat.”
Enter the cast of Hotel Florida, Amanda Vaill’s energetic group biography of six characters who found themselves—or rushed to place themselves—in the heat of this great battle to defend a shakily democratic, fractiously Republican Spain against the Nationalist rebellion of General Francisco Franco.
“…It captures the intellectual promiscuity of war reporting, and perhaps of journalism in general.”
In July 1936, when Franco led the army uprising, Robert Capa and Gerda Taro were young photographers in Paris, Jewish émigrés from Hungary and Germany, respectively, with newly assumed trade names. When they heard the news from Spain, Vaill writes, they felt “the adrenaline rush of a scoop in the making” and decided to leave for Spain immediately. “Here was a chance to document the struggle between fascism and socialism that was already consuming their homelands and might soon spread to all of Europe. It would all be a most extraordinary adventure, and it would make them famous. Together. They could hardly wait.”
[You can order the book “Hotel Florida: Truth, Love, and Death in the Spanish Civil War” from Amazon]
Far away in Key West, Ernest Hemingway was in the doldrums. He was struggling over a collection of stories that would turn out to be To Have and Have Not and then be forgotten. He was worried that his success had turned him into a sellout. His rivalry with John Dos Passos was on his nerves. His marriage to Pauline Pfeiffer was on the skids. Spain was an escape to opportunity: “If he went to Spain with an assignment to report on the war, he’d get the makings of any number of novels.” Read the rest of this entry »
Happy Cinco de Mayo!
Posted: May 5, 2014 Filed under: Art & Culture, Comics, Entertainment | Tags: bull fight, Cinco de Mayo, design, graphics, Illustration, Mexico, SPAIN, typography, vintage Leave a comment
While Obama Pushes to Put More People on the Dole, Many Older Welfare States Now Stress Work
Posted: February 19, 2014 Filed under: Economics, Health and Social Issues, Think Tank, U.S. News | Tags: Cato Institute, Dutch, Michael Tanner, Netherlands, Obama, Politics of the Netherlands, SPAIN, United States, Welfare 3 Comments
Welfare, Here and Abroad
Michael Tanner writes: How bad have things become? The British newspaper the Telegraph recentlylooked at the growth in welfare spending in industrialized nations and found that such spending (including health-care and pension programs) had grown faster in the United States since 2000 than in any country in Europe except Ireland, Spain, and Portugal.
Of course, European welfare states were larger to begin with, but the Telegraph’s report is reflective of an important trend. While the Obama administration presses forward with efforts to combat “income inequality” by expanding the American welfare state, the European nations and other industrialized welfare states are moving in the other direction.
[Order Michael Tanner’s book: Leviathan on the Right: How the Rise of Big Government Conservatism Threatens Our Freedom and Our Future from Amazon]
The Netherlands: Just 42 percent of U.S. welfare recipients are engaged in even broadly defined work activities (including job training, college, or job searches), and Republican attempts to restore work requirements to the food-stamp program have been met with a storm of resistance. Meanwhile, the Obama administration touts the idea that Obamacare will enable people to quit their jobs while having their health care subsidized by taxpayers.
BUSTED: Canadian HELLS ANGELS in Spain Charged with Smuggling 500 KILOS of COCAINE
Posted: September 14, 2013 Filed under: Crime & Corruption | Tags: Arrest, Canada, EUROPOL, Hells Angel, Royal Canadian Mounted Police, SPAIN Leave a comment
Policía Nacional The cocaine seized by Spanish police.
MADRID, Spain — Four members of the Hells Angels have been arrested in northwest Spain for allegedly smuggling 500 kilograms (1,100 pounds) of cocaine into the county with the aim of distributing it, the Interior Ministry said in a statement Saturday.
The statement said the men, all Canadians, were arrested near the coastal city of Pontevedra, where one had arrived by yacht, allegedly having sailed from Colombia with the drugs. One of the three men who met the yacht was “a known member” of the San Diego chapter of the Hells Angels and another had been under investigation for suspected drug smuggling by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, the statement said. Read the rest of this entry »
GET YOUR THIRST ON: Toast to Mexican Independence Day with tequila, mezcal cocktails
Posted: September 13, 2013 Filed under: Entertainment, History | Tags: Cocktail, Mestizo, Mexico, Mezcal, Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla, SPAIN, Tequila Leave a comment
Tequila and mezcal cocktails are a treat in celebration of Mexican Independence Day. (Photos/NBC Latino)
Nina Terrero writes: Each year on September 16th, Mexicans around the world celebrate Mexico’s independence from Spain’s governance, which was secured during a revolt in 1810 by the Mestizos (those with mixed Spanish and indigenous Indian heritage) and Criollos (Mexicans of Spanish ancestry) who fought under the leadership of Father Miguel Hidalgo against the Spanish. In celebration of the upcoming holiday on Monday, we’re sharing our favorite cocktail recipes that incorporate traditional Mexican spirits – tequila and smoky mezcal – with which to toast to a momentous occasion in Mexico’s history.
S&P Warns of Socially Explosive Situation in Euro Zone
Posted: March 18, 2013 Filed under: Economics | Tags: AUSTERITY, BAILOUTS, BUSINESS NEWS, DEBT, ECONOMIC MEASURES, economy, EURO, EUROPE, EUROPE: NEWS, European Union, Italy, JOBS, POLITICS AND GOVERNMENT, SPAIN Leave a comment
Standard and Poor’s sees a high risk that Spain, Italy, Portugal and France will not be able to carry through necessary reforms as the unemployed become less willing to put up with austerity, S&P’s Germany head Torsten Hinrichs told a newspaper.
“The high unemployment in Spain, Italy and France is socially explosive,” Hinrichs was quoted as saying in Monday’s Neue Osnabrcker Zeitung.
“There has to be a social consensus for saving measures. High unemployment … does not help.”
Hinrichs said the people of Spain and Portugal had already proven they were willing to bear with austerity measures, but “this cannot continue forever”.
In Italy, there was the further danger that “a new government may not be strong enough for the still necessary reforms to strengthen growth,” he said.
Hinrichs said S&P still rated Germany as a triple A with stable outlook and did not see any reason for concern: “It is one of the few AAA and stable countries that we still have in Europe”.
The weak profitability of the banking sector due to the profusion of banks was the only problem in Germany, he said, although he saw positive changes in the sector in terms of equity capital and refinancing.
pundit from another planet 