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ONE OF THE leaders of Germany’s far-right AfD party has sparked outrage by downplaying the crimes of Adolf Hitler and the Nazis, saying they were “just a speck of bird shit in over 1,000 years of successful German history”.
The Alternative for Germany (AfD) is the biggest opposition party in Germany’s lower house of parliament, the Bundestag, with more than 90 deputies.
In remarks reported by Deutsche Welle and the German news agency DPA, Alexander Gauland, co-leader of the anti-immigrant, anti-Islam party, told a youth party congress that there was more to the country’s history than the 12 years of the Nazi regime.
“Yes, we plead guilty to our responsibility for the 12 years” of Nazi rule, he said.
But “we have a glorious history and one, my dear friends, that lasted a lot longer than those damned 12 years”, Gauland said.
Hitler and the Nazis are just a speck of bird shit in over 1,000 years of successful German history.
Gauland has repeatedly attacked Islam, and argued that Germany should be proud of its veterans of two world wars.
In 2016, he took aim at star footballer Jerome Boateng, who was born in Berlin to a German mother and a Ghanaian father.
“People find him good as a footballer, but they don’t want to have a Boateng as a neighbour,” Gauland said.
The head of Angela Merkel’s conservative Christian Democrat Union party quickly hit out at Gauland’s latest remarks, saying that the AfD was revealing its true face.
“50 million war victims, the Holocaust and the total war are nothing more than ‘bird shit’ for the AfD,” she tweeted. “That’s what the party really looks like behind its bourgeois mask.”
Set up in 2013 as an anti-euro party, the AfD recorded a surge in support after it began capitalising on unease in Germany over the arrival of more than a million asylum seekers since 2015.
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Role on august and for this whole debacle to be consinged to Reeling in the Years.
They’ll have to make a one-hour-special at this rate.
Gift Grub http://youtu.be/QtNDJEFiIVc
I heard the independents want to request a independent inquiry to investigate the debacle of brookgate… Wallace and Daly are extremely P’d they wont get to wear their stilettos
Fionn, was that a typo for Wallace and Gromit ?
“You’ve been Brooke’d!”
The Gareth Brooks incident will appear on the show when the music goes silent.
I’m (well) over 35 years of age; I don’t have (& cannot afford) private health insurance. I am keep coming out in an increasingly vicious skin rash every time I read the words ‘Garth Brooks’. I can’t afford to go to the doctor and get a prescription so it’s cheaper for me, and better for my health, to stop reading The Journal until 30th July.
It’s farcical at this stage his much airtime this story is getting.
Just because it’s there doesn’t mean you need to read it!
Colm it’s a bit hard not to come across a Garth Brooks story at this stage. People are clicking into the stories to say they are getting sick of seeing them. Where are they meant to complain, a story about a Sesame Street cake?
It’s being reported that Garth Brooks just blew his nose. Any updates Aoife ??
Now he’s wiping his………
Couldn’t he just PM him on Facebook?
You ok hun xxxxxx
Im giving up the journal until the end of the month. Im sick of this whole mess. Lets move on people.
Yeah! Sod the 400,000.
They’ll get their money back.
Ross, they don’t want their money back. Do you seriously think the 70,000 flying into Ireland just want their €70 back? What about the other €700 they spent getting here and the hotel bills? Will they get that back?
What about the €2,500,000 loss to the GAA. How many pitch and changing room upgrades for teenager players would that pay for?
What about it?
They shouldn’t be here yet.
Hotels shouldn’t be booked without 24 hour cancellation.
I’ve no time for that horrible organisation that is the GAA so if it closed entirely tomorrow I think it would be a huge leap forward for the country.
On a parochial level the GAA causes bitterness, feuds and isolation.
Ross, “horrible organisation that is the GAA”, you’re stone mad.
“Peter Aiken on way to US for Garth Brooks ‘crisis talks’”
Good. Keep the greedy ba$tard. He was able to sell tickets for the initial 2/3 and stage the whole thing for a profit. Then he chances his arm with another two, gets turned down, and then claims that he’ll all of a sudden make a loss?
The fans have been treated atrociously by the promoter, and whatever the outcome I hope they don’t hand him money for one of his events ever again.
Show me ANY promoter that treats the punter with a bit of respect…. Fees on concert tickets are astronomical right across the board… And for what? Pure profit…. As someone commented earlier about this promoters trip to the US for crisis talks; “keep the greedy basta*d”…. Shambolic… The whole thing
I find Aiken to be alright as far is it goes. As an alternative to Ticketmaster there is always tickets.ie which charge about €1/ €0.50 per transaction which is fairly decent (beats the poxy charge per ticket).
I think most of the Harmonic stuff is done through them (open to correction). It often it falls to the venue, band, etc. as well as the promoters to how the tickets are sold.
Also, €60/€70 for a big concert isn’t really gouging considering the demand for the tickets.
This month late at night
The residents may lie awake and hear him screeching
Theyve lost their peaceful dreams
So they turn out the light, and head on to Croke Park
And the thought crosses their mind
hes here again tomorrow morning
Would they ever doubt the GAA lied
about him from the start
If the concert never comes
Will he know how much they loved him
DCC tried in every way, there were headlines every day
and there wasnt only one
and If our time with Garth is through
and we must face this month without him
will they love they gave him in the past
ever be enough to last
If the concert never comes.
Ah first world problems,when I think of what must actually be going on out there in the world it saddens me even more that people put such focus on something so trivial as a concert.
TheJournal has become the Adrian Kennedy Phone show of online news,probably below ‘the Sun’ for actual news at this stage.
This Croke Park residents committee seems like every other residents or town development committee in the country. A few muppets self appointed to it and those with different views not notified or invited to meetings. From what i can see the committee are in the vast minority in the area. If fake objections have been lodged i sincerely hope those responsible will face tough penalties
The Croke Park residents minority have objected to any development of the stadium including floodlighting, Soccer and Rugby and now can pay to go the high court to object to something that will bring the surrounding areas millions. At the end of the day they had opportunity to sell their houses for inflated values over during the boom if the living their was so bad.
Now any future events including this country hosing major international sporting events will be in doubt.
The city manager is playing god . Like he dose with his bike crusade , his ego is more important than the will of the people that pay his wages .
Can’t he just be fired?
He better have his mobile phone and laptop charged.
1850 715 815
Thought they said we’d know by today at the latest… its a joke…. ive tickets bt at this stage with not knowing I jus want a refund and il use my two days ive booked off work to go to the country music festival in lovely leitrim instead!!! Be more craic & less hassle!!!
exactly people will still spend their monies in Ireland, just wont be concentrated around Croke Park / Dublin
Garth Brooks,
Capitalist Martyr.
Gaaarth Broooks stoooop!
Hammer time.
Absolutely. He only booked 1 concert originally, so to turn around and say 5 or nothing is greed personified.
His career was already over until this and he’s trying to kick start it over this.
He’ll back down and take the 3…..unfortunately!
How is it greed personified? It’s how the guy makes a living. Why not just play three? Because everything was scaled for 5 shows, the support people, the equipment, the documentary. Why do three if it now means he would end up losing money? Good on Garth Brooks for making a stand. It’s not his fault that this debacle has ballooned.
It is greed. Pure greed and ego. So just scale it back a bit. Original plan was for just 3 shows anyway. Here’s something else to chew on. http://www.thelostogle.com/2013/04/16/surprise-garth-brooks-is-shameless/
Have you ever been to a stadium concert? There’s a lot more to it than a stage and his band. All of that work will have already been done. The stage is built and paid for. It’s too late to scale it back!! Can’t believe they haven’t reversed this decision yet! F*cking country pisses me off more by the day.
I spent too many months of my life working on a Garth documentary 1st time around 20 years ago, even 1 gig would be torture let alone 5 :) That hat totin’, God-fearin’, yeeee-haaaawin’ act doesn’t do it for me. Lovely man, could land a spit on a sixpence but his music is about as far as you can get on the other end of the spectrum to what I would listen to. In this row I think vitriol should be directed at the promoter who knew full well that it was subject to license. I’m sure GB could’ve sold those dates elsewhere given sufficient notice. Could be that he’ll end up suing the promoter too.
Totally agree, the blame lies squarely with the promoter. That little disclaimer at the bottom of the tickets ‘subject to planning permission’ is a little clue as to how they operate. GB would have sold those tickets no matter where he was playing, why did it have to be Croke Park 5 nights in a row? Surely Aiken are big enough to do a deal with Pairc Ui Chaomh or other stadiums which could have been an Irish tour? Then a more adaptable show could have been created like most musicians do. It’s a mighty cock-up.
I feel sorry for all those who purchased tickets in good faith and the local businesses that will lose out now but if people think this is just about 300 or so residents they’re wrong. The whole of North Dublin is set back every time there’s a match or concert on, either by traffic delays or people parking their cars in estates as far as Santry, not to mention noise pollution and potential anti social issues for the locals. It’s not the promoters but the council who have to take responsibility for that.
Derek, to be fair, if Brooks was that greedy he’d cut his losses and accept the three. I think he’s just being naive here and standing up for his fans. He also knows that he would lose a certain amount of face with fans and peers if he meekly accepted the three shows without a fight. It’s the promoters who should be accused of greed. You could say they led him on!
In effect Dublin isn’t a city anymore- it’s just a commercial entity to be exploited. The same attitude extends to the city center with tacky outlets that should never have been granted license.
What did you think cities were for?
Ye are all forgetting something here. The ship carrying the stage and rigging has sailed. If it hits an iceberg (mmm?) it will sink. No stage, no concerts. We have to wait now to see if this ship docks. Aiken will be looking down at it from his plane and cringing and praying.
Brooks has a guarantee from Aitken – to provide a suitable venue for 5 concerts.
If such a venue is not made available to Brooks (and his group/company), significant penalties will apply – to be paid by Aitken and his backers.
Its his problem; he promoted (and sold tickets) before the required permissions had been obtained.
Glen, “Its his problem; he promoted (and sold tickets) before the required permissions had been obtained.” Surely by now you’ve reads that this is NORMAL!
OK, normal. But is not Aitken’s predicament, his problem?
…and the 400,000 ticket holders AND the struggling businesses in Dublin.
I think there’s a great deal of snobbery here. The 70,000 people flying in for C&W singer is too much for some people who think their taste in music is superior, even if it’s probably equally crap. There’s probably thousands of Rap, R&B (not the proper R&B but the crap new stuff) and Dance fans who think they’re cool and C&W fans are m0r0ns.
It will effect the life of one person. This story gets funnier by the day.
One person? So cancellation won’t effect shops, pubs, restaraunts, hotels and all their workers? Won’t effect those from inside of Ireland and out who have booked vacations and travel plans around this event? Revenue generated, taxes and licensing fees all go to one person as well? This isn’t Brooks’ fault…he negotiated and signed what he thought was a firm contract. He could’ve taken this concert series, which would generate millions for a local economy, elsewhere…but he signed a contract. That contract has now been broken and, as a business entity, he has a right to walk away. You may think it’s unfair that he makes a lot of money, but in our system those who generate large amounts of revenue tend to make a lot of money…
We could force the concert goers to take a different route each night. Get the psni down with their expertise. Get an eu grant for cross border project
Oh FFS people it’s not guns n roses. Take the cash & move on.
No he’s not quite that sh*t, thank God.
The comments should be turned of on these articles like the one last night!!
*OF*
One more try
I know! It nearly 11 and I’m still not with it yet!
it*…I’m
Remember when all the half price dust pans are gone – they’re gone.
Because we’re worth it.
I can’t believe it’s not butter.
Bodyformed for you.
Advertising has NO affect on me at tall.
At last another Gareth Brook story I was getting withdrawal symptoms
Just because a few eejits think this is a big deal does not make it news. Maybe a few less articles? There was a question a while back if it would damage Ireland. The reporting of it certainly would. How pathetic would the world think the Irish are if they go on top the Journal and find an article every hour about this? And all these politicians and other eejits falling over themselves to provide a few more mil in revenue for some overrated country star. Absolutely pathetic.
A few is hardly what you would describe 400,000 people as?
Mr. Aiken, tell Mr. Brooks I love him anyway.
For everyone who is sick of the Garth Brooks articles – you have the option to just not read them! No one is forcing you to read them, there are plenty of other articles on the Journal that you skip, just making this part of your skip list and stop wasting what’s apparently your precious time
and the thunder rolls ,and the thunder
Rolls
For Gods sake Peter, make sure your phone and laptop are charged!!
How many concerts did he do last time he was here anybody know?
3 concerts in ’97, he did a tv special about Ireland which was aired in March ’98 which 15.7 million people watched..
The Haiyan was a crisis ,this is not ,Drama too much.
I genuinely still don’t even really know who he is, not to mind why everyone cares so bloody much if he plays or not! Leave him off jaysus too much hassle at this rate.
have your say