Word: german
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...with such care and creativity that each scene has a visual, emotional luster. One critic jokingly called Silent Light the best film ever made in its language - an easy claim to fame, since it is probably the only film in which the characters speak Plautdietsch, the form of Low German used by the sect in Europe, Latin America and Canada. One could make a grander claim: that this is among the finest recent foreign films. And to viewers conditioned to the speed and swagger of Hollywood product, one of the most foreign. (See TIME's list...
Just a few weeks ago, Chancellor Angela Merkel seemed content to coast along and see just how bad the financial crisis would get before taking action. As world leaders were piling up huge bailouts, Merkel promised only modest aid for the German economy, and members of her Cabinet even ridiculed other European leaders for engaging in a race to see who could spend the most. But as the new year gets under way, Merkel has clearly joined the race and may be moving ahead of the pack...
...fronts. Merkel's coalition nearly doubled its stimulus package to €50 billion this week and is drafting plans for a €100 billion Germany Fund to provide credit for midsize businesses. And Commerzbank, Germany's second biggest bank, has said it is to be partly nationalized. The German government's bank-rescue fund, the Financial Markets Stabilization Fund (SoFFin), will provide €10 billion in fresh cash to Commerzbank in exchange for a 25% stake plus one share in the bank. "We are weatherproofing our bank for an economically stormy environment. This will enable us to fulfill our responsibility...
...Government officials say the stimulus money will be earmarked for investment in long-term infrastructure projects that will help revive the construction industry, for aid to companies to reduce layoffs and for education. Data on German industrial orders indicate there will be no respite soon. Figures out Thursday showed orders fell a huge 6% in November from the month before, and orders in the final quarter of 2008 were down 43.6% from the same quarter a year ago. (See pictures of the global financial crisis...
Just as Merckle was a symbol of Germany's industrious spirit, his death may come to symbolize the way Germany is dealing with the global financial crisis. For years, German media and politicians railed against U.S. and British private-equity companies as a plague of destructive "locusts" who inflicted harm on German society. As Merckle's stock-market gamble failed, he seemed to become a homegrown locust for commentators and politicians looking for a scapegoat for the financial situation...