Reiche be gone and cetero censeo, Reiche must resign.
Anyone who disregards international agreements, such as the Paris Agreement, undermines the foundation of a rules-based global order.
If you choose to run for and become Federal Chancellor, you can’t just skip the single most important climate summit of the year—not even because it’s your 71st birthday and you’d rather go out for an Italian dinner. Given the protests by Gen Z and the widespread, justified frustration among the younger generation, it sends a striking—and frankly questionable—signal for the Chancellor to skip an event that so profoundly affects them. It’s essentially a middle finger to all young people—thanks for that. And it’s not just him; Macron, Meloni, and Sánchez—from France, Italy, and Spain—aren’t there either. These wealthy Europeans, who bear a significant share of the responsibility for this whole mess, consider themselves too important to show up and take responsibility. It sends a disastrous message to the global community. After all, COP remains a unique forum: nearly every nation on Earth gathers there—regardless of other conflicts or wars—to collectively address humanity’s greatest crisis.
A striking contrast: for 2025, Germany has allocated only 4.7 billion euros for international climate finance—falling short of the 6 billion promised (an amount that would be insufficient even if fully met). Meanwhile, the government has poured billions into the construction of new gas-fired power plants and, this year alone, sank 7.5 billion euros into fuel subsidies—subsidies that, as has been shown, primarily benefited the fossil fuel lobby. But sure, I guess we just "don’t have the money."
A quick reminder: the only statement our government made regarding the 16,000 heat-related deaths in Germany this year was that, well, you can’t change the weather. * I’ve come up with a new term, and I think we should all use it as often as we possibly can. I’ve been thinking about the Office for the Protection of the Constitution—the German domestic intelligence agency—which distinguishes between three forms of extremism: Islamism, left-wing extremism, and right-wing extremism. I asked myself: Why only these three?
The agency’s mandate is to protect the constitution; so why is there no term for those who fanatically seek to incinerate our world and our future?
In 2021, the Federal Constitutional Court ruled that a failure to take climate action is incompatible with our constitution, as the Basic Law mandates the protection of the foundations of life for future generations. So, what do we call those who, with such vehemence and ambition, fuel the climate crisis and violate our Basic Law?
My suggestion: "fossil extremists." News reports might then sound something like this:
The Union—comprising the CDU and CSU—has been classified by the Office for the Protection of the Constitution as definitively "fossil extremist." According to a 300-page document, there are various reasons for this, with political decisions made over the past year playing a major role. These include several laws originating from the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs that appear specifically designed to stall the energy transition, as well as two substantial tax windfalls for major fossil-fuel corporations—measures presented to the public as a "fuel discount." This classification allows the intelligence agency to conduct targeted surveillance of the Union and document further constitutional violations. Some politicians from other parties are now calling for the Federal Constitutional Court to examine whether the "fossil extremist" Union should be banned. Meanwhile, the SPD—which governs in a coalition with the Union—has been flagged as a "suspected case" of fossil extremism, given that it has supported many of the Union’s fossil-extremist policy decisions. And now for the weather: We are in a climate crisis—wake up, for heaven’s sake, and stop voting for parties that promote a fossil-fuel agenda.
Various studies—including one from Lüneburg (published in 2026)—show that people consistently underestimate how much importance others place on the climate as an issue. As a result, we collectively underestimate how much climate protection actually matters to us, and how prepared we are to take action. So, let’s not underestimate ourselves—let’s speak up loudly for climate justice!
