Tobias Traut

This world is full of exciting things.
Special interest in church, diakonia, ecumenism. And Russia.
Views are my own.

#NieWieder #WirSindMehr #СлаваУкраїні

[Tobias Traut @ya_tobi]

Ukraine - the role model for Europe. ✊️

[Denys from Ukraine @GlushkoDenys]

💔🇺🇦 “We do not fear death for the sake of freedom. And freedom will be ours, And we will win, and Ukraine will be in Europe, and it will be among all the free nations of the world,” a Revolution of Dignity activist said 11 years ago on Kyiv's Maidan Nezalezhnosti.

They were not afraid and stood up to the internal enemy. And they started the fight for a free and independent Ukraine from Russian influence. Now we have to complete and survive this struggle.

On Feb. 20, the Ukrainians honour the Heroes of the Heavenly Hundred, remembering the most tragic days of the mass shootings of protesters during the Revolution of Dignity 2013-2014.

[Tobias Traut @ya_tobi]

@newsand_more @ThomasLeurs1 Das beste Role Model hier ist wohl Matthias Warnig.

[Tobias Traut @ya_tobi]

@ed2muc @VerenaW74911 @BauerWilli_org 40 Grad im Schatten ist schön? Das kann man wohl nur dann sagen, wenn man vom Wetter nicht abhängig ist und das Privileg hat, in klimatisierten Räumen leben und arbeiten zu können.

[Tobias Traut @ya_tobi]

@QalaatAlMudiq @APHClarkson Global solidarity. ❤

[Tobias Traut @ya_tobi]

@mfphhh Und all denjenigen, die ihr Leben ließen und nie mehr nachhause zurückkehren werden.

[Tobias Traut @ya_tobi]

Eins kann Deutschland gut: Selbsttäuschung. Das geht seit Jahrzehnten schon so. Und egal, wo: Außen- und Sicherheitspolitik Klimaziele, Rente, Automobilindustrie. Selbst beim Fußball.

[Roderich Kiesewetter🇪🇺🇩🇪🇮🇱🇺🇦 @RKiesewetter]

Anyone who wants to be a leader must take responsibility and adopt a clear stance. In my latest for War on the Rocks, I argue that Germany’s New Military Strategy claims to lead, yet hesitates to act.
Germany has become a master of grand announcements. But the aim of this document seems to be propping up leadership claims on paper, rather than proving them by taking on responsibilities we could already shoulder today. Shaped by politics rather than military advice, it combines hubris and despondency instead of translating the demands of the modern battlefield into actionable steps.

The strategy suffers from three fatal flaws:
1. An inconsistent timeline: The Bundeswehr is supposed to be capable of national defense by 2029, yet key capabilities will not be operational until 2035, and full conventional strength is slated for 2039. This completely ignores the acute threat window forecasted by our own intelligence agencies for 2026–2028. Where is the ambition to be ready today?
2. No operationalization of realities: The federal government is not implementing conscription; it is misallocating the Sondervermögen (special defense fund); and it is withholding Taurus cruise missiles out of a misplaced fear of escalation.
3. The missing will to win: The government still cannot agree on whether Ukraine’s victory is the strategic objective. When democracies are under attack, they must be willing to win.
That is why the most central statement is missing from this strategy: “We are building up our Bundeswehr at a pace that will allow us to win in the event of an attack.”
Anyone who wants to be a leader must take responsibility.
https://t.co/a5Cvmopp1B

[Prof. Stefan Rahmstorf 🌏 🦣 @rahmstorf]

Unsere Kinder und Enkel werden uns bitter verfluchen.
Die #Erderhitzung lässt sich auch durch Nullemissionen nicht zurückdrehen, nur die weitere Erhitzung stoppen.
Denn CO2 bleibt Jahrtausende in der Luft. Kipppunkte kommen näher.
Es wird kein Zurück geben.

[Tobias Traut @ya_tobi]

@Sven_Krueger_ @berndulrich Wegen der Umweltlobby verkaufen sich die deutschen Autos im In- und Ausland so schlecht? Den Zusammenhang müssen Sie mal erklären!

[Tobias Traut @ya_tobi]

Das intellektuelle Niveau des bayerischen Wirtschaftsministers:

[Hubert Aiwanger @HubertAiwanger]

@MeRei133 Das hängt zusammen. Woke Verhältnisse führen zu kaputten Toiletten.

[Tobias Traut @ya_tobi]

@ajfuzz1 The juridicial perspective on that is quite simple:
There was a treaty between Ukraine and Russia on the use of Sevastopol until 2042 (https://t.co/SrR9ksIgYT). Russia terminated that treaty unilaterally in 2014. So it has no right anymore to run a naval base on Crimea.

[Tobias Traut @ya_tobi]

👏👏

[Andreas Püttmann @Puettmann_Bonn]

"Die anderen Bistümer, alle Gläubigen in Deutschland sind aufgerufen, ihnen beizustehen, ihre Stimme zu verstärken und klarzumachen: Die Verteidigung von Menschenwürde, Demokratie und Nächstenliebe ist keine regionale Aufgabe, sondern gemeinsamer Auftrag."
https://t.co/AxYFEVuW7Q

[Tobias Traut @ya_tobi]

@MartinSauerbrey How much I would like to see this criminal on the bench in The Hague!

[Tobias Traut @ya_tobi]

@planetinterview @MaxZeising Das ist eine Kritik an der Praxis des ÖRR, nicht am ÖRR an sich.

[Chris Chilton @chillychrisy]

Starmer is leaving because he lost a battle with The Daily Mail, The Sun, GB-News, Russian Propaganda, Musk, MAGA and Twitter.
The next PM will have the same forces undermining him from Day 1.
Who and how can we win this war? The answer isn’t Andy Burnham…

[Damian Low @DamianLow3]

Seeing some of the embarrassingly hateful reactions to Starmer's resignation today, I thought it was worth resharing this.

The level of personal hostility directed at Keir Starmer deserves scrutiny in its own right. Not because he should be immune from criticism, but because the tone and intensity of the attacks tell us something unhealthy about the state of democratic politics.

Starmer is a conventional political figure. Cautious, legalistic, incremental. He frustrates people precisely because he is managerial rather than messianic. Yet the reaction to him often goes far beyond disagreement, tipping into visceral hatred more commonly reserved for authoritarians or demagogues.

Much of this hostility is disconnected from concrete policy. It is not about specific votes, proposals or outcomes, but about projection. A belief that Starmer embodies betrayal, bad faith or hidden malice. That kind of politics runs on suspicion rather than evidence.

This matters because democracy depends on the assumption of good faith among opponents. You can think a leader is wrong, timid, or misguided without believing they are fundamentally illegitimate. Once politics becomes moralised to the point of demonisation, compromise is reframed as treachery and pluralism as weakness.

The pattern is familiar. In fragmented, polarised systems, anger concentrates not on extremists, whose intentions are clear, but on moderates, who disappoint maximalists on all sides. The centre becomes the lightning rod precisely because it resists totalising narratives.

There is also a media and online dynamic at work. Incentives reward outrage, not proportionality. Algorithms favour contempt over analysis. Over time, this creates a political culture in which relentless personal attack feels normal, even virtuous, rather than disgusting.

None of this is a defence of Starmer’s decisions, instincts or record. Those should be argued over robustly as you do in a democracy. The problem is the substitution of critique with hostility and the quiet erosion of democratic norms that follows when political opponents are treated as enemies rather than rivals.

A democracy cannot function if every election is framed as an existential struggle against internal evil. At some point, the target may change, but the damage to trust, restraint and culture remains.

[Sam @SamCKx]

A democratically elected British Prime Minister has been driven from office by a relentless campaign of propaganda and misinformation; funded, amplified and perpetuated by foreign billionaires and elites whose interests bear zero resemblance to those of ordinary working people.

A noble gesture from an emotional Keir Starmer, entirely consistent with his conduct in office.

A truly sad day for British democracy.

His full resignation speech:

[Tobias Traut @ya_tobi]

@daniel3liasson Offensichtlich ein Nazi.

[Tobias Traut @ya_tobi]

@confehrenbach @LindaTeuteberg 🤦‍♂️

[Tobias Traut @ya_tobi]

@japvie81 Ich gucke wohl zuwenig Fußball. Was ist kleingeistig an ihm?

[Tobias Traut @ya_tobi]

@confehrenbach @LindaTeuteberg Da steht, ohne Anführungszeichen, "Unser Krieg gegen Russland". Darum geht es, nicht um den Inhalt. Was stimmt: Wer zwischen Russland und der Sowjetunion nicht unterscheiden kann, ist da das Gegenteil von "woke" - ignorant, unwissenschaftlich, schlafmützig.

[Tobias Traut @ya_tobi]

@confehrenbach @LindaTeuteberg Es geht hier weder um Wokeness noch um Rumopfern, sondern um eine historisch präzise Darstellung. Das schafft der Spiegel nicht - dafür befördert er die Narrative der Lügner aus dem Kreml.