Where debating everything under the sun is only the beginning

The Federal Cabinet approved the wording aid submitted by the Federal Minister of Digital Affairs and Transport (BMDV) on April 27 for the parliamentary groups of the SPD (Social democrats), Bündnis90/Die Grünen (Green Party) and FDP (Liberal Democrats) for a draft of a Seventh Act to amend the Regionalisation Act to be introduced from the centre of the German Bundestag. With the amendment, which now enters parliamentary consultations, regionalisation funds are to be increased by a total of 3.7 billion euros in 2022. This is intended to finance both the implementation of the “9 for 90 ticket” and the federal government’s contribution to compensating the public transport companies for the loss of fare revenue due to the pandemic.

Roe and Casey are similarly suspect.

For similar reasons, Gorsuch's reasoned addition to Title VII's definition of "sex" should be reconsidered...

Invented in Rotterdam and spreading across the country, the fietsvlonder is a “bike platform” that temporarily swaps one car parking space for 8 bikes.

If successful, the curb is permanently adjusted, and it is moved to another location. The Hague Vice Mayor @RvanAsten
 explains.

I have seen photos of Third Reich schoolchildren doing the Nazi salute with the teacher in schoolclass. The Nazi salute may easily have been a daily thing. Moreover, insofar as Hitler managed to institute the Nazi salute as a general greeting among all citizens, it can be deemed creepier than in USA. In USA there is no "Heil Uncle Sam" or such.

The "flag worship" thing -as you call it- has much to do with military service, here. What other forms of regional (or national)  symbolism or heraldic identification bother you so?

What countries have we conquered?

@Frenzie: "creepy totalitarian pledge"...? What about the U.S. Pledge of Allegiance is creepy or totalitarian?

I am yet to find an American who'd think the children's daily flag-worship remarkable in any way. But let me tell you that it's extraordinarily remarkable. I am not aware of evidence that even Third Reich or Stalinist USSR had this level of indoctrination and brainwashing for children. They sure as hell had indoctrination and brainwashing and it had its effects, but this did not come in a daily worship ritual for all school-going children.

@Frenzie What I am most interested in is whether the regions have their own tax authority with their own tax officers and do the regional tax authorities operate their own tax accounts.

[Edit]But it matters in this context how the operations are funded. Do the regions have their own taxes and are able to draw own taxes directly to own budget? In Estonia and Sweden, municipalities have the right to impose some municipal taxes. In Sweden the municipalities also in fact use this capacity. In Estonia they do not. But either way, the tax money goes to the state and the municipalities need to wait until their share gets distributed to them from the state. And this municipal tax base is so limited that any bigger project, say a major reconstruction of a kindergarten, not to mention a whole new kindergarten, needs external funding, state support or private sponsors.[/edit]

Among other things, Carantonis refers to the car registration tax. It is noted that certain luxury models of BMW, with a purchase price of approximately 80,000 euros, are charged a registration tax of 4,957 euros in Wallonia and Brussels. In Flanders, on the other hand, only 468.90 euros has to be paid. This has to do with Flanders' decision to calculate the tax on emissions, while in Wallonia and Brussels it is still calculated on power. Since the BMW in question has a particularly high power output, but also records good ecological performance, the differences are particularly high.

Registration duties on real estate are also much more advantageous in Flanders than in the other regions of the country. In Flanders, 10 percent of the selling price is applied, compared to 12.5 percent in Brussels and Wallonia. On a 300,000 euro home, this results in an advantage of 7,500 euros in Flanders. But in Flanders, these amounts can also be deducted when buying a larger home at a later date. If 400,000 euros has to be paid for this, 40,000 euros will ultimately be charged in registration duties in Flanders, compared to 87,500 euros in Brussels and Wallonia. Moreover, in Brussels the discounts for modest houses have been abolished. Belgians also still have to pay taxes in their own municipality. Only in Flanders, however, are there a number of exceptions to this. In De Panne, Knokke or Koksijde the municipal surcharges are 0.0 percent. In the Walloon municipalities of Mouscron or Visé, on the other hand, this rises to 8.8 percent.  Finally, in Wallonia there is still a tax of 100 euros per television set in the home to be paid. In Flanders and Brussels, these levies have been abolished for a long time.

Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)

Doesn't depend on federal or otherwise. Sweden is not federal. And the same seems to work in Netherlands.

• Spatial planning
• Home and living (e.g., rules around renting, constructing social homes)
• Environment
• Nature
• Water
• Agriculture, fishery
• Economy
• Tourism
• Animal welfare
• Energy policy
• Jobs
• Infrastructure, transit
• Scientific research
• International relations

• Culture
• Education
• Healthcare
• Welfare
• Justice

This phenomenon is present in Western European countries too, e.g. Sweden and Belgium can be unable to form a government (called "government crisis") for years, yet the country keeps functioning just fine, because state officials keep doing their job.

Since I'll likely be accused of partisanship anyway

I think this implicitly means that beer is also earlier than wine.

Aren't you the guy who downloaded the entire Wikipedia?

"Victory in Europe" depended a lot on where in Europe: Czechs mark anniversary of liberation by American troops in WWII