reuters.com
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The EU executive appears to have yielded to the call from carmakers to be allowed to keep selling plug-in hybrids and range extenders with CO2-neutral biofuel or synthetic fuel

the electric vehicle industry says this will undermine investment and result in the EU yielding even more ground to China in the shift to EVs

        • thespcicifcocean@lemmy.worldEnglish
          1·
          11 hours ago

          europe already had shitty practices before americanization could have been an excuse. also, Frontex, AfD, Marine le Pen, Meloni, all that crap, seems to be stemming from a systemic problem in europe with the right wing actual nazis and actual nazi sympathizers. Spain only stopped being a literal fascist country in the 1970s. It’s easy to dunk on America, because America is loudly doing shit that’s obviously bad all the time. But it seems to me that Europe is on par with america, except here in europe, you also have to deal with the Fr*nch.

          • Diplomjodler@lemmy.worldEnglish
            3·
            10 hours ago

            I’m not in any way saying that everything that’s going wrong in Europe is the fault of the US. We’ve certainly had fascists here ever since fascism was invented as a concept, which happened in Europe, as we all know.

            What I’m talking about are the recent political developments where all kinds of malignant actors are using US run social media platforms to normalise fascism. There was a time when there was a broad societal consensus that fascism is bad. Now people will argue with you if you say that and the corporate media will report on it as a “controversy”.

      • DandomRude@lemmy.worldEnglish
        11·
        1 day ago

        Yes, here is some information about the career of the German Chancellor, who is currently using his influence to weaken the ban on combustion engines.

        Friedrich Merz (born November 11, 1955, in Brilon), tenth Chancellor of the Federal Republic of Germany since May 6, 2025, CDU federal chairman since 2022, former business lawyer and long-time top lobbyist, has held leadership positions in a number of companies and business-related interest groups and networks. [1] Until the end of 2021, Merz was vice president of the CDU’s business lobby group, the Economic Council, and a guest member of the presidium of the Small and Medium-Sized Business and Economic Union (MIT). In 2022, the MIT welcomed Merz’s election as CDU chairman and stated that he was the first chairman to be a member of the MIT.[4] Armin Peter, most recently deputy press spokesman for the Economic Council and press spokesman for the then Economic Council Vice President Merz, has been deputy spokesman for the CDU and personal press spokesman for Merz since February 2022.[5] [6] Merz continues to be a member of the following organizations: Founding member of the New York section of the CDU Economic Council,[7] lobby organization Society for the Study of Structural Policy Issues,[8] Ludwig Erhard Foundation network, which brings together lobbyists and top politicians. Merz worked as senior counsel for the law firm Mayer Brown LLP until the end of 2021; prior to that, he was a partner for nine years.[9] During his time at Mayer Brown, he advised clients on corporate law, M&A transactions, compliance, and banking and finance law. According to research by CORRECTIV, he represented BASF as a lawyer on several occasions in 2010 and 2011. [10] He was a member of the board of directors at BASF Antwerp for almost a decade, where he headed the “Paints & Pigments” division of the BASF Group. From 2009 to 2019, Merz was chairman of Atlantik-Brücke [11] and from 2016 to 2020, he was chairman of the supervisory board of the German branch of asset manager BlackRock, for which he mediated relationships with important clients, authorities, and government agencies in Germany. [12] He was active in the Market Economy Foundation as a member of the Political Advisory Board of the Tax Code Commission. [13] In connection with his candidacy for the CDU party chairmanship, Merz ended his role as chairman of the supervisory board of Blackrock at the end of the first quarter of 2020.[14][15] At the 2021 CDU party conference, he lost a digital runoff election to his rival Armin Laschet. At the party conference on January 22, 2022, he was elected chairman of the CDU with 94.62% of the delegates’ votes. [16] On September 23, 2024, Merz was officially nominated as the CDU and CSU’s candidate for chancellor in the next federal election. [17]

        [Translated from German | Source with source references]