Pity is a feeling that is forbidden to journalists at school. After all, we are supposed to look as closely as possible at the sometimes actually dirty fingers of the more or less powerful, so a look clouded by tears is not helpful. But even journalists are only people who are sometimes better off and sometimes worse off. In a valley, it can happen that empathy arises even for contemporaries who would have been showered with scorn and ridicule with the arrogance of height.

Berthold Kohler

Editor.

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The "citizen of the Reich", who has to answer for an attempted coup d'état with other conspirators, would even have deserved only contempt and condemnation. But when the seventy-seven-year-old was now led into the courtroom in her jogging suit, we remembered the images of old Yasser Arafat in a terry romper, and then the ruthlessness cracked. But what does this grandmother still have to want to kidnap the Lauterbach at her age, instead of simply weakening the state by cashing in on her teacher's pension, which she is now rid of, for as long as possible? Did she have nothing left to knit?

All day long at the Russen-Gerd

A certain sympathy arose against every reluctance for the now unemployed woman of the Russian Gerd. She was fired by her employer because she celebrated the victory over Nazi Germany together with her husband, AfD leader Chrupalla and other illustrious figures in the Russian embassy; the victory over Nazi Ukraine is still a long time coming. It must be said that the economic development agency of the state of North Rhine-Westphalia, of which Mrs. Schröder-Kim was the representative, must have known for some time that it had not hired a Lieschen Müller. Now the poor woman sits at home with her Gerd all day again. Loyalty to the regime sometimes comes at a high price.

Which brings us to the case that took us the most this week: Habeck. When he announced that he had to dismiss his best man after all, we were almost as touched as the minister himself. Graichen was not only a close friend of Habeck, but also, according to his eulogies, the man who almost single-handedly ensured that we still had electricity and gas in winter and did not plunge into a deep economic crisis.

Will the merits of this unsung hero ever be adequately appreciated? There is hope. After a certain waiting period, Merkel is now also showered with medals. She even gets one from Söder, who, for an obvious reason, does not want to show a worse record than Wüst in this field either.

God did not fall into Habeck's arms

But back to the Old Testament tragedy of Graichen. Only a few days earlier, Habeck had declared that he was not prepared to "sacrifice a human being". Who could not think of Abraham, who would have thrust the knife into the throat of his son Isaac if an angel had not appeared at the last minute with the message that the divine invitation to do so was merely a test. Did Habeck also hope for this when he tied Graichen to the altar of the heating turnaround in order to save his law, his own job and also a few percent for the Greens with this proof of merciless adherence to principles? In any case, God did not intervene. Not really his people.

Even the Greens are now relying on the plagues with which the Lord punishes us for dealing with his creation: If the forests burn again in the summer, the Graichen affair will no longer be an issue. Our old saying: no harm that does not also have a benefit. Habeck himself also seems to have survived the rapid shutdown of his Mr. Heat pump without a core meltdown. When asked who he would appoint as his successor, he said: "Not my best man." But now we are relieved! Not even a human sacrifice can rob the man of humor. Let us use this as an example.