British Newspaper Owner calls all Germans 'Nazis'

Apparently the German newspaper group Axel Springer is possibly going to buy out Britain's most widely read broadsheet newspaper, the Daily Telegraph.

At a meeting yesterday (Thursday 22nd April 2004) between Telegraph executives, the Axel Springer group, and others, Richard Desmond (owner of the Daily Express) launched into a tirade calling all Germans Nazis. He sang, "Deutschland über alles" and asked, "How did we fancy being taken over by a lot of 'effing Nazis?'". One or two of them were giving 'sieg heil' salutes and he placed two fingers of one hand in the style of a Hitler moustache.

Nice one Desmond!

Full story on BBC News: Express Owner in Nazi Outburst

to be fair though..you' have to give him some credit for knowing the words to deutschland ueber alles.

bloke sounds like he's off his trolley.

... now, if he could only get the tune right to the Horst Wessel anthem!

This story also reminded me of the two Germans who worked for Motorola in England and had to leave because of the anti-German abuse they received. See the earlier TT thread:

Germans suing Motorola

Good to see that Anglo-German relations haven't improved a jot in 60 years.

What he doesn't appear to know, flogger, is that singing the first verse of the German National Anthem (which starts with "Deutschland über alles") has been banned since just after WW2. The official anthem nowadays starts with "Einigkeit und Recht und Freiheit". I didn't know either till I moved here, but s.o. fimds it highly amusing that the rest of the world stil sings the first verse...

Fucking funny flogger :-)

But can we now perhaps begin to see the oh so subtle reasons why the UK press is anti-europe??? Hmmmm If only I had the illumination earlier I could have saved myself some sleepless nights.