Elections, SPD, AI, rockets: It would be cool if Germany could have democracy

t az: Mr. Küppersbusch, what was bad last week?

Friedrich Küppersbusch: Merz gives the speech of an opposition leader against a chancellor, this time - Weidel.

Küppersbusch: Someone explain it to him.

taz: Journalists are trying to explain the election results in Saxony-Anhalt. What do you think is behind it – pure racism, economic concerns or defiance?

Küppersbusch: It's good that you asked me; I am Nostradamus. Maybe a humorous aspect: If I came up with a designer Nazi for a script who was also called “Siegmund” and who until recently sold “scent marketing for companies” for a living, it would definitely be comedy. Siegmund steams his folkish mud with a vain parting and penetrating buddy vanilla. Next door in Meckpomm, a caring country mother with the opposite program is almost as successful. In short: the will of the voters can definitely be moved, above a sea of ​​firmly right-wing extremist attitudes - by a convincing offer of personnel. Especially when the childlike, pre-democratic desire for a really nice authority always resonates. The Union and the SPD look at me in astonishment and say: "Oh, we just have to come across as cool? Just say that straight away!" Yes, I'm sorry.

taz: As you know, after the election is before the election. What can we expect from the state elections in Berlin and Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania?

Küppersbusch: Grosso modo: minority governments. From the surveys - shaky Greens here, imploding CDU and Socialists there - all sorts of checkered surprise coalitions can be imagined. But we can still manage the week. Holland, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Spain, Latvia - all minority governments, even at the national level. Sometimes more to the left, sometimes to the right. The miserable drumming of Springer and company against the “firewall” would sound quieter if one looked more calmly at the option of cooperation between Democrats. Then it suddenly becomes nonsense that nothing works without the AfD. In addition, the Left in Berlin should not miss the fun of being the first to invite the CDU to talks. Like as a junior partner.

taz: There was a lot of row in the SPD with top candidate Steffen Krach, who is being investigated for corruption. What impact do the house searches have on the Berlin election?

Küppersbusch: Deadly. The allegations come so late that Krach can neither convincingly refute them nor can the SPD replace the candidate. Sunk. If you take into account that the first house search of this investigation took place in May, the timing - allegations against Krach 11 days before the election - seems original. The same investigative public prosecutor's office in Hanover ruined a federal president in 2012 with a bunch of allegations that ultimately turned out to be unfounded in court. After his resignation. Good Hunting. The presumption of innocence applies.

taz: The Anthropic researcher Jacob Coxon resigned out of concern about possible consequences and warns in interviews about uncontrollable AI systems. Will AI kill us all?

Küppersbusch: If I were her, I would make it look more like an accident. As long as AI cannot build solar parks or photovoltaics, it needs us – as electricity slaves. It gets dark behind there. Of course we are carriers of the divine will, but our ecological balance is worse or even unacceptable. Has anyone ever wondered where our particular interest in dinosaurs comes from?

taz: The German health insurance companies are threatened with a loss of billions because they have relied on risky funds. What went wrong here?

Küppersbusch: Social security institutions – so-called SGB investors – must invest their funds according to the strict rules of the “Fourth Book of the Social Security Code”. Or shit on it and then the money is gone. By law, investments should only have been made in loss-free products. A particularly bad piece of news at exactly the historic moment, when in the future pensions will also be secured in part through investments on the capital market. You wouldn't want to let the same experts do it.

taz: A German start-up has launched the first rocket into space in continental Europe. Friedrich Merz calls this the “beginning of a new era”. What do you call it?

Küppersbusch: If Germany has billions in funding and enough commercial and scientific skills to “emancipate itself from Elon Musk” - “Germany can do space travel”: then I would like to do the same thing against “X”, formerly “Twitter”. “Germany can do democracy” would be cool too.

Küppersbusch: If you win 6 to 2 and have five different goalscorers, that sounds like a good team structure.

Friedrich Küppersbusch is a journalist, producer and grimly confident