Merkel at EU: COVID Proves You Can't Manage Reality with Lies and Misdirection

On July 1, 2020, Germany took over the rotating, six-month presidency of the Council of the European Union (here).  On July 7, Chancellor Angela Merkel traveled to Brussels to give a speech to the Council (here).   The transcript in English is here and in German here.

CNN carried a lively headline on July 10 - "Angela Merkel Knows How to Insert a Dagger."

What happened?

CNN quotes:

"As we are experiencing firsthand, you cannot fight the pandemic with lies and disinformation any more than you can fight it with hate or incitement to hatred," Merkel said. "The limits of populism and denial of basic truths are being laid bare."

In fact, this remark, occurring at around minutes 17/18, was the only remark that led to an interruption for applause from the audience.

In German, the remark is:

"Wir erleben es gerade: Mit Lüge und Desinformation lässt sich die Pandemie nicht bekämpfen, ebenso wenig wie mit Hass und Hetze. Dem Fakten leugnenden Populismus werden seine Grenzen aufgezeigt." 

Online at Youtube, in the German video, the zinger comes at about 17min50sec.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=twbIHQRENBI

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• CNBC reviews Germany's COVID progress as "a master class in science communication" - here.
• For a July 23 Associated Press article on Merkel's theme, here.