In the two days since the new German government under Chancellor Friedrich Merz tightened border controls, 19 people who had applied for asylum have reportedly been turned away.
I don’t understand what you’re arguing. That because Germany has 84M people they should just let smugglers, people with open arrest warrants, terrorists, and extremists into the country as they please? Why? That seems crazy to me.
I am saying that it does not sound like a very effective measure.
There are, give or take, 2m crime suspects per year in Germany–while many are likely counted twice, the number still gives an idea of the dimension. That makes roughly 5500 criminal suspects per day. 70 suspects/2d is 0.6% of that.
In addition, I find it exceedingly likely that they caught a bunch of low-level people who didn’t care to protect themselves but missed out on higher-level, systemic cases they’d have caught given a different personnel allocation.
I see, so you believe it has low benefit for the cost? Surely you would need to know the cost (e.g. number of personnel deployed) to make that judgement?
I would also caution you against attempting to hide big numbers behind even bigger numbers. 35 arrests a day is 12,775 per year. That might not be a proportionally big number, but it is a big number. Especially when we remember that the majority of violent crime is committed by just 1% of the population. Detecting and arresting criminals is often even more effective than harsh sentences.
I think criminals of all levels should be appropriately punished. Otherwise the law should change to reflect what is and is not criminal.
You didn’t just “contextualize.” You minimised the number: “Yeah, that totally sounds like a lot in a country of 84m. /s” Those are your words, verbatim.
It was 3,000 officers. Germany has 333,000 full time officers. That’s 0.9% of the force. Hardly grossly disproportionate to the benefit. There are undoubtedly far less “efficient” endeavours they use police resources on. The clearance rate for burglary in Germany, for example, was 19.5% in 2001. If we extend your logic, police should just stop investigating burglaries. I might even agree. I consider catching smugglers and terrorists more important.
You didn’t just “contextualize.” You minimised the number: “Yeah, that totally sounds like a lot in a country of 84m. /s” Those are your words, verbatim.
Oh dear. Is this “argument” anything but bad faith? I basically said that that is a normal-enough number in a country of 84m.
It was 3,000 officers. Germany has 333,000 full time officers. That’s 0.9% of the force. Hardly grossly disproportionate to the benefit.
It seems to me that 0.9% is 50% larger than 0.6%, so dunno about that. And it’s not just any police, as far as I am aware, it’s Federales rather than low-level local trainees.
If we extend your logic, police should just stop investigating burglaries. I might even agree.
That’s awfully sweet of you, given how you apparently just came up with “my logic”.
I consider catching smugglers
You do realize that “smuggler” most likely primarily refers to people who bought more cigarettes in Poland/Czechia than the legal limit allows, right?
I am very anti-smoking but finding small-time tobacco tax evaders wouldn’t be a priority to me. Especially since Germany still allows cigarette ads in POS locations and cigarette giveaways on festivals.
and terrorists more important.
Now, you’ve mentioned “terrorists” a number of times. The report speaks only of “extremists”, i.e. people holding extreme world views who likely acted out on demonstrations or are otherwise accused of a smaller crime.
I don’t understand what you’re arguing. That because Germany has 84M people they should just let smugglers, people with open arrest warrants, terrorists, and extremists into the country as they please? Why? That seems crazy to me.
I am saying that it does not sound like a very effective measure.
There are, give or take, 2m crime suspects per year in Germany–while many are likely counted twice, the number still gives an idea of the dimension. That makes roughly 5500 criminal suspects per day. 70 suspects/2d is 0.6% of that.
In addition, I find it exceedingly likely that they caught a bunch of low-level people who didn’t care to protect themselves but missed out on higher-level, systemic cases they’d have caught given a different personnel allocation.
I see, so you believe it has low benefit for the cost? Surely you would need to know the cost (e.g. number of personnel deployed) to make that judgement?
I would also caution you against attempting to hide big numbers behind even bigger numbers. 35 arrests a day is 12,775 per year. That might not be a proportionally big number, but it is a big number. Especially when we remember that the majority of violent crime is committed by just 1% of the population. Detecting and arresting criminals is often even more effective than harsh sentences.
I think criminals of all levels should be appropriately punished. Otherwise the law should change to reflect what is and is not criminal.
So “contextualizing” is “hiding a big number behind a bigger number”?
Also, yeah, the initial announcements had a number of around 3.5k police officers busybodied with this stuff.
You didn’t just “contextualize.” You minimised the number: “Yeah, that totally sounds like a lot in a country of 84m. /s” Those are your words, verbatim.
It was 3,000 officers. Germany has 333,000 full time officers. That’s 0.9% of the force. Hardly grossly disproportionate to the benefit. There are undoubtedly far less “efficient” endeavours they use police resources on. The clearance rate for burglary in Germany, for example, was 19.5% in 2001. If we extend your logic, police should just stop investigating burglaries. I might even agree. I consider catching smugglers and terrorists more important.
Oh dear. Is this “argument” anything but bad faith? I basically said that that is a normal-enough number in a country of 84m.
It seems to me that 0.9% is 50% larger than 0.6%, so dunno about that. And it’s not just any police, as far as I am aware, it’s Federales rather than low-level local trainees.
That’s awfully sweet of you, given how you apparently just came up with “my logic”.
You do realize that “smuggler” most likely primarily refers to people who bought more cigarettes in Poland/Czechia than the legal limit allows, right?
I am very anti-smoking but finding small-time tobacco tax evaders wouldn’t be a priority to me. Especially since Germany still allows cigarette ads in POS locations and cigarette giveaways on festivals.
Now, you’ve mentioned “terrorists” a number of times. The report speaks only of “extremists”, i.e. people holding extreme world views who likely acted out on demonstrations or are otherwise accused of a smaller crime.
Where do the terrorists you mention come from?