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You are here: Home / Foreign Affairs / Open Thread: German Hospitality At the G20

Open Thread: German Hospitality At the G20

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No, srsly. Per Buzzfeed:

… Organizers announced the scheduled summit in February 2016, which requires 9,000 hotel rooms to accommodate world leaders, their sizable staffs, and security details.

The Hamburger Abendblatt, a local news outlet, reported that the US government wanted to accommodate Trump in the Four Seasons, but it was already booked. In fact, it turns out that every luxury hotel in Hamburg was reportedly booked by the time the Americans called, leaving Trump, who is associated with an empire of hotel properties, scrambling for a place to stay.

Several weeks ago there were even rumors Trump might have to sleep in Berlin and have to fly to Hamburg via helicopter…

With the summit approaching, the city of Hamburg is now apparently stepping in to help.

Police officers guard the official Senate guest house of Hamburg, where US President Donald Trump will reportedly stay during the upcoming G20 summit…

Meanwhile, the US Consulate General in Hamburg is reportedly preparing to host Trump’s staff.

The address of the guest house is more than fitting: “Beautiful View 26”. It is located close to the Russian general consulate and the Hamburg Islamic centre.

And the citizens of the hosting country stepped up to prove it’s not true that Germans have no sense of humor. It’s not a subtle humor, but then…

Reader Interactions

47Comments

  1. 1.

    JCJ

    I read an article in the Abendblatt yesterday detailing where all the visitors were staying. I wondered why Trump wasn’t mentioned. This is awesome.

  3. 3.

    Ruckus

    They are not just incompetent, they are fucking insanely incompetent. But then you knew that. How the fuck do these dunderheads manage not to fall out of airplanes or get run over by buses, or step in front of moving trains? Do they have no idea how things work? They are about as bright as a 5 watt flashlight. On the surface of the sun.

  5. 5.

    patrick II

    I’d feel more comfortable laughing about this if I didn’t think the entire U.S. government is being run with equal competence.

  6. 6.

    joel hanes

    JFK in Berlin “Ich bin ein Berliner!”

    DJT in Hamburg “Bring me two hamburgers, no onion, no pickles, very large, only the best, very good, and don’t touch them. And a Diet Pepsi”

  7. 7.

    Ruckus

    @patrick II:
    I don’t think anyone is laughing. Screaming in disgust is more like it. If you hear laughter about the shape of the country or the current maladministration, there will be a moronic republican nearby who has no idea about how things work or desires to not have anything work. Either way a fucking moron.

  8. 8.

    Redshift

    He’ll only allow the Executive Branch to hire self important yes-men who aren’t Dems and have never said anything bad about him. That sort won’t do grunt work.

  9. 9.

    Betty Cracker

    @patrick II: I think that’s what’s saving us, tbh. If these crackpots weren’t so busy stomping their own dicks, they’d have managed to wreak even more havoc. I worry about them becoming marginally MORE competent.

  10. 10.

    Achrachno

    Oh, come on! THIS has got to be fake news. No administration can be this stupid, nor could any real hotel room be that tasteless.

  11. 11.

    Ruckus

    @Achrachno:
    You have just learned a valuable lesson. There really are people this stupid. And there are people far more stupid, they are called voters. And really, really stupid people with some money and no concept of taste are just that tacky.

  12. 12.

    seaboogie

    If only the wedding planner lady now in charge of housing had been appointed sooner…

  13. 13.

    Aleta

    In their arrogance they probably assumed that the summit hosts would arrange everything for them. They are, after all, titled entitled, white vulgarian bigots.

  17. 17.

    opiejeanne

    @Major Major Major Major: That still makes me laugh: how many of these people are staying? Dear Lord, even hate-watching the West Wing they would have had a clue of a clue about how things work.

  18. 18.

    Aleta

    The impeccable Assistant to the President is supposed to be on top of things like this.

  19. 19.

    NotMax

    More Shelley Berman (who initiated the phone shtick as a routine in stand-up) than Bob Newhart.

  21. 21.

    Aleta

    @opiejeanne: Speaking of the WWing, I’ve been watching it, and tonight the title of one episode was Let Bartlett Be Bartlett. I bet they did educate themselves (and steal slogans) off it.

  23. 23.

    Aleta

    This is not the first time a US official has had trouble with hotels in Germany. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson had to stay several miles away – at a sanitarium outside of Bonn – from other leaders at the February G20 ministers’ meeting.

  24. 24.

    Beautifulplummage

    @Aleta: Thank you! I was trying to recall this. Strike two

    ETA or is that “fool me once shame on you, fool me uh fool me twice uh … won’t get fooled again” ?

  25. 25.

    piratedan

    is there much doubt now about how incredibly compromised the entire GOP is in this situation? They know that they’re treasonous fucks and they there are, still brazening it out. You know, they may skate on the actual conviction part of the deal (resigning in shame I guess is still an option) but at some point, with the fact that we’re dealing with the wholesale betrayal of the United States for essentially the twofer of tax cuts for the rich and because they get to allow their racism flag fly free as they trash 44’s legacy, is someone going to take these fuckers to court and what are the odds that anything that gets revealed there (no matter how fucking heinous) somehow gets a pass, if not from his supporters, but by those sitting legislators and the press?

  26. 26.

    LosGatosCA

    AirBnB Trump style.

    The US government is now run exactly like a Trump business

  27. 27.

    eemom

    There’s some kind of no room at the inn baby Jesus joke in here somewhere, but I can’t quite put it together.

  28. 28.

    Ruckus

    @eemom:
    I think the reason it’s difficult to make a joke out of this is that it really isn’t funny. We want to laugh, to keep our sanity, but it’s just not realistic to expect anyone to laugh at this mess. The very real risks that they may just stumble into doing something extraordinarily stupid and dangerous are just all too possible.

  30. 30.

    gene108

    There is a White House Travel Office scandal related joke here somewhere, but it is too early for me to put it together….

    Travelgate II: Airbnb to the Rescue

  31. 31.

    Sloane Ranger

    Cue them blaming Obama for not booking the rooms in February 2016 when the summit was announced.3..2…1..

  34. 34.

    debbie

    @Betty Cracker:

    That coffee table is straight out of Clockwork Orange, which seems appropriate. On the other hand, a president has finally topped GWB’s less-than-smooth performance with that locked door.

  35. 35.

    Unknown known

    @Betty Cracker: He’d love the coffee table for about 2 minutes, then become frustrated when the glass top stuck out too far for him to LOVE it.

    This joke brought to you by the national brain bleach emporium. Now taking bulk orders, since November 2016.

  36. 36.

    NorthLeft12

    @Ruckus: Even foreigners are no longer laughing. Look, we know what happens in the rest of the world when the US is run by incompetent and arrogant boobs. Nothing too good, let me tell you.

  37. 37.

    sherparick

    This is also one consequence of basically eliminating the Department of State and having the Crown Prince (a/k/a Jared) run foreign policy from the White house.

  39. 39.

    Radiumgirl

    I wonder if the reason Trump didn’t have a room has to do with some blanket edict he issued early on to cancel everything Obama — without any thought to it — if the Obama admin lined it up, cancel, don’t bother me with the details.

    Then he finds out what the G-20 actually is and realizes, hey we need a room!

    If the conference was announced in January 2016 it seems that the White House or the State Department at the time would have lined something up — regardless of who won the election, the U.S. would be sending a delegation, so wouldn’t it have already been booked? There has to be all sorts of stuff like this — standing commitments to attend one confab or another that’s lined up years out — G-7, G-20 — what’s the practice for these kinds of arrangements? I don’t think booking a year or more out would be at all unusual.

    But even if the Obama folks decided to prank Trump by cancelling the reservations (very doubtful) it’s Trump’s team that’s responsible for making sure the arrangements are in place — another fallout of his faillure to staff up.

  42. 42.

    J R in WV

    When the average IQ of the National government is lower than that of a blog focused on crazed dog and cat owners and ravening jackals… man, we are in trouble.

    I have never gone away somewhere without looking up a hotel and booking rooms. Who does that? What are they thinking? Are they so busy trying to beat the espionage raps that no one has time to do their job? Do they never do anything without someone else telling that “it needs to be done, TODAY!” ???

    WE are so fuqued….

  44. 44.

    Vor

    Just seems odd. As noted, the date was known long in advance. I imagine the Secret Service would be involved in vetting the hotel. Perhaps when Trump fired all the ambassadors without waiting for replacements the ball got dropped.

  45. 45.

    Uncle Cosmo

    @Radiumgirl: Very plausible. The tell, to me, is that the (Mis)administration isn’t screaming its shrieking heads off about how Obama cancelled/failed to make their accommodations to make them look (even more) incompetent. At least one of those pointy widduw heads (maybe Jar Jar Kush) might have realized, not only that the Obama Administration had made arrangements that were subsequently cancelled by Dolt45, but that there is documentary proof of this out of their control (with the hotel if nowhere else) that could be released the instant they started to blame Obama to make them look even more incompetent.

  47. 47.

    What Have the Romans Ever Done for Us?

    Bet any one of those hotels would have “found” a room for Obama. Last minute cancellation, something opened up, happy to oblige you Mr President.

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