Nord Stream: From Russia With Love

Could a natural-gas pipeline running from Russia to Germany shed light on the views of the man likely to become the next U.S. Secretary of State? While it’s hard to know exactly which topics the Senate Foreign Relations Committee will delve into when ExxonMobil CEO Rex Tillerson testifies at his upcoming confirmation hearing, one thing is virtually certain: both Republicans and Democrats on the committee will explore Tillerson’s vast international experience in the oil-and-gas industry, as well as the friendship with Vladimir Putin that has grown out of it.  How will the Putin-energy connection shape the direction of U.S. transatlantic policy under Tillerson’s watch? One entry point into this fascinating question is “Nord Stream”—an undersea pipeline system that has supplied Russian natural gas directly to Germany since late 2011.

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Deutsche Bank’s Most Famous Client is About to Become its Regulator.

Donald Trump is a major client of Frankfurt-based Deutsche Bank AG.  On January 20, he will also become its most powerful regulator.  Because the interests of the Trump Organization LLC are not directly aligned with the interests of the American people, one of many conflicts of interest will arise that could shape the official actions of the United States under President Trump.  If past performance is predictive of future results, Trump will not take the steps needed to eliminate this and other conflicts, setting up years of speculation about whether his private business needs are influencing official U.S. decisionmaking.

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What Can Americans Learn From German Observations of U.S. Politics?

The 2016 presidential election, mercifully, will end soon. One can only guess how much ink will be spilled in the coming years as experts and observers of U.S. history try to explain how Donald Trump became a finalist in a two-way race for the American presidency. In the meantime, however, can our German friends offer insights about our embrace of a candidate whose political convention in Cleveland was aptly compared to a modern-day Nuremberg rally? According to the panelists on a recent installment of the Anne Will show that sought to evaluate Trump’s political success, we Americans may be having the same populist catharsis that many others around the world are. Alternatively, we may be drawn to Trump as a bewitching alternative to a dynastic candidate who is bought and paid for by corporate special interests. Or another possibility: we may just be insane, puzzled children who indiscriminately chase shiny objects, even within the serious medium of politics.

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Comparing the Fate of Volkswagen Diesel Owners on Either Side of the Atlantic

September 18 marked the one-year anniversary of the revelations that Volkswagen AG had installed a software “defeat device” in 11 million of its vehicles, to circumvent diesel emissions tests. One year on, on the eve of finalizing a mammoth $16.5 billion settlement in the U.S. with consumers, regulators, and dealers, it is interesting to compare how Volkswagen is making amends to its diesel customers on either side of the Atlantic. Despite many prevailing American perceptions that the European Union is less friendly than the U.S. to big business, and more protective of consumers and the environment, the company’s response to date suggests that the opposite is true—at least when it comes to selling diesel automobiles.

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Floundering Free Trade and the U.S.-German Relationship

During the past year, free trade has become more controversial in the U.S. than ever in recent memory. Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump has made trade one of the centerpieces of his campaign, declaring at rallies that he would renegotiate or withdraw from NAFTA, and that he would block the Trans-Pacific Partnership (“TPP”)—a recently concluded multilateral accord that would establish a free-trade zone among the U.S. and 11 other Pacific nations encompassing 40 percent of global GDP. (By way of comparison, the NAFTA establishes free-trade zone between 3 nations encompassing a quarter of global GDP.) Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton also now opposes the TPP, meaning that the window of opportunity for TPP to pass through Congress and into force is vanishingly small—perhaps limited to the “lame-duck” session of November through December of 2016.

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