Europe

I simply do not believe that refugees or illegal migration are among Germany’s most pressing problems. Nevertheless, this issue dominates the public debate – and in a way that is in fact very harmful. This was already the case in the last federal election and, unfortunately, continues to be the case.

Probably not, but still is a problem.

All this plays into the hands of the right wing, as they construct their usual threat scenarios, which are not only completely exaggerated, but also absolutely counterproductive, because they deliberately ignore essential aspects such as demographic change and the (in parts associated) shortage of skilled workers. Instead, they rail against foreigners with populist slogans such as “German culture is threatened by immigration,” “foreigners are taking jobs away from Germans,” and all that nonsense.

True and they can exactly because the left wing is not willing to tackle the problem. Let's be real, AfD would never have been at this level if the other parties would have done their job.

The far-right AfD, which, together with large sections of the conservative camp, is responsible for making the issue of migration so prominent, is not interested in focusing on these much more important issues at all. The reason is simple: The AfD is a neoliberal party that pursues the interests of the upper class (even worse than CDU/CSU).

True. The point is that they are able to do it because the issue exist and nobody else care to speak about it, let alone to tackle it.
It is too easy to point at the hundreds or thousands of illegal immigrants that are around the street and say "see, they are the problem with their petty crimes". People will agree because they know it is true to some extend.

If we don’t manage to finally reestablish a meaningful political discourse that addresses the country’s real problems instead of fueling blind hatred, we will end up just like the Americans – with an autocratic regime that is utterly incompetent and corrupt beyond belief, yet at the same time ruthless enough to terrorize its own citizens. We already had such a regime in Germany: namely, the Nazis in the Third Reich.

Yep, and as far as I remember Hitler was elected before going crazy. Now, obviously the scenarios are really different but the one common thing they have is that there is someone willing to talk to people about the problem they have (or think to have) and promise to solve them. And thinking that to resolve the problem all you need to do is to neutralize AfD will only end with AfD 2.0 with an even worse program but since it will have a more presentable way, it will be accepted.

So in short, I consider the completely overrepresented debate on migration to be essentially a diversionary tactic. The aim is to obscure the real reasons for Germany’s economic decline and the falling standard of living – foreigners in Germany have nothing to do with either of these issues, but that is what the right wing wants citizens to believe. Legal foreigners have nothing to do with these issues, illegal foreigners are part of the issues, they are a cost both economically and socially.
Economically because you spend money on them in the form of some sort of welfare or aids, socially because it is a problem if the streets are no more secure because them (which obvously do non exclude the fact that they are not the only ones committing crimes).

As I said, you only have to look at the US to see where this leads – a look at Germany’s history would also confirm this, but unfortunately many of my compatriots seem to want to deliberately ignore the horrors of Nazi rule so that they can have a scapegoat for all their problems: foreigners.

I don't think you can have a parallel, in the US Trump won because the Democrats decided that in the end standing by a convicted felon (Floyd was not an innocent black guy killed by a racist police officer) and allowing petty crimes (and not only them, they decriminalized many things), on top of choosing as candidate Kamala Harris because she is a black woman, who in the primary elections of her own party got less than 1000 votes, was a good strategy. And with all the woke ideology and BLM charade it was simple for him to win.

If AfD (or any other party) would try something like that would be destroyed, nobody really like it.