The euro is our common fate, and Europe is our common future. – Angela Merkel
I feel sorry sometimes for these sportsmen and women who put in just as much effort as the footballers. For example, athletes train at least as hard as footballers but have to be happy if they can earn enough to finance a decent education. – Angela Merkel
It certainly is dangerous that there are only a few clubs left in Europe that can afford to pay millions. At the end of the day however, the spectators decide the rates of pay – by watching the games and consuming the goods and services advertised on sports TV programmes. – Angela Merkel
So Europe needs to be competitive and we also need to be competitive if we wish to remain an interesting economic partner for the United States. This has to be done on the basis of strength, of competitiveness. – Angela Merkel
It is well to know something of the manners of various peoples, in order more sanely to judge our own, and that we do not think that everything against our modes is ridiculous, and against reason, as those who have seen nothing are accustomed to think. РRen̩ Descartes, Discourse on the Method, 1637 (translated)