In yesterday’s Bavarian state election, the conservative CSU regained an absolute majority. My earlier post on the national election this coming Sunday neglected to mention the event because, in accord with the vast majority of Bavarians, I don’t think they’re really part of Germany. Still, the Bavaria outcome does bear on the national outcome: In Berlin, the CSU is in a coalition with the rest-of- or truly-German CDU, and CSU boss Horst “The Sun King” Seehofer will now make a yet-more royal pest of himself. His proposal for a foreigners-only highway toll will be a flashpoint. On the one hand, it…
Leadership, Jawohl!
Germany goes to the polls this coming week. The German media are desperately trying to convey Spannung (meaning tension and urgency), and party apparatchiks here and there fret about the emoluments of their offices. However, the German voters are united with the rest of humankind in not giving a rip. Frau Merkel will continue to run Germany with this or that coalition. Her principal (Social-Democratic) opponent did well against her in a TV debate but hasn’t been able to think of any socialist demand that Mrs. Merkel’s nominally conservative government hasn’t already fulfilled or credibly promised to fulfill. The differences are about the reimbursement rates for dental care and about Bavaria’s plan to impose highway fees on foreigners—which, to Bavarians, means anyone outside barfing distance of a Munich beer tent. (And, no: none of this is a joke.)
I’m the first to celebrate boredom and civic disengagement—indicia of the rule of law, if not exactly its purposes. But then, this is Germany. If you’ve paid attention to the past millennium or so, you have to worry about what’s smoldering under the surface. Germany is a very large force among democratic nations, and the single largest force in the EU. Her place in the world ought to take front and center in an election—no? No.
