And They Said It Wouldn't Last
MATUS, VICTORINO
And They Said It Wouldn't Last Germany's grand coalition survives its first year. by Victorino Matus After Germany's election debacle in September 2005, when none of the major parties had enough...
...I am not willing to accept that women do not have the same rights as men...
...This coalition has betrayed its voters," he declared...
...Westerwelle pointed to the 70 million euros Germany sends to China each year in development aid and massive subsidies for the coal industry as evidence of wasteful spending...
...Westerwelle criticized the tax hikes, especially an increase in the value-added tax from 16 percent to 19 percent next year, and a new "wealth tax" that reflects "the government's unwillingness to make fiscal discipline the principle of their policies...
...When asked about Pope Benedict's recent remarks on Islam and reason that sparked riots in the Middle East, Schauble was particularly eloquent: "[The pope] gave a very interesting position that science and faith are not opposite...
...Free Democrats and others give the government high marks on foreign policy, applauding Merkel for mending transatlantic relations, distancing the country from Russia, and setting a bold agenda for the European Union when Germany takes over the E.U...
...With an uneasy smile, he replied, "It's like being married to my aunt...
...Yet despite its seemingly untenable nature, the coalition is now nearing its one-year anniversary and taking credit for an increase in the economic growth rate, consumer spending, and tax revenues...
...It was a failure to be tolerant of that in the last two decades, so we have too many young jobless people today...
...You may say it's okay...
...And to use such a quote you may say it's not helpful...
...Koch, a possible chancellor candidate himself, was optimistic about reducing company tax rates and cutting unemployment numbers from 4.4 million to below 4 million...
...As for the improving economy, Gramckow says it is due mainly to the World Cup and the postponing of the value-added tax increase until next year...
...They've been sharing power with them in the state of Rhineland-Palati-nate for the last 15 years, partly under Governor Kurt Beck...
...It was a very interesting debate...
...The disillusionment among the Free Democrats is nothing to shrug at, considering the latest polls have them at 12 percent—the highest of any minor party and well above their usual 7-8 percent...
...Those who come to our country have to become a part of our society," said Ruttgers...
...For instance . . . not to try to arrange marriages between sons and daughters or to send girls back to Turkey to get a man they have never seen before, to get married and come back, and so on...
...In this otherwise awkward and fragile coalition, the interior minister remains one of the few figures of strength...
...If we start to resign, we will not succeed in convincing other people that the freedom of speech, freedom of thought, and tolerance are better than fundamentalism...
...But I will never accept that it's not allowed for the pope or for anyone else to make such a speech...
...Helmut Schmidt's government fell in 1982 when the FDP switched sides, making Helmut Kohl chancellor...
...by Victorino Matus After Germany's election debacle in September 2005, when none of the major parties had enough support to govern alone or with a junior partner, the Christian Democrats and Social Democrats agreed to work together for only the second time in postwar history...
...A sizable contingent of FDP supporters are conservative crossovers from the CDU and not liberal converts from the SPD...
...Interior minister Wolfgang Schau-ble also recently addressed the need for integration with respect to Germany's three million Muslims...
...We told the people that some reforms were impossible while others will be made...
...They have no capability to speak and write in our own language...
...We cannot have a situation where young people of Turkish origin, because they don't speak German well enough, do not complete school, and then don't find any work...
...But would the FDP really consider switching partners, leaving Merkel out in the cold...
...government are now predicting the coalition will last a full four years before the next general election...
...But while the chancellor herself continues to enjoy a popularity rating above 50 percent, Angela Merkel's party, the Christian Democratic Union, is polling at a mere 32 percent—near an all-time low and tied with the Social Democrats...
...That such a Grand Coalition occurs rarely is obvious: Imagine the United States governed by a Republican and Democratic administration, with a President Bush and a Vice President Kerry— and imagine that government reforming the nation's health and welfare systems...
...Roland Koch, however, warns that the Free Democrats "will lose a lot of voters they have in the polls now, when they cannot assure every voter that at the end they will cooperate with the Christian Democrats...
...And with major health care reforms delayed until 2009 and no labor market reforms on the horizon, Gramckow considers the Christian Democrats to have succumbed to SPD demands: "We can easily say there are two Social Democratic parties in power right now...
...Meanwhile, on immigration, governors like Koch in Hessen and Jurgen Ruttgers in North Rhine-Westphalia have taken harder lines in light of the riots in France and concerns over terrorism (police and counterintelligence units thwarted a terrorist plot to bomb trains inside Germany in July...
...Immigrants] are no longer allowed to be in the regular school classes as long as they are not able to speak the language," Koch told me...
...presidency in January...
...Germans give him an approval rating of 66 percent, higher than any other politician—including Angela Merkel...
...As for a solution, both Ruttgers and Koch mentioned remedial language courses their state governments provide, especially for the young...
...Earlier this year, Ruttgers was in Washington and, when asked about immigration policy, responded firmly that integration was the goal...
...The reason for this, according to critics of the government, is that all is in fact not well...
...One conservative member of the Bundestag captured the awkwardness of the arrangement when I asked him how it felt to be back in power after years in opposition...
...Members of the Merkel Victorino Matus is an assistant managing editor at The Weekly Standard...
...And in his speech he quoted a debate between a former emperor . . . and a Muslim...
...Describing the government as "a coalition of small steps," Koch explained that "the compromises between these traditional antagonists in economic policy are so difficult that you cannot hope that they will solve these things that others were incapable of doing before...
...I am not willing—for cultural or religious reasons—to accept another image of what another human being is supposed to be...
...Claus Gramckow, acting director of the FDP-affiliated Friedrich Naumann Foundation in Washington, strongly disagrees: "They were elected because the people expected them to do big steps...
...If they are part of Germany, they have to accept fundamental rules of life and society in Germany...
...Not that everything is falling apart in Germany...
...The FDP's increase in popularity has given the party new leverage and potential to be a spoilsport...
...During a visit to Washington last month, Roland Koch, the Christian Democratic governor of Hessen and fiscal policy adviser to Merkel, said his assumption "is that we can solve the budget problem and we can solve the taxation problem, but we cannot solve the labor market problem in the given period of time...
...Although historically allied with the CDU, the Free Democrats have worked with Social Democrats in the past...
...And to understand that they have to fight terrorism as well because it is in their own interest...
...The voters thought last year [that] only a Grand Coalition can solve these big problems...
...If new elections happen," says Gramckow, "all options are open...
...According to the Financial Times, the country's social security system collected more contributions than it paid out for the first time in more than ten years...
...In an op-ed last June in the Wall Street Journal Europe, Guido Westerwelle, chairman of the fiscally conservative Free Democratic party, said the coalition "is proving to be only one thing for Germany's citizens: extremely costly...
...It is the reason they cannot be integrated into the labor market...
...As chairman of the SPD and heir to Gerhard Schroder, Beck could challenge Merkel (possibly in 2008 if the CDU suffers heavy losses in state elections that year) with the aid of the Free Democrats...
...You may say it's an interesting speech...
...Members of the coalition posit that there is only so much they can realistically accomplish given the circumstances...
Vol. 12 • November 2006 • No. 9
