German elections prediction

[DinoDoc]

I'm somewhat suprised to hear that.

[DanS]

Looks like the price is going to be valued higher than one justice minister...

http://news.ft.com/servlet/ContentServer?pagename=FT.com/StoryFT/FullStory&c=StoryFT&cid=1031119571820&p=1012571727088

Now we know who Bush was talking about when he said "their credibility is on the line" and who ignored it.

Doubt there was a congratulatory note on the election.

[Giancarlo]

Schroeder being elected will cloud Germany's economic future. He is a typical "no changes necessary" politican and wants to increase the size of the state. Stoiber is a better leader and the province he managed (Bavaria if I am not mistaken?) is evidence of this.

[Winston]

I read Jacques Chirac is so genuinely fed up with Gerhard Schröder and his shennanigans that he refused to pickup the phone when Schröder called to discuss a plan to save a bi-national phone company from a threatening bankruptcy.

The cooled relations between France and Germany will likely continue after this, and could severely slow down the development of the EU.

[DinoDoc]

I wonder how well he'll be able to repair the damage he caused on the foreign policy front during this election.

Bush-Hitler Remark Shows U.S. as Issue in German Election
By Steven Erlanger
New York Times | International

Friday, 20 September, 2002

COLOGNE, Germany, Sept. 19 -- A reported remark by a German minister comparing President Bush's tactics over Iraq to those of Hitler envenomed a close-fought German election today and demonstrated how anti-Americanism had moved to the center of political debate here.

The regional newspaper Schwabisches Tagblatt said today that Chancellor Gerhard Schroder's justice minister, Herta Daubler-Gmelin, had said: "Bush wants to divert attention from his domestic problems. It's a classic tactic. It's one that Hitler also used."

Her remarks were reportedly made on Sunday during a conversation with representatives of the trade union IG Metall.

In a statement to the newspaper, Ms. Daubler-Gmelin, 59 and a member of the chancellor's Social Democratic Party, denied comparing the two men, but did not deny comparing their tactics. "I didn't compare the persons Bush and Hitler, but their methods," she said.

Later tonight, she told ZDF television, "I just did not say that; it is as simple as that."

Mr. Schroder said tonight that he believed Ms. Daubler-Gmelin when she said she had not compared the two men. He added that anyone who compared Mr. Bush to a criminal would have no seat in his cabinet. He did not elaborate.

In Washington, Ari Fleischer, the White House spokesman, was asked at a news briefing about the minister's comments and the effect of such election campaign statements on the German-American relationship. After speaking of the importance of the long relationship, he added, "But this statement by the justice minister is outrageous, and it is inexplicable."

Germany's conservatives, who are challenging Mr. Schroder in national elections on Sunday, immediately called for her resignation.

Friedbert Pfluger, a Christian Democrat, called Ms. Daubler-Gmelin's statements outrageous and said, "This is what happens when the government allows the moral coordinates to deteriorate so far."

He was referring to Mr. Schroder's decision to distance Germany from the United States over Iraq, a course that has proved politically rewarding even as it has opened a sharp rift with Washington.

Mr. Schroder has said Germany will not take part in any attack on Iraq, whatever the United Nations decides. His stand has appealed to broad stretches of a postwar German population bred to abhor war, but it has also brought charges of "German unilateralism" and estrangement from its principal allies in the United States and Europe.

With voting on Sunday in a very tight election, the debate over how much damage Mr. Schroder may have done to Germany's relations with its partners, in particular with the United States, has become ever more passionate and shrill.

The chancellor has clawed back to a slight lead over his conservative rival, Edmund Stoiber, in large part by running against the Bush administration and its plans for war and "regime change" in Iraq.

Mr. Schroder says that under him, Germany will neither help in any war against Iraq nor help pay for one. Pollsters now say Iraq -- not the weak German economy -- has become the most important issue for those still deciding how they will vote.

Is this shift a reflection of a significantly changed Germany, no longer beholden to its conqueror and liberator from across the sea? Or of a chancellor in trouble using a delicate issue to try to squeak by? Or of a Bush administration that is failing to bring along its own allies? Or of a true friend to America, as Mr. Schroder insists he remains, who is simply speaking truth to power, as a real friend should?

Mr. Pfluger, a lifelong devotee of close German-American ties, is beside himself.

"This is a disaster," he said. "In a matter of weeks, Schroder was able to deprive Germany of its reputation of dependability which was developed over many years, from Willy Brandt to Helmut Kohl."

As for Germany's position in the European Union, some outside experts say they believe that Mr. Schroder has also done harm by casting doubt on Germany's reliability at the "inner circle" of European nations along with France and Britain.

William Drozdiak, the executive director of the Transatlantic Center, a Brussels-based study center of the German Marshall Fund, said Mr. Schroder was "definitely causing harm, especially to relations with France, Britain and the United States."

The chancellor received some comradely political support today from the British prime minister, Tony Blair, who told the newspaper Tagesspiegel: "Schroder has set out his position on Iraq, and we respect that. I certainly have never seen Germany isolated in key issues in the past. On Iraq, Germany is raising questions which it does make sense to ask. There may well be differences of opinion, but I have no doubt that we will ultimately all work closely together."

But the publisher of Tagesspiegel, Hellmuth Karasek, blasted Mr. Schroder for electoral cynicism, "German unilateralism" and "cheap anti-Americanism" in words that echoed through the German policy elite.

There are signs that Mr. Schroder is already trying to patch things up with Washington. His foreign minister, Joschka Fischer, a member of the Green Party, met briefly with Mr. Bush at the United Nations and reportedly tried to reassure the president that Germany remained a close friend.

Officials say Germany quickly ceded jurisdiction over the captured Yemeni Ramzi bin al-Shibh to the United States to show its continuing commitment to the war against Al Qaeda, despite differences over Iraq. Mr. bin al-Shibh, who lived in Hamburg, was also wanted in Germany in relation to the Sept. 11 attacks.

German officials say the country is now more likely to take over command of the international security force in Kabul from Turkey early next year to show solidarity with the United States.

But in such a close election, even Mr. Stoiber has been loath to praise Mr. Bush's plans for Iraq and sound like a warmonger. Today, he said he would deny Washington use of German bases for a unilateral attack on Iraq. "Certainly never if the Americans go it alone," he said.

He followed Mr. Schroder in saying, "Now the aim is to destroy weapons of mass destruction, not the toppling of a dictator."

Mr. Stoiber has, however, firmly supported the need for the United Nations Security Council to defend its resolutions and provide a mandate for any military action -- but only if the goal of unconditional arms inspections fails.

If the Security Council votes to allow military force, he said, "I believe it is impossible that Germany would stand alone and refuse to accept a U.N. mandate."

In essence, his stance is like that of the French president, Jacques Chirac, a fellow conservative who has awarded Mr. Stoiber a decoration for his services to France.

Germany's longstanding desire to be a postwar force for peace is part of the legacy of the Nazi period and the American occupation. The use of the German military in any action without a United Nations mandate is constitutionally forbidden.

It has been Mr. Schroder and Mr. Fischer who have pushed Germans to take up a larger international role, including taking part in the Kosovo war and the use of German special forces in Afghanistan. Mr. Schroder emphasizes that Germany has nearly 10,000 troops abroad, almost exclusively in peacekeeping duties.

Now the chancellor has undermined that extension of Germany's military role, American officials say, while personally offending Mr. Bush.

[Roland]

This is getting quite funny. The Ari line seems to be evil, evil "bush-bashing" Schröder, when all the chancellor himself said was that he has no interest in going adventurous in Iraq.

I would have thought the Bushies are more cold blooded, instead they are playing the insulted sausage like a 3 year old.

And if Dubya's beloved US really was so great, why bother ? As the proverb goes:

Was stört es die Eiche wenn sich die Säue an ihr reiben ?

Just that America does not seem to be the oak tree in that proverb.

[DanS]

"when all the chancellor himself said was that he has no interest in going adventurous in Iraq"

Implying that Bush was being adventurous, even when no course of action had been chosen. It was an unfair characterization of the reality.

I think you know the score. Exorcising the national political demons by slagging your friends unfairly is OK. Just don't expect them to return your phone calls after you're done.

[Roland]

"Implying that Bush was being adventurous, even when no course of action had been chosen."

So he said, at worst, that when Bush seeks adventurs in Iraq, Germany will not participate. Horrible insult. Does Shrub's mum change his diapers still ?

"Exorcising the national political demons by slagging your friends unfairly is OK."

Friends ?

[Roland]

dp

[DanS]

"Friends ?"

I'm willing to listen to other proposals.

"So he said, at worst, that when Bush seeks adventurs in Iraq, Germany will not participate."

The context of it was that Shroeder was trailing in the polls and that Bush wasn't seeking adventures in Iraq.

Whatever you say about Bush, I don't think you could say he's a bad politician. Bush knows that Shroeder won the election on the back of the American relationship. Again, this is OK. Just don't expect that relationship to be healthy when you're done.

[Roland]

Enemy or lackey. That's all the Bushies know.

"won the election on the back of the American relationship"

Bollocks. He won it on the floods and the Iraq issue.

And I suppose you do not know what Stoiber had said about Iraq....

[DanS]

"That's all the Bushies know."

Why do you use these throw-away lines?

"He won it on the floods and the Iraq issue."

Yes, how they presented the Iraq issue is what we're discussing. The minister's Hitler comments weren't the only place they strayed into unfair characterizations. Rather, this was the end of the line of a string of unfair characterizations.

We were basically wondering why we were being dragged into an election where the most important issue was the ineffectiveness of the government to find jobs for 4 million.

Oh wait! I've discovered the reason! Is it because Shroeder was trying to deflect German public opinion from domestic issues?

"And I suppose you do not know what Stoiber had said about Iraq..."

From what I have heard, he said he would leave his options open, that he was well disposed towards Shroeder's views, but that these views about American policy should have been communicated most forcefully privately with the administration.

Stoiber seems like a sensible fellow.

[Roland]

"The minister's Hitler comments weren't the only place they strayed into unfair characterizations. Rather, this was the end of the line of a string of unfair characterizations."

Like what ?

"Oh wait! I've discovered the reason! Is it because Shroeder was trying to deflect German public opinion from domestic issues?"

You really need a question mark there ?

"From what I have heard, he said he would leave his options open"

He said no SC resolution, no use of US bases in Germany. He backpaddled later on this one, but don't forget, even the prime puppet does not want that war. The Bushies are pretty alone with this. Schröder or Stoiber.

[DanS]

"Like what ?"

It took a pretty bad turn with the "adventurous" comments a couple of months ago.

"He said no SC resolution, no use of US bases in Germany."

Which is a fine position to take, at the end of the day. Germany has national political imperatives just like everybody else.

But we're talking about the way it was said by a sitting Chancellor. Bush thinks Shroeder played the "Anti-American" card, which trumped Stoiber's xenephobia card. A total cheap shot for Shroeder.

"but don't forget, even the prime puppet does not want that war"

Blair? Bush is marching to his tune, not the other way around. The Brits have played this very skillfully, both domestically and diplomatically.

[Roland]

"But we're talking about the way it was said by a sitting Chancellor. Bush thinks Shroeder played the "Anti-American" card, which trumped Stoiber's xenephobia card. A total cheap shot for Shroeder."

First Stoiber did not play the xenophobia card. Second, every second sentence from US politicians is "we are better than everyone else" - you don't get a childish reaction on that one. Third, not every criticism of the Bush admin is anti-american.

"Blair? Bush is marching to his tune, not the other way around. The Brits have played this very skillfully, both domestically and diplomatically."

Nope. Blair is in damage limitation fights on all fronts.