ER Editor: One of the disappointments voters have with Merz is the willingness to heavily indebt the country, which Germans are traditionally averse to. Zerohedge, in a lengthy piece yesterday, offers us this by way of background. A reminder that following the election, a coalition government has not yet been formed:
Last Tuesday, the prospective new coalition partners, the CDU/CSU and SPD, proposed a significant fiscal expansion. It would exempt defense spending over and above 1% of GDP from the debt brake, establish a EUR 500 bn off-budget fund for infrastructure investment, and raise the net borrowing cap for the German states from 0% to 0.35%. The prospective government plans to pass the proposed fiscal reform in the old Bundestag, i.e. before the new Bundestag constitutes itself on March 25. A first reading will be held tomorrow (March 13) and the second and third readings are planned for March 18, resulting in a vote.
As the German constitution doesn’t allow (we believe) for this type of manoeuvre, constitutional changes will have to take place (Zerohedge):
Tomorrow’s debate in the reconvened outgoing Bundestag – unless it is halted by the Constitutional Court – kicks off a constitutional amendment process that could, if successful, result in the largest fiscal expansion since German reunification (see here). However, the fiscal package is not yet a done deal, and below we provide an update of the latest events.
A drama about to play itself out.
Remix News has a simpler summary —
If Germany’s €1 trillion debt deal falls through, expect tough times ahead for the incoming government
Shortly after the election, the Christian Democrats (CDU) gleefully announced their plan for a debt bonanza, along with their new Social Democrat (SPD) partners. A total of €1 trillion would be spent on weapons and infrastructure, all Germany needed to do was suspend its “debt brake” to make it happen.
Now, the whole plan is coming under threat. The Greens have signaled they won’t back the black-red trillion-euro debt plan, at least not without some serious investment in climate infrastructure and funds for foreign nations. The CDU has signaled they want to accommodate the Greens’ requests, but even if that happens, there are other serious roadblocks ahead, including a vote in the Bundesrat, which is made up of the 16 state governments in Germany.
In addition, the March 23 deadline is rapidly approaching. After that date, the new Bundestag forms, the German parliament, and due to the new composition of parties, the votes will no longer be in place to overcome the required two-thirds majority to rewrite the German constitution.
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Germans Losing Faith in Merz After Policy U-turns
His wavering stance on migration and fiscal policy has weakened support even among his party’s own voters
ZOLTAN KOTTASZ for EUROPEAN CONSERVATIVE
More than half of Germans do not believe that Friedrich Merz will be a good chancellor, a new survey has said. According to the poll conducted by the Forsa polling institute for the RTL/n-tv Trendbarometer, 52% of respondents are sceptical of the CDU leader, compared to only 38% who think he will do a good job.
Support for Merz is also dwindling among his own voters: 74% of CDU sympathisers believe that Merz will be a good chancellor, which is a lot lower than the 83% from last week’s similar survey.
The leader of Germany’s Christian Democratic Union (CDU) party Friedrich Merz RALF HIRSCHBERGER / AFP
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The centre-right CDU leader’s image has been tarnished by his proposal to force the state to take on a massive €1 trillion debt to boost defence and infrastructure. He did this by giving in to the demands of his likely future coalition partner, the Social Democrats—and he may also adhere to the wishes of the left-wing Greens for their support.
The CDU won the national elections on February 23rd despite receiving 28.5% of the vote, one of the worst results in the party’s history. Voters who did give their support to the centre-right party did so thinking that Merz would deliver on his promises to take a tough course on migration and revive Germany’s faltering industrial base while getting rid of radical climate policies.
So far, however, he has made a U-turn on his policies—even before becoming chancellor—in order to accommodate the Social Democrats. On migration, for example, he has backtracked on his vow to close Germany’s borders to illegal and undocumented migrants, and on the budget, he is willing to indebt the country instead of pursuing fiscally conservative politics.
Also, if he is intent on securing the support of the Greens for his debt plan, he will naturally be forced to accept their demands on climate funding.
Two-and-a-half weeks after the elections, the CDU’s support has mildly dipped, signalling that there is not huge enthusiasm for Merz’s programme. According to the latest opinion polls, the CDU, together with its Bavarian sister party CSU, is on 28%, a drop of 0.5 percentage points compared to their election result.
The Social Democrats are also on a downward spiral: they currently have the support of 15% of the electorate, a 1.4-point drop compared to their election result.
Meanwhile, the right-wing AfD party, which finished second on 20.8%, now has 22% support.
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Published to The Liberty Beacon from EuropeReloaded.com
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