The CDU clings to the fiction of governance because it doesn’t even know what to worry about. It’s a lifeless, puny feeling of being used.
At some point in this exciting, boring and, above all, much too cold summer, I stood downstairs in the Konrad-Adenauer-Haus and waited for an appointment. Up front is a café, and while I was standing at the coffee machine, I saw an employee who was going through the drafts for the CDU campaign on his laptop.
“More time together” was written on a design that later became a poster: A father with his son, they do something together, but you don’t see exactly what; you can see a bicycle tire, flowers and, at first glance, a carrot. But it didn’t seem to matter either – father, son, bicycle, flowers, vegetables, it was one of those soft, artificial idylls in which people supposedly live. It was just about the message that you are doing something together. Because the core message of the Union should be that “Germany is being made together”.
The voters prefer to do Germany without the CDU
The Union has now reasonably experienced how unclear and hollow this promise was, but I already felt it with this poster: What exactly did the CDU want to promise me? That I could spend more time with my kids? And if so: how? Or did she just advertise that she is also modern, that she likes fathers who want to spend more time with their children mending bicycle tires in flowering meadows?
Election posters are usually empty and flat, but with the CDU it was almost chronic. What was missing everywhere was the specific offer. The Union could have promised 500,000 new daycare places. Because next door, on the big red poster, Olaf Scholz grinned and promised a minimum wage of 12 euros. On talk shows, he promised 400,000 new apartments per year, including 100,000 social housing. The Greens want a million solar roofs and a speed limit, the FDP less than 40 percent levies. The main message of the SPD was “cats would buy whiskas”. The CDU wanted to make Germany together.
Well, the voters said they would rather do Germany without the CDU first, at least in the federal government – the CDU is still there in states, cities and municipalities, and numerous mayors and district administrators are definitely doing valuable and respectable work and creating even daycare places.
A powerless, miserable still being used
The CDU’s problem was not just that they didn’t write anything on any of the posters. I’m afraid she didn’t even know what to write on it. This perplexity affected what advertisers call content. And people who had good insights into the CDU campaign tell exactly that: There was no content. And since the main product, the candidate for chancellor, was difficult and controversial, these posters came out with the stupid puns.
It is now easy, lemming-like and a little cheap to just hit the Union so that it is ready and done. If you were to think anti-cyclically, you would actually have to join the CDU, at least if you want to become something politically – just as the SPD had to rebuild a few years ago and now has around 100 newcomers in the Bundestag.
But it is not that far yet, the CDU is still clinging to itself, nor does it know what it could be used for: It is a powerless, miserable still being used, like the remaining life of a German nuclear power plant. It is no longer the “government claim” that the CDU announced on Sunday, nor the “government offer” and certainly not the “government willingness” – because the CDU no longer has the latter. She is not trusted to lead a government because she is too divided and disoriented. In the theoretical Jamaica scenario, she would be the powerless power manager of the content on which the Greens and FDP have agreed – but could not prevail with the SPD. One has to hope that it doesn’t come to that.
The Union doesn’t even know what the problem is
The Union is not only at a loss, it is a perplexity of perplexity that plagues it. She doesn’t even know what exactly to worry about. Because it is currently unclear what the famous renewal in the opposition actually means.
This is not only due to 16 years of Angela Merkel, during which the Union only had to advertise with Merkel three times, and that Germany is somehow allowed to continue running like this. The last time they had to fight, really with content about the Chancellery in 2005, the CDU had an offer – with clear promises and reform proposals that would be called “neoliberal” today. For example, a health bonus, which made a career as a head lump sum during the election campaign.
With the program, the CDU almost failed, too hard, too much, in some things too honest. And the CDU experienced all of this in a world in which you could also say that red-green has to go now so that the bourgeoisie can get back to it. That was clear. In the meantime, the CDU in the federal government needs to govern like “Star Wars” villain Darth Vader his mask, which is why the fiction of being able to govern must still be upheld. But she can breathe without a mask, even if the air is thin at first.
Of course the Union will recover
Of course the Union will recover, as the SPD has just shown, even if the recovery is not as brilliant as the SPD is currently doing. Especially since Scholz stands before the party like a Potemkin facade. Or is that not the case at all? That will still have to be fathomed. First of all, it says in black and white: 1.5 million votes won by the CDU. And 640,000 from the Left Party. And 700,000 more than in 2013. In that year, 18.2 million people made their mark on the CDU / CSU. On September 26th there were 11.2 million.
The CDU has a lot to clarify, to the right, to the left, how wide, how big, first of all, presumably, it would have to clarify the relationship with Markus Söder, who has taken the party into a tactical hostage: no one can survive at the top for as long It is unclear how unsatisfied Söder’s ego is – whether he is only afraid of losing his place in Bavaria in autumn 2023, or whether he is daring a new attempt in 2025. Whether he just wants to be a candidate for chancellor or the party should submit, as Sebastian Kurz did in Austria.
Opposition is crap, is one of the winged words of German politics. For the CDU in the federal government, it is the best conceivable and most desirable state. “I’m over”.
I wish you a quiet, sunny autumn weekend.
David William is a talented author who has made a name for himself in the world of writing. He is a professional author who writes on a wide range of topics, from general interest to opinion news. David is currently working as a writer at 24 hours worlds where he brings his unique perspective and in-depth research to his articles, making them both informative and engaging.
