Amid Hillary Clinton’s march to the White House, hoping to be the first female U.S. President, few have noticed German chancellor Angela Merkel, 59, has already lapped her as the second most powerful politician in the world, according to Forbes Magazine , just a tick behind President Barack Obama and ahead of Russian president Vladimir Putin (no. 3) and departing Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke (no. 6).
Merkel or `Mutti’’ (mother of the nation) as she has been hailed for her cautious pragmatic tough-love approach to the eurozone crisis, struck big in the German national elections with her Christian Democratic Union, and their allies, the Christian Social Union in Bavaria capturing 41.5 percent of the popular vote on Sunday, their best showing in more than 20 years, winning 311 of the 630 seats in Parliament, just five votes short of a majority. According to The New York Times, Konrad Adenauer was the last chancellor to receive an absolute majority in 1957.
Merkel tried in vain to tamp down the deafening cheers of ``Angie!, Angie!,’’ at CDU headquarters; but when the roars did die down, she told her euphoric supporters, "We can celebrate tonight because we have done something fantastic’’, while urging her party to celebrate a ``super result’’ as she begins her third term.
The only downside to Merkel’s conservative party victory was that she must now find a new coalition party, since the Free Democratic Party failed to make it over the 5 percent threshold, meaning the CDU/CSU will more than likely enter into a coalition with either the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD) or the Greens.
A noteworthy election casualty was the Alternative für Deutschland, the protest anti-euro party, fell just shy of the 5 percent threshold, which means only four parties, will be represented in the Bundestag.
As a further boon to Merkel’s leadership, voter turnout increased for the first time since 1998 from 70.8 percent to 72.5 percent, according to the Bild newspaper, a German tabloid.
What follows is a brief sampling of headlines in Germany, splashing news of Merkel’s remarkable election victory.
- ``CDU/ CSU Clear Winners in Fed Election’’: The Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (FAZ).
- ``Merkel Triumphs, FDP Suffers Debacle’’: The Süddeutsche Zeitung (SZ)
- ``Merkel’s Greatest Triumph’’ (Bild)
- ``Merkel’s Triumph’’ (Welt)
- ``Now Merkel Has To Choose’’ (Tagesspiegel)
- ``Chancellor Now looking For a Partner ‘’(B.Z),
- ``The Euro Chancellor’’ (Handelsblatt)
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Preliminary Fed election results:
- CDU/ CSU 41.5 percent (+7.7 on 2009 result),
- SPD 25.7 percent (+2.7),
- FDP 4.8 percent (-9.8)
- Left Party 8.6 percent (-3.3),
- Greens 8.4 percent (-2.3)
- Pirates 2.2 percent (+0.2)
- Alternative für Deutschland 4.7 percent (+4.7)
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New Composition of Bundestag
- CSU 311 seats (+72 compared to 2009
- SPD 192 (+46)
- Left Party 64 (-12)
- Greens 63 (-5)
-Bill Lucey
September 23, 2013
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