For German speakers
Posted on 09/16/2005 2:14:41 AM PDT by 12B
Edited on 09/16/2005 2:22:25 AM PDT by Admin Moderator. [history]
Berlin (dpa) - Battling for reelection in a tight race, German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder's party is putting up campaign posters showing flag-draped coffins of dead American soldiers to underline their opposition to the Iraq war, reports said Friday.
Rolf Schwanitz, a state secretary in the Berlin chancellery, is using a poster with five coffins covered by the American stars and stripes being loaded into a transport aircraft flanked by a U.S. military honour guard. The caption of the poster is aimed at conservative challenger Angela Merkel, who backed the Iraq war while always vowing not to send German troops.
``She would have sent soldiers,'' is emblazoned across the poster for Schroeder's Social Democratic Party (SPD). The Chancellor, who narrowly won reelection in 2002 after making his ``no'' to the Iraq war a key campaign issue, never misses a chance to attack Merkel over Iraq in election rally speeches.
``As long as we are in office German foreign policy will be made in Berlin and not anywhere else,'' said Schroeder to cheers at a rally in Potsdam this week, adding that Merkel lacked the strength to stand up to ``the kind of pressure'' he had to face over Iraq.
Schroeder's use of the Iraq war in 2002 for domestic purposes led to the worst post-war crisis in German-American ties.
The conservative Bild tabloid dubbed the posters ``perverse election campaigning.'' Merkel's Christian Democratic alliance (CDU/CSU) reacted with outrage to the poster.
``It's totally tasteless! There are limits even in an election campaign - you don't use the dead to win votes,'' said CDU Secretary General Volker Kauder. German elections will be held this Sunday. Polls show a very tight race with Merkel's centre-right alliance short of a majority in parliament.
There is speculation that Merkel may try to form a grand coalition with Schroeder's SPD as junior partner. But some analysts predict Schroeder will try to cling to power by adding the opposition Free Democrats (FDP) to his SPD-Greens government which all polls show failing to win a majority. dpa lm pmc
Can you post a source link? Thanks.
Apologies for the format. Copied off bloomberg.
They're desperate to remain in power. Can we expect anything LESS from a culture that spawning Hitler, the SS, and the Hitler Youth? I think not.
Sorry, can't find it online yet. Hit Bberg at 11:06 from dpa newswire so I expect it will hit the Net sometime shortly.
Ok, thanks.
Is Michael Moore his campaign manager??
Thank you for mentioning Hitler. The Pope himself was member of the Hitler Youth, you got any problems with that? Don´t prosecute an entire nation. I thought collective guilt was a thing of the past that died 1945?
By the way, here in Germany, this kind of campaign isn´t going too well. It´ll be a boomerang, nobody likes to have the dignity of the soldiers violated through this abuse by Mr. Schwanitz.
Kann Mann nur hoffen. Es wird knapp.
Schroeder pulled this in 2002 and it worked.
We are protecting the likes of Schroeder along with the rest of Western Civilization. Those coffins are a badge of shame for Germany and those too cowardly to stand up and fight.
Questionable taste, indeed.
However the crux of the matter is right. Merkel would perhaps have sent troops to Iraq back then. Schröder didn't. As far as the vast majority of Germans are concerned, that's a point in his favour. The lesson won't be lost on Chancellor Merkel.
Thank you, I'd forgotten that.
Evidently not. Germans lockstep just as well now as they did then. I've spent a few years in Europe and Europeans in general, Brits excluded, would embrace a tyrant just as fast now as they did in the 30's, IMHO.
Ha! I hope you are right! Er ist ein dummer Esel!
Somewhat distasteful, but the headline made me imagine something far worse. Still, glad to see him, hopefully, go.
Not so unbelievable!!
And Scum is an insult to scum.
They are MUCH lower than that.
But then again, what would you expect from a bunch of socialist wanna-be's? This is neither surprising nor unexpected. The "anti-american" undertones of the campaign have been very much present, but "covert" - now, with three days left to go - I guess the SPD has declared no quarter.
Schroeder,Chirac...AND alii OUT ! The shame of western civilization.
Missis Rice don't forget what you told about France and Germany in 2003 !
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