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RUGEN, Germany. Americans groove on the exhilaration of argument and accusation as the midterm elections finally approach, but here in Germany there's the bitter remembrance of what it was like to have none of the above. Trading barbs and insults is the American way of campaigning, but East Germans recall fear, not free speech, as reams of barbed wire and blocks of cement turned into a wall and lookouts with guards who were ordered to shoot any of their own people trying to flee their encircled prison of a country. An American visitor quickly becomes aware of sharp contrasts in...

I have a guest post this morning from Saxo Bank chief economist Steen Jakobsen regarding the slowing German economy. Steen says the German economy is decelerating too quick for comfort and faces a triple whammy from Asian rebalancing, the US economy, and a bad energy policy. From Steen JakobsenGermany May Have Won the World Cup, but Its Economy is Cooling Fast We need to congratulate Germany on its World Cup win. It was a victory for organisation and science, but unfortunately the Germany economy is slowing fast — and too fast for comfort when we look at Eurozone GDP. I...

She likes pantsuits, suffers public attention to her coif and shows telling signs of age with unflattering puffs under her eyes. But Angela Merkel is no Hillary Clinton. As a world leader, she's channeling Margaret Thatcher, not Eleanor Roosevelt. This lady is famously "not for turning." The chancellor of Germany, just re-elected for a third time in a landslide, is appreciated for her austerity in the European Union. Her countrymen call her "Mutti," or Mother, with affection but with a certain formality, recognizing that she's hanging tough because she thinks tough love is good for you. She makes the less...

A couple days ago Bloomberg reported Polls Indicate Merkel’s Coalition Is Likely to Win Election.

BERLIN -- The Germans play "gotcha" with a decidedly Teutonic skill and attitude. The latest victim is Annette Schavan, Chancellor Merkel's education minister, who resigned her position in a gathering storm of accusations that she plagiarized the doctoral dissertation she wrote 32 years ago. The title sounds particularly apt: "Person and Conscience." She held on for a week, fighting back. She insists she will sue to regain her title of "doctor," revoked by Heinrich Heine University in Dusseldorf. In the age of the Internet, obscure dissertations once relegated to the memory hole, out of mind, unread or assigned to a...

BRUSSELS: Angela Merkel reached out on Wednesday to the United States in her first foreign trip as German chancellor, saying it was time to heal the trans-Atlantic rift caused by Germany's opposition to the US-led war in Iraq.

Hello there! I am new to this forum. I am from Germany and I am interested in politics. I want to learn more from the US especially besides our papers and TV. So as a start-up my question is: What do you think about WWII? Was everything such simple. Have there been certain interests of the Allies? What was the role of the UK? Was Germany the biggest danger or was it Russia? Many question, I know. :) But more interesting for me: What is your point of view regarding Germany today? How do you consider the current politics of...

State of Saxony - results : Christian Democratic Union: 41.1% (-15.8%) 55 Party of Democratic Socialism: 23.6% (+1.4%) 31 Social Democratic Party: 9.8% (-0.9%) 13 National Democratic Party: 9.2% (+7.8%) 12 Free Democratic Party: 5.9% (+4.8%) 7 Greens: 5.1% (+2.5%) There were elections yesterday also in the state of Brandeburg (around Berlin). ex-communist also second at 28.0% (+4.7%), behind the SPD 31.9% (-7.4%). The Christian Democratic Union went below 20%.