Free Republic

BERLIN (AP) — Ten weeks before national elections, Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder fired his defense minister Thursday following reports he took $72,000 in royalties from a public relations adviser. In a terse statement, Schroeder said that ``there is no longer a basis for working together in government'' with Rudolf Scharping, who held the job since Schroeder won office in 1998. ``I will ask the federal president to dismiss Rudolf Scharping from his functions as defense minister,'' Schroeder said. Schroeder is in a tough re-election campaign against conservative Bavarian Gov. Edmund Stoiber who said Scharping's ouster showed the weakness of the Social...