There will still be enough occasions for the Union to criticize the traffic light coalition. To invent a dirty name even before the formation of the new federal government is ridiculous.
After the publication of the coalition agreement of the traffic light parties, it was that time again. Union faction leader Ralph Brinkhaus spoke of “the left-yellow coalition”, CSU regional group leader Alexander Dobrindt called the paper “the birth certificate of a left-yellow coalition”.
This wording has long since arrived further down in the hierarchy of the Union faction. “Left yellow must take into account the economic viability of affordable housing,” headed parliamentary group Vice Ulrich Lange from the CSU in a press release. “Left-Yellow puts Germany’s security to the test,” said parliamentary group vice-chairman Thorsten Frei and CDU right-wing expert Jan-Marco Luczak. “The coalition agreement of the future left-yellow government is a bitter disappointment from an agricultural policy point of view,” announced the CSU agricultural politician Artur Auernhammer.
Although this has been going on for a few weeks, the name has not yet caught on outside of the Union bubble. That is not to be expected either, because the implication that goes along with it is ridiculous. The FDP, which in the Bundestag – rightly in the view of the Union – sits to the right of the CDU and CSU, as part of a left-wing alliance? Christian Lindner as the stirrup keeper of the government and wastefulness? The traffic light as the Trojan horse of eco-socialism?
Anyone who nods now, whose linguistic usage may include the unspeakable battle term of “left-green silted up” or “left-red-green contaminated 68er Germany”, which is so popular in the AfD. Sure, “left-yellow” is much less hateful than “left-green dirty”, but the milder variant is also designed to divide. It aims to detach the FDP from the context of the “bourgeois parties”, to remove it from the political space known as the “center”.
That alone is quite bold, if you remember that the Union’s candidate for chancellor said during the election campaign that “a coalition in which the FDP is involved is better than without the FDP”. Above all, however, it is simply embarrassing when politicians invent names that no one else uses. The goal is just too transparent. Without a doubt, there will be occasions when criticism of the traffic light is legitimate, right or necessary. But how can one trust the analytical ability of a Union that operates with an enemy image that it does not believe in itself?