Wieduwilt’s week
Merz hits bizarrely next to it
A column by Hendrik Wieduwilt
09/16/2022, 09:42 am
The Union has arrived in opposition. At its party conference in Hanover, the CDU wanted to demonstrate departure and resilience. But then she served dull punch lines – is that supposed to excite today’s conservatives?
You have to give CDU chairman Friedrich Merz credit for one thing: he embodies the most beautiful thing that cabaret artists imagine in a conservative. An elderly gentleman with a bony appearance coughs his resentment into the hall in a strange military tone. A chancellor candidate for the year 2025, however, was not to be seen in Hanover.
The CDU politician always sounds a little jagged and breathless – like a great-uncle at a family party commenting on a confirmation suit. That could be amusing, but his language sometimes takes on a threatening undertone: “In the course of this party congress, public service broadcasting will be dealt with particularly lovingly,” he threatened. He then demanded that the radio should adhere to the German language rules. Anti-gender as the core of identity – you can try it.
Merz shows a similarly strange hardness when he attacks Robert Habeck. Don’t get me wrong: that’s a good idea in itself! After the gas allocation debacle and insolvency embarrassment, the formerly admired federal minister mutated into a political piñata that anyone can hit on. But Merz beats bizarrely next to it: maliciously he reads from a children’s book by Habeck. As the leader of a people’s party, how can you make fun of texts from a children’s book without shrinking yourself in the process?
Criticism of children’s stories and hairstyles
Criticism of children’s stories, what’s next, like criticism of hair that’s too long? Yes, why not: where Merz left off, Bavarian Prime Minister Markus Söder continued. He’s not above trying a stale joke about Toni Hofreiter’s hair at the CDU federal party conference: “I only believe Anton Hofreiter that he’s for the Bundeswehr when he finally gets a decent military haircut.”
Uff. Hofreiter has had long hair for a while and criticism of hairstyles was already surrounded by a muff in the 1950s. Picking out one of the traffic light politicians who, without any ifs or buts, campaigns for the support of Ukraine, and therefore for Western values - values: that was the thing that conservatives once stood for – that is even for the media-savvy and versatile pop Prime Minister a remarkably stupid move. Above all, Söder had the same tired joke just before presented at the Gillamoos – but the big sister in Hanover was obviously not important enough for originality.
The matter was not only well received in their own ranks: “When Toni Hofreiter criticizes the government and supports Ukraine, I believe him, even without a ‘proper, military haircut'”, wrote Armin Laschet, hashtag #style. You can now book that as an aftershock of the undignified dispute in the election campaign with Söder – or as, well, a hairline crack in the Union.
Unconstitutional ideas
Conservatism, it seems, is not finding its way to the present. Yes, the party congress laboriously decided on a quota and thus promoted the “sale of values”, like the FAZ complained. It was the boss’s project, you really couldn’t dismantle him. Equality and equality are about as different as a planned economy and a market economy, says the conservative Kristina Schröder. And so the party carries on debates from the 1980s, losing some and gaining nothing compared to others.
Then there is the “duty to serve” for young people: not only constitutional lawyers and traffic light politicians criticized the idea, but also a spokesman for their own parliamentary group tweeted then that the CDU was discussing “for the first time in its history a political project that is obviously unconstitutional”. Conservatives and values, that obviously doesn’t refer to the Basic Law.
What is this Union, what does it want? Ungrün, that’s probably the essential thing. Although according to his Statements in the summer interview about the energy turnaround, it is probably only a matter of time before Markus Söder has his picture taken hugging a wind turbine.
Charter without outline
One “Core Values Charter” should now pave the way into the future. “Generational equity, child and family friendliness, education for all, consistent climate protection, social justice and economic strength” should represent the whole, in other words: nothing, absolutely nothing, not without exception any other party would also sign.
After all: “Christian, social and conservative” should be the CDU. Christian? Christian-democratic politics think from the person and not from group affiliations, said the historian and chairman of the commission, Andreas Rödder. Sounds interesting, albeit more like the FDP than the CDU, and none of that could be read at the party conference in Hanover: the stage there belonged to reactionary identity politics, keywords: gender, the Greens and too long hair.
But even the conservative Union issues such as the protection of life could not inflame the hall in Hanover: The Scholz government has removed advertising for abortion from the criminal code, some traffic light politicians also want to decriminalize the abortion itself and even euthanasia is to be reformed. But when Söder takes up these social issues, the applause is polite at best – there was a lot more for the joke about Hofreiter’s hairstyle.
Reactionary or Conservative?
The applause sounded similarly rhythmic and effortful when Söder resisted the release of cannabis. It’s the kind of party gossip that doesn’t come from the heart, but is performed for the cameras and those sitting next to you: gossip, gossip, gossip, yeah, okay, we don’t want to, well then. Saying nay doesn’t excite anyone.
Maybe it’s worse and the conservatives have caught up to reality: Even in the Union, people have seen unintentionally pregnant children, terminally ill people in the family or a joint up close. It seems this union can’t decide between developing contemporary conservatism or cheering on reactionaries in the Facebook comment columns.
With no decency in their hearts and no basic law in their heads, a dull conservative Union is dragging itself into a shaky future, held together only by the lack of alternatives and resentment, with a bloodless charter of basic values in its briefcase. It’s a shame, because there really is enough space to the right of the traffic lights.