German chancellor Olaf Scholz still doesn’t get it. ‘Der Fisch stinkt vom Kopf’ (the fish stinks from its head) is a popular German saying. It’s proven right by Scholz’s abysmal failure to lead since the Russian invasion of Ukraine. He’s failing again with Israel, declaring the Jewish state is Germany’s ‘Staatsräson’, or raison d-etat, but never spelling out what this means.
Scholz has flopped with his tepid attempts to explain what’s at stake for Germany and Europe in Ukraine and Israel and why Berlin should be the leadership power of the EU. This problem is partly due to Scholz’s nature. If you think you’re the smartest guy in the room you don’t bother with pesky stuff like explaining things. It’s also because he was elected as a continuation of chancellor Angela Merkel. Dubbed ‘Mutti’ (Mommy), Merkel’s domestic policy can be caricatured as a general anaesthetic-cum-birthday party where subsidies and social welfare presents were handed out to all.
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