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INSIGHT
INSIGHT
Aired September 20, 2002 - 17:00:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JONATHAN MANN, CNN ANCHOR (voice-over): Wartime romance. German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder works his way back into the hearts of millions by campaigning against conflict with Iraq, while a cabinet minister fights hearsay about Hitler.
HERTA DAEUBLER-GAMELIN, GERMAN JUSTICE MIN. (through translator): Yes, I did mention the word Hitler, but to make it clear, that it was not in this context.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MANN: Hello and welcome to a special edition of INSIGHT from Berlin.
Over my shoulder, I think you can see the gleaming dome of the Reichstag. That's where the German parliament meets. A modern dome placed atop a much older structure, a building that was set alight before World War II and then bombed much more heavily during the war.
Germany's parliamentary elections officially come to an end today. German voters go to the polls on Sunday in a race that is essentially deadlocked, transformed, in fact, by talk of war.
German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder, seeking a second term, started out his bid for reelection a distant second, behind conservative challenger Edmund Stoiber, leader of the Christian Social Union of Bavaria, the Christian Democrat flag-carrier for this election.
Schroeder, as I mentioned, started out second, but now is in a dead heat, profiting from two things that normally don't do anyone very much good: the threat of natural disaster and the prospect of war.
On our program today, making the best of two bad situations.
We begin, though, with a look at the final campaign rallies of this election season.
Saturday it will be a quiet day in the campaign. Sunday is voting day. So the two candidates had their last chance to speak to voters this evening.
Gerhard Schroeder speaking in shirtsleeves, reminding people of his humble origins and his reputation as a man who likes to be a friend of the regular guy, the working man. Schroeder, in fact, told supporters this evening that he has a lot of work to do, that his government has done a lot for the country, but there is much more ahead.
He reminded people about the terrible floods in eastern Germany, floods that broke a lot of hearts and may yet break the bank with the enormous costs of reconstruction will represent.
He also talked about a theme that is very familiar in this election, that Germany is opposed to war with Iraq, and though it remains a friend and ally of the United States, it will not hesitate to speak its mind.
His challenger, Edmund Stoiber, of Bavaria, a man who also spoke this evening, though he's not really the shirtsleeves type. He was more formal, stuck to facts and figures, for the most part, as is his habit, but they're important facts and figures. Facts like Germany's unemployment rate, nearing 10 percent, something that really Germany has tried very hard to fight without success.
Stoiber said he could succeed against unemployment. He could make all of Germany more like Bavaria, his home state, the state he is premiere of, and a place where the economy has been much more successful, where people are more affluent than in the rest of Germany.
That's how the campaign came to an end. The truth is, when it began, it wasn't all that interesting. It seemed like a dull race at the outset, but it was transformed by talk of war, as I mentioned, and then transformed again in a way in the last few days by talk of a different kind.
CNN's Chris Burns, who covers this country, is our Frankfurt bureau chief, joins us now, to talk about the latest twist in all of this -- Chris.
CHRIS BURNS, CNN FRANKFURT BUREAU CHIEF: Jonathan, even though this is an incredible horse race finish, a photo-finish, that we're going to see on Sunday, we don't even know who's going to win.
Really, what has overshadowed this race in the last couple of days is talk. One reference, in fact, to Adolph Hitler.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
(voice-over): What has generally been a civil campaign has gotten ugly in the last stretch that has Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder and conservative challenger Edmund Stoiber in a statistical dead heat. They scrambled for an elusive edge before Sunday's vote.
Then Schroeder's Justice Min. Herta Daeubler-Gamelin is quoted as saying United States President George W. Bush aims to attack Iraq in order to divert attention on domestic issues. She reportedly said Adolph Hitler had a similar strategy.
The minister tells a news conference her comments to a small group of union members were misquoted by a local newspaper.
"The word Hitler I referred to," she says, "but in making clear that that context should not be used, not in reference to Bush," she said.
Her denials have so-far failed to stem sharp reaction.
"Daeubler-Gamelin Under Pressure" headlines the "Berlin Zeitung," which, like other papers, calls the reported comments (UNINTELLIGIBLE), stupidity.
"Did the minister insult Bush," asks the (UNINTELLIGIBLE).
Ask White House spokesman Ari Fleischer.
ARI FLEISCHER, WHITE HOUSE SPOKESMAN: This statement by the justice minister is outrageous and is inexplicable.
BURNS: Conservatives call for Daeubler-Gamelin to quit or be fired. Chancellor Schroeder stands by her, but says if she really said what she reportedly said, then she's out.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Schroeder was very quick, you notice, to distance himself from this kind of comment.
BURNS: Schroeder already has damage control to do with Washington after gaining German votes by criticizing United States threats to attack Iraq and vowing German forces would stay clear.
Edmund Stoiber has attacked Schroeder over that position, although he says any such action should be through a UN mandate.
Stoiber has also attacked Schroeder over his immigration policy, saying it's too weak in dealing with Muslim militants. Germany was a base for September 11 hijackers.
EDMUND STOIBER, CONSERVATIVE CHANCELLOR CANDIDATE (through translator): We have 4,000 violence-ready Islamists who are looking to belong to terrorist organizations. We've been demanding for a long time these terrorist members be expelled.
BURNS: Stoiber and Schroeder are also battling over the biggest issue in German's minds, the 9.6 percent jobless rate. But where the mud is flying most intensely is around reported gaffs like Daeubler-Gamelim's.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
More damage control this evening. Schroeder's letter to President Bush saying, "I regret the fact that the alleged comments by the justice minister have given an impression that has offended you. Let me assure you that there is no place in my cabinet for anyone who made a connection between the American president and such a criminal."
Some more damage control this evening.
MANN: Chris Burns, thanks very much.
The election has hardly been about Adolph Hitler, but it has very much been about war, unquestionably the most dramatic and revealing issue of this campaign.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
(voice-over): German forces are on the move. There are German soldiers in the Balkans. There are German soldiers in Afghanistan. There are still more on the horn of Africa. All of them on the front lines of a small-scale revolution.
Germany is a profoundly pacifist country, scarred by the devastation, suffering and guilt of two world wars. Until 1956, post-war Germany had no army. Until a decade ago, it essentially didn't use it, drafting soldiers who never fought, promoting officers who never led men in battle.
As a loyal member of NATO, Germany spent decades preparing to defend western Europe, but no one ever attacked. Instead, the trouble turned out to be elsewhere. In the wars of splintering Yugoslavia, German troops were deployed outside their borders for the first time as peacekeepers in Bosnia. In the NATO bombing to stop ethnic cleansing in Kosovo, German warplanes flew combat reconnaissance missions, another postwar first.
Gerhard Schroeder, the first contemporary chancellor too young to remember the second world war, risked the fall of his government to win parliamentary approval for the Kosovo mission.
"The government," he said, "will stand together with its NATO and EU partners and will not accept violence against innocent people."
It was a dramatic change for Schroeder and many other Social Democrats who'd begun their careers protesting against war. It was a transformation for the Green Party, Schroeder's coalition partners, who had been the most passionate pacifists of all.
Foreign Min. Joshka Fischer, the most famous face of the Greens, turned into a target for many members of his own party. The coalition nearly collapsed under the strain. By March of this year, the Green Party made the change complete, officially recognizing in its party platform the need for force to combat terrorism or genocide.
NIELS DIEDERICH, FREE UNIVERSITY, BERLIN: People thought that Germany should never take part again in military action in foreign countries, but step by step we had to learn that Germany is not only economically a big country, but politically too.
MANN: This is the (UNINTELLIGIBLE), a bombed out Franciscan monastery that was left the way it was at the end of World War II while the rest of Berlin was rebuilt around it. Germany was more than ready enough to move on. And so now it's not only confident enough to use its armed forces once again, it is confident enough to refuse.
GERHARD SCHROEDER, GERMAN CHANCELLOR (through translator): If you're gambling with war and military intervention, it's not with us you'll be doing it.
MANN: At nearly every opportunity, Schroeder told voters that he will not join a United States war in Iraq.
"One more time, and let me be very clear, I am against military intervention in Iraq, and under my leadership, Germany will not take part."
And playing to concerns about Germany's chronic unemployment, his finance minister said war would make the price of oil explode and push back economic recovery.
In many countries of the world, campaigning against the United States is a familiar way to win votes, but not in Germany. This election has been different.
DIEDERICH: It's the first time that questions of foreign politics plays a role in a federal electoral campaign. In former times, international questions always were avoided.
MANN: International questions weren't the important ones at first. Floods in August killed 27 people. The torrents of rain and water undermined more than a decade of reconstruction in the formerly communist east. Schroeder rushed to the scene. Conservative candidate Edmund Stoiber cut short his vacation to visit, but not quickly enough in the minds of many voters.
And when there was talk of war, Stoiber may have lost support on the left and the right by trying to stay somewhere in the middle.
"In politics, no one should play on the fear of the people. When the chancellor uses these election tactics, he's trying to cover-up his failings."
The United States ambassador to Germany is not amused, and he's publicly questioned the chancellor's policy. A German general who sits on a top NATO military committee also took issue.
Many German voters were pleased with the government's position, but some saw it as politics.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: My opinion is the same as Schroeder.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I hate war and I can't understand why the Americans are so hateful about a lot of people in the world.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The German people don't want any war, and so they think they have to vote for Schroeder, but that's wrong of course.
MANN: Pollsters who thought Schroeder would have a hard time winning suddenly found the race too close to call.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
And according to the latest polls, Schroeder may even be ahead, though within the margin of error, so it really is a horse race. An extraordinary thing, because Gerhard Schroeder has an enormous Achilles' heel. It's called the economy.
We'll have more on that when INSIGHT from Berlin returns. As we go, though, a look of the night sky over Potsdamer Platz. This was ground zero of the Cold War, and where you see those skyscrapers, the Berlin Wall once stood. Millions and millions of dollars of investment have poured into Potsdamer Platz and the rest of formerly East Germany. What's happened to Germany's economy?
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
MANN: Before they see the results from Sunday's election, Germans had these numbers to think about: the Frankfurt Stock Exchange's DAX index hit its lowest levels in more than five years this week. This year alone, investors have on average lost more than 1/3 of their money.
Welcome back to Berlin.
It's not just investors who are hurting. German's are going without jobs in numbers they haven't seen for a long time. Unemployment, as we've been saying, up near 10 percent.
What's wrong with the German economy? We asked CNN's Suzanne Kelly to look into it, and she went shopping -- Suzanne.
SUZANNE KELLY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: That's right, Jonathan.
It may seem like a plumb assignment, but actually shopping is just one indicator of what many analysts say is wrong with the German economy.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
(voice-over): Berlin, the capital of a country rich in tradition and pride, but no longer rich in economic growth. In fact, Germany is now among Europe's worst performers.
A sign of the times: Germany's most famous department store, KaDeWe. They say you can find anything here that the West has to offer. Anything, that is, except flexibility. Just like shops across the country, this store is forced, by law, to close early on Saturdays and stay closed on Sundays.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I think the government has to do a lot to liberalize the opening times for us, so it's necessary to open longer on Saturday, because we have to close at 4:00, and that's terrible, because people want to buy longer than 4:00, but we are not allowed to do it.
KELLY: The complaint is echoed throughout the country. Businesses are forced to turn paying customers away in order to keep the government and the unions happy.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We have also problems with our social partner. We call it "the union" from the union, our social partners from the union. So we have to handle it, and we need more help from our government on this point.
KELLY: In 1998, it seemed that Gerhard Schroeder was the answer, promising to find ways to get all segments of the economy working together, a business savvy politician who managed to gain the support of the unions.
As chancellor, he introduced the Alliance for Jobs, a program of cooperation among business, government and unions aimed at getting more Germans off the unemployment roles. But halfway through his term, he seemed to turn his back on business, focusing again on securing the union voter base instead of seeking agreement between the two.
JEFFREY GEDWIN, ASPEN INSTITUTE: I think flexibility is a big issue here.
KELLY: Jeffrey Gedwin is the director of Berlin office of the United States-based Aspen Institute, a think tank that studies the differences and similarities between the United States and Germany.
He says Germany's lack of flexibility can't be blamed solely on Schroeder and his policies.
GEDWIN: I think Germans, in particular, when they think about economic questions, they think about security, and they think about stability. They don't exclude the others, but it's a question of emphasis and priority.
KELLY: Germany defines itself as a socially responsible market economy, one that thinks about its workers, not just the bottom line.
A lot of voters seem disenchanted, though, feeling that whoever wins on Sunday won't be able to find a balance between the generous social welfare system and bringing down high unemployment, pushing through a significant labor reform package and dealing with economic problems.
Problems, ironically, created by the fall of the Berlin Wall, one of the most joyous events this country has ever seen.
GEDWIN: We underestimated, all of us -- the Communists, the GDR, the Soviet satellite, had 40 years there to destroy the economy, to destroy the environment, to destroy the whole attitude and moral philosophy about how a liberal democratic and market society works.
KELLY: So with the fall of the Berlin Wall in many ways began the fall of the German economy.
A European Commission report traces 2/3 of Germany's economic problems to reunification, and the other 1/3, right back to that inflexibility factor.
Conservative candidate Edmund Stoiber promises to change things, steering the country back on a pro-business track while not forgetting about German traditions, but it's a promise the voters have heard before.
"The unemployment rate is at the moment just as high as before Schroeder came into power. Nothing has changed. And if it will be better in the future is another question."
(END VIDEOTAPE)
Well, as you can see, shopping is really just the tip of the iceberg, so to speak. More importantly will be whether the chancellor, whoever it may be, will be able to steer Germany back onto a path of cooperation in order to stimulate more economic growth and get more Germans back to work - - Jonathan.
MANN: Suzanne Kelly, thanks very much.
The economy is an enormous problem, but it's not the first one the next chancellor will have to face. That is the complicated math of building a coalition.
Stay with us for that, when INSIGHT from Berlin returns.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
MANN: Welcome back to Berlin. Once again, the Reichstag behind me.
Gerhard Schroeder was the first chancellor to serve in the newly refurbished Reichstag, the first tenant, if you like, of that building. He'd like to hold on to the lease for four years longer, but to do that he's going to have to not only do well when the voters go to the polls on Sunday. He's going to have to assemble a coalition. No government in modern Germany has ever served without one. No majority has ever been voted into office, and this time in particular the math of building a majority, building that coalition, could be a little bit complicated.
Joining us now to talk about that is Olivia Schoeller of the "Berliner Zeitung."
Thanks so much for being with us.
Let me ask you, first of all, who's going to win?
OLIVIA SCHOELLER, "BERLINER ZEITUNG": Well, we don't know. It's a very, very close race and it is very, very hard to say now.
The polls show that both parties are actually almost on the same numbers, and the other smaller parties as well.
MANN: The reason that it so complicated, and I keep stressing this, is that it's not just a matter of which of the two leading parties wins. It's a matter of what kind of coalition they form and whether any two parties together could even have a majority. It is possible that that won't necessarily happen, isn't it?
SCHOELLER: That's right. If the PDS gets into the parliament.
MANN: I'm going to interrupt you. The PDS is the Party of Democratic Socialism. It is the party that was formerly the Communist Party. It's the heir to the Communist party that used to rule East Germany. Forgive me.
If the Communists get in.
SCHOELLER: If the Communists get in, then it's probably very hard for either one of the big parties to form a coalition with one of the smaller parties they really want to rule with, which means that if the PDS gets in, we're probably going to have a grand coalition in Germany, which is something that we haven't had for 30 years.
MANN: A grand coalition would be what, in simple terms?
SCHOELLER: A grand coalition would be a coalition between Schroeder's SPD and Stoiber's CSU, where it depends who gets the majority. If Schroeder gets the majority, you probably don't have Stoiber leading the CSU. You would have somebody else.
MANN: So this could happen. Once again, Germany could get a new premiere, or the same chancellor, to use that term, depending on how a small group of Communists do in this election. It seems like not the first party, not the second party, and not the third party, which I suppose would be the Greens, not the fourth party, which I suppose would be the Free Democrats, but the fifth party may end up being, in a sense, kingmakers. Are they actually going to decide who the chancellor would be, do you think?
SCHOELLER: Well, I don't think so, because they won't vote for Stoiber being the chancellor, and Schroeder doesn't want to get elected by them. So at the moment, it's probably not them who's going to decide.
I think both big parties, which is Schroeder's SPD and the CSU, CDU, are probably going to go for the grand coalition to avoid being made king by the PDS.
MANN: So the chancellor could end up being reelected.
Now, one of the things he said quite famously is that if, in his first term in office, he didn't lower unemployment, he didn't deserve to run for reelection. Well, he didn't lower unemployment as substantially as he hoped. And despite that he's failed in his own terms, and he has this promise, he's run again, why are people still so likely to vote for him?
SCHOELLER: I think they do believe him to a certain point, that he is not the one who is responsible, alone, for the situation, but the world economy, economic situation, is responsible for that too. And I think he has built -- he was able to get the campaign away from employment figures to the war issue and the flood issue.
MANN: What about Edmund Stoiber? He came offering a Bavarian vision of the future, lederhosen and laptops, they like to say. Why didn't he capture more of the public's attention, more of its passion, do you think?
SCHOELLER: I think he is not the kind of guy -- obviously, if you look at the polls right now, he's not carrying the popular vote. If we would elect our head of government like Americans would do, voting for the president, Schroeder would clearly be the president and Stoiber wouldn't.
Stoiber is the candidate of the union, of Christian Democrats and Christian Socialists, and that's why he's getting elected, because people believe in the party, but the more popular candidate is Schroeder, definitely. And I think that is one of the reasons people are now probably going to vote for Schroeder.
MANN: Olivia Schoeller, of the "Berliner Zeitung," thanks so much for talking with us.
SCHOELLER: You're welcome. Thank you.
MANN: One last thing before we leave you here in Berlin about this campaign. It has been interesting. It has been earnest. It has been serious discussion. When the political leaders here in Germany make a mistake, when they mumble or stumble or literally fall off their feet, the German media don't generally make fun of them. So it was a bit of a breath of fresh air when the Free Democrats, one of the smaller parties, took on the mantle of being "the fun party."
They did it with some clever advertising and some interesting little campaign stunts. But then things started going badly. There was a small scandal associated with the party, and it doesn't seem to be doing as well in this election as it had hoped.
When we called up the Free Democrats to talk to them about their unofficial title, they said no, in fact, it was wrong. So although there will be a lot of parties to watch in the German election as the campaign ends and the voting unfolds, don't expect a whole lot of fun.
That's all for this edition of INSIGHT from Berlin. I'm Jonathan Mann. Stay with CNN for our extensive coverage of the German election all through the weekend, and especially our special when the polls close on Sunday. We'll bring you all the results.
For now, I'm Jonathan Mann. Thanks for joining us.
END
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