The poet Friedrich Rückert once wanted to warn against dark feelings with the pretty verse: “Rach ‘is a pleasure that lasts for a day / generosity is a feeling that may make you happy forever.” Should Friedrich Merz be familiar with old Rückert, as can by no means be ruled out with a conservative bourgeoisie, the CDU politician looked outwardly at Maybrit Illner on Thursday evening as if he had taken these words to heart. Merz, the perfect gentleman, who spoke only good things about Armin Laschet with a kind smile, “who deserves every respect” for his suggestion that he will not stand in the way of a new beginning in the Union, maybe. Merz, who said things like: “As long as this chairman is in office, this chairman is in office with an inimitably faithful look at Laschet.”
Joachim Käppner misses the veteran reporter Peter Scholl-Latour in nostalgic moments when he reported in the press club from the wide world and reacted to contradiction with the expression of a man who has long accepted how much stupidity there is in the world.
But if “die Rach ‘” were a pleasure that only lasted one day, “then that one day was a particularly beautiful one for Friedrich Merz.
And why shouldn’t he enjoy it. “This chairman” of the CDU should be history in office as soon as a leadership of Borussia Mönchengladbach holds to stay in Laschet’s Rhineland homeland. And what will become of Friedrich Merz then, he left open artistically. Only this much: he will “never again” run a fighting candidacy for the chairmanship of a federal party congress of the CDU.
Say: If you call me, here I am! But I won’t compete against people like that anymore. Open bracket: Like when he lost to Armin Laschet, and why did he lose? Because of the establishment, i.e. that of the party, Merkel and her court. Clip closed.
Friedrich Merz would of course not say something like that out loud. He lectured with enjoyable coolness over the long journey of the Union from the People’s Party down to the gates of hell, the 24 percent opposition party. Merz has long been the bearer of hope for that conservative camp in the Union that dreams of the good old days of clarity, whether these times ever existed or not. Laschet, on the other hand, embodied as much clarity from the point of view of this Union wing as an Aachen carnival prince on the late evening before Ash Wednesday.
Actually, this show had all the prerequisites to make viewers nod off very soon, and that through no fault of their consistently clever guests or the usually good-humored presenter. From the audience’s point of view, you were just so tired, so very, very tired. So many talk shows, opinion leaders and great interpreters for always the same, almost two weeks after the general election. Merz had long been on the invitation list when, a few hours before the broadcast, his old adversary Armin Laschet gave the speech from which it was concluded that he, Laschet, could or would, when the time comes, perhaps resign should the party do so wish, and let’s see. Say: The end is near. And Merz, Laschet’s second fiercest internal party opponent (after Markus Söder, who cannot be beaten in this regard), took the stage at Maybrit Illner.
Nothing against Cem Özdemir, the friendly green integrator, or Jessica Rosenthal, two other guests: But they remained rather marginal figures. Rosenthal, however, accomplished, incidentally, a remarkable achievement for a Yusochefin invited to television. Unlike her predecessor, she did not insult potential coalition partners (FDP) as a voodoo preacher, did not brand her own candidate for chancellor (SPD) as a servant of state monopoly capitalism (joke) and avoided the usual attitude of the SPD left of knowing everything better while the make others do better. She even uttered the word “progressive coalition”, although the cosmic adversary a. D. Christian Lindner plays the kingmaker there together with his new friends from the Greens. The power is at hand and there has to be so much discipline. Olaf Scholz should just not rely on it to last forever.
But this talk show was Friedrich Merz’s hour, even if he had the attitude “Didn’t I tell you right away?” bravely sought to avoid. Only Melanie Amann, head of the Berlin capital office of the mirrors, Strong Paroli, for example by the persistently repeated question, what the content of Mr. Merz would do so much differently and better than Laschet or the still-Chancellor. Merz of course skilfully avoided it. Why content when revenge tastes so sweet? Perhaps instead of Friedrich Rückert he read his Wilhelm Busch: “Is fatal!” noticed Schlich. / “Hehe! But not for me.”