comment by
Detlef Esslinger
How does a challenger make it into government headquarters? One of the wisdoms of political business is that the incumbent is voted out rather than being elected. As far as Saarland is concerned, the saying is both true and false. The SPD politician Anke Rehlinger almost triumphantly defeated the CDU Prime Minister Tobias Hans, which has to do with his weaknesses and her strengths, but is also the result of a very special constellation. That makes it easy for the CDU in the federal government to tick off the defeat. Treacherous easy.