Stardate 20020922.2002

(On Screen): And so, Schröder's party wins the German elections, after a rancorous campaign in which Schröder and his ally Fischer of the Greens faced a challenge from the right, and in order to win had to play every leftist card they had, including the Anti-American card. Over and over again.

In the course of that, their denunciations of the US became ever more loud and emphatic. At first they simply proclaimed their disagreement with American foreign policy (especially with regard to this or any other war), and said that Germany wouldn't participate in this or any other war. Then, raising the stakes, they claimed that they would try to prevent America from fighting in Iraq, with or without German troops. The next step was to begin to directly criticize President Bush, and it came to a head when the Justice Minister, Herta Daeubler-Gmelin, said a couple of days ago that Bush was trying to stir up a war in order to not have to answer to Americans for the problems of our economy, and that this was just the kind of thing that Hitler used to do.

At which point it hit the fan. Bush and his advisers had been seething anyway, and at that point they went rather public with their dissatisfaction. Schröder apologized.

Sort of. "We're sorry you got the idea from incorrect news reports that we'd compared you to Hitler." He apologized without admitting that anything had happened that should be apologized for, and tried to pretend. I don't think that was enough, and there has been very real damage to German-American relations.

There are rumors that Schröder said privately that once he'd won, he'd make it up to Washington. It's not that easy.

One of the articles I've added to my "Essential Library" is Water Mead's article about Jacksonianism. It's now generally accepted that Bush has become a nearly pure Jacksonian. So it's worthwhile to quote one critical section from Mead's article:

Jacksonian honor must be acknowledged by the outside world. One is entitled to, and demands, the appropriate respect: recognition of rights and just claims, acknowledgment of one’s personal dignity. Many Americans will still fight, sometimes with weapons, when they feel they have not been treated with the proper respect. But even among the less violent, Americans stand on their dignity and rights. Respect is also due age. Those who know Jacksonian America only through its very inexact representations in the media think of the United States as a youth-obsessed, age-neglecting society. In fact, Jacksonian America honors age. Andrew Jackson was sixty-one when he was elected president for the first time; Ronald Reagan was seventy. Most movie stars lose their appeal with age; those whose appeal stems from their ability to portray and embody Jacksonian values—like John Wayne—only become more revered.

A word which has entered the English lexicon in the last twenty years ago is "diss". It's a verb, but it's derived from the noun disrespect. When you "diss" someone, you're denying them the respect they deserve. It may have come from inner city blacks, but it's a pure Jacksonian concept: you do not diss someone and expect them to forget about it afterwards. Nor do you buy back the insult with largesse. It doesn't work like that. You may be able to cool a Jacksonian's anger down that way, but you won't regain his friendship.

Schröder dissed Bush, and he also dissed America. In order to heal the breach, he doesn't just have to make it up to Bush. He's also got to make it up to the American people. I don't think he can do either one, and I don't think he can even make a start with the American people..

The WaPo article about the German election discusses this, and suggests some of the things that "many analysts" think Schröder will try to do.

Many analysts expect that Schroeder, who apologized to Bush in a letter, will now fire Daeubler-Gmelin in the first of a series of conciliatory gestures to repair U.S.-German relations. Daeubler-Gmelin lost her seat in her constituency in southern Germany, but theoretically could return to government on a party list for Parliament; in Germany, people get two votes – one for an individual and one for a party.

To appease the United States, Germany may also take over leadership of the international peacekeeping force in Afghanistan, analysts here have suggested. And the chancellor may yet find a way to reconcile himself to any U.N. resolution authorizing an attack on Iraq. But he is still widely regarded as unlikely to commit troops to the effort.

Not even remotely enough. You don't spend six months calling us every vile name you can think of, and then walk up afterwards and offer your hand and say, "Let's let bygones be bygones, OK? Friends?" The proper response to that is a punch in the jaw.

For one thing, if he was going to dump Daeubler-Gmelin, he should have done it last Friday. To wait until after the election to do it is to try to play both sides; he wanted to be seen as supporting her insult of Bush in the run up to the election, but will fire her afterwards to try to prove to us that he's repudiating her statement.

But it becomes clear why it is that "many analysts" think this will be enough once you realize that they're all German analysts. You can tell that because "many analysts" also tossed