Abysses of the traffic light coalition: The opposite of state political responsibility

Tagesspiegel Abysses of the traffic light coalition: The opposite of state political responsibility Article by Christopher Ziedler • 7 hours • 3 minutes reading time A typical red-yellow-green week is coming to an end: When something succeeds, embarrassing attempts to gain a profile ensure that no one notices. An "autumn of decisions" is needed. It is three years this Saturday since the Bundestag met for its constituent session on October 26, 2021 with a traffic light majority. What began as a hopeful story about a new relationship between three very different participants that could bridge the great social divides and bring social, ecological and economic progress to the country in equal measure is increasingly developing into a divorce drama from which each partner only wants to get out of it in the best possible way. Of course, she had an extremely difficult time with Russia's war of aggression and its global economic side effects. Her coalition agreement was not written for this. Much had to be renegotiated. The SPD, Greens and Liberals have developed the self-destructive talent of covering up every coalition achievement by publicly dismantling themselves over another issue. The past week could have been a good one for the traffic light coalition if it had sold what it achieved on Wednesday as a joint success. But hardly anyone noticed that the G7 finance ministers had agreed on the final details of a 50 billion dollar loan for Ukraine. Many experts were skeptical as to whether it could really be secured with interest earnings from frozen Russian assets, but now Christian Lindner & Co. have delivered in New York and provided relief for the coalition in Berlin. At least one less traffic light-out scenario What does that have to do with the traffic light coalition? A lot! Without this financial instrument, which would justify the halving of the budget for Ukrainian military aid in the 2025 federal budget, the question would inevitably have arisen as to how Germany could otherwise fulfill its promise of support. There should have been talk again about suspending the debt brake rules again. The Greens saw this as a breaking point internally if the FDP had refused. At least this scenario for a premature end to the coalition is now off the table. But the traffic light coalition would not be the traffic light coalition if it had not started the next loud argument, which completely drowned out this important point. The appeals that have been made in abundance to please pull together in the interests of the greater good have all too often fallen on deaf ears. They are no longer even articulated because hardly anyone hopes that they will be heeded. And so those who are still interested are witnessing a completely irresponsible handling of the economic crisis by the three most important traffic light men this week. Robert Habeck - more as a candidate for chancellor than as economics minister - presents his idea of ​​a Germany fund. He and FDP leader Lindner apparently knew nothing about the industrial summit that SPD Chancellor Olaf Scholz had organized for Tuesday afternoon, which is why the FDP leader is now organizing a counter-summit of those not invited to it in the morning. A government must not act in such an inconsistent and confused manner, especially not in economic policy, which is known to consist of at least half of the right psychological signals. Anchor of stability only on paper It exposes the more pleasant-sounding of the two arguments for why the traffic light coalition is staying together despite everything. How often is it said that Germany, as the largest EU economic power, cannot use early elections in this turbulent global situation and must remain Europe's anchor of stability? Of course there is something in that, but Scholz, Habeck and Lindner are celebrating the exact opposite of state political responsibility. Each of them contributes to this - otherwise the trio would have locked themselves in long ago and would have decided together what must follow the inadequate growth initiative in order to get out of the recession. So the fatal impression remains that it is only the poor poll ratings of the three coalition parties that are preventing them from leaving the alliance. If the parties involved are already only focusing on the election campaign to save their own skin, they are doing the republic no favors. The "autumn of decisions" proclaimed by Lindner is the traffic light coalition's very last chance: it should either give itself a sensible remaining program for the rest of its term - or shorten it.