DAVOS, Switzerland – In astonishingly short time, German Chancellor Angela Merkel has emerged as the most dynamic leader in Europe. That at least seemed to be the verdict of the applause meter at the World Economic Forum in Davos on Jan. 25. “You have given us hope for the first time in a long time,” Peter Brabeck-Letmathe, chairman and chief executive of Swiss food giant Nestle, told Merkel after she delivered the keynote address to a packed auditorium. Merkel called for a massive reduction in bureaucracy in both Europe and Germany, and an increase in the retirement age, among other measures. “We have to be more flexible. We’re holding back enormous potential,” she said.
Brava. Even with limited technical power because of a coalition government, the moral power of authentic conservative ideas coupled with her commitment to what is right means the great German people can, and will, lead Europe out of its malaise.
Related Link:
World Economic Forum Official Site
It’s hard to have high expectations about Merkel, Harper, Sarkozy, etc, who aren’t exactly in the Reagan / Thatcher line, but she might surprise us. I like what I hear. Now if only we had someone in the Reagan / Thatcher line over here.
It is hard to say how much the German leadership has improved in the last few months. Almost from the “Dark Ages” to the 19th century in only a few months!
Beautifulatrocities, I wouldn’t put Stephen Harper in the same category as Merkel and Sarkozy: the latter are “conservative” statists in the Continental Chistian Democrat/Gaullist mold; Harper most certainly is not. He’s not a “red Tory,” from the old eastern-doimnated Progressive Conservative Party, but rather someone who came to the newly-united Canadian right from the Alliance and the Reform Party, i.e., from the Canadian West. I’d say that makes him much more comparable to, say, John Howard in Australia.
All that said, Merkel and Sarkozy are very far indeed from perfect, but still each light-years’ worth of improvement over Schroeder and Chirac. If Merkel would lose the instinctive postwar German fawning over anything related to the EU, now THAT would be impressive, but it’s not happening anytime soon. Most Germans are still true believers rivalled only perhaps by the Belgians, and any Geramn leader now who openly said that the EU is not always the answer to everything would be committing political suicide. Unfortunately.
My optimism is somewhat tempered by the fightening results of the Palestinian elections. For every one step forward, it seems like there are always some huge jump backwards.