The recent German election has left many Americans and Europeans perplexed.  Where is Germany headed?  Is it still a part of the European Union or is it pursuing an independent course?  Has it turned its back on America, which provided so much help economically and politically?  Let’s think about Germany.

• First of all, Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder won re-election over his challenger Edmund Stoiber, a conservative candidate, by the narrowest of margins.  In fact, he remains in power because of his coalition with the Green party, an environmentalist, leftist party in Germany and other smaller parties.  It is a fragile coalition.  He turned the election around when he began criticizing President Bush’s policy towards Iraq and strongly argued that he would never go along with Bush on his goal of regime change in Iraq.  Furthermore, his justice minister, Herta Daubler-Gmelin, argued that Bush was making Iraq an issue for his own political gain and compared President Bush to Adolf Hitler.  Correctly, the US maintains that Schroeder is feeding a growing anti-Americanism in Germany, poisoning one of the strongest alliances over the last fifty years.  Finally, Schroeder made all of these decisions without consulting any other members of the European Union (EU).  In short, Schroeder won reelection but did so by alienating America, France and other members of the EU.  He is now furiously engaging in damage control.  It is a bizarre situation for Germany.

• Second, an examination of the situation in Germany is on order.  As “The Economist” has observed, Germany is Europe’s “sick man.”  Last year it managed no more than 0.6% growth, the worst in the EU.  It is in a recession and its employment is over 10% and rising, with business spending falling and consumer spending flat.  Positively, Schroeder has reduced social-welfare spending and has halted the steep rise in public debt.  Further, he has begun to reduce the popular agriculture subsidies to farmers and has even become the first Chancellor since World War II to deal with immigration reform.  Finally, in foreign affairs, Schroeder was the first Chancellor to lead Germany into armed conflict in Kosovo and has contributed troops to fight al Qaeda in Afghanistan.  So, Schroeder has not been a typical liberal Christian Democrat.  

• Finally, one must remember the enormous economic burden of unification.  When the Berlin Wall came down, Germany had to integrate a region (=East Germany) of 16 million people, with a collapsed economy and no modern infrastructure into one of the richest, most advanced nations on earth.  Over $75 billion a year have been pumped into the East and it is only now having the desired effect.  But eastern Germany’s unemployment, wages and productivity all lag behind the West.  No other industrialized nation has had to bear this kind of burden.  Germany remains the world’s third-largest economy, with world class companies, a huge trade surplus and a well-trained and determined labor force.  It will remain one of the most important nations of the EU.  Its foreign policy under Schroeder is changing and its relationship with the United States is at a post-World War II low. To get reelected, Schroeder has alienated the US and much of Europe.  He needs to mend fences and he had better do so quickly.

See The Economist (23 September 2002), pp. 23-25.

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RUMBLINGS IN THE ACADEMY

Within the academy, controversy is the norm.  However, two recent developments demand some comment.

• First, Lynn Weber, director of the women’s-studies program at the University of South Carolina at Columbia, has created a firestorm because of a single page of her syllabus for a graduate seminar in women’s studies.  The objections centers on a set of discussion guidelines that ask students to “acknowledge that racism, classism, sexism, heterosexism and other institutionalized forms of oppression exist” and “to assume that people—both the groups we study and the members of the class—always do the best they can.”  This represents a pattern that has been emerging within many American colleges and universities.  At the University of California at Berkeley, the course, “The Politics and Poetics of Palestinian Resistance,” mandated “that conservative thinkers are encouraged to seek other sections.”  At Arizona State University, a course on Navajo history restricted enrollment to American Indian students.  Likewise, several Spanish courses offered at Florida International University were closed to non-Hispanic students.  (Each of these courses was revised after the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education expressed its disapproval.  Obviously we are very thankful for the changes.)  The point is that Weber’s guidelines are politically charged and it is difficult to defend them at a public college like South Carolina.  Her guidelines pit the rights of student expression against her rules as a professor.  That they can intimidate and stifle are obvious.  Weber defends them as necessary to create a safe environment for her students.  But the guidelines are obviously tilted towards a politically-correct, left-wing agenda.  It is difficult to view them in a positive manner.  Mandating that students acknowledge “heterosexism” is likewise intimidating because there are many who have serious ethical questions about homosexuality.  It seems unfair to require students to hold certain arguments as unquestionable truth in this area of political correctness.  At least Weber is getting close to the line of violating the free speech rights of her students.  She also seems to be promoting ideology rather than free thinking.  It is part of a worrisome trend in America’s colleges and universities. 

See Chronicle of Higher Education (27 September 2002), pp. A10-11.

• Second, Lawrence H. Summers, president of Harvard University, at his annual morning-prayers address in Memorial Chapel, warned of an “upturn of anti-Semitism” around the world.  Although he cited many concerns from around the world, it was his focus on American higher education that caused the stir.  In particular, he said, those who demand that colleges divest their stock in companies that do business in Israel are taking an action that is “anti-Semite in effect, if not intent.”  This includes 71 Harvard professors who, along with 56 at MIT, have signed a petition asking the two universities to take such a step with their holdings for what they call “human-rights abuses against Palestinians at the hands of the Israeli government.”  It seems absurd to single out Israel and not discuss barbaric regimes in the Middle East, or China or North Korea, etc.  Summers is asking the right question--why only Israel?  The pro-Palestinian and anti-Israel line is currently popular with the American left.  Summers is asking some hard questions that need answered.

See Thomas Bartlett, Chronicle of Higher Education (4 October 2002).

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THE ROLE OF GOVERNMENT IN OUR LIVES

We often are so concerned with the national government and national issues that we forget how important state governments can really be to us as Christians and as citizens.  Consider with me several cases:

• First, consider the case of California.  Over the last several years, that government has had a legislature that is committed to the postmodern worldview and has had a governor that is equally committed to that worldview.  Some use the term “liberal” but I choose “postmodern” because I believe it more accurately reflects what has been occurring in that state.  It is the first state to witness the legislative triumph of postmodernism.  From 1997-2001, postmodernism has been institutionalized in that state’s laws and practices.  Allow me to summarize some of the evidence for this claim:

1. All K-12 schoolchildren must now be taught to “appreciate” various sexual orientations.
2. Public school teachers and counselors must identify children with the potential to be “intolerant” of homosexuality—and refer them for retraining.
3. School sports teams that object to homosexual or transsexual behavior may be barred from participating in California Interscholastic Federation sports.
4. All taxpayers must fund marriage-equivalent benefits for homosexual partners of state employees.
5. Nonprofit groups such as the Boy Scouts that refuse to hire homosexuals may be fined up to $150,000 per incident.
6. A person’s gender is whatever he or she says it is, regardless of biology. 

California probably represents where many state governments will be in 5 to 7 years.  State governments are not focusing on promoting justice and thwarting evil.  State governments are using power to promote the postmodern ideology.  It is a difficult time for Christians because laws are being made that result in the transformation of culture and lead it down the path of self-destruction.

See the article on California in World (31 August 2002), pp. 15-17.

• Second, state governments are becoming addicted to cigarette taxes.  Oregon has just become the 19th state this year to raise cigarette taxes, which now range from Virginia’s 2.5 cents per pack to New York’s $1.50 per pack.  (New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg has raised the city tax from 8 cents to $1.50, so a typical pack bought in the city costs $7.50.)  Studies suggest that a 10% tax increase produces a 5% decrease in smoking.  Further, poorer smokers are especially apt to respond to tax increases by quitting smoking.  But the dilemma is that states have a larger interest in preserving a large number of smokers.  With states facing their worst budget problems in a decade, George Will argues, “Many are becoming as addicted to cigarette revenue as some smokers are to cigarettes.”  Furthermore, as Will shows, the 1998 agreements between tobacco companies, state attorneys general and trial lawyers will pay out $246 billion over 25 years.  (Incidentally, the trial lawyers received #13 billion in fees for this.)  A portion of those pay-outs are supposed to be used to discourage smoking.  However, some states are selling all or portions of their future payments at a discount to investors (e.g., Wisconsin sold its entire $5.9 billion 25-year windfall for $1.59 billion.  They will use it for their budget, not to promote anti-smoking campaigns.).  The point is that the states worked so hard to gain the settlement on tobacco and received a $246 billion windfall.  They are not using it wisely in many cases, and they are certainly not using the money to promote anti-smoking campaigns.  An interesting development for our states - is it not? 

See Will’s perceptive essay in The Washington Post (27 September 2002).

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