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The arrogance of German chancellor Angela Merkel reflects the self confidence of the dominant elite. The Bundeswehr, the army of German imperialism, is ready to intervene at any point of the globe. In ten years, the annual income of the richest has increased by 50%. And despite some scandals, the poles of résistance remain very circumscribed (the anti-nuclear movement, opposition to the new railway station in Stuttgart, actions against the neo-Nazis, “Blockupy” in Frankfurt); nothing seems really capable of disturbing the game of trade union co-management and the alternation of the traditional parties in the management of governmental affairs.
On July 12, the former CDU president of the Land of Bade-Wurttemberg was the subject of a prosecution for an illegal competition agreement during the sale of the regional electricity company to the French group EDF. Five months earlier, Germany’s President, Christian Wulff, was forced to resign following a financial scandal: chosen for this honorary responsibility by the Bundestag’s deputies from among supposedly exemplary personalities Wulff, who is soon to appear before the courts, claimed his pension of 199.000 Euros annually for life, for serving 20 months in office, while the age of retirement was raised to 67 and millions of people are surviving with Hartz IV or poverty wages.