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No-Frills Candidate Aims For Germany's Top Spot (Craig Whitlock, 9/13/05, Washington Post)

Unsmiling, unstylish and uncharismatic, Merkel, 51, is bidding to become Germany's first female chancellor, as well as the first to have grown up behind the Iron Curtain, in the former East Germany. Polls show that her party, the Christian Democratic Union, holds a lead, albeit a narrowing one, in a national election scheduled for Sunday and that she stands a very good chance of sitting at the chancellor's desk in Berlin.

The vote comes at a pivotal moment for Germany, the biggest country in Europe and the world's third-largest economy. Despite spending more than $1.5 trillion over the past 15 years to reunify the nation, Germany has failed to heal many divisions between east and west. It is also grappling with the competitive challenges of globalization, as German companies move jobs to lower-wage countries.

Although Merkel's party leads in the polls, for many Germans she remains a remote figure. The former physicist rarely talks about her personal life, her upbringing under communism or how she became involved in politics. She often appears dour and uncomfortable. On her latest campaign poster, she looks like she's clenching her teeth as she forces a grin.

"Typical German," said Kai Sausmikat, 41, a voter who came to hear Merkel at the Osnabrueck rally, pulling down the corners of his mouth into a clown-like frown.

What do they have to smile about?

MORE:
Schroeder's Rival, and Opposite, Leads in Polls: Even though many Germans regard Angela Merkel as aloof, the conservative appears poised to become their first female chancellor. (Jeffrey Fleishman, 9/14/05, LA Times)
The daughter of a Lutheran minister, raised in communist East Germany, Merkel is the antithesis of the spin and glamour of modern politics that her opponent Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder navigates so well.

The reticent leader of the Christian Democrats, Merkel, a physicist, carries an air of determination and integrity that has dogged the gregarious Schroeder in his campaign rallies.

Yet many Germans regard Merkel as aloof and inscrutable, a politician who has managed to remain in the shadows while standing in the spotlight.

"The German public is finding out it doesn't know the lady very well," said Matthias Machnig, a consultant who ran Schroeder's first campaign for chancellor in 1998. "Who is she? What is her foreign policy? What is her economic plan? She's powerful and willing to win, but is she the leader of a nation? That's the question."

Posted by Orrin Judd at September 14, 2005 7:59 AM