Merkel Might Lose After All

By Spiegel Staff February 14, 2017 

With just six months until Germans go to the polls, Angela Merkel's re-election is looking less certain by the week. Martin Schulz is a dangerous adversary and his Social Democrats are full of the kind of enthusiasm that the chancellor's party lacks......... The refugee crisis, though, changed everything. Since the summer of 2015, Merkel has become extremely polarizing, not unlike Hillary Clinton was in the recent U.S. campaign. "There are now people who would rather chop off their hands than vote for Merkel," says one Merkel confidant. When the chancellor was campaigning in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania last summer ahead of elections in the state, she occasionally appeared only in front of hand-picked audiences because her speeches would otherwise have been drowned out by boos and whistles........To Read More......