Welcome to live blogging of the German election. Reuters correspondents, photographers and television camera crews in Berlin and around Germany will be bringing you frequent updates of all the action from now until Sunday evening. Stay tuned.#germanelection live blog
by erik_kirschbaum at 9/25/2009 2:46:51 PM
It's going to be an exciting race
Frank-Walter Steinmeier, the SPD candidate, just finished a fiery speech to 10,000 in front of the Brandenburg Gate in the middle of Berlin. He has been getting more and more aggressive as the campaign winds down even though his voice seems to be going hoarse 48 hours before the polls close. Steinmeier sounded confident that the opinion polls are moving his way and that the centre-left SPD will accomplish its main goal of preventing Chancellor Angela Merkel from forming a centre-right coalition with the pro-business FDP that last ruled for 16 years to 1998. #germanelection live blog
by erik_kirschbaum at 9/25/2009 5:27:19 PM
Just published @erik_kirschbaum's #germanelection live blog
"There are only two days left and the race is wide open again," Steinmeier said. "No matter what the polls were saying before, we didn't let that stop us or get to us. We kept fighting and it's paid off. We've caught them. And the conservatives are getting nervous. They've lost their lead. They've been arrogant and were already starting to divvy up the ministries before the election. There's no majority for the centre-right in this country, there's no majority for arrogance like that." Lots of cheers for those lines.#germanelection live blog
by erik_kirschbaum at 9/25/2009 5:33:41 PM
Merkel, who is in Pittsburgh at the G20 meeting today, will speak in Berlin on Saturday shortly after arriving back in Germany. Her Christian Democrats and the FDP had a lead of about 6-7 points in opinion polls four weeks ago but that has shrunk to a dead heat in some polls and a 1-2 point lead in others. #germanelection live blog
by erik_kirschbaum at 9/25/2009 5:37:15 PM
Follow the Reuters #germanelection live blog by @erik_kirschbaum
ow.lyIt's kind of amazing that Merkel left Germany for two days just before the election -- especially when her lead was shrinking in opinion polls. Will that come back to haunt her and her party on Sunday? Steinmeier's strong attacks on Merkel in his speech tonight featured prominently in the evening news broadcast on ARD at 8 p.m. -- the most popular newscast in Germany with about 10 million viewers.
by erik_kirschbaum at 9/25/2009 6:19:52 PM
Michele Sani of Reuters TV was also watching Steinmeier tonight and this is what he thought: "He had a few good lines. But the crowd didn't seem to get as ecstatic about it as I thought they might.".#germanelection live blog
by erik_kirschbaum at 9/25/2009 6:25:38 PM
Click here for the latest Reuters story on the election
www.reuters.com.".#germanelection live blog
by erik_kirschbaum at 9/25/2009 6:31:54 PM
by erik_kirschbaum at 9/25/2009 6:45:18 PM
Tobias Schwarz from the Reuters pictures desk in Berlin captured this unusual image of Steinmeier. Most Germans know him as Foreign Minister, the country's soft-speaking top diplomat who weighs his words carefully and seemingly never gets angry. But Steinmeier didn't mince words tonight in attacking Merkel and the centre-right government she wants to form. He criticised them for their opposition to a minimum wage in Germany and their policies that would lead to "starvation wages" with hourly wages of as low as 4.50 euros per hour. Steinmeier, whose party wants a minimum wage of 7.50 euros per hour, got a lot of applause for that.." #germanelection live blog
by erik_kirschbaum at 9/25/2009 6:51:55 PM
by erik_kirschbaum at 9/25/2009 6:56:17 PM
This is where Merkel spent the penultimate day of the German campaign -- 6,783 km and six time zones to the west in Pittsburgh at the G20 meeting. Pictures like this from Reuters photographer Kevin Lamarque of her rubbing elbows with other world leaders usually go down well with Germans -- they enjoy seeing that their chancellor seems to be a player on the world stage. But there's never been a meeting quite like this on the eve of the final day of the German campaign. Some Germans are asking if it shows Merkel is utterly confident of her re-election or utterly foolhardy to go AWOL so close to the ballot.#germanelection live blog
by erik_kirschbaum at 9/25/2009 7:05:20 PM
Here is a short excerpt from Steinmeier's speech in front of the Brandenburg Gate. He was complaining about how the fabric of the society would fall apart if a cashier gets sacked for pocketing 1.50 euro, as happened last year, while well-paid executives get golden handshakes despite severe mistakes that cost a lot of people their jobs. It's one of his favourite stories on the campaign trail.
www.youtube.comby erik_kirschbaum at 9/25/2009 7:42:07 PM
That's it for tonight. Tomorrow Merkel will be back in Berlin for her final rally whileSteinmeier heads to Dresden. In the past, the Saturday before the Sunday election was a rest day for the candidates -- there was an unspoken ban on campaigning to give the voters a break and a chance to reflect. That all started to change in the last two elections in 2002 and 2005 when the pool of undecided voters grew to about 15 percent of the electorate and there were big swings in sentiment in final two days of the race. In 2005, for instance, pollsters said Merkel's party lost about six percentage points in the final two days. This time, pollsters say, about 20 percent of the voters have not yet made up their minds. So the Saturday before the election has now become one of the most important days of the campaign.
by erik_kirschbaum at 9/25/2009 7:49:12 PM
Welcome back to the live blog of the German election. Today is the final day of campaigning ahead of Sunday's vote. Chancellor Angela Merkel arrived back in Germany this morning at 7 a.m. after an overnight flight from the G20 meeting in Pittsburgh. She will jump right back into the campaign mode after two days in the United States with a speech to supporters in Berlin at 12 noon and then she'll travel to Potsdam for another rally at 2:15 p.m. Her rival Frank-Walter Steinmeier is in Dresden for a speech at 12:45 and then he heads off to his home town of Detmold in the west for a finally rally at 4:15 p.m. #germanelection live blog
by erik_kirschbaum at 9/26/2009 8:33:33 AM
Alexandra Hudson, a Reuters correspondent, is in Dresden waiting for the Steinmeier speech and writes: "It's a gorgeous sunny day in Dresden and the SPD has picked a very grand location in the heart of the old city. But so far it's been mainly tourist groups passing in front of the stage. Steinmeier not due to speak for a while yet." germanelection live blog
by erik_kirschbaum at 9/26/2009 9:34:09 AM
Sarah Marsh, another Reuters colleague, is waiting for the Merkel rally in Berlin to start and offers:
"On the way to the huge showdown campaign rally, I was struck by the massive presence of armed police and security guards roaming around the train stations. The release of an al Qaeda Internet video threatening Germany with an attack after the election has got the country on red alert. A guard at the entrance to the rally told me security was much higher than usual as she rifled through my bag, checking for anything unusual." Click here for the story:
in.reuters.com #germanelection live blog
by erik_kirschbaum at 9/26/2009 9:39:40 AM
Merkel has arrived at the CDU rally to thunderous applause from the crowd of supporters in the arena in east Berlin, which is just a few kilometres from where she lives. She doesn't look tired despite flying through the night. germanelection live blog
by erik_kirschbaum at 9/26/2009 10:10:08 AM
CDU campaign manager Ronald Pofalla says the CDU is in its 24-hour nonstop campaign mode now. "We'll be out all night talking with taxi drivers and people riding in taxis. We know the final phase is decisive. We want to win over the undecideds." Merkel picks up a microphone and adds: "Pollsters tell us a third are undecided. It's hard for us to imagine that but that's the way it is. It's worth the effort to work hard all day and into the night today talking to neighbours and friends about what's at stake." #germanelection live blog
by erik_kirschbaum at 9/26/2009 10:13:42 AM
Merkel is asked by the host of the event if she will be able to sleep in on Sunday: "I'll try to sleep as long as I can tomorrow. There's nothing wrong sleeping a bit longer on election day. I'll then have breakfast and then at some point go to vote. And then you just sit and wait. The time passes faster on other days, that's for sure." #germanelection live blog
by erik_kirschbaum at 9/26/2009 10:19:05 AM
Merkel says rather emphatically: "Every vote will count." She sounds sincere. And she knows that in 2002, conservative candidate Edmund Stoiber lost the election by just 6,000 votes.
by erik_kirschbaum at 9/26/2009 10:20:59 AM
Merkel says: "Germany can't afford any experiments. Germany needs stability."
by erik_kirschbaum at 9/26/2009 10:22:07 AM
Sarah Marsh of Reuters writes: "
Merkel has greeted the so-called flashmobs that have accompanied her on her last few campaign rallies. The mobs, groups of people summoned over the Internet to show up at a specific time and place to do something unusual, have appeared at events to wave flags and banners and heckle the unsuspecting Merkel. Mostly, they have been chanting “Yeahhhh!” after every sentence she utters and the slogan is meant as an ironic expression of support. But today, she just smiles good-humouredly, says “Ah, my friends are there again, a warm welcome to you” and the crowd claps. Are the flashmobs right to hijack her campaign events? " Here is a recent blog from my colleague
Madeline Chambers on flash mobs:
blogs.reuters.com by erik_kirschbaum at 9/26/2009 10:30:17 AM
Noah Barkin, chief correspondent, watched Merkel's speech and offers this: "Merkel just finished what was billed as a rousing final speech. But like much of her campaign it steered clear of big ideas and lacked passion. Her message was a vote for her conservatives is a vote for stability. Perhaps it'll be enough. German voters have a long history of backing incumbents. But if she comes up short and only squeezes into office again, unable to form her centre-right coalition of choice, she could well regret running such a cautious campaign". #germanelection live blog
by erik_kirschbaum at 9/26/2009 11:34:47 AM
Sarah Marsh found this line in Merkel's speech interesting:
"She's Germany's first chancellor to have grown up in Communist East Germany and drew on those experiences -- 'I urge all of you to think about the fact that it is a wonderful right to have the right to vote. I lived for 35 years in a country where that wasn't possible'." Despite all at, voter turnout in formerly east German is lower than in western Germany. Political analysts put down to a general distrust of politicians after 40 years of Communist rule. Here's a longer story Sarah wrote about the voting habits of easterners
uk.reuters.com #germanelection live blog
by erik_kirschbaum at 9/26/2009 11:51:11 AM
by erik_kirschbaum at 9/26/2009 12:09:11 PM
Fabrizio Bensch, a Reuters photographer, filed this picture of Merkel coming into the rally.
by erik_kirschbaum at 9/26/2009 12:10:04 PM
Sarah Marsh writes: "The CDU love their national anthem at the end of their rallies but I had to get a piece of information for a story. When I was carefully trying to get back to my seat in the press box without disturbing anyone singing, a middle-aged woman came over to reprimand me: 'Young lady, when the national anthem is being played you don't walk around. You stand up straight and sing!" Here's a bit about the Deutschlandlied anthem:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deutschlandlied
by erik_kirschbaum at 9/26/2009 12:14:23 PM
by erik_kirschbaum at 9/26/2009 12:16:17 PM
Kai Pfaffenbach, a Reuters photographer, got this unusual picture of Merkel at her final campaign speech. Maybe the jetlag coming back from Pittsburgh overnight caught up to her for a brief moment here afterall.
by erik_kirschbaum at 9/26/2009 12:19:41 PM
Alexandra Hudson, a Reuters reporter dispatched to Dresden today to follow Steinmeier, writes: "Frank-Walter Steinmeier has just finished his last main campaign speech but it dragged on too long for many in the crowd and seemed surprisingly flat for a final rallying call. He spoke of how the SPD has made up ground in the polls, was staging a comeback. He also stressed it is his party which spared Germany from the worst ravages of the financial crisis. Germany needs social fairness and that is only to be had from the SPD." #germanelection live blog
by erik_kirschbaum at 9/26/2009 12:29:36 PM
Steinmeier seemed to more impressive in Berlin on Friday evening, by most accounts. There was a crowd of 10,000 there at the rally in front of the Brandenburg Gate while there might have only been about 1,000 in Dresden on Saturday. #germanelection live blog
by erik_kirschbaum at 9/26/2009 12:31:35 PM
Alexandra Hudson adds: "Steinmeier was wearing a white shirt with rolled up sleeves and looked more like an earnest bureaucrat. He has faced a lot of criticism during the campaign that his ideas and speeches don't really inspire people or pull them over to his cause. Dresden's scenic Schlossplatz wasn't as full as it might have been and there were still seats to be had on the long benches set up for the rally. 'Depressing,' is the way SPD supporter standing nearby put it."#germanelection live blog
by erik_kirschbaum at 9/26/2009 12:42:17 PM
by erik_kirschbaum at 9/26/2009 1:24:57 PM
Wolfgang Rattay, a Reuters photographer, filed this shot of Steinmeier in Dresden this afternoon. The writing beneath his microphone says: "Unser Land kann mehr" or "Our country can do better". It was Steinmeier's campaign slogan. In German doesn't quite have the melody of "yes, we can" but at least he got one of Obama's three words into his slogan without sounding ridiculous.#germanelection live blog
by erik_kirschbaum at 9/26/2009 1:29:45 PM
by erik_kirschbaum at 9/26/2009 1:32:08 PM
Wolfgang Rattay got close enough to Steinmeier in Dresden for this shot. Is the Foreign Minister waving goodbye to his government job? Or will he win over enough of those 30-percent still undecided to prevent a centre-right government and keep his job? Or will Sunday's election produce another great surprise like in 2002 and 2005? #germanelection live blog
by erik_kirschbaum at 9/26/2009 1:36:53 PM
Here's the story from Sarah Marsh and Alexandra Hudson:
www.reuters.comby erik_kirschbaum at 9/26/2009 1:48:10 PM
by erik_kirschbaum at 9/26/2009 3:14:38 PM
Ina Fassbender, a Reuters photographer, got this picture today of Guido Westerwelle, the leader of the pro-business Free Democrats that hope to form a centre-right government with Merkel. The CDU/CSU and FDP had the champagne on ice in 2002 and 2005, confident of winning power because they had such big leads in opinion polls. But they fell short both times and the FDP has been stuck in opposition since 1998 -- a l-o-n-g time for a party that before that was the post-war kingmaker, in power with either the CDU/CSU or the SPD for almost the entire post-war era. #germanelection live blog
by erik_kirschbaum at 9/26/2009 3:21:22 PM
Curiously, the FDP has ruled out a coalition with the SPD and Greens even though they might have enough on Sunday for such a "traffic light" coalition if their preferred centre-right option falls short. The FDP says they would rather go into opposition again than into such a three-way government. It's a strange tactic but a lot of it has to do with the complicated nature of German election laws: voters get two ballots and the FDP is hoping to get a lot of those crossover "second ballots" from conservative voters who think they'll be giving the centre-right option an advantage by splitting their vote: first ballot for the conservatives and second ballot for the FDP. It doesn't really seem fair and the Constitutional Court has ruled parliament has to reform the law by 2011. #germanelection live blog
by erik_kirschbaum at 9/26/2009 3:24:12 PM
Alexandra Hudson is in Dresden today and was intrigued by the clever strategy the FDP used to attract the attention of potential voters at one central market square: "The FDP has come under particulary hard criticism in eastern Germany by the Left party that disparages the FDP as 'neo-Liberal', which in German means 'hardcore capitalist'. The FDP in central Dresden have the most visible presence with a huge blue bouncy castle. They're trying to show their soft side, it seems. 'We've been on tour with it for six weeks now,' one FDP campaigner told me. 'It's a good tactic. The kids jump in it and we can jump on the parents and tell them all about our policies'." #germanelection live blog
by erik_kirschbaum at 9/26/2009 3:50:40 PM
Here are some of the highlights of the final speeches today by Merkel and Steinmeier as well as the three leaders of the three smaller parties -- FDP, Greens and Left:
www.reuters.comby erik_kirschbaum at 9/26/2009 4:35:00 PM
by erik_kirschbaum at 9/25/2009 6:45:18 PM
by erik_kirschbaum at 9/25/2009 6:56:17 PM
by erik_kirschbaum at 9/26/2009 12:09:11 PM
by erik_kirschbaum at 9/26/2009 12:16:17 PM
by erik_kirschbaum at 9/26/2009 1:24:57 PM
by erik_kirschbaum at 9/26/2009 1:32:08 PM
by erik_kirschbaum at 9/26/2009 3:14:38 PM