This poster is great. The political strategy of the "2nd worst Chancellor" had one similarity to that of the worst. Fire up the citizenry by blaming all of Germany's (and the world's) problmens on a scapegoat. Substitute the word "Jews" wherever Schroeder says America in some of his speeches and it's eerie.

Yes, 'organised state action' is the ticket to success during natural disasters. Horrific hurricane strikes the Gulf Coast and, while more people died than could have or should have, the toll is (I think) less than 2,000 people. A heat wave (a heat wave, mind you, not a tornado, flood, hurricane or earthquake but a freakin' heat wave) hits Europe and 35,000 people die, nearly 15,000 in France... mostly because people couldn't be bothered to interrupt their precious vacations.
It's easy to slag on Schroeder because he is clueless. And corrupt. And Chirac's lap poodle. But people get the leadership they deserve. Sadly most Europeans are living in complete and total denial about what the future holds; they don't want a leader who tells them their huge social welfare system is imploding.

OK, someone fill me in. Obviously, he's been bad for the economy or the stock markets all across Europe would not have risen on announcement of Merkel (who will only end up throwing a different kind of hissyfit in my opinion). Its understandable why he took the last election with the Iraq war and German's attitudes towards wars of aggression (at least by people they understand) but why was he popular in the first place?

Remember, elections in Germany are different. They don't directly vote for their PM; they elect seats to the Bundestag (parliament); the Parliament elects the leader of the dominant faction PM (or, as in the current case with no dominant faction, negotiated among the parties to the coalition). The PM is more analogous to the Speaker of the House than to the President of the US.

Schröder, as I understand it, was the leader of the Sozialdemokraten/Grüne coalition that won the last round of elections. It was a matter of inter-SDP/Green politics more than a measure of Schröder's popularity, as we'd understand it in the US.

What is really funny about Mr. Schroder is how wrong he is. New Orleans is run by the Democrats. Louisiana has a Democrat Governor. The left screwed this pooch. Schroder is criticizing his own ideology and does not even know it. What a boob.