Germany: Bring back the deutschmark!

At the founding convention for the new Alternative for Germany party, speakers denounced the euro.

Who would have thought that a proposal to change the national currency could produce “such cheering, such euphoria”? said Alard von Kittlitz in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (Germany). The founding convention last weekend for the new Alternative for Germany party rang out with stomps and yells as speakers denounced the euro and called for the return of the deutschmark. The party’s name is an allusion—or even a retort—to the long insistence of Chancellor Angela Merkel that Germany had “no alternative” but to bail out debt-ridden countries in the euro zone. “The euro was a fatal mistake that threatens our prosperity,” said party leader Bernd Lucke, a Hamburg economics professor. He said the currency even threatened European integration, since German restrictions on bailout money were leading to widespread resentment of Germany in the poorer nations of the euro zone.

This new party embraces “a uniquely German brand of prosperity chauvinism,” said Derek Scally in The Irish Times. Germans feel they have been responsible and lived within their means, and have nothing but scorn for the profligacy of “debt sinners” on Europe’s periphery, who failed to budget properly and now want Germans to bail them out. Most analysts doubt the new party could actually garner the 5 percent of the vote necessary to win a seat in parliament. But its message certainly appeals to many Germans. Nearly one quarter of voters from across the political spectrum said they would “possibly consider” voting Alternative in September’s general elections.

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