Olaf Scholz: the Union's fear of the SPD Merkel

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Social Democrat Scholz with Chancellor Merkel and CDU leader Kramp-Karrenbauer

No, apart from the early point in time, it was not really surprising to anyone in the party headquarters of the CDU and CSU that Olaf Scholz was nominated by the SPD as a candidate for chancellor. On the other hand, you couldn't be sure either, since the recent shrink social democrats were definitely good for the unforeseen. Take Scholz, for example: At the end of last year, the Union also expected the Federal Finance Minister and his political partner Klara Geywitz to win the race for party leadership. Saskia Esken and Norbert Walter-Borjans were ultimately elected.

But this time it was Scholz.

The first prominent voices from the Union sound skeptical. Friedrich Merz, who at the end of the year will first become CDU boss and then want to conquer the chancellery for the Union, says: "The candidate does not fit the party." His party friend Norbert Röttgen, also an applicant for the CDU chairmanship, calls the nomination of Vice Chancellor Scholz a "tactical solution that is not credible". And Bavaria's Prime Minister, the CSU chairman Markus Söder, criticized the personnel because, in his view, the election campaign would begin too early. Söder is allegedly worried that the Scholz nomination would make it more difficult to fight the Corona crisis, he calls the point in time "devastating" with a view to the cooperation within the federal government.

But nobody wants to talk about the concerns that an SPD chancellor candidate Scholz could cause the Union with a view to the successor to Angela Merkel.

A possible Chancellor Scholz? Iwo.

The numbers seem clear

On paper, the matter seems clear: the Union is currently rated at 38 percent in the polls, the SPD only comes to around 15 percent. The significantly higher rated Greens are the only remaining half-competitors in the federal election campaign, one heard regularly from the Union recently.

But the situation is by no means that comfortable - and the strategists at the CDU and CSU know that too. Nobody knows how much of the great poll numbers will be left in the election in a good year. In any case, the Merkel bonus, which the Union is currently enjoying because of the once again popular head of government, should then be gone. After all, the CDU politician will not run again.

And who the Union parties send in the race as candidates for chancellor is completely open. Only at the party congress at the end of the year does the CDU elect a new chairman; alongside Merz and Röttgen, the vice-chairman and North Rhine-Westphalian Prime Minister Armin Laschet is running. The new party leader should also reach for the candidacy for chancellor. But then there is also CSU man Söder, who has gained such political stature and approval in the Corona crisis that he is also considered a possible candidate for chancellor. And what will become of the ambitious Federal Health Minister Jens Spahn, actually allied with Laschet, in the end if he continues to weaken?

That can all be found in time for the CDU and CSU. But the unexplained staff record will cause unrest for months, possibly well into the election year. The SPD, on the other hand, sorted itself out early on and can meanwhile work on the Scholz campaign in peace. Of course, the Social Democrats are still good for any self-destructive action.

And then there is the strategic problem that a candidate for Chancellor Scholz poses to the Union: Scholz's only power option to succeed Merkel in government headquarters is red-red-green if the SPD ends up in front of the Greens - but nobody could R2G, as the Left Alliance is called, also take away the political horror like Scholz.

Left spinning mills are alien to Scholz

In his calmness, the Vice Chancellor looks like an image of his boss Merkel, left-wing spinning was just as far removed from him as SPD general secretary under Gerhard Schröder, as federal labor minister in Merkel's first grand coalition, long-time Hamburg mayor and finally as federal finance minister.

How Scholz wants to win the Left Party for himself and at the same time tame it and get the Greens on board is still completely open. If he succeeds, however, any red sock campaign by the Union should be superfluous. A narrow majority for R2G with Scholz at the top would then not be ruled out.

For now, the CDU and CSU have the motto: keep calm. At least that's how the reaction of CDU General Secretary Paul Ziemiak sounds, which he forwarded to officials of his party on Monday. According to SPIEGEL information, Ziemiak wrote that Scholz's nomination, "let's take it easy," said that "now is not the time" for the election campaign.

But the time is coming, for Union too. And then it could be more exciting than expected.