CDU Friedrich Merz conducted some political spring cleaning this week as he removed a former Merkel loyalist from the party’s ruling committee in favour of a conservative alternative as the German conservatives ponder the rise of the AfD.
Their arguments on Brexit are, after more than half a decade, tired; but I would struggle to argue that some of the points being repeated over and over inside the conference were any less spent.
Conservatives and right-of-centre parties won 33 of the 51 seats in the election to the Constitutional Council that will decide on the future of the new proposed constitution.
It is as if, in the boomer-con’s mind, liberalism is a ‘nice principle’ that ought to temper the ‘nasty but necessary principle’ of conservatism. Young-cons, however, don’t identify liberalism with niceness at all.
It is no wonder that the countryside and small towns have always remained a bastion of traditionalism, naturally suspicious of progress and resistant to change.
Despite clear and unwavering opposition to socialism, the conservative movement remains reluctant to dip its toes into the debate over the welfare state, the foremost vehicle for socialist policies in democratic countries.
