Troubles on the right

A series of difficulties for the European Centre Right.

In Britain, David Cameron is holding on with the support of the unpopular Liberal Democrats; the public has not yet felt the force of the rather modest austerity measures and 2011 / 12 will be a difficult time.

In Germany, Chancellor Merkel has lost Baden-Wurttemberg, which only a year ago most commentators would have thought impossible. Merkel supported the European Bailout mechanism and she supported nuclear power: the voters don't like either of them.

President Sarkozy has done disastrously in local elections in France. Unlike in Germany, the opposition is not going to join up against him (they are the left and the extreme right) but his own party is beginning to wonder if he is the right man to field in 2012. He was expecting a boost from the Libyan adventure but it failed to materialise.

Oddly, Silvio Berlusconi is more popular than any of the others but his path is not strewn with roses. Having lost his immunity from prosecution the court cases are beginning to pile up (currently four) and he is finding it increasingly difficult to portray this as a political attack. As usual his solution would be to do something good for Italy but with massive sovereign debts and Greece likely to default his options are increasingly limited.

Interesting times