There was an extensive poll done in collaboration with the BBC (yes, it is that Beep based in London) on global perceptions of Communist China. Respondents were asked to consider whether they are favourable to China from an economic and military perspective. It reveals that even the Axis of Weasels countries have a heavily negative response to China when they are asked to consider from the military perspective. The figure for France runs at 79% and Germany at 91%. In contrast, the United States is at 76%.
Schroeder beware. You are going to open a pandora's box if you think you can get away from arms sales to the PRC.
He'll toss the Volk a few sound bites alluding to his economic intelligence in such matters, which is, in actuality, their subtle reminder that he considers the Volk much more ignorant than he himself is, and that shall be that.
Any retaliatory measures by the US because of arms sales to China will be passed off as attempts by the US to keep the Volk from getting ahead economically.
The only hope now is that the vote in North Rhine Westfalia can bring him to the brink of governing impotence, and the remaining parts of the country decide to climb on the bandwagon and clamor for new elections.
Schroeder, however, will make mincemeat out of any opponent, and may very well be elected again by a slight margin by playing to the fringe parties.
It almost worked in an attempt to regain power recently in Schleswig-Holstein. He managed to wring his way out of a CDU/FDP takeover there by sacrificing a governer, and has thus far avoided new elections in that State.
If he had lost S-H, and then loses NRW in May, he would lose his veto power due to sheer numbers of the oppostion voting. He needed S-H at all costs.
longjack
It's amazing that Schroeder is still in power. His most serious concern is his hair dye. He once threatened to sue some of the European press outside Germany for speculation about his hair dye. He's had 4 or 5 wives, and allegedly a mistress, and while that's more of a private matter of course, it's a reflection on the fact that he's a dabbler who isn't very earnest about what he says. Germany needs many reforms. Obviously, someone on the Left might have been better able to reform labor and such than someone on the Right. But Schroeder has managed to botch everything as far as I can tell. His one significant moment was also a big disgrace because he abused for his own gain the one nation that was for German reunification in the early 90's, a nation that stood by the Germans through the Cold War, a nation that fed the Germans after WW II and WW I, a nation that provided nearly all the help for the Berlin Airlift, a nation that financed the Marshall Plan, and a nation that, with its allies, defeated the tyrants who had plunged the Germans to the depths of hell and insanity. So a little over two years ago Schroeder campaigns on a policy of basically taking no sides in a struggle to liberate a country from a man as mad as Hitler; Schroeder pledged Germany to be neutral. That is his legacy; he provided moral comfort to the anti-American people in Europe and the US who were morally confused about the war in Iraq. He provided false comfort to Saddam and may have given him the hope that the US wouldn't attack. Now, he encourages dallying while Iran builds nuclear weapons. One might have hoped that Schroeder would have seen his way to lead the German people rather than to demagogue to the crackpot Leftists who never forgave the US for all it's done for Germany. Is it any wonder that Schroeder is sooo comfortable with Chirac? They're from different parties and political philosophies but they are cut from the same cloth.