Over the next four weeks, the German chancellor has the fight of her political life on all fronts, domestic and European, at a moment when one slip could sink her government and tear down the European Union's single currency.
In the coming days, Mrs Merkel must take the lead in trying to find an answer for the Greece [sic] crisis after three[-]fifths of Greek voters rejected EU austerity measures, crafted in Frankfurt, the home of the European Central Bank.
German taxpayers have put 211 billion euros on the line to bail-out [sic] countries like Greece, and Germany's patience is running out with countries that reject the economic medicine they are prescribed to cut debt while continuing to demand the hand[-]outs.
In order to appease her highly taxed voters worried that EU bailouts breached Germany's constitution, Mrs Merkel made German economic aid conditional on all eurozone countries signing the "fiskalpakt [sic]".
The treaty, signed by 25 EU countries, gives Brussels officials the right to block budgets that break spending rules that must be enshrined in national constitutions, as is the case in Germany. » | Bruno Waterfield, Paris | Monday, May 07, 2012
