Whoopee or something. Germany’s grand coalition is finally here – a government the Germans didn’t vote for.

GERMANY’S language boffins were first: they coined “GroKo” (short for grand coalition) the German language’s word of the year 2013 (an accolade that is not automatically flattering). To some Germans, this neologism might evoke a “great crocodile” or something otherwise sinister.

What does this really mean? It means that the tail (SPD) has succeeded in wagging the dog (CDU/CSU) and will now force enough of its social democratic agenda (“social” = free lunch) upon the German ship of way-too-big-state to veer it off the proper course, once again. It had been heading, however timidly, toward more private initiative =  responsibility and away from your typical German been-there-done-that world of ever more government waste, meddling and control. The CDU/CSU has now become thoroughly social democratized, in other words.

Just like with the “energy turnaround,” everybody will wake up again once they figure out that this is actually going to cost them personally way too much money. Hey, life is a zigzag course. They’ll get back on track again eventually.

PS: Something actually happened on German TV last night that was apparently worth watching.