All Over but the Acrimony

The campaign produces more invective than serious debate

It had been billed as Das Duell (The Duel), and it was expected that the West German election campaign pitting Chancellor Helmut Schmidt against Conservative Challenger Franz Josef Strauss would be a stimulating confrontation of intellects and ideologies. Instead, halfway to the Oct. 5 election, it has been a disappointment, practically devoid of serious debate on the issues and degenerating easily into mudslinging and character assassination. The battle seems to be all over but the invective: Schmidt's coalition of Social Democrats and Free Democrats is a heavy favorite to defeat the Christian Democrats and their sister party, Strauss's Christian Social Union.

Last week, in one of the rare surprises of the campaign, the country's Roman Catholic bishops got into the act with a hortatory pastoral letter intended to be read in their churches on Sunday. Without naming a candidate or party, the letter inveighed against the expanding role of the state, the burgeoning federal bureaucracy and the growth of the national debt--all themes of Strauss's campaign. The bishops also criticized Schmidt's government for making divorce and abortion too easy. While denying undue influence, the church, which is especially strong in Strauss's native Bavaria, thus appeared to be intervening in an effort to shore up Strauss's fortunes. Schmidt was predictably furious. Said he: "Politics from the pulpit is an abomination!"

Otherwise, the campaign has turned almost entirely on the candidates' personalities. Schmidt has capitalized on his basic popularity--60% of the electorate currently approve of his performance as Chancellor--and on his image as a nearly ideal embodiment of the leadership qualities West Germans seek: confidence, firmness and statesmanship--not to mention telegenic good looks. In campaign speeches to large, lustily cheering crowds, he proudly points to the country's healthy economy, its fervent commitment to detente, and its enhanced international stature. Strauss, he warns, would "squander" these hard-won achievements.

By contrast, Strauss's image is his biggest liability and provokes intense reactions. Beloved in Bavaria, the heartland of German conservatism, he is not just disliked but often detested nearly everywhere else. A highly intelligent man who was an exceedingly capable Defense and Finance Minister, he is nonetheless regarded as a hard-lining cold warrior. His bulldog appearance is caricatured almost daily. His rallies are beset by hecklers who hurl rotten eggs and tomatoes. Strauss's efforts to improve his image have backfired, leaving an impression of uncertainty and artificiality rather than statesmanship.

Ostpolitik, Schmidt's policy of dialogue with the Soviet bloc, has emerged as one of the campaign's few solid issues. Strauss has repeatedly criticized Schmidt for being "too soft" on Moscow since the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. He pounced on the Polish labor crisis, calling on Schmidt to support the strikers openly and to make a new West German loan to Poland conditional on the Warsaw government's keeping its promises to the workers. Schmidt, intent on calming the West German electorate's special sensitivity to any increase of East-West tension, took a cautious line, insisting: "For the sake of detente, noninterference is the only sound policy in this situation."

Most of the time, however, the issues have been submerged by the campaign's nasty name-calling. Schmidt has referred to Strauss as "unstable" and "unfit to be entrusted with the nation's future." Strauss has denounced Schmidt as a "peace prattler and panic prophet." The Christian Democrats have suggested that Schmidt is a dangerous megalomaniac who belongs in a mental institution; Social Democrats in turn have depicted Strauss as a bloodthirsty warmonger. Indeed, the august daily Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung has characterized the campaign so far as "the stupidest the Federal Republic ever lived through.''

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