Joseph de Weck

Conventional wisdom suggests that the German public is fiscally conservative and hostile to easing the constitutional debt brake. However, a new poll suggests that a majority of Germans, including supporters of the center-right CDU/CSU, want the debt brake to be changed to allow for higher levels of investment.

The new Assemblée Nationale’s most important task is to adopt an electoral system based on proportional representation. Only then can France’s transition from a presidential to a parliamentary democracy succeed and the far right be kept in check.

Foreign journalists wield extraordinary influence in France. That’s partly because the foreign media is integral to President Macron’s economic and foreign policy strategy.

Paris has learned to advance its EU agenda with whatever government emerges in Berlin.