German politicians have never been known for their sex appeal. Then along came Karl-Theodor zu Guttenberg, the aristocratic finance minister, who is inspiring a level of public excitement normally reserved for rock stars and Hollywood actors.
The extraordinary rise of Guttenberg, a Bavarian baron, since his appointment only a few months ago has bewildered experts who thought that the 37-year-old lawyer and rock enthusiast was unqualified to lead Europe’s largest economy through a recession.
Not only has the “rocking baron”, as they call him, become as popular as German Chancellor Angela Merkel, his mentor, he has emerged as one of her best electoral assets as she campaigns to win another four-year term in office.
Guttenberg, a member of the German Christian Social Union, the Bavarian partner of Merkel’s Christian Democrats, benefits from being a relative newcomer – he was elected an MP only in 2002 – and likes to present himself as an “unpolitician”, comparing politics to a “circus” and often referring, disparagingly, to “the business of politics”.
His hobbies, too, help to set him apart: his holiday reading this year was Plato in the original Greek; and the passion for rock included an appearance earlier this year at a concert by the Australian hard rock band AC/DC. Next to him, with red devil’s horns on her head, was Stephanie, his glamorous wife, a great-granddaughter of Otto von Bismarck, founder and so-called “Iron Chancellor” of the 19th-century German empire.
The hip image helps Guttenberg, the most eloquent defender of free markets in Merkel’s conservative block, reach out to the young who often sit around drinking beer at his rallies. His campaign has been labelled “Woodstock for conservatives”.
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