Kurt Beck, the leader of Germany’s left-wing SPD party, which is part of Chancellor Angela Merkel’s "grand coalition" government, has been hit hard by new polling data suggesting that even a majority of his own party members think he’s not the right guy for the top job in Berlin. The 59-year-old, fully-bearded Beck, who comes across as a baroque, dull, and uninspiring politician, has served as Minister-President (or Governor) of Rhineland-Palatinate since 1994. Since taking the reins of the SPD in May 2006, Beck has turned out to be a big disappointment for the party faithful and he has failed to acquire the kind of national stature and strong leadership reputation necessary to successfully challenge the incumbent conservative CDU leader Angela Merkel for the Chancellorship in the fall of 2009, when the next general elections are scheduled to take place.

According to a recent opinion survey conducted by Infratest dimap, 69 percent of the respondent were "less or not satisfied" with Kurt Beck. In contrast, Chancellor Merkel’s scored the best result of all German politicians--68 percent indicated that they were "very satisfied" or "satisfied" with her handling of political affairs. In this context, it is important to point out Beck’s strongest intra-party rival, Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier, scores 66 percent, the second-best rating of any politician in Germany after Angela Merkel. In a hypothetical direct-election match-up with Merkel (in Germany, the chancellor is elected indirectly by the Bundestag members), Beck would only receive 14 percent of the vote (Merkel would get a solid 68 percent). Even among SPD supporters, a stunning 58 percent would back Merkel. In contrast, only 25 percent of Beck’s own party faithful would support his candidacy. Such figures are truly devastating.

At this stage, it is clear that Kurt Beck will not be the SPD nominee to run against Merkel in the fall of 2009. Rather, one can assume that Foreign Minister Steinmeier will fight for Germany’s most powerful position next year. In this context it is certainly noteworthy that the 52-year-old Steinmeier (he served, inter alia, as former Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder’s chief of staff) has never held elected office before. In fact, he was just recently given a safe SPD district in the former East Germany from which he will run for the Bundestag in 2009. If national elections were held now, the results would be as follows: CDU/CSU: 37 percent; SPD: 27 percent; Left Party: 12 percent; Greens: 10 percent; FDP: 10 percent; others: 4 percent. The big question, of course, is what kind of coalition government will emerge after the next general elections: a center-right CDU/CSU-FDP coalition, a Red-Red-Green (SPD-Left Party-Green) coalition, an SPD-FDP-Green "traffic light coalition", a CDU/CSU-FDP-Green "Jamaica coalition", or another CDU/CSU-SPD "grand coalition"?