I listened to Angela Merkel’s television speech on the occasion of the plague, I listened to in German, I probably understood 80 percent. which, in my opinion, is a sign in itself that it was written and said so that everyone understands as much as possible.
Are we worse (and why)?
And I thought – why no one can talk to us Poles? Do we not want to be talked to us like that? Do we think that politicians by definition cheat and lie and that there is no emotional truth to them, because if they are cheating on us, at least don’t let them cheat us by telling us that they understand us, because such cheating is more painful?
Politics is obviously the art of toughness. If you read in Angela’s biography, you will also find fragments there that show unusual cunning or ruthlessness. But the complexity of robotic politics is that it must have both. A real democratic politician on a scale like Blair, Obama or Merkel, that’s why he reaches people and wins the elections, because he can experience and describe the world in the same language and color that his voters think, only he can say what they think but they can’t say or are afraid.
So the question is about voters, it is the voters who determine which politics they choose and what language of emotions goes to them. So, I thought, since we – we are not Michał Tomczak, but we, as the majority of Poles, choose hateful or introverted technocrats, we probably need it (for the most part), and we don’t need Angela’s language for anything. (As Prime Minister Morawiecki says something “from himself” it is so glaring that it would be better if he did not say it anymore, because you can see how terribly tired this warm approach to people is, I just feel sorry for him.)
Like a pastor’s daughter
We’ve known Angela for years. He is a momentous, historical leader, it is already known. Angela looks like a pastor’s daughter. And he looks like a physics doctor. It is not a natural volcano of emotions. However, it so happens that in the largest, most important countries of Europe, very smart people are usually leaders. Wise in the versatile sense of the word, also in terms of the color of the language and emotions experienced.
Angela can ask her countrymen to call their relatives and grandparents not to leave them alone. Connect on Skype, talk, send a podcast, write a letter. Angela, I thank the people working at cash registers and in stores, because they are on the front line of the fight and hardly anyone appreciates them.
The leader is really important, the man is very important, he is not afraid to speak from himself, even if he does not write the speeches himself. Entangled people, uncertain of their role, closed ones are not able to appeal to their emotions, they do not know what they are allowed to do, because they have never obtained the democratic approval of who they really are. Often, I think, just their spirituality is not full, it is limited by participation in political games and reshuffles, during which they learned to say what they think, even if they once could.
In Poland, politics is not and has rarely been democratic in the same sense in the last 30 years in which it is in Niemcza, and therefore it has often not carried the most credible and significant people to the most important offices. The very structure of our system allows for what is unimaginable in Germany, France or Great Britain, namely that the most important politician does not have the most important office. This in itself is a deeply undemocratic solution, and yet we allow it.
Even more ambiguity is introduced by the office of president, which significance depends on the political phase, i.e. it does not give any stable power. Theoretically, the office of the head of state, in practice, since the times of Kwasniewski, who in some sense was too good for the president’s office, i.e. whatever was wasted, i.e. for 15 years we allow the selection of secondary figures for this office, who are the most important helpers. So in many cases, we just don’t even know who the leader is, the one who should convince us to anything at the most important moments.
I think, I really think, that the last such leader who did not want to cheat democracy and himself, that Donald Tusk, although I am not sure if he used his power to change us. Tusk spoke, speaks my language, my emotions. He spoke himself and they speak me at the same time. I believed him and I believe him. Like Kuroni or Mazowiecki.
Numb, artificial, deceived
This can be seen better in times of plague. Andrzej Duda, or the entire PiS regretfully try to take advantage of the situation and the publicly exposed role of public authority – in order to win the election. What Duda says, his pseudo-understanding conversations with people in conditions of fear and uncertainty, reveal more than anything else his numbness, overwhelming artificiality, banality, for which there is shame even those who have to look at it (As in school, shame I was for those who stood at the blackboard and mistaken Austria for Australia.)
Of course, here you can ask the question anything stupid, is such a Duda really someone’s leader, does anyone think him so, or anyone wants to listen to what he has to say about the virus? Well, isn’t it, why the hell do we have a president then?
I do not know exactly how it is in Germany, but I have the impression that leaders such as Angela at such times listen with conviction even those who are not politically in favor of her. This is the authority of a democratic leader that he receives a certain level of acceptance, so necessary in difficult times, from everyone, just everyone, in the interest and for which he rules.
As Angela said, we are a democracy that comes not from coercion, but from exchanging experiences and participating. I would add to this – democracy comes from faith in the sense of this system, i.e. also from faith in leaders who were not chosen, because it is impossible to assume that we will be ruled only by those whom we voted for.
