BURIDAN’S ASS IN GERMANY

Jean Buridan (1300-1358) was a 14th century medieval French philosopher famous for his paradox known as Buridan’s Ass. If a perfectly rational ass or donkey were placed exactly equidistant between two bales of hay exactly the same, there would be no reason to choose one over the other – and given no reason to choose, the ass would be unable to do so and starve to death.

Buridan meant for his thought experiment to demonstrate the irrational barrenness of pure reason and the superiority of emotion to rationality. How medieval.

Yet it is just the position of Buridan’s Ass that the German electorate has placed itself in, exactly equidistant between the free market solutions required for their economic survival and the government subsidies to which they have become addicted.

Frozen by their emotional fears and addictions, German voters are unable to make a rational choice. So they have a Buridan’s Ass of a government, immobilized with no party able to create a parliamentary majority.

With Angela Merkel unable to persuade the eco-loonies of the Green Party to join her Christian and Free Democrats, she is now forced to try for an even more ridiculous farrago with the currently ruling Social Democrats, laughingly named a “Grand Coalition.”

The only silver lining is that at least such a coalition will see the political departure of Germany’s greatest ass, Gerhard Schroeder.

But hold no hopes for Angela, once billed as Germany’s Margaret Thatcher. Germany is the country of Buridan’s Ass. As you watch the political kabuki dance unfold, keep that image in mind – of a people, a government, and a nation so paralyzed between two choices it will choose to commit hara-kiri rather than choose between them.

As Toynbee said, “Civilizations die by suicide, not by murder.” Or as my friend Ralph Peters says, “I love Germany. It’s one of my favorite museums.”