“I've never gone into a year with as many worries as 2024,” Friedrich Merz says after a clip edited together of his verbal slips from the last few months. The CDU leader downplays these statements, saying that he is just very “committed” there.

Nassehi is critical of the “presumption of incompetence”. This includes Merz's remarks about Germany as a “land of immigration” while pointing to problems with Muslims. The sociologist is also critical of the debating culture. His appeal to the CDU is to be aware that the “affective response” of conservatives is different from that of AfD voters.

Hähnig disagrees that he does not perceive debate culture as negative. However, he sees difficulties in solving the problem of established parties. As an example, he gives a slow turn.