So what makes those Germans different from us, aside from their wearing black socks and Birkenstocks? For starters, they don’t spend as much on political races as we do. In total, all the parties spent the combined amount of 50 million euros (about $70 million). That’s it. Compare this to the Obama campaign, which spent approximately $750 million. Individual Germans can donate as much as they want to a party, though if it’s more than 10,000 euros, it has to be published. The donor can also get a tax deduction (1,650 euros is the max on the return). On the other hand, a direct donation to an individual candidate will land you a 25 percent “gift” tax on it. Companies also donate and, like in this country, tend to spread the wealth, though none of them gives to the far left party that wants to see them dead. The parties are barred from buying mailing lists, too. So what the FDP did in the state of Baden-Wurttemberg, for instance, is go to an Internet company that has access to email addresses and have it send out political messages from the FDP to one million of those addresses, paying 50 cents for each one. This cost them 500,000 euros. Out of those million, maybe 100,000 respond positively-and those email addresses the FDP can keep. It all sounds strange to us but such are the laws, which are strictly enforced. In 1994, Walter Eschweiler, a special adviser to the FDP treasurer, found in his mailbox an anonymous gift of 510 Deutsch marks (before the euro existed). Such anonymous donations exceeding 500 DM must be returned to parliament immediately. But the gift Eschweiler discovered was particularly curious-looking. The 500 in cash was sitting neatly in his box, held together by a paper clip. He stared at it for a moment but did what he had to do and returned the money to the government, as much as he regretted to. Not long after, he received a phone call from Der Spiegel magazine informing him he was the first person from any party to do this and congratulated him on it. It was Der Spiegel who placed the cash in his mailbox in the first place.
