vin vremuri grele in Germania: Getting Shirty Over Tax Hikes

/reuters/ Angry Germans who think Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder wants to tear the last shirt off their backs with his plans to raise taxes have decided to spare him the trouble. His office is being deluged with old shirts. The "last shirt for Schroeder" campaign was launched two weeks ago by Christian Stein, an Internet marketing consultant from Dortmund. The campaign Web Site www.aktionletzteshemd.de recorded 33,200 people as saying they had sent a shirt so far. "Dear Gerhard, I wish you a happy festive season and send you my last shirt to fulfill your greatest Christmas wish. That should make all further tax increases superfluous as I have nothing else left anyway," shirt senders write to Schroeder. The Web Site also offers T-shirts for sale, which read: "I am wearing this T-shirt because Schroeder has my last shirt."

A government spokesman said Schroeder's office had received 9,000 shirts by last Friday, with 7,000 already sent on to a shop that raises money for the unemployed in the western city of Bielefeld and other charities interested in taking the rest. Schroeder's popularity has plunged in polls since he narrowly won re-election in September as he has announced tax increases and spending cuts to plug a gaping budget hole. The shirt campaign comes as a song mocking the chancellor's broken election promise not to raise taxes spends its third week at the top of the German charts. Schroeder has called comedian Elmar Brandt a "freeloader" for his hit "The Tax Song."