Friedrich Merz has three performances ahead of him when his chauffeur drives him towards Hamburg, but not into the city, but to towns outside the city, because it's nice there too.

First, Merz has to inspect an X-ray laser, then give a speech in a three-star hotel, then give a speech in a car dealership.

It's an election campaign here, in Schleswig Holstein, just as there is almost always an election campaign somewhere, especially in the life of Friedrich Merz, who first fought his way into the Bundestag and then, a few months later, to the head of the CDU.

Now he is fighting for the successes to come, in Berlin, but also this Tuesday in mid-April in Schenefeld, Pinneberg, Norderstedt.

Every CDU success is now also a Merz success, and every CDU defeat, such as that recently in Saarland, is also a Merz defeat.

It's an afternoon like any other, day 72 with Merz as party leader looking for the way to the future.

So Schenefeld.

It is typically flat and green here.

On the edge of a particularly flat and green part is the largest X-ray laser in the world.

But you don't see it because it shines in underground tunnels.

Above ground, Merz climbs out of the limousine.

He's about to take a look at the laser.

Karin Prien invited him to do this, she is one of Merz's deputies and also Minister of Science here.

And she is a woman.

That's good for Merz, because he has a reputation for underestimating smart women.

That goes down badly with many.

That's why every joint appearance with women who oppose it helps him.

Karin Prien is such a person.

She is considered one of the great hopes of the party.

Some in the CDU talk about them like the Greens talk about Baerbock.

Farewell to Minister Spiegel

Because of this women's issue, Merz also has to be careful how he attacks the new government.

He could easily complain about Health Minister Lauterbach, who was overwhelmed.

That would pass as the usual opposition noise.

He couldn't say that about Interior Minister Faeser without saying: Merz dismisses the next woman.

The case of family minister Spiegel from the Greens was different.

She had resigned the day before.

Merz had demanded it, but he wasn't particularly bad at it because the leadership of Spiegel's own party also thought it was necessary.

Merz could have left the matter alone, shut the flap, dead monkey.

But his team posted a short video on Twitter.

Then Merz speaks into a reporter's microphone, he feels "a little" what has burdened Spiegel and wishes her and her family "a little distance and personally all the best".

It comes from the heart, he adds, but what comes from the heart rarely sounds like a phrase from a letter of resignation.

They are canned: We thank you for the cooperation, good luck, personally all the best.

Precisely because Merz is sensitive, the cool phrase is so obvious.

The fact that he smiles slightly and rubs his hands, for whatever reason, maybe he just has cold fingers, contributes to the usual interpretation that Merz didn't want.

That's hypocritical, it says in the comments to the video.

A man writes: "When Merz comes into a room,

This, in turn, would deny various rooms that Merz has already come to.

This type of accidents always happens to him on the web, which doesn't mean that the reasons are virtual.

But Twitter is being looked at more closely and strictly, especially by those who have never been in a room with Friedrich Merz.

In rooms, and generally at meetings with people, Merz comes across as affable and interested, which also appeals to some who are not party friends.

For example in the underground world of the X-ray laser.