and now for the last look. for 16 years germany had just one chancellor, angela merkel. only two germans have held the office for longer. now after a very close election, it will like i will be lead by someone outside of merkel s party. the center-right block of christian democrats suffered the worst performance in history. what accounts for the shift? merkel overhshadowed all others on her side. the successor in her own party made several missteps. perhaps more significant, merkel moved her party away from the conservative roots partly by joining forces with the center left for three or four terms. that left an opening for a man