@ Fuchs
Well your right, our president is indeed the head of the country and he maybe would give away his opinion. Our old one (that got abolished due to cases of fraud, which is good because he was a dweeb) wouldn't, our new one probably would.
Anyway, I did not relate Merkels passive behaviour to the gay-marriage or a similar ethical theme, more for general political questions.
Merkel has been critiziced a lot for her passive behaviour. There are political questions people expect a reaction from. I know it goes away from the topic of gay-marriage but there are questions that people expect Obama and Merkel to comment on in their countries.
Her job is a lot more than just keeping the gouvernment together. People expect statements and a clearly drawn political line, but do not get that.
What our president says is not that interesting to the people, he is just the representative of our country and his words are usually not worth a lot, because he is not the one who can make a change. Again: you are right, he would definately be the one stating his opinion about ethical themes.
So home policy unfortunately comes down to Merkel, and she does not say anything most of the time.
So better there is an important politician that gives away a populistic opinion, than one that does not take stand at all. No matter how much Obamas and Merkels positions differ, in general political questions people demand a reaction from both, we usually do not get one, nor the coalation, nor her own party which leads to different political camps in the gouvernemnt itself, which leads to an implausible gouvernment at the moment. Mission of keeping the government together imo failed, and a clear political line is missing there.
Obama got one, and as you said he has great success, in Germany we lack something like that atm, that was all I wanted to express with that
Edit: Thanks for clearing that up mudra, estimated Obama himself a bit wrong then. I nevertheless like that he said that, even if it's pure populism.