German voters head to polls facing world of change as far right waits in the wings

News Snapshot:

German voters go to the polls today but it is a different world from when the campaign began only a few weeks ago. Nearly 60 million ­people are choosing a government that will have to grapple with the breakdown of the transatlantic alliance under Donald Trump and new threats to European security just as the country’s vaunted economic model is hitting the skids. If the polls are correct, the man leading that administration will be conservative opposition chief Fried­rich Merz, a corporate lawyer with a decades-long desire to be chancellor despite never ­serving in government. His in-tray will be staggering....