As has been noted by others before: Using unflattering pictures of Kohl has a long history. The term "Birne" (pear) is immediately associated with Kohl in a der

As has been noted by others before: Using unflattering pictures of Kohl has a long history. The term "Birne" (pear) is immediately associated with Kohl in a derogatory context to most Germans. While I'm no fan of his, this is actually one thing where I have to defend him. The best book on Kohl (and contemporary German politics) is Heribert Schwan's "Kohl Protokolle". Put aside, the ridiculous law suit Kohl waged against its release (ultimately winning - I'm a lucky owner of the uncensored version) and his former ghostwriter Schwan, as well as all the negative stuff in it about Kohl and politics in general - one thing even Schwan notes in it, is the continuously biased portrait of Kohl by German media (which Schwan was a part of, working for Der Spiegel). In the book, Schwan (a journalist; himself openly left-leaning before, during and after being Kohls's ghostwriter) paints a picture of the grotesqueness of the lengths German journalists went in making Kohl look like a buffoon (often using Kohl's rural upbringings) while simultaneously exalting his left-leaning predecessor Schmidt (the highly cultured urbanite). Much of this bias resembles to me the favouritism amongst journalism today. Even to the point where when journalists claim that "everything used to be more civil (oh, the polarizing!) but <insert-your-most-hated-conservative-here> discrediting journalism is really breaking ground for new lows" is itself prove of the bias (since the media bias clearly existed at least in Germany throughout the 1970s and 1980s already). As the linked article already mentioned, Schmidt died 2015 beloved by most Germans ("best chancellor ever") while Kohl died 2017 more or less shunned.