Demonstrators at Bellevue Palace (Source: FAZ)

There was a whiff of Baghdad in the nippy Berlin air yesterday as some 300 surly citizens trudged over to Bellevue Palace to wave their shoes at Federal President Christian Wulff's window. How did they ever come up with such a bizarre protest? You guessed it: They were following the example of Muntadar al-Zaidi, the Iraqi journalist who famously flung his shoes at another political hardship case, George W. Bush, at a press conference in 2008. Even without that inspiring example, their message to the nation’s highest representative couldn’t have been clearer: Herr Bundespräsident, it’s time to tie up your shoes and take a hike.

Poor old Wulff can’t get a break these days. His problem is that, even though his misdeeds hardly qualify as actual crimes, the person filling the office of Federal President is supposed to be above such things. As I reported last week, Wulff has been under fire for several weeks now due to shady dealings with his billionaire buddies, including a 500,000€ low-interest house loan and numerous free luxury vacations, which he later lied about to the Lower Saxon state parliament while he was still minister president in Hanover. Then news broke that he personally phoned up newspaper editor Kai Diekmann of the powerful BILD tabloid last month and threatened him on Diekmann’s voicemail if he didn't kill the house loan story (now it turns out he also called up Diekmann’s boss, the head of the mighty Springer Group). Then a specially scheduled TV interview last Wednesday turned into a fiasco when Wulff played down the accusations against him, describing the sweetheart loan and the holidays as “a private matter,” and claimed that he never threatened Diekmann with “war” and “lawsuits” but merely asked him to postpone the story for just one day. BILD is sticking with its version and it’s only a matter of time before it publishes the original voicemail message, presumably proving the high-flying president to be a liar.

Bettina and Christian Wulff in happier days 

Then there’s the matter of his private life. Try Googling his second wife’s name, “bettina wulff,” and the first suggestion that comes up will be “Bettina Wulff prostitute,” followed by her name plus “escort service,” “brothel,” “red light,” “tattoo,” and the names of two discrete establishments in Lower Saxony. The stories have been circulating for at least two years, and all I know is what the Berliner Zeitung wrote on December 16:

If Wulff doesn’t {respond to the charges against him}, they’re saying in Berlin, {BILD} could retaliate with a story about Bettina Wulff’s previous life. The editors apparently possess information that they are not allowed to print due to instructions from above.

Bloggers have been speculating that Bettina Wulff, who married Christian in 2008, may once have been employed by two agencies located in Hanover and Osnabrück under the professional name “Victoria.” Not that there’s anything wrong with that – prostitution is a legal business in Germany and the story, if openly admitted to, has a certain fairytale charm to it. Rather like Pretty Woman. But if it should turn out that the fairytale involves blackmail and hush money, it’s hard to see either the tattooed princess or her Prince Valiant lasting long within the whitewashed walls of Bellevue Palace.

The notorious (and completely phoney) Hitler salute photo 

Of course, this may all be a pack of lies. But even if it is, Bettina Wulff still has plenty of problems of her own. In 2010, a photographer captured her supposedly delivering a “Heil Hitler” salute on the steps of Bellevue Palace, a gesture which, in Germany, is about as kosher as giving the Pope the finger at a private audience and would land an ordinary person in the Big House quicker than you can say “denazification.” (A closer examination revealed that she did no such thing and the photographer merely got a lucky shot.) The Wulffs have filed a lawsuit against a Saxon blogger who published the photo, comparing Bettina to a Nazi era "Blitzmädel." (This is a fate shared by many attractive, blond, and successful German women, as former Defense Minister Guttenberg's wife, Stephanie von Bismarck, can attest.) Then, just last week, word got out that Bettina has regularly worn free clothes from leading fashion designers. This may or may not be a big deal, but when viewed on top of everything else the couple is being accused of, it leaves a mighty bad impression.

Bad political news is like a leak in a dike. Without a little boy – or a good chief of staff – to stick his finger into the hole, the trickle will quickly turn into a flood. And so it goes with Wulff, whose every failing in life is now daily tabloid fare. The word this weekend is that Chancellor Merkel has been conferring with her coalition partners – her Bavarian sister party, the Christian Social Union, and the Free Democratic Party – on a replacement for Wulff if he should resign in the near future. (Merkel’s office denies it.) In fact, the presidential crisis comes at a difficult time for the coalition: A crucial state parliamentary election is looming in Schleswig-Holstein in May and the FDP is plummeting in the polls. The Chancellor herself is taking flak for her handling of the Euro crisis. This time, Merkel, who only barely managed to squeeze her old rival Wulff through the gates of Bellevue Palace over the popular East German Stasi-hunter Joachim Gauck in 2010, would have to fight like a valkyrie to install Jesus Christ himself.

Meanwhile, the opposition Greens are demanding a new “consensus candidate” for president and the Left Party is talking impeachment. Wulff himself says he intends to stick it out until the end, but by now no one believes anything he says, particularly when it comes to his future. That, for now, is in the hands of the tabloids and bloggers.