Germany has been stuck in political limbo since the country's inconclusive Sept. 18 general election. Neither the Social Democrats (SPD) nor the Christian Democrats (CDU) won a clear victory in the poll, making impossible for either Chancellor Gerhard Schröder or conservative leader Angela Merkel to form a government. Despite plenty of personal animus, they were forced to pursue marriage of political convenience between their two parties. But who should lead this grand coalition? On Monday, it finally became clear: Angela Merkel will become Germany's first female chancellor. Not any less historic, she will also be the first German from the formerly communist east to govern the country.

Germany's mass-circulation Bild newspaper has long been a vocal supporter of Merkel's bid to oust Schröder from office. The Tuesday edition splashes a picture of the grinning Christian Democrat with the less-than-flattering headline under it: "Miss Germany!" The paper sticks to its sexist chops inside, lamenting that Schröder's departure heralds the end of macho politics in Berlin. "The chancellery will soon smell of a woman, of tea and cookies," the paper opines. Germany's largest daily also worries that Merkel yielded so much power to the SPD that it could threaten the security of her chancellorship. After seven years in power, how can the Social Democrats be trusted to reform key areas such as Germany's finances, health system and rid the country of its record unemployment? "Angela Merkel must now prove that she can truly lead a 'coalition of new possibilities' and not an alliance of gridlock," it concludes.

Berlin's left-wing Die Tageszeitung keeps the gender theme going with its headline "It's a Girl" and a photo of Angela Merkel as a toddler circa 1956. While pleased that the breakthrough for a grand coalition shows German democracy works, the paper isn't sure who the winner is. "Angela Merkel has made it to the top," the paper writes. But what good is making it to the top if the "bottom line is that she'll become chancellor only by giving up all of her political goals," the editorial asks. The daily also focuses on the end of the Schröder era. "Schröder was a strong chancellor. Who could have imagined that at the start of his tenure? An era is ending. How it will be judged by history remains to be seen. And perhaps that is a sign of the unsettled times we live in."

The right-leaning broadsheet Die Welt comments that with all of the challenges facing Germany, Merkel's government is "damned to success." Nevertheless, the paper warnscautions that compromises between the CDU and the SPD could hinder deregulation and efforts to improve the country's international competitiveness at a time when the pace of globalization is accelerating. "The party platforms during the campaign were neither radical nor extreme. Now a grand coalition under Angela Merkel -- walled in by eight SPD ministers -- will try to overcome hurdles by the lowest common denominator," the paper writes in a Page One commentary.

That sentiment is seconded by Germany's conservative paper of record, the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung. "This victory has a price and it will be a burden on Merkel's term in office. There is a danger that the SPD and CDU/CSU will begin a competition as to who will demand the least of the German people," writes the newspaper, adding that no matter how courageous the new chancellor is, she cannot do everything on her own. "Her triumph over Schröder cannot conceal the fact that she has been weakened by her poor election result," the paper comments. In order to become chancellor she has had to forfeit too many key ministries to the SPD, and that's something her own party will not soon forget. That means Merkel will be far more reliant than ever before on the support of her long-time rival, CSU leader Edmund Stoiber, who is tipped to take over the Economics Ministry in the new government.