Mario Draghi’s presentation to the German Bundestag today takes place behind closed doors, but what he will say is clear: he will defend the ECB’s continued ultra-loose monetary policy, and urge the German government to spend more. The ECB insists its policies have spurred recovery and largely removed financial-market fragmentation in the euro zone. But its actions have met with resistance in Germany. Conservative politicians have asked the constitutional court to rule on the bank’s quantitative-easing programme; in June the same court rejected a similarly frothy challenge to the ECB’s “outright monetary transactions”. Yet the effect of monetary policy alone is reaching its limits. The ECB knows this, repeatedly calling on euro-zone governments to spur growth with fiscal policy and structural reforms—Mr Draghi exhorted Germany earlier this month to use its fiscal space. But until politicians pick up the slack, the ECB is doomed to do all the heavy lifting.