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Does en in this context have anything to do with en in this context? Or does it mean something else altogether?
Also, I can see that en in this context plays a certain role in the comparison between the solidity of the machines-outils and the popularity of the German Kanzlerin, but don't know what that is.
Il en est ... comme de ... is actually a comparison. This means, depending of the context, these two things are doing as well as each other or these two things are working the same way.
In this article,
Il en est de la solidité des machines-outils «made in Germany» comme de la popularité d'Angela Merkel. Le temps ne les use pas.
could be rewritten this way:
La solidité des machines-outils «made in Germany» et la popularité d'Angela Merkel sont comparables : le temps ne les use pas.
