The Big Bad Swedish Politics & News Thread

[The Lord Marbury]

Why on earth I've never looked for a Swedish political thread on this forum before is beyond me, but I'm sure glad I did! I'll just dive right in.

Thanks for the welcomes. For the record, I lack a partisan identification and prefer to analyze than bring my own opinions.

What happens during 2013 and early 2014 will affect a potential Social Democratic-led government. I don't even know if they could get supply and confidence from the Left Party without being a part of the government anymore. Whether the results, it would probably be very much of a lame duck on most issues.

Firstly, I'd like to say how nice it is to see you over here on this forum. And secondly I would say that after talking to several people at local SSU meetings, especially my local Ombudsman who also works part time as an aide for Social Democratic MPs in the Riksdag, most of the people with any major role in the leadership of the Social Democrats have given up any illusions about being able to govern as a one party government in the eventuality of a red green majority following the next election. They know that the next time they're in government it's going to be in coalition with either the Left, the Greens or both.

Yougov have a Euro tracker, originating from their French arm, asking it to several countries - with Sweden amongst them:

"If there was a referendum on [COUNTRY’S] membership of the European Union, how would you vote?"

Oct 2012
Swedish sample: 1,012   
44% I would vote to remain a member of the European Union
41% I would vote to leave the European Union
 3% I would not vote
12% Don't know

Nov 2012
Swedish sample: 1,006   
44% I would vote to remain a member of the European Union
40% I would vote to leave the European Union
 3% I would not vote
13% Don't know

Still awaiting December's.

Wow, that's still a surprisingly high number of people who'd say no to the EU. I do wonder why in such a case as this the Left Party haven't started the flex their eurosceptic muscles a bit more since that might bring some of the anti-EU voters who now support SD over to their camp. Though obviously the bridge between V and SD is an extremely one, so the only ones who could move from one to the other are one issue voters who only support SD for euroscepticism and nothing else.

A full out internal war is basicly happening in the Center party right now. Annie Lööf's attempts to cool down the conflict has not been very effective to say the least. For every day that pass I'm more and more convinced that the party will not survive this.

From my point of view she's probably going to have a very hard time distancing herself from that controversial piece of paper since there are interviews and blog posts to prove that a lot of those opinions are her own. I do wonder if, in case of falling numbers in polls (for now they appear to be holding steady), the possbility is open that she'll go the way of Maria Leissner (Fp leader, 95-97) and step down before the next election. Granted, things would probably have to get real bad for that to happen...

[The Lord Marbury]

Anyone other than me who's going to watch the party leaders debate in the Riksdag today. It starts airing at 9am on SVT2, or you can watch it live on SVT's homepage.

http://www.svt.se/nyheter/svtforum/arets-forsta-partiledardebatt

[The Lord Marbury]

From what I saw of the leaders debate in the Riksdag I was somewhat dissapointed at Damberg's preformance. While he carried his arguments well and his tone, while a bit agressive, still came off as better than the slightly smarmy and overconfident way Reinfeldt debated, I was dissapointed over what he said about profits in the welfare sector. It wasn't surprising, considering that he's on the right of his party, but this happens to be a problem for the entire party leadership as a whole.

As I said yesterday on another forum, when polls show that 94% of Social Democrats and 77% of voters as a whole are strongly in favor of either banning or heavily regulating profits in welfare, it's time for Löfven and the rest of the leadership to finally come out of the closet and show that they're Social Democrats.

[The Lord Marbury]

Sifo (the most reliable pollster in Sweden) has released their first 2013 poll.

The Centre party has their worst poll result ever in a Sifo poll while the Christian Democrats are picking up enough support from them to pull themselves over the 4% line.

Alliance: 43,2%

M: 29,3%
FP: 6,2%
KD: 4,5%
C: 3,2%

Centre-left: 47,2%

S: 33,6%
MP: 9,0%
V: 4,6%

Sweden Democrats: 9,1%

SD would be the third largest party, barely beating the Greens.

A quick run of those numbers through a seat allocation calculator gives these seat numbers. Though since we use a modified version of the Sainte-Laguë method here, it's probably off by a few seats here and there.

S - 123 seats
M - 108 seats
Sd - 33 seats
Mp - 33 seats
Fp - 22 seats
V - 15 seats
Kd - 15 seats
C - 0 seats

Centre-Left Bloc - 171 seats (4 seats short of a majority)
The Alliance - 145 seats

[The Lord Marbury]

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It awards large parties, is neutral to medium-sized parties and punishes small parties, so my guess is S and M would get a few more seats, MP and SD would be the same, and FP, KD, and V would get less.

If your seat acollation calculator is in excel you can modify it to the Swedish system. (Not that it'd be completly reliable either due to not taking into account constituency level results.)

Actually its an online calculator (found here: http://staatsrecht.honikel.de/en/sainte-lague-schepers-verfahren.htm).

Though it could actually be fairly accurate since 15 is the lowest number of seats any party has attained in a parliamentary election since the unicameral Riksdag was implemented. But as you said, the constituency results do mess things up a bit.

[The Lord Marbury]

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Added seat changes from the 2010 election.

Nice.

There's also this thing today:
http://www.thelocal.se/45720/20130121/#.UP05APJUV8s
http://www.thelocal.se/45728/20130121/#.UP04_PJUV8s

I think most people expected that Sabuni's departure was close at hand ever since the Ministry of Equality was eliminated after the 2010 election and her post became part of the Education Ministry. Though I at least expected that her resignation wouldn't come so suddenly, but there you go...

[The Lord Marbury]

This just in: http://www.thelocal.se/45890/20130129/#.UQgLbujOxnI

In a way it's good news for SAP I guess, since the government won't be getting a feather in their cap by sheparding though a major deal between the unions and the Confederation of Swedish Enterprise just a little over a year prior to the next election. And the risk of blowback for SAP isn't as big as it might have been since it was Swedish Enterprise which walked out on the deal and not LO.

[The Lord Marbury]

DN/Ipsos poll:

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Seems like the Christian Democrats and Centre are still doing very badly and are continuing their stay below the 4% threshold, while the Sweden Democrats are continuing to gain. Though I do wonder what's with that sudden 3% drop for the Social Democrats, seemingly coming out of nowhere.

[The Lord Marbury]

So the center party has suddenly gone all Jerry Brown-style yuppie?  Lol.

LOL, that's actually a good way of putting it.

---

Also, I forgot to post the seat calculations for the latest poll, so here they are:

Left: 5,9% - 19 (±0)
Social Democrats: 29,8% - 113 (+1)
Greens: 8,6% - 31 (+6)

Centre: 3,3% - 0 (-23)
Moderate: 32,3% - 124 (+17)
Liberal: 7,2% - 27 (+3)
Christian Democrats: 3,2% - 0 (-19)

Sweden Democrats: 9,0% - 35 (+15)

Red-Greens: 44,4% - 163 (+7)
The Alliance: 46% - 151 (-22)

[The Lord Marbury]

Here are the latest two polls, published today.

YouGov/Metro:
Left Party - 5,4 (-0,7)
Social Democrats - 31,3% (-0,1)
Green Party - 9,7% (+1,4)

Centre Party - 3,3% (-1,2)
Liberal Party - 5,8% (+0,9)
Moderate Party - 28,8% (+1,4)
Christian Democrats - 3,5% (-1)

Sweden Democrats - 11,5% (-1)

Red-Greens - 46,4%
The Alliance - 41,4%

Demoskop/Expressen:
Left Party - 5,8% (-0,1)
Social Democrats - 31,9% (-0,8)
Green Party - 8,5% (+1,2)

Centre Party - 3,4% (-1,1)
Liberal Party - 6,5% (+0,1)
Moderate Party - 29,4% (-1,1)
Christian Democrats - 4,4% (+1,5)

Sweden Democrats - 9,6% (+0,4)

Red-Greens - 46,2%
The Alliance - 43,7%


I've also done seat calculations for both polls:

YouGov/Metro:
Left - 20 (+1)
Social Democrats - 121 (+9)
Green - 35 (+10)

Centre - 0 (-23)
Liberal - 20 (-4)
Moderate - 110 (+3)
Christian Democrat - 0 (-19)

Sweden Democrat - 43 (+23)

Red-Green: 176 seats (majority of 2)
The Alliance: 130 seats

Demoskop/Expressen:
Left - 19 (±0)
Social Democrats - 118 (+6)
Green - 30 (+5)

Centre - 0 (-23)
Liberal - 23 (-1)
Moderate - 110 (+3)
Christian Democrat - 15 (-4)

Sweden Democrat - 34 (+14)

Red-Green 167 seats (8 seats short of a majority)
The Alliance: 148 seats

[The Lord Marbury]

SIFO poll:
Left - 5,4% (-0,3)
Social Democrats - 35,0% (+3,7)
Greens - 9,3% (-1,7)

Centre - 3,8% (+0,2)
Liberals - 5,6% (-0,6)
Moderates - 27,3% (-1,7)
Christian Democrats - 3,3% (-0,3)

Sweden Democrats - 9,0% (+0,5)

Red-Greens - 49,7%
The Alliance - 40,0%

Seats:
Left - 19 seats (±0)
Social Democrats - 136 seats (+24)
Greens - 35 seats (+10)

Centre - 0 (-23)
Liberals - 19 (-5)
Moderates - 105 (-2)
Christian Democrats - 0 (-19)

Sweden Democrats - 35 (+15)

Red-Greens - 190 seats (majority of 15)
The Alliance - 124 seats

----------------

It should come as no surprise that I am simply all smiles when looking at these numbers.

[The Lord Marbury]

In the old days some Swedish Social Democrats voted Communist to keep the party above the 4% threshold. Those voters where known as "Comrade 4 percents". Will we see any Moderates doing the "Comrade 4%" thing and voting Centre or Christian Democrat this time? I could imagine at least tactical CD voting would be tempting.

Well yes it is quite likely that Moderate voters will support the Christian Democrats and Centre Party since that actually happened in the last election. IIRC, in fact 2% of Centre Party's voters last time around were actually Moderates who supported the party when it was hovering just above 4% for a while there. But the issue here is if those Moderate support voters will be enough considering that back '09 when the Alliance was also in trouble, it was only the Christian Democrats who were steadily getting numbers below the threshold. Now it's both the Christian Democrats and the Centre Party, so there's the chance that one of those parties might make it while the other does not. There's also worth remembering that when the Christian Democrats were in trouble back then, they were only below the threshold for a few months, while this time around they have been staying below four percent for a good long while now.

[The Lord Marbury]

SIFO poll:

2011 - Who do you trust the most to lower unemployment?
A Moderate led government (Fredrik Reinfeldt) - 49%
A Social Democratic government (Håkan Juholt) - 31%

2013 - Who do you trust the most to lower unemployment?
A Social Democratic government (Stefan Löfven) - 44% (+13)
A Moderate led government (Fredrik Reinfeldt) - 35% (-14)


2011 - Who do you trust the most with the economy?
A Moderate led government (Fredrik Reinfeldt) - 59%
A Social Democratic government (Håkan Juholt) - 25%

2013 - Who do you trust the most with the economy?
A Moderate led government (Fredrik Reinfeldt) - 50% (-9)
A Social Democratic government (Stefan Löfven) - 32% (+7)


2011 - Who do you trust the most to govern the country?
A Moderate led government (Fredrik Reinfeldt) - 55%
A Social Democratic government (Håkan Juholt) - 28%

2013 - Who do you trust the most to govern the country?
A Moderate led government (Fredrik Reinfeldt) - 40% (-15)
A Social Democratic government (Stefan Löfven) - 39% (+11)

[The Lord Marbury]

Hopefully the trends keep going in that direction until 2014... I remember that in 2010 the Left coalition had a lead early on which eroded throughout the campaign. Is Löfven competent, campaign-wise?

Well he has been criticised at times for being a bit anonymous and not giving clear positions on some policies, but some of that can be attributed to the fact that the Social Democrats haven't even held their national congress to decide political platforms for the coming years and the election. Technically Löfven hasn't been officially been elected leader either, which will happen during the congress in April.

But the key thing to remember is that despite this Löfven still has higher personal approvals than Sahlin and Juholt ever had and the qualities which Swedish voters most often tend to prefer when it comes to their PMs; stability and pragmatism, is something he projects in spades. The problem will only be getting a clear message to the voters, something which could be tricky for him considering that he's only been a real politician for a year or so. Though his past as a union man is also a bit of a plus, considering that because of it the voters has higher confidence in his skills when it comes to job creation. And it does look like he'll make good use of that, because in the past year the two issues he's been focusing the most on are jobs and education and it does appear to be working since he now has higher confidence in job creation than the sitting government (though not surprising, considering rising unemployment and youth unemployment approaching 25%). But wether it's enough to take him to Rosenbad is still too early to tell, but it's looking a whole lot better for the party than it did one and a half years ago.

[The Lord Marbury]

Well, that's quite promising. I want to be optimistic and expect Sweden to come back to its glorious traditions.

You and me both.

[The Lord Marbury]

I would caution the left supporters that incumbent governments tend to gain votes during election campaigns in Sweden. I think C and KD are likely to make the threshold at the end of the day with support voting as well.

There are two main obstacles to the social democrats, as I see it. One is that they have to form a governing coalition. They're doing well now because people have forgotten V and MP. At some point that will come back to haunt them a bit. The second issue is that with the Sweden Democrats this strong it will be hard to form a left-wing government. I think it's easier for the right to handle it, especially as they were so close to an own majority.

Yeah I do agree with you that C and KD, or at least one of them will make the 4% barrier (I still think there's a good chance that at least of them will fall 0,1-0,2% short), thanks to Moderate voters backing them to keep all Alliance parties in the Riksdag. However, I am still quite confident that the Alliance will lose seats and probably also come in second to the Red-Green bloc since compared to 2006 and 2010 they actually have very little new thinking to run on. A fifth in-work tax credit? Zzzzz....

Especially now with the unemployment figures rearing its ugly head again, the voters will want some clear message from the government on how to tackle them, but the problem is that all their key reforms such as cutting the employment fee for young in half, cutting the VAT on resturants, etc. have all been carried out and now they have to figure out something new and exciting to bring to the table. The deal between the unions and employers was supposed to be it really but then Svenskt Näringsliv pulled out and now they're stuck, needing to figure out something new to offer. Right now I see the government as being in the same position as Göran Persson's in 2006: tired and out of ideas.

But I do agree with you that the issue of who S will want to govern with will eventually come back up again and Löfven will have to come with a clear message on that, but I also do not think that it's necessary that there is a united Red-Green front for the 2014 election again since it did not work that well last time and there's nothing at all wrong with negotiating the particulars behind closed doors following the election when the parliamentary situation is clear. It's been done before after all (1976 for example, though the doors apparently weren't as closed back then ) and I do hate the idea of permanently cementing the role of the blocs in Swedish politics.

And as for the Sweden Democrats, I agree that it is unlikely that the left will gain its own majority if they stay at the same level in the polls that they're at today. In that case, with the Red-Greens having more seats than the Alliance but not their own majority, I actually think it's more likely that we'd see a continued Alliance government relying on the Sweden Democrats than a Red-Green one. Sort of like what happened in Denmark with right wing government there relying on the Danish People's Party. Though I could also see a chance of one of the Alliance parties jumping ship to the Red-Green side, perhaps FP. But that would only be possible if Jan Björklund was to resign and be replaced with someone like Birgitta Ohlsson. Either that or the Greens jump over to the Alliance side, should it be enough to give them a majority.

Btw, as we're on the topic of Swedish politics... there are rumours that Reinfeldt wants to succed Barosso as President of the EU commission in 2014, and thus will step down this year to leave way to a new M-leader and PM.

That just doesn't feel that likely to me. Reinfeldt might be tired and worn out, something you can tell just by looking at his latest tv appearances, I think that the idea of leading a right wing government to a third straight election victory appeals to him very much. Coupled with Anders Borg's harsh denial of him replacing Reinfeldt before 2014, it doesn't feel very likely. However I will say that if it should happen, Reinfeldt will be stepping down as PM towards the end of the summer at the very latest, since Borg is going to need at least a year or so in the office before the election.

Him stepping down in favor of someone else I don't see as possible in any way. Because aside from Reinfeldt and Borg, the party really doesn't have someone who's popular enough to lead them to reelection and putting some relative unknown as PM a little over a year to the next election is a disaster waiting to happen.

[The Lord Marbury]

I agree with you that Borg does not want to be party leader and PM. He's an economist, not a politician. Still I think there are a few alternatives that would be a possibilty to succed Reinfeldt if he stepped down. I actually think Hillevi Engström could turn out to be a good leader for the Moderates.

I mean why not counter Löfvén with another Union leader. And it would be nice depriving the left from getting the first female PM. I wonder if the left-wingers who said we should support the red-greens last time because it was about time we had a female PM would say the same for Engström.

But you're quite right that Reinfeldt would have to announce his retierment quite soon if he were to step down before the next election.

To each his own I guess. From what I've seen of Engström in debates and speeches and so forth, she hasn't impressed me in the slightest. She might be a decent enough leader for the Moderates (better than some of the other alternatives), but somehow I doubt that she'd make any kind of a difference to the polling numbers. At least Reinfeldt is good at coming off as sympathetic and friendly in his public appearances, even if to me it just comes across as smarmy condescending arrogance, but I haven't even seen a hint of that level of skill coming from her.

Countering Löfven with another union person (not leader, she was only an ombudsman) might work if she had some concrete labour policy to come with, but from what I've seen and experienced she really doesn't. Also, even as a left winger I can say that the people who said you should vote red-green because we'd get a female PM are morons. Competence should always come first, and that's why I'd never support an Engström government in any way.

(Also there's no accent on the e in Löfven, even if it sounds like there should be)

[The Lord Marbury]

Also, even as a left winger I can say that the people who said you should vote red-green because we'd get a female PM are morons. Competence should always come first, and that's why I'd never support an Engström government in any way.

Well I believe most people (left- or right-wing) found that argument stupid, and some people bringing it up probably just did more harm than any good. And naturally you wouldn't support an Engström government, the day SSU members start backing Moderate lead goverments, I will start to be worried where this country is going.

(Also there's no accent on the e in Löfven, even if it sounds like there should be)

Well actually according to folkbokföringen:

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True, so true.

Huh, how 'bout that. Oh well, I'll still write it as Löfven since that's apparently how he himself does it.

I'd also like to add that I see Engström as a realistic successor to Reinfeldt. Obviously if I could have anyone I wanted it'd be Maria Abrahamsson. ^^ But let's face it, she's too awsome for it to actually be anything more than MP. 

And she's a good person to rally the right-wing troopes, but not convince and win the swing-voters.

YES, make that happen! Not because I like her or think her politics are remotely good for the country, but because with her at the helm SAP reaching 40% in 2014 doesn't seem so far fetched anymore.

[The Lord Marbury]

YES, make that happen! Not because I like her or think her politics are remotely good for the country, but because with her at the helm SAP reaching 40% in 2014 doesn't seem so far fetched anymore.

Be careful what you wish for, I'm sure Labour would have said similar things about Thatcher before she became Prime Minister.

There's a slight difference there in that Labour was actually in power back then and were crushed in the '79 election because of the Winter of Discontent and economic difficulties during their time in office*. Now the Moderates are actually in charge so Löfven could just sit back, pour himself a nice glass of Jägermeister or Whiskey, whatever he prefers, and just wait for the inevitable implosion of the Alliance and just sail into power afterwards.

*Interestingly enough, if Callaghan had had the guts to call an election in 1978 there was a fair chance that Labour would've gotten an additional five years (or less, depending on the size of their majority), as seen in polling around that time. And then Thatcher possibly never would've have made it into office since Labour would be guaranteed to get another term after that if the Falklands still happens.

Abrahamsson was at my school just recently, debating gender equality issues against Jonas Sjöstedt. I may not agree with her on many issues, but she has some independence, which is sorely needed in the Riksdag, especially in the Moderates. But she might go to jail. (http://www.thelocal.se/46990/20130328/#.UVh_rjf7CDo) (Or not - it's a stunt, but for a decent cause)

Personally, I think Anna Kinberg Batra could be someone to watch out for, if Borg doesn't want it. The other female ministers as well (Catharina Elmsäter-Svärd and to a lesser extent Gunilla Carlsson). Personally, I hope for Tobias Billström, if nothing else to see the socially libertarians of the Centre and Liberal Youth Leagues here in Stockholm go insane.

That's kind of interesting and it's one of the very few occasions on which I agree with her on something. That current child pornography law is really just far to vague and far reaching for the police to able to hunt down the real criminals, and definitely needs some changing. I also agreed with her when she protested against the FRA-law back in '08, but of course then recently it turned out that she's just a massive hypocrite when she voted for the data storage directive. Also, I envy you that you get some national politicians visiting your school to debate things. Nothing like that ever happens here, only the Kommunalråd showing up at times. Though we did get Reinfeldt visiting a few years back, but that was on a break and just some PR crap.

I could definitely see Anna Kinberg Batra having a decent shot at it because after all it's been a good while since she made that stupid remark, though it's certainly something which would come back to haunt her in taunts and opposition soundbites just like what happened with Mona Sahlin and references to the Toblerone thing during her time as leader. I'm not sure about Elmsäter-Svärd or Gunilla Carlsson, they both come off as quite stiff and upper class bourgeois so I doubt that they'd be able to connect with voters very well (but for a Moderate leader that's obviously a plus in my book).

As for Tobias Billström, I would LOVE to see him as leader. Him and Annie Lööf are plain simple just the best two ministers that the opposition could hope for.

Personally, I think Anna Kinberg Batra could be someone to watch out for.

Her gaffe "People from Stockholm are smarter than people from the country side" will hunt her forever though.

Sweden, the place where right-wingers are the urban elitists and left-wingers are the rural rednecks.

Indeed. I still remember how shocked I was when I found out in the US and UK that it was in the major cities that the left was the strongest since I had always associated the cities with egotistical bourgeois elitists.

[The Lord Marbury]

Oh Lord, I'd forgotten about that gaffe. For the record, Kinberg Batra went to school with my former history teacher in Danderyd (Sweden's own Chelsea, ridiculously rich and Moderate-voting) and is married to famous comedian David Batra (who could see his career being boosted, but also potentially destroyed). Normally, that would be good news for the Centre Party, but right now the rural voters might go to the Christian Democrats instead. Or the Sweden Democrats. Crud. A few would switch to the Social Democrats too, of course.

Oh yeah, I know what you mean about rural voters not going to the Centre Party. Just in the past two years I've met 11 Centre Party members who are now former members because they gave up their membership. Most of them are now independent swing voters, but 3 of them, including my great uncle have actually joined the Social Democrats. And he was real Centre Party core voter being a farmer, small business owner and all that. He was even the president of his local CUF (or SLU as it was called then) back in the day! But after going on for years and years about how he didn't recognize his party anymore he finally jumped ship last year and moved over to the other team. I'm not sure how many will switch to the Christian Democrats though. Maybe on a national level since the national party leadership isn't really that crazy or extreme, but on the local level Christian Democrats are the most hyper conservative moralizing people in existence. I don't see Centre voters supporting them on that level. Though sadly the Sweden Democrats are definite possibility, especially in rural communities in southern Sweden. But strangly enough, not up here. For some reason they just don't have much of a presence here...

Actually, both the Moderates and the Social Democrats have bizarrely thin benches. I think I can name more potential party leaders from the Centre Party than each of them. The Moderate really only have Borg and Kinberg Batra, and maybe Engström, Carlsson and Elmsäter-Svärd. All other candidates are too weak or too controversial. And the Social Democrats are just eternally bad at finding talent, they're used to coronations, but that has kind of not been possible since the freaking 80's due to cinemas, chocolate, NK and chocolate/mediocrity/red-green röra, respectively. Marbury, get your party to grow up. I want to see primaries happen.

Trust me, I'm right there with you on that and from what I've heard and from what I think personally, the party has learned from the criticism directed towards it over the highly closed off process it went through when Juholt was picked as leader. And I expect that next time there is a change in leader we will see a more open process. It may or may not be a multi-candidate thing depending on the situation. If the next leadership change takes place when the party is once again in opposition and going through another period of soul searching, then I think it's very much possible that we'll see several candidates openly running for the job, but if the change is when the party is in government with Stefan Löfven willingly stepping down after a long and successful time as leader, I'm not sure about there being a multi-candidate race because then there'd most likely be a strong crown prince/princess waiting in the wings. That and the fact that they party wouldn't want to look weak and splintered while in government talks against something like that happening while in government.

For the record, Mrs. Schyman visited us as well. There are advantages to being a large, prestigious school in Stockholm, I guess. I want to question that we're bourgeois elitists, though - if nothing else, there are exceptions. But yes, the Social Democratic base would be the rural working class, while the bourgeois latte liberals in the cities vote Green, Liberal or Feminist Initiative (not that many do, but even fewer outside the cities do)

Oh don't worry, that wasn't directed at you in any way. It was just how I used to think a few years back when I was fair bit more radical, in my pre-SSU days and all that. At the time I was actually considering joining Young Left but then I actually met some local members who were bloody insane to put it lightly, and that whole experience got me thinking in more sane directions which eventually led me to SSU.

Yep pretty much, though immigrants or at least immigrant-heavy communities are also SAP strongholds, something which is obvious just by looking at these numbers:
http://www.alliansfrittsverige.nu/2013/03/muf-ostra-real-goes-rinkeby.html

Oh, and rejoice!

DN/Ipsos:
Left - 5,5% (±0)
Social Democrats - 34,6% (+1,5)
Greens - 9,2% (+0,1)

Centre - 3,8% (±0)
Liberal - 5,6% (+0,4)
Moderate - 28,0% (-0,1)
Christian Democrats - 4,0% (+1,0)

Sweden Democrats - 8,0% (-2,2)

Red-Greens - 49,4%
The Alliance - 41,4%

Seats:
Left - 19 seats
Social Democrats - 127 seats
Greens - 34 seats

Centre - 0 seats
Liberal - 19 seats
Moderate - 105 seats
Christian Democrats - 15 seats

Sweden Democrats - 30 seats

Red-Greens - 180 seats (majority of 5)
The Alliance - 124 seats

Yep, the Sweden Democrats are decreasing by 2%! Granted the only statistically certain change is the increase of the Social Democrats but I'll take what I can get, and that's pretty damn good too...

[The Lord Marbury]

Red-Green is nearing 50%!

The election is held in fall 2014 though, right?

Yep, it's held on Sunday September 14th, 2014.

[The Lord Marbury]

Actually, both the Moderates and the Social Democrats have bizarrely thin benches.

The selection of Mona Sahlin as party leader is a great example of that. Still can't believe that Socialdemokraterna made such an absurd decision. After what happened in '95, and Sahlin's coverage in the press, anyone must have been a better choice, surely (even a random backbencher). Could anyone explain this choice?

That they couldn't manage to find a single leadership candidate amongst 110-or-so MPs, would also seem to prove this point - although in fairness, Löfven appears to be doing well.

Basically, the "crown princess" Anna Lindh was gone and all the other top candidates like Margot Wallström, Pär Nuder, Ulrica Messing and Thomas Bodström said no to the job and with the lack of any serious high profile candidates to speak of, Sahlin simply got the job because she was somewhat well known (for all the wrong reasons) and it was "her turn" in a manner of speaking.

[The Lord Marbury]

Also, there's a new SIFO poll out today with the approvals of all the party leaders:

Approval numbers
Fredrik Reinfeldt (M) - 63% (+1)
Stefan Löfven (S) - 45% (-3)
Gustav Fridolin (MP) - 40% (+1)
Jan Björklund (FP) - 32% (±0)
Göran Hägglund (KD) - 28% (-2)
Åsa Romson (MP) - 22% (-7)
Jonas Sjöstedt (V) - 21% (-3)
Annie Lööf (C) - 16% (-4)
Jimmie Åkesson (SD) - 13% (±0)

Disapproval numbers
Jimmie Åkesson (SD) - 55%
Annie Lööf (C) - 30%
Jonas Sjöstedt (V) - 18%
Göran Hägglund (KD) - 17%
Jan Björklund (FP) - 16%
Åsa Romson (MP) - 16%
Gustav Fridolin (MP) - 13%
Fredrik Reinfeldt (M) - 10%
Stefan Löfven (S) - 9%

Approvals among women
Fredrik Reinfeldt (M) - 57%
Stefan Löfven (S) - 40%
Gustav Fridolin (MP) - 39%
Jan Björklund (FP) - 31%
Göran Hägglund (KD) - 28%
Åsa Romson (MP) - 23%
Jonas Sjöstedt (V) - 19%
Annie Lööf (C) - 16%
Jimmie Åkesson (SD) - 9%

Approvals among men
Fredrik Reinfeldt (M) - 68%
Stefan Löfven (S) - 48%
Gustav Fridolin (MP) - 39%
Jan Björklund (FP) - 33%
Göran Hägglund (KD) - 30%
Jonas Sjöstedt (V) - 24%
Åsa Romson (MP) - 22%
Jimmie Åkesson (SD) - 18%
Annie Lööf (C) - 15%

Approvals among young voters (18-29)
Fredrik Reinfeldt (M) - 52%
Gustav Fridolin (MP) - 36%
Åsa Romson (MP) - 30%
Stefan Löfven (S) - 30%
Göran Hägglund (KD) - 24%
Jonas Sjöstedt (V) - 19%
Jan Björklund (FP) - 15%
Jimmie Åkesson (SD) - 13%
Annie Lööf (C) - 13%

Yikes. These numbers must be giving the guys at Centre Party HQ one hell of a headache right now....

[The Lord Marbury]

Christ those figures for Annie Lööf are hilarious, and richly deserved.

Indeed. Lööf is living proof that the idea that just picking someone youthful without putting much consideration into qualifications is a pretty stupid idea for a party to make.

The opposition blew a far bigger lead last time, though, and I expect them to do it again. Let's not kid ourselves, the core Moderate voters can save both C and KD as long as they stay above 2.5% or so.

I agree that it is quite likely that C and KD will make it over the 4% threshold thanks to Moderate support as long as they don't drop too far down, though I do think that the opposition have a much better chance of eating into the government's lead this time around because now they actually have some compentent people in charge.

[The Lord Marbury]

Why are Löfven's approvals so mediocre? Based on what you guys said, I'd have expected him to be on par with Reinfeldt.

That's largely because Löfven has kept a relatively low profile for the past year, partly because it was a good thing to do in order to give the party time to rebuild and stabilize after Juholt, and partly because he doesn't have a seat in parliament.

Also it's important to keep in mind that he is up against Fredrik Reinfeldt, who despite his backwards politics is a very skilled communicator who has the ability to appear sympathetic to almost any group of people in society even when they do not benefit at all from his policies. Under those circumstances Löfven's approvals are actually quite decent with a good potential for growth, and he's still higher than both Sahlin and Juholt ever were and also higher than Reinfeldt was before he got elected back in the spring of '06.