2011 State Elections in Germany

[Franzl]

For which government?

Mayor of Frankfurt/Main

[minionofmidas]

For which government?

That is for us to know and for you to find out. size=1pt]What Franzl said.[/size]

[Middle-aged Europe]

The German 5% threshold for European Parliament elections was ruled unconstitutional today.

Reason given: Unlike the Bundestag, you don't need stable majorities in the European Parliament, so it doesn't really matter whether five or ten parties win seats there.

Good news for the NPD, Pirates, Free Voters, Animal Protection Party, Family Party, and possibly a few others, because we could see them in Strasbourg from 2014 onwards.

[minionofmidas]

Heh.

I figured out years ago that this would logically follow from court decisions on thresholds in other races, but I never knew there was a lawsuit on the issue.

[Middle-aged Europe]

Germany's 2009 European Parliament election result without 5% threshold, according to election.de:

CDU/CSU 39 seats (-3 compared to actual result)
SPD 21 (-2)
Greens 12 (-2)
FDP 11 (-1)
Left 8 (+-0)
Free Voters 2 (+2)
The Republicans 1 (+1)
Animal Protection Party 1 (+1)
Family Party 1 (+1)
Pirate Party 1 (+1)
Pensioners' Party 1 (+1)
Ecological Democratic Party 1 (+1)

[Franzl]

New Forsa federal poll:

CDU/CSU: 34%
SPD: 26%
Grüne: 15%
Linke: 9%
Piraten: 9%
FDP: 2%

Government: 34%, Opposition: 59% (counting only parties that would be represented in parliament)

CDU/FDP: 36%, SPD/Green: 41%

Obviously insufficient for both CDU/FDP and SPD/Greens.

[The Mikado]

New Forsa federal poll:

CDU/CSU: 34%
SPD: 26%
Grüne: 15%
Linke: 9%
Piraten: 9%
FDP: 2%

Government: 34%, Opposition: 59% (counting only parties that would be represented in parliament)

CDU/FDP: 36%, SPD/Green: 41%

Obviously insufficient for both CDU/FDP and SPD/Greens.

I never thought I'd see the day when there was a chance that the Pirates would be in the Bundestag while the FDP wasn't.

[MaxQue]

2% for the FDP?!! I thought than 3-4% were their base.
Where their voters went?

[republicanism]

Keep in mind that this is Forsa, the institute well known for their news-making poll results.

An other institute, Allensbach, also had a new poll yesterday:

CDU/CSU: 32
SPD: 30
Greens: 17
FDP: 4,5
Left: 8
Pirates: 4,5

---

So choose your reality ;-)

[DL]

Its really astonishing how support for the FDP (aka "the party of doctors and dentists") has totally collapsed - not that I'm shedding tears since they would be by far my least favourite party in Germany.

But I don't understand why they are so unpopular. I was under the impression that Merkel was wayyy more "centrist" than any previous CDU leader and had opened up a large vacuum on the right. I would have thought that if anything this would be the perfect time for the FDP to increase support since they are essentially the only rightwing party in Germany! - I suppose the only explanation might be that by being in coalition with the CDU they have lost any identity of their own and have almost nothing to show the people who voted for them...kind of like the Li bDems in the UK who also face obliteration.

[Tender Branson]

2 polls from Infratest dimap today:

Baden-Württemberg

37%  [-2] CDU
29% [+5] Greens
22%  [-1] SPD
  4% [+2] Pirates
  3%  [-2] FDP
  2%  [-1] Left
  3%  [-1] Others

51-37 majority for the Green-SPD coalition.

Governor Winfried Kretschmann (Greens) currently has a 58-28 approval rating.

In 10 days there will be a referendum on Stuttgart 21.

Currently 55% are in favor of the new train station, while 45% are opposed.

http://www.swr.de/nachrichten/bw/-/id=1622/nid=1622/did=8888524/316i8y/index.html

Saarland

35% [+11] SPD
32%    [-3] CDU 
12%    [-9] Left
  8%   [+2] Greens 
  5%    [-4] FDP
  4%   [+4] Pirates
  4%    [-1] Others

In Saarland, there's currently a CDU-FDP-Green coalition.

According to the poll, this so called Jamaica-coalition currently has only 45% support, while the SPD-Left opposition would have 47% and the Pirates are knocking at the 5% treshold.

http://www.sr-online.de/nachrichten/1209

[Middle-aged Europe]

But I don't understand why they are so unpopular. I was under the impression that Merkel was wayyy more "centrist" than any previous CDU leader and had opened up a large vacuum on the right. I would have thought that if anything this would be the perfect time for the FDP to increase support since they are essentially the only rightwing party in Germany! - I suppose the only explanation might be that by being in coalition with the CDU they have lost any identity of their own and have almost nothing to show the people who voted for them...kind of like the Li bDems in the UK who also face obliteration.

^^ Yeah, that's it.

And the truth is that most of the younger FDP politicians simply suck at governing. Problem is that most leadership positions in the party are currently filled by those younger politicians.

Ah well, and there was this Mövenpick scandal earlier during this administration which reinforced the FDP's image that the party is for hire for any company who can afford to buy legislation from the FDP. They never really recovered from that, I suppose.

In short, the FDP's image is that they're incompetent, corrupt and that they're not keeping their campaign promises. This doesn't leave many redeeming qualities.

[DL]

Its funny that a party (the FDP) that is supposed to be the party of rich, highly-educated professionals with very high opinions of themselves - turn out to be so incompetent at actually running anything.

There must be a moral to that story somewhere!

[Tender Branson]

In 10 days there will be a referendum on Stuttgart 21.

Currently 55% are in favor of the new train station, while 45% are opposed.

BTW: Support is up 2% and opposition is up 13% compared with the August poll.

Even though the left-wing parties currently have a 53-40 lead in the state (57-40 if you factor in the Pirates), it will still be hard for the opposing side to close the gap in the last 9 days. Probably a lot of SPD-voters will vote for the new station, maybe they are even split 50-50 - while most Green voters will vote against it.

Anyway, at least 1/3 of all people have to vote so that the result is valid.

[Antonio the Sixth]

In 10 days there will be a referendum on Stuttgart 21.

Currently 55% are in favor of the new train station, while 45% are opposed.

BTW: Support is up 2% and opposition is up 13% compared with the August poll.

Even though the left-wing parties currently have a 53-40 lead in the state (57-40 if you factor in the Pirates), it will still be hard for the opposing side to close the gap in the last 9 days. Probably a lot of SPD-voters will vote for the new station, maybe they are even split 50-50 - while most Green voters will vote against it.

Anyway, at least 1/3 of all people have to vote so that the result is valid.

If the quorum is not met, what happens ? Will they build it or not ?

Though I guess it will be, if the issue is as divisive as it seems.

[Tender Branson]

In 10 days there will be a referendum on Stuttgart 21.

Currently 55% are in favor of the new train station, while 45% are opposed.

BTW: Support is up 2% and opposition is up 13% compared with the August poll.

Even though the left-wing parties currently have a 53-40 lead in the state (57-40 if you factor in the Pirates), it will still be hard for the opposing side to close the gap in the last 9 days. Probably a lot of SPD-voters will vote for the new station, maybe they are even split 50-50 - while most Green voters will vote against it.

Anyway, at least 1/3 of all people have to vote so that the result is valid.

If the quorum is not met, what happens ? Will they build it or not ?

Though I guess it will be, if the issue is as divisive as it seems.

After reading a bit, it is slightly different actually:

1/3 of all eligible voters have to vote "Yes", so that the train station is not built.

Not 50%+ of Yes votes of those who voted !!!

The train station is built though, if 50%+ of those who voted went for "No" ...

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Why is this referendum so biased against the "Yes" side ?

This would mean that at least 60% have to turn out and out of these 55% have to vote "Yes" ...

[Tender Branson]

That's weird:

The better the turnout, the better the chances for the Yes side, the worse the turnout the worse it is for the Yes side.

Considering a 50% turnout, Yes would need 66% to win.

60% turnout, Yes needs 55% to win.

During the last state elections, turnout was 66.3%

That would mean 5.039.000 voters. Yes would need about 50% to win.

[Antonio the Sixth]

I think it's a fair system. The 33% requirement isn't hard to meet if the topic interests enough people, and it ensures the decision is taken only if a reasonable share of the population supports it. The italian system is far worse, as it require a turnout rate above 50% counting both yes and no votes, which encourage opponents to just abstain to ensure the proposal fails.

[Tender Branson]

I think it's a fair system. The 33% requirement isn't hard to meet if the topic interests enough people, and it ensures the decision is taken only if a reasonable share of the population supports it. The italian system is far worse, as it require a turnout rate above 50% counting both yes and no votes, which encourage opponents to just abstain to ensure the proposal fails.

Yeah, you are right.

But still, 65% turnout would be about what is needed for this thing to pass (well, fail actually).

And I doubt if a simple referendum can do that if the state election only had 66% turnout.

[Tender Branson]

I think it would be better to have a 50% turnout requirement in this case and a binding "Yes/No vote out of those who voted.

[Antonio the Sixth]

I think it's a fair system. The 33% requirement isn't hard to meet if the topic interests enough people, and it ensures the decision is taken only if a reasonable share of the population supports it. The italian system is far worse, as it require a turnout rate above 50% counting both yes and no votes, which encourage opponents to just abstain to ensure the proposal fails.

Yeah, you are right.

But still, 65% turnout would be about what is needed for this thing to pass (well, fail actually).

And I doubt if a simple referendum can do that if the state election only had 66% turnout.

It all depends on how motivated the "yes" supporters are. I'm sure it's possible to find 33% of registered voters who oppose Stuttgart 21, so all lies on GOTV operations. After all, Italy managed to have 50.86% (!) of its registered voters say no to nuclear energy.

[Antonio the Sixth]

I think it would be better to have a 50% turnout requirement in this case and a binding "Yes/No vote out of those who voted.

No, this system sucks balls. It encourages "no" voters to abstain.

[Tender Branson]

I think it's a fair system. The 33% requirement isn't hard to meet if the topic interests enough people, and it ensures the decision is taken only if a reasonable share of the population supports it. The italian system is far worse, as it require a turnout rate above 50% counting both yes and no votes, which encourage opponents to just abstain to ensure the proposal fails.

Yeah, you are right.

But still, 65% turnout would be about what is needed for this thing to pass (well, fail actually).

And I doubt if a simple referendum can do that if the state election only had 66% turnout.

It all depends on how motivated the "yes" supporters are. I'm sure it's possible to find 33% of registered voters who oppose Stuttgart 21, so all lies on GOTV operations. After all, Italy managed to have 50.86% (!) of its registered voters say no to nuclear energy.

The problem is, 33% of 7.630.000 people would be 2.518.000 people.

And in the state elections, the Greens only managed to get 1.2 Mio. votes.

[Antonio the Sixth]

I think it's a fair system. The 33% requirement isn't hard to meet if the topic interests enough people, and it ensures the decision is taken only if a reasonable share of the population supports it. The italian system is far worse, as it require a turnout rate above 50% counting both yes and no votes, which encourage opponents to just abstain to ensure the proposal fails.

Yeah, you are right.

But still, 65% turnout would be about what is needed for this thing to pass (well, fail actually).

And I doubt if a simple referendum can do that if the state election only had 66% turnout.

It all depends on how motivated the "yes" supporters are. I'm sure it's possible to find 33% of registered voters who oppose Stuttgart 21, so all lies on GOTV operations. After all, Italy managed to have 50.86% (!) of its registered voters say no to nuclear energy.

The problem is, 33% of 7.630.000 people would be 2.518.000 people.

And in the state elections, the Greens only managed to get 1.2 Mio. votes.

So, if the No-side just decides to stay at home - they have already won.

Whether the no side stays home or votes no, it technically can't impact the quorum (contrary, again, to what happens in Italy). If, however, the yes side doesn't turn out in great numbers, they won't be able to pass it. I find it fair that a reasonable share of the voters have to support a policy in order for it to be implemented.

The true problem is, of course, that the burden lies on the "yes" side. Which means that if people don't care enough about the station, it will be built by default. This is of course contestable, but I guess that's the State government's choice.

[minionofmidas]

That's because it's a last-stop nuclear option to prevent something that had already been done dusted & sealed behind closed dorrs?