Denmark parliamentary election: 15-09-2011

[Jens]

I suppose the letter O has more white in it than any other letter?

LOL, you might be right - And D was taken by Centre Democrats, when DF was founded. (I always think of it as a zero, symbolising their understanding of modern society among other things;-)

[Jens]

RV used to have non-Copenhagen support. How did these places differ from Venstre dominated municipalities.

More smallholders and certain local personalities and radical newspapers (Holbæk Amts Venstreblad)

[Ethelberth]

K used to Communist and D was originally Venstre

[ingemann]

*They are strong in urban area, and moderate sized in rural areas, so they benefitted the most of these reforms (which was meant to weaken them)

Gerrymandering backfire ? That's quite interesting, how exactly did it happen ?

DPP fail to delive on local level, while a lot of people was pissed that their municipalities was forced together by the government.

Another element is that the Danish municipalities are a lot more powerful than in other countries,  they are also the major part of the executive branch, beside hostitals and the police, they are the most likely contact people have with the state, and while people tend to trust the right more on fiscal matters, on administrative matters SocDems are much more trusted. DPP model also translate quite well to national politic, administrative people don't trust them, and their top-down model have resulted in weak local organistions.

[ingemann]

Anyone kind enough to give any brief outlines of the issues, the parties, how the leaders are perceived, etc? Thanks for any help.

Venstre/Liberal:Just want to stay in power, ideological push some buzz words about individual choice and freedom, but after ten years of expanding the bureaucracy no one really believe them. Mostly push that they aren't the SocDems. Their leader PM Lars Løkke Rasmussen are seen as a tired little man, who fumble from issue to issue. Most believe them to be more responsable on fiscal issues

Social Democrats: People mostly see them as the guarantee for the survival of the welfare state, use most of their time warning that it's going hurt when they get power and say that everybody are going to hurt everybody equally and they promise nothing. Ironic this seem popular among the population, mostly because they are tired of Venstre, but also because it's seen as a short term il tasting medicine. Helle Thorning-Schmidt is not very popular neither internal in the party or among the wider population, but most think that she will be a good PM. She will likely win.
While left, the SocDems lack the bleeding hearts of the rest of the left, and are willing to do what's necessary to win, rule or make Denmark prosper. This are a mayor reason to why they can get away with promise doom to everybody, because people know that the SocDem want what's best for the entire population, even if it hurt on the road to that goal

DPP: Nationalist, anti-immigration, anti-EU, want to turn the clock back to the early sixties, through they are pro-choice and gay rights. Beside their voter segment most people are tired of them, including the rest of the right, so they have started a internal war on the right with the conservative. They will likely win the battle but lose influence, by making the centre-right voters move to the left. Pia Kjærsgaard is the most hated, feared and respected politician in Danish politic, but most voters want her to lose influence.

SPP: Have more less evolved into the left-wing of the SocDems, doesn't love EU like most parties but accept it. Villy Søvndal have a incredible personal popularity, but he has become unable to translate that into votes anymore.

Social Liberals: Bleeding hearts liberals, imagine a American liberal, with more fiscal conservative policies, but all the arrongance of the American "centrists".
They want to lower the taxes on work, raise it on property, open the borders for immigration, more European federalism and cooperation between the right and left (keep DPP away from power). Their biggest weakness are their arrogance, which ensure that many who agree with them won't vote for them, another weakness are that their voters tend to be a lot more fiscal left than they are. Margrethe Vestage hard to say, the media and the "creative class" love her, but outside that segment people tgend to find her off putting.

Conservatives: Want to cooperate over the middle to get rid of DPP's influence, through after ten years of cooperation few believes them, beside that lower taxes. Lars Barfod: who?

Liberal Alliance:; Lower taxes, lower taxes, lower taxes, lower taxes, lower taxes, lower taxes, lower taxes and lower taxes. The party is more or less bought and paid by Saxo Bank, a bank well known for it asocial and borderline criminal behaviour. Anders Samuelsen want to create a new centrist party, the problem are that the moment Saxo Bank cut the fiscal support the party is unlikely to survive. As a person Anders are popular among his voters and seen as a fanatic by everybody else.

Unity List: take a standard college socialist's opinions and make a party out of that and you have unity list. Johanne Schmidt-Nielsen she's something of a light weight, but she's also the world's nicest girl, that's maybe her biggest strength, everybody like her, including her opponents, so not only they don't want to attack, they would likely get a backlash from their voters if they did. So even Pia Kjærsgaard, who take a deep personal pleasure in ripping the limbs of other politicians treat her nice.

Christian Democrats: anti-abortion, anti-gay adoption but beside that a typical centre left party, except that they hate the centre-left. Per Ørum Jørgensen a complete non-entity.

Nice post, and welcome to the forum. I don't agree with everything, especially the part about SF for obvious reasons but hey, it's you outline

In my eyes the comparison to the SocDems are a compliment:p, but thanks.

[ingemann]

K used to Communist and D was originally Venstre

The use of letters to symbolise the parties started in Copenhagen municipality in the late 19th century, with the Social Democrats taking "A", Venstre "B" and Conservative "C", but with the split of Venstre into RV (radical left) and Venstre (moderate left), RV was stronger* in Copenhagen so they kept the letter "B". Venstre later adopted "V" when the letter system spread from Copenhagen.

*Venstre was more or less non-existent in Copenhagen until after the war, only being kept alive by rural migrants (in fact native-bore Copenhagen Venstre-voters are more or less a post-1990 phenomen and still relative rare)

[Heimdal]

It is really interesting that you should mention that Ingemann, because that was the situation in Norway as well (I lived there from 1995-1999). In Oslo (Norways capital city), Venstre (the sister party of the Danish Venstre) was practically destroyed in the early parts of the 20th century. They have only reappeared the last few years.
If I remember correctly I think they were replaced by Hoyre, which is the main center-right party, and the Norwegian equivalent of the Danish Conservative party.

The vote on the left was splitt between the more dominant Arbeiderpartiet and smaler NKP (the communist party).

[Sibboleth]

To see it in its full glory (?), use the magic of right click. Some minor errors are always possible.

[Vasall des Midas]

What's with KD's stronghold area?

[ingemann]

What's with KD's stronghold area?

The left are weak in the area, it's the stronghold of Inner Mission (Christian Fundamentalists). As such the strength of KD is to be expected. Whats more surprising are the strength of DPP in west Zealand (but it's because it's Pia Kjærsgaard's election district) and their weakness in North Jutland (which were a stronghold for the Progress Party)

[Senator MaxQue]

What Y was?

[Ethelberth]

http://da.wikipedia.org/wiki/Partibogstav

[Swedish Cheese]

Swedish media is reporting today that the centre-right is gaining back ground according to a poll by Voxmeter, and that they're know only slightly behind the centre-left.

I know nothing about the pollster, so they might just be bad, or it's an outliner. Wouldn't surprise me too much if it were true though. Goverments tend to gain a bit when the election is coming closer. Could end up being a Danish version of Sweden 2006 when the opposition had a decisive lead for a long time before the election, but where the election got really close in the end and the opposition only ending up defeating the goverment by a very slim margin.

 

[You kip if you want to...]

Swedish media is reporting today that the centre-right is gaining back ground according to a poll by Voxmeter, and that they're know only slightly behind the centre-left.

I know nothing about the pollster, so they might just be bad, or it's an outliner. Wouldn't surprise me too much if it were true though. Goverments tend to gain a bit when the election is coming closer. Could end up being a Danish version of Sweden 2006 when the opposition had a decisive lead for a long time before the election, but where the election got really close in the end and the opposition only ending up defeating the goverment by a very slim margin.

  

There's a Megafon poll out today showing the left's lead widening. Looking at some of the other polls as well, Voxmeter appear to be showing noticably less support for the Socialists and the Greens than other pollsters.
http://politiken.dk/politik/meningsmaaleren/

If Helle Thorning Schmidt isn't the next PM of Denmark, the European Left are beyond screwed.

[Swedish Cheese]

There's a Megafon poll out today showing the left's lead widening. Looking at some of the other polls as well, Voxmeter appear to be showing noticably less support for the Socialists and the Greens than other pollsters.
http://politiken.dk/politik/meningsmaaleren/

If Helle Thorning Schmidt isn't the next PM of Denmark, the European Left are beyond screwed.

Probably an outliner. And my money is of course still on Thoring Schmit having majority support (in one form or another) but I think it might end up closer than it looks.

Going to spend the night with a Danish guy, should be an exciting evening.

EDIT: Looking at Al's amazing maps. That little Green spot north of Copenhagen is Pia Kjaersgaard's home town, fun little trivia.

[ingemann]

The left has gone from a 95-80 lead to a 90-85 lead, while it's not impossible it's going to be closer than that, I lean that we will ast least get 90-85 split, if not we will see the right win, simply because if it become closer the left will panic. The last week are going to be interesting, if nothing else gbecause of the leak* of Helle Thorning-Schmidts tax case. While the great irony is that it shows she's innocent, the media has spun it like she's guilty. Much depend on how the voters react to this.

*The leak seem like it likely come from the government itself, which means that there are a chance that even if they win, they may end up collapsing later, if the police find out who did it.

[Tender Branson]

It looks like the Left-Coalition still has about 51-53% support in todays 4 tracking polls.

The only real trend I have noticed recently is that the Venstre could overtake the Social Democrats.

Also, the Enhedslisten seem to gain ground rapidely, from 2% to 7% now.

[Californian Tony]

Is this graph accurate ?



I find it quite surprising to see there are so few polls recently.

[Sibboleth]

There have been more than that, yeah. A link was posted earlier in the thread and here bist: http://politiken.dk/politik/meningsmaaleren/

[Californian Tony]

I don't get the left's apparent downfall... Did something particular happen in these last weeks ?

[Sibboleth]

I don't get the left's apparent downfall... Did something particular happen in these last weeks ?

It's a pretty small shift and it's not so strange for governments to mount a bit of a comeback during an election, especially if they've been polling terribly for a while.

[Swedish Cheese]

I don't get the left's apparent downfall... Did something particular happen in these last weeks ?

Elections get closer in the spurt, that's just the way of things. Polls tightened in Sweden both in 2006 and 2010 the week before the elections. 

[Californian Tony]

Still, having Venstre > SD and DF > SF is a pretty significant change, no ? Doesn't that mean the left's overall leadis razor-thin ?

[Swedish Cheese]

Still, having Venstre > SD and DF > SF is a pretty significant change, no ? Doesn't that mean the left's overall leadis razor-thin ?

Todays voxmeter is saying it's only 1,5% lead for the left. There are two other polls sayig the left's lead is 4,8% and 4,9% respectivly.

[Jens]

We just had the last party leaders debate on DR.
The PM seemed like a man under pressure and Pia Kærsgaard kept on trying to attack Villy Søvndal without succes. I don't really think that the debate changed much and most certainly easn't a game changer for Lars Løkke.

To summarise a bit on the whole polling debate: The polling firms are spitting out polls every day and a few of them show a close race. The closest was 88 to Red Block and 87 to Blue Block, but remember that the most likely outcome of the North Atlantic mandates is 2 red from Greenland and 1 red and 1 blue from Faroe Islands. Blue Block thus needs 89 Danish mandates to win, and no poll has been even close to that.

Internally in the blocks, there has been some changes.
Enhedslisten is on its way to its best result ever, around 5-7 %. Not since the 70'ties has the extreme left has such a succes. A lot of it is because of Johanne Schmidt-Nielsen, the young and charimatic spokesperson for the List. Not the other hand has the List been under heavy fire the last few days because of the quite radical opinions of its members, who want to nationalise Maersk and Lego and support FARC and PFLP. Enhedslisten will get an excellent result but perhaps "only" around 5 %.
Radikale Venstre has also gained and is looking at a result around 7-9 %. Again a charimatic leader, Margrethe Vestager, holds some of the explanation but also some clear stances on immigration, economy, taxes and early retirement has attracted the Café Latte segment, who adored SF and Villy Søvndal in 2007

The losers are SF and S who at best is going to get the same result as in 2007. S perhaps a bit over, SF probably a bit under. Both parties are suffering from their somewhat pragmatic (and boring) policies and a Villy Søvndal and SF who have had a hard time being the responsible government party... (me no like )

Blue Block hasn't showed the same major changes. Conservatives is loosing bad and is going to lose half their seats. Venstre is losing a little. DF is unpredictable a usual and Liberal Alliance is probably going to get a decent result if their can control some of their more unconventional candidates, like Joachim B. Olsen, former Olympic bronze medalist in short putting, who started talking about allowing polygamy (and he isn't even a Mormon)...

Sorry about not posting much - real life campaining is keeping me quite bussy