Austrian Elections & Politics - Version 1.0

[EPG]

It's a tough one. The main pool of NEOS-considerers seems to be the voters who defected from ÖVP to NEOS and back to ÖVP again.

[Tender Branson]

The liberal NEOS takes a big hit after they came out in favour of fully legalizing pot:



http://www.oe24.at/oesterreich/politik/Sonntagsfrage-Jetzt-sind-alle-auf-Platz-1/163497908

[Tender Branson]

New Vienna state election poll by Unique Research for "NEWS" magazine (online survey, sample = 500, MoE = +/- 4.3%):

38% SPÖ
28% FPÖ
14% Greens
11% ÖVP
  7% NEOS
  1% TS
  1% Others

That's the highest share for the FPÖ so far in any Vienna poll.

The current city government is SPÖ-Greens.

They would currently keep a 52-46 majority, according to this poll.

Vienna will vote at some point in summer/fall next year.

http://neuwal.com/wahlumfragen/wahlumfrage.php?uid=852#facts

[Tender Branson]

The conservative ÖVP could soon be 1st in federal polling again and overtake the SPÖ and FPÖ for the first time since mid-2010.

Tomorrow, the ÖVP leadership convention will take place in Vienna and Reinhold Mitterlehner will be formally elected the new party leader. 1100 delegates will be invited, of which 528 are eligible to vote in the leadership and deputy elections. Mitty should at least get 95%+ from the delegates.



After Spindelegger stepped down as ÖVP leader, the ÖVP already gained 6% (from 19% to 25%) and if they get a small bump from the convention, there could soon be polls out showing them ahead.

[Tender Branson]

Mitty elected new ÖVP-party leader with 99.1% of the delegates.

The best result for an ÖVP party leader in over 30 years ...

[Tender Branson]

The Lower Austrian FPÖ-deputy leader called some protesting asylum seekers "cave men" yesterday.

Austrian politician calls asylum seekers ‘cave men’

A member of parliament from Austria’s far-right Freedom Party (FPÖ) called asylum seekers cave men on Facebook, triggering calls from other parties for his resignation.

Christian Höbart’s comments highlighted a febrile debate on immigration in the country, where recent polls have shown FPÖ neck and neck with traditional centrist parties, attracting about a quarter of votes.

His message, posted late yesterday, criticised a rally of mostly African asylum seekers held in the town of Traiskirchen near Vienna.

“I (could not) show understanding for yesterday’s brouhaha of asylum seekers from Africa, so I called (them) emotionally... ‘soil and cave men’, who cannot appreciate how good they’ve got it with us - their host country Austria.” he wrote.

Other opposition politicians called for Mr Höbart, an FPÖ leader in the province of Lower Austria, to quit his political posts.

“To call humans that maybe fled from murder and rape of Islamic State murder gangs in Iraq and Syria ‘soil and cave men’ is open racism, which - similarly to the Nazis - would like to classify certain humans as Untermenschen (under-humans),” said Albert Steinhauser from the Austrian Greens.

(...)

“I was put in the limelight by our front of do-gooders and wannabe-world-improvers,” Mr Höbart wrote on Facebook, defending his comments.

He said that anyone who could think would know that cave men simply meant humans who are “many many years behind our culture”.

http://www.irishtimes.com/news/world/europe/austrian-politician-calls-asylum-seekers-cave-men-on-facebook-1.1993845

...

The Lower Austrian FPÖ is one of the least successful state FPÖ-chapters, so I guess this was just an attempt to appeal to the FPÖ-base and get some attention.

[Tender Branson]

New Gallup poll shows the FPÖ not leading for the first time in a Gallup poll since April:



Of course, due to the margin of error, it's impossible to say which party is really ahead right now.

The tabloid Ö24 (for which the poll was done) argues that the FPÖ might have taken a small hit from the asylum seeker bashing recently from an FPÖ-politician, calling African ayslum seekers "cave people" and asylum seekers from Iraq/Syria/Afghanistan "goat shepherds" (see previous page).

[Tender Branson]

Today's "Profil" poll by "Unique Research" (online poll, sample = 500):

27% ÖVP
27% SPÖ
26% FPÖ
12% Greens
  7% NEOS
  1% TS

The ÖVP gained 8% in the past 3 months after their leadership change. The SPÖ gained 2%.

The FPÖ is down by 3, NEOS down 3, the Greens down 1 and TS down 1 as well.

http://www.profil.at/articles/1446/980/378477/umfrage-spoe-oevp-mitterlehner-kanzlerfrage-faymann

[Tender Branson]

Another sign of the ÖVP's recent upswing is the new APA/OGM "trust index" of Austrian cabinet members/party leaders and the President.

The chart below shows the trust rating, which is measured by using the balance of "I trust this politician" minus "I do not trust this politician".

As you can see, the President (Fischer) has the best trust rating, followed by several ÖVP politicians - while the SPÖ ones only have mediocre ratings.

Also, Chancellor Faymann does much worse than the new ÖVP leader and Vice-Chancellor Mitty:

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

um, did Strolz eat a kitten recently?

[Tender Branson]

um, did Strolz eat a kitten recently?

Nope, but NEOS voted in favour of fully legalizing pot recently (CO-style).

And the "Young NEOS" even went a step further and voted to legalize all hard drugs incl. cocaine, heroin, etc. (something that is opposed by 95%+ of Austrian voters).

So, all the goodwill that NEOS and Strolz had left with centrist voters is now gone.

[Tender Branson]

A new Vienna poll today (Gallup):

38% SPÖ
25% FPÖ
15% Greens
12% ÖVP
  7% NEOS
  3% Others

53-44 majority for the current Red-Green government.

[Tender Branson]

New Upper Austria state election poll by Unique Research for "Heute":



Upper Austria will vote next fall. The current coalition is ÖVP-Greens.

The ÖVP is losing slightly, but remains dominant.

The SPÖ is heading for a major disaster, losing another 5% from their already-worst-result-ever.

The FPÖ could overtake them, but they are weaker than elsewhere - mostly because the ÖVP is so strong in the state.

The Greens are also gaining and benefitting from the national trend and their solid work in the state government.

NEOS is at 5% and because there's a 4% threshold they could enter the state parliament for the first time. But it's still too early to be sure.

[Tender Branson]

Also interesting:



Manfred Haimbuchner (Upper Austria's "Eric Cartman" and FPÖ-leader) is advertising beer on his website (a brand called "Fucking Hell" btw).

The FPÖ constantly attacks other parties for being pro-drugs, so ...

[Colbert]

I luuuv Austria 'cause they make polls very oftenly

but austrian polls are so boring...always the same 24/28 % for the 3 GP ^^

[Tender Branson]

The Greens have already reserved the domain www.vdb2016.at for a potential Alexander Van der Bellen Presidential run in 2016.

Neither the Greens nor VdB himself have yet announced their plans, but also not ruled out a Presidential run.

The Greens said it's only a "safety measure" in case VdB decides to run.

VdB is currently ahead in the polls for the Presidency.

http://derstandard.at/2000008385295/Gruene-reservierten-Internet-Domain-wwwvdb2016at

[Tender Branson]

There will be 12 elections in Austria next year:

4 state elections

* Burgenland (May)
* Upper Austria (September)
* Styria (September)
* Vienna (October)

6 municipal elections

* Lower Austria (January 25)
* Vorarlberg (March)
* Styria, except Graz (March)
* Carinthia (March)
* Upper Austria (together with the state elections in September)
* Vienna (together with the state elections in October)

2 other elections

* Austrian Economic Chamber of Commerce
* Austrian National Union of [University] Students

...

Some of these elections might be moved to an earlier date though.

It also means that just 2 states will not vote next year: Salzburg & Tyrol.

...

[Tender Branson]

The Team Stronach is going the way of the joke party BZÖ:

After announcing a few days ago that she's pregnant, TS co-party leader Kathrin Nachbaur announced today that she quit the party and the co-party leader post (she wants to remain club-leader of the TS parliamentary group though).

Apparently, this comes after party leader Frank Stronach cut her 140.000€ per year payment at MAGNA International for a leadership post.

So, as you can see the TS is in deep sh*t and likely gone by 2018.

Nachbaur was until a few days ago the closest person to Frank Stronach. If he dumps her (or treats her badly, so that she quits), you know that something is really wrong ...

http://derstandard.at/2000008480051/Team-Stronach-Nachbaur-tritt-aus-Partei-aus

[Beagle]

The Team Stronach is going the way of the joke party BZÖ:
...

So, as you can see the TS is in deep sh*t and likely gone by 2018.

I love how you're qualifying it with a "likely". Is there any conceivable scenario in which TS comes even close to the Nationalrat? Do they even have any local party machines?

[freefair]

The Team Stronach is going the way of the joke party BZÖ:


So, as you can see the TS is in deep sh*t and likely gone by 2018.

http://derstandard.at/2000008480051/Team-Stronach-Nachbaur-tritt-aus-Partei-aus

As far as I can see members of BZO and TS should defect en mess/merge with each other or  NEOS or FPO if they want any chance of survival. Those parties isolated are useless.

[Tender Branson]

The Team Stronach is going the way of the joke party BZÖ:
...

So, as you can see the TS is in deep sh*t and likely gone by 2018.

I love how you're qualifying it with a "likely". Is there any conceivable scenario in which TS comes even close to the Nationalrat? Do they even have any local party machines?

Nope and ... nope.

The Team Stronach is going the way of the joke party BZÖ:


So, as you can see the TS is in deep sh*t and likely gone by 2018.

http://derstandard.at/2000008480051/Team-Stronach-Nachbaur-tritt-aus-Partei-aus

As far as I can see members of BZO and TS should defect en mess/merge with each other or  NEOS or FPO if they want any chance of survival. Those parties isolated are useless.

NEOS doesn't need (or want) any of these failed personalities from the TS or the BZÖ. Would be bad for the party image.

And while the FPÖ would be the best choice for these failed personalities, they won't take them either (despite the fact that the FPÖ is already made up of failed personalities as well ... )

[DC Al Fine]

The Team Stronach is going the way of the joke party BZÖ:


So, as you can see the TS is in deep sh*t and likely gone by 2018.

http://derstandard.at/2000008480051/Team-Stronach-Nachbaur-tritt-aus-Partei-aus

As far as I can see members of BZO and TS should defect en mess/merge with each other or  NEOS or FPO if they want any chance of survival. Those parties isolated are useless.

NEOS doesn't need (or want) any of these failed personalities from the TS or the BZÖ. Would be bad for the party image.

And while the FPÖ would be the best choice for these failed personalities, they won't take them either (despite the fact that the FPÖ is already made up of failed personalities as well ... )

I agree. It's a question of where TS & BZO voters go now. I assume most will go FPO with a significant minority going OVP and NEOS.

[Tender Branson]

The Team Stronach is going the way of the joke party BZÖ:


So, as you can see the TS is in deep sh*t and likely gone by 2018.

http://derstandard.at/2000008480051/Team-Stronach-Nachbaur-tritt-aus-Partei-aus

As far as I can see members of BZO and TS should defect en mess/merge with each other or  NEOS or FPO if they want any chance of survival. Those parties isolated are useless.

NEOS doesn't need (or want) any of these failed personalities from the TS or the BZÖ. Would be bad for the party image.

And while the FPÖ would be the best choice for these failed personalities, they won't take them either (despite the fact that the FPÖ is already made up of failed personalities as well ... )

I agree. It's a question of where TS & BZO voters go now. I assume most will go FPO with a significant minority going OVP and NEOS.

The question has already been answered, because the TS polls only 1% anymore and the BZÖ has no support whatsoever anymore.

The voters from both parties are socially-conservative and/or business-minded. Which means they have almost exclusively gone to the FPÖ and ÖVP already.

NEOS is more of an urban/suburban party that attracts more socially liberal and/or business-minded people, which makes it unlikely that former TS/BZÖ voters went to them.

Besides, NEOS is now losing voters as well - which means they need to be careful as to not end up like TS and the BZÖ in the long run ...

[Tender Branson]

The conservative ÖVP could soon be 1st in federal polling again and overtake the SPÖ and FPÖ for the first time since mid-2010.

New OGM poll for the "Kurier" newspaper today:



http://kurier.at/politik/inland/ogm-kurier-umfrage-django-effekt-katapultiert-vp-zur-nr-1/98.558.612

[Tender Branson]

The questions below the "election poll" and on the right side of the "Chancellor vote":

"Should the SPÖ head into the next federal election with Chancellor Werner Faymann or someone else ?"

35% Faymann (Among SPÖ-voters though: 79%)
48% SOMEONE ELSE
17% don't know

"Should the ÖVP head into the next federal election with Vice-Chancellor Reinhold Mitterlehner or someone else ?"

53% Mitty (Among ÖVP-voters though: 86%)
28% SOMEONE ELSE
18% don't know

"Did the climate and the teamwork improve within the SPÖVP coalition since the ÖVP changed their leader ?"

32% has become better
42% it stayed the same
12% became worse
14% don't know

"Will the SPÖVP government remain together until the next election in 2018 or will there be early elections ?"

59% remain together
26% there will be early elections
15% don't know