German Elections & Politics

[ApatheticAustrian]

simple:

the SPD pushed through some more or less necessary reforms to make germany look more like scandinavia than italy and since its own voting bloc was the biggest enemy to any such reform and the CDU trended to the left in cultural and economical questions, there is ATM no need for a SPD.

[ApatheticAustrian]

i would love to see the AfD in local government position, don't really in which role.

since i think the goals and ideology of the AfD are more or less anti-german, they are doomed to crush themselves.

if they don't - good for them.

[ApatheticAustrian]

how?

imho they contradict the social contract of post-war germany; promote, especially inside of the "new states", kind of "blood and soil" nationalism, leading politicians even attack famous german soccer celebrities cause of their skin colour.

those are - imho - anti-german, neo-russian values, trying to redeem pre-hitler concepts of VOLK (in an ethnical way) and nation.

[ApatheticAustrian]

if INSA shows a CDU recovery you can believe it.

they are using the yougov pool which is kind of small and bad balanced in germany and since those numbers would be ludicrous they are adding SPECIAL SAUCE, meaning they make the numbers look like whatever they thing is right.

on the bad side.....they are just running behind trends and don't really have real metrics behind their work....on the good side....they can push their numbers hard into the direction they think is reasonable ATM and hit closer to the goal than real polls would suggest.

[ApatheticAustrian]

Leading Alternative politican Björn Höcke, head of the fascist wing of the party, calls Holocaust memorial in Berlin a "monument of shame".


German nationalist calls for end to Nazi guilt
https://www.yahoo.com/news/german-nationalist-calls-end-nazi-guilt-224455947.html?ref=gs

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[ApatheticAustrian]

just recently found mister habeck....seems like a kind of outsider-part-realo-candidate, eh?

personally i am happy with KGE and öz.... they are well-known and able to communicate in a good way.

wouldn't have any problem with a strong leftwing-candidate like mister trittin but regarding the populariy of mister hofreiter and miss peter and the current opinion climate inside of germany, this result should be for the best.

[ApatheticAustrian]

höcke is supported and tolerated by the likes of "liberal" and "friendly" AfDler like Meuthen....just to annoy Petry.

[ApatheticAustrian]

Too bad that the AfD decided to keep Höcke today.

This guy is a nut and deserved to be kicked out for his recent comments.

Always funny if AfD-Haters want to give advise. Totally irrelevant what the enemies want, always do what you believe in. Great move, close the party instead of openly attack each other. ^^

it has been an open attack from the meuthen wing on the petry wing.

höcke himself doesn't care about such meaningless debates.

[ApatheticAustrian]

No big deal, I doubt that outside the far-left bubble anyone hardly cared.

you know quite well, that the monument stuff was just the peak of the iceberg which was his big speech, full of oldschool nationalist rhetoric and hardcore enough even most AFD party leaders felt like apologizing.

höcke dominated the headlines the next few days - it was a big effing deal, especially in germany.

[ApatheticAustrian]

i respect the hell out of schulz but i am not into believing someone who worked in brussels for such a long term can suddenly break away in his home country.

didn't work in countries like egypt, won't work in germany.

but if i would make an educated guess..... gabriel got burn-out, scholz knows he can't win with merkel still on top of the CDU and schulz seemingly wants his 15 minutes in the sunlight.

[ApatheticAustrian]

i respect the hell out of schulz but i am not into believing someone who worked in brussels for such a long term can suddenly break away in his home country.

didn't work in countries like egypt, won't work in germany.

but if i would make an educated guess..... gabriel got burn-out, scholz knows he can't win with merkel still on top of the CDU and schulz seemingly wants his 15 minutes in the sunlight.

Schulz is to the right of Gabriel.

All true, but, still a good option for SPD. At least, is there alternative is both a solid liberal and somebody who has not been a part of the government they are trying to replace.

depends on the definition of the word.

i think schulz is more liberal in the modern way but less classical left-wing, yeah.

[ApatheticAustrian]

i have for years wished for a socially liberal, pro-welfare state, pro economy, scandinavian-like european system, which is economically liberal but middle-taxing, no race to the bottom, fitting social safety net, maybe even including a basic income....

i raged against merkel for years for her small-mindedness (for example regarding greece) and making germany into a stumbling block for history....but i learned to love her since the alternatives got WAAAAY out of hand and the ukraine crisis started a fight against liberalism in all of europe.

the modern left will be pro-liberalism and the modern conservative must be pro-welfare or both center parties will go down in the west imho.

[ApatheticAustrian]

if schulz wants he could make something big out of the recently published hits on his lacking formal education.

[ApatheticAustrian]

AfD and "the left" have more in common than the parties in between, imho.

[ApatheticAustrian]

if a party breaks away from your own party and vilifies you and takes on irresponsible hardcore positions, there usually won't be an alliance until the leading figures on both sides are gone.

[ApatheticAustrian]

while this poll could easily be right you need to take everything INSA said with a ton of salt.

and sure...pro-gov channels are going to hype schulz....and forsa is pro-cdu or nothing.

[ApatheticAustrian]

You need to take every poll with a ton of salt. None of them is truly independent.

long story short:

my problem is not the bias of INSA but their methods.

the other  pollsters are more or less transparent re: their work, bias or not, INSA's way of success is something like an educated guess out of nothing. finally the special sauce is taking over the business.

and ofc i know of their track record but you or I could have done the same if we wanted to.....just take an average of everbody else and bet against the coalition and on AfD.

seems more like a scam to me but well....maybe that's the only way to break through the reality of permanently lying voters.

[ApatheticAustrian]

i am a longterm fan of schulz/juncker and even while i am pretty pessimistic about the chances of an european politican to succeed on the ground, i would vote for mister schulz.....and would never have voted for gabriel.

[ApatheticAustrian]

INSA making bold predictions as always.

[ApatheticAustrian]

The guy spent 2 decades in Brussels. I'm pretty sure the CDU is sitting on an array of scandals that it'll release in due time.

the cdu is risking alienating their lower middle class supporters if they hit him the wrong way...he surely is a more tricky enemy than gabriel.

otherwise i agree, there is too much anti-eu sentiment to surive.

[ApatheticAustrian]

a german eurocrat is more popular in germany? unheard of

[ApatheticAustrian]

the Afd is filled with many old fdp and cdu voters.

to outbalance it, merkel has filled her party with former spd/green voters.

imho nowaday the spd electorate is closer to the afd than the average cdu voter.

[ApatheticAustrian]

primarily cause "the left" has transformed into an even-more-fringe-party on the national level.

well, if the votes are there (highly unlikely) i guess the SPD would at least try it anyway.

[ApatheticAustrian]

wagenknecht is - like her husband oskar lafontaine, the former most dangerous man of europe - a left-national-populist.
.

[ApatheticAustrian]

wagenknecht is - like her husband oskar lafontaine, the former most dangerous man of europe - a left-national-populist.
.

the "most dangerous man" thing wasn't my idea. ;p