Austrian Elections & Politics 2.0 (Presidential runoff re-vote: 4 Dec. 2016)

[Tender Branson]

Maybe, but the early opening and pre-selection of postal ballots on Sunday affected more than 500.000 ballots, according to the FPÖ-lawsuit.

And this is not allowed, according to the election law. And the CC is taking this matter very seriously it seems, because they will have hearings the whole next week and asked 90 (!) witnesses (= district election commission members from the districts mentioned in the FPÖ's lawsuit) to appear in court next week ...

But - unless I have missed something - no-one is actually alleging that if these irregularities in the count actually affected the result - that is why I spoke of "errors of form". Sure, it's not meant to work like that, but it didn't actually change who won, so no reason for a rerun.

Given that a major political party is claiming electoral fraud (and, more indirectly, some sort of establishment conspiracy), I would be extremely disappointed if the Constitutional Court wasn't taking this very seriously, no matter how absurd and spurious their allegations are.

Aross says that apparently the Constitutional Court cannot suspend the postal voting (for some reason that I don't understand, because it's the friggin' Constitutional Court, so who else can suspend it, if not the CC ?).

Because something that is part of the constitution (such as postal voting, which is obviously absurd, but never mind, it's Austria) can by definition not be unconstitutional.

A) Reading the ORF article today, especially this part:

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... makes me think that the CC will rule the whole runoff invalid and order a re-vote, because of the large number of postal ballots affected and because like the article says, the postal ballots cannot be re-counted anymore. And if you have more than 500.000 postal ballots which are either opened too early, or sorted by people other than the election commissions in some cases, that could be even more reason for the Court to rule in favour of the FPÖ - mostly because nobody can confirm if postal ballots did not "disappear" on Sunday or were "illegally sorted away".

And B) the Court doesn't need to rule the postal voting unconstitutional I guess. They can suspend postal voting for the re-vote and order the government to repair it. Or they can order the government to repair it first and order the re-vote after the repair law (which means the re-vote would be held later, next year or something).

[Tender Branson]

Or do you think it wont have any impact?

I think the additional TV debates and campaign talk (& possible gaffes) will have more of an impact than the CC ruling itself. A new campaign will get new dynamics again, but Austria would be so polarized again that another close result is likely ...

[Omega21]

Or do you think it wont have any impact?

I think the additional TV debates and campaign talk (& possible gaffes) will have more of an impact than the CC ruling itself. A new campaign will get new dynamics again, but Austria would be so polarized again that another close result is likely ...

Looking forward to seeing this Election first hand, as Im moving to Wien on the 30th of Sept, who knew that there would be some political fun before 2017 after all...

If Hofer continues moving to the Center a bit more he could gain some more votes without losing the Right, as the only alternative is a Green candidate, he would have far more sucess if FPO was not as contraversial as it is.

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

Could Hofer replace stache?

[Tender Branson]

Or do you think it wont have any impact?

I think the additional TV debates and campaign talk (& possible gaffes) will have more of an impact than the CC ruling itself. A new campaign will get new dynamics again, but Austria would be so polarized again that another close result is likely ...

Looking forward to seeing this Election first hand, as Im moving to Wien on the 30th of Sept, who knew that there would be some political fun before 2017 after all...

If Hofer continues moving to the Center a bit more he could gain some more votes without losing the Right, as the only alternative is a Green candidate, he would have far more sucess if FPO was not as contraversial as it is.

Cool. What for ? Studying ?

Could Hofer replace Strache?

The media speculated about it, but no.

[Omega21]

Or do you think it wont have any impact?

I think the additional TV debates and campaign talk (& possible gaffes) will have more of an impact than the CC ruling itself. A new campaign will get new dynamics again, but Austria would be so polarized again that another close result is likely ...

Looking forward to seeing this Election first hand, as Im moving to Wien on the 30th of Sept, who knew that there would be some political fun before 2017 after all...

If Hofer continues moving to the Center a bit more he could gain some more votes without losing the Right, as the only alternative is a Green candidate, he would have far more sucess if FPO was not as contraversial as it is.

Cool. What for ? Studying ?

Could Hofer replace Strache?

The media speculated about it, but no.

Yeah, I applied to WU Wien, I will be losing one year though because of German, since I only have B1 but B2 is needed..

Also dont think Hofer will replace Strache, even though I think the party would make more gains with him as he is softer and really not contraversial at all.

[Tender Branson]

Or do you think it wont have any impact?

I think the additional TV debates and campaign talk (& possible gaffes) will have more of an impact than the CC ruling itself. A new campaign will get new dynamics again, but Austria would be so polarized again that another close result is likely ...

Looking forward to seeing this Election first hand, as Im moving to Wien on the 30th of Sept, who knew that there would be some political fun before 2017 after all...

If Hofer continues moving to the Center a bit more he could gain some more votes without losing the Right, as the only alternative is a Green candidate, he would have far more sucess if FPO was not as contraversial as it is.

Cool. What for ? Studying ?

Could Hofer replace Strache?

The media speculated about it, but no.

Yeah, I applied to WU Wien, I will be losing one year though because of German, since I only have B1 but B2 is needed..

Also dont think Hofer will replace Strache, even though I think the party would make more gains with him as he is softer and really not contraversial at all.

Good luck with your studying then ...

[Tender Branson]

The new monthly "Profil" magazine poll by Unique Research:

34% FPÖ
25% SPÖ
19% ÖVP
14% Greens
  7% NEOS
  1% Others

Chancellor vote:

27% Christian Kern (SPÖ, incumbent)
19% Reinhold Mitterlehner (ÖVP)
17% H.C. Strache (FPÖ)
  6% Eva Glawischnig (Greens)
  4% Matthias Strolz (NEOS)

http://www.ots.at/presseaussendung/OTS_20160618_OTS0006/profil-umfrage-kern-in-kanzlerfrage-voran

[Omega21]

Thanks Tender, will do my best

And now to a off topic question. How hard would it be to implement a law where if you get arrested for selling Drugs, you lose Asylum rights and get deported after your sentance, and im not talking about people from war-torn countries, im talking about Algerians and so on, since it would be mad to deport someone to a War zone.

And which parties would never sign such a law?

Im asking because of this: http://m.oe24.at/oesterreich/chronik/Drogen-Hotspots-99-Verhaftungen-seit-1-Juni/239752048

80%(102 men) of all arrests at a drug hotspot are African, and in total 105 of the arrested have Asylum status.

[Tender Branson]

President-elect Alexander Van der Bellen (Greens) today said that people should "accept whatever judgement the Constitutional Court will announce on the FPÖ's Presidential runoff challenge". He also said he has full confidence in the Court and their decisionmaking.

http://diepresse.com/home/politik/innenpolitik/5023726/Van-der-Bellen-Vertrauen-wir-in-den-Rechtsstaat

Meanwhile, Norbert Hofer and H.C. Strache met with leaders of several European far-right parties yesterday in Vösendorf, incl. Marine LePen.

http://diepresse.com/home/politik/aussenpolitik/5023495/Das-Netzwerk-der-nationalistischen-Internationale

[Tender Branson]

Thanks Tender, will do my best

And now to a off topic question. How hard would it be to implement a law where if you get arrested for selling Drugs, you lose Asylum rights and get deported after your sentance, and im not talking about people from war-torn countries, im talking about Algerians and so on, since it would be mad to deport someone to a War zone.

And which parties would never sign such a law?

Im asking because of this: http://m.oe24.at/oesterreich/chronik/Drogen-Hotspots-99-Verhaftungen-seit-1-Juni/239752048

80%(102 men) of all arrests at a drug hotspot are African, and in total 105 of the arrested have Asylum status.

Deporting criminal foreigners/asylum seekers is really hard, even though most people would like to have them deported immediately.

For a criminal foreigner/asylum seeker to be deported, one has to commit a serious crime with a sentence of at least 3 years in prison. That sentence also has to be "final" (no appeals left) for the person to be deported. Drug crimes often carry a lower sentence, but are the bulk of criminal offenses of asylum seekers from North Africa and the Middle East (like you posted).

Additionally, the Moroccan/Algerian etc. drug dealers are sadly pretty safe from deportation because Austria has no deportation agreement with North-African countries => they simply don't take them back.

Which means they can still deal around with drugs at the main Austrian trains stations, get arrested, get a small sentence, continue to collect their generous monthly welfare payments and continue to sh*t on the heads of the working Austrians who finance all of this ...

[Tender Branson]

New Kurier/OGM poll:



http://kurier.at/politik/inland/neuwahl-start-statt-neustart/205.222.734

[Tender Branson]

New Market/AK poll for Tyrol:

36% ÖVP
27% FPÖ
16% Greens
13% SPÖ
  4% FRITZ
  4% Others (NEOS, Impuls, etc.)

http://www.tt.com/politik/11647335-91/schwarz-gr%C3%BCne-mehrheit-trotz-magerer-dynamik.csp

[Tender Branson]

The VdB-camp and the Interior Ministry have handed their counter-arguments to the FPÖ's election challenge over to the Constitutional Court.

The extensive hearings by the Court will begin tomorrow and will last the whole week. The Court will also hear several FPÖ district election commission members who have said there were "irregularities" in their district's counting process - but who also signed the joint election commission paper with the other party officials that everything went correctly.

If the Court upholds the election, these FPÖ commission members could be charged with a crime ...

[Zanas]

I put the probability of a nation-wide revote at 0.1%.

[Omega21]

I put the probability of a nation-wide revote at 0.1%.

I think its much higher than that..

[Tender Branson]

I put the probability of a nation-wide revote at 0.1%.

I think its much higher than that..

Yes. A lot higher, probably a 50-50 chance.

The Constitutional Court hearings started today and will be extended until next week.

Initial hearings today were quite disturbing, with many district election commission members testifying that they signed protocolls that were handed around, without actually being present at the postal vote count later ...

You must be logged in to read this quote.

http://kurier.at/politik/inland/die-wahlanfechtung-im-live-ticker/205.051.200

http://diepresse.com/home/politik/innenpolitik/5024524/Wahlbeisitzer_Mir-war-nicht-klar-dass-ich-dabei-sein-muss

[DavidB.]

A revote would be fycking insane. This is embarrassing for the FPÖ.

[Tender Branson]

A revote would be fycking insane. This is embarrassing for the FPÖ.

It would mostly be slightly embarrassing for the election officials in question and the country as a whole. Mostly because some election officials acted in a very negligent manner and not 100% in line with the election law and vote count procedures ... and with their actions they also discredited the hard work of the other election officials who did it right.

The FPÖ and Hofer should come out relatively unharmed, but I still expect that VdB would win a re-vote.

[Tender Branson]

From the questioning of the Kitzbühel (Tyrol) election commission leader:

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While there were no vote counting irregularities, there have been mistakes with the election protocoll: Not all district election commission members were present when the postal votes were counted, they simply came later to the count. But when they arrived, they had the chance to watch the count and every postal ballot that was counted or not. The final result of the count was signed and protocollized by all election commission members.

The problem (if the Court agrees) might be that not all election commission members were present during the count ... this is a point which was also mentioned by witnesses from other district election commissions.

[Tender Branson]

A "Standard" article sums up the first day of Court hearings:

http://derstandard.at/2000039420732/Wahlanfechtung-Klarheit-schaffen-in-einer-Frage-die-das-Land-bewegt

The hearings of district election commission members from all parties highlighted a mix of negligence and sloppiness, as well as huge ignorance of the election law and vote-counting protocoll by many d.e.c. members.

But even the FPÖ d.e.c. members who testified said that they are not aware of any actual vote counting fraud.

[DavidB.]

This is a waste of time. Oh well.

[Tender Branson]

This is a waste of time. Oh well.

Nah, not really. I think the negligence and sloppiness by many election commission members warrants the hearings. But we all know now that there was of course not the slightest vote fraud, just laziness and ignorance concerning the interpretation of the election law and vote count protocolls.

A repeat vote in some districts seems most likely now and the Court might issue mandatory training lessons for all election workers for future elections to avoid these sloppiness problems ...

[MaxQue]

A revote would be fycking insane. This is embarrassing for the FPÖ.

It would mostly be slightly embarrassing for the election officials in question and the country as a whole. Mostly because some election officials acted in a very negligent manner and not 100% in line with the election law and vote count procedures ... and with their actions they also discredited the hard work of the other election officials who did it right.

The FPÖ and Hofer should come out relatively unharmed, but I still expect that VdB would win a re-vote.

No, it would mostly be embarrassing for these morally corrupt judges. You don't overrule the decision of the people over technicalities. Only proven fraud.

[Omega21]

What in the living hell is this

http://www.oe24.at/oesterreich/chronik/Fluechtling-missbraucht-Zwolfjaehrige/240516617

A man god 20 months of Jail for abusing a child, what kind of sick justice system is this?

Could someone explain to me why he cant be sentenced to a correct sentance, fitting the crime.