Austrian Elections & Politics 5.0 (Burgenland state election - January 26)

[Tender Branson]

The ÖVP puts some pressure on the FPÖ now, by saying that banning the far-right "Identitarian Movement" is a pre-condition for them in a future coalition.

The FPÖ says the ÖVP is becoming a party of "bans" and that it is "overreacting" and downplays such a demand.

The ÖVP on the other hand says that the FPÖ has become a "guardian angel for right-wing extremists".

https://kurier.at/politik/inland/oevp-nennt-verbot-der-identitaeren-als-koalitionsbedingung/400580729

[DavidB.]

Don't understand where the ÖVP thinks its leverage comes from. Not as if they have a majority with NEOS in the polls, huh? Wishing Kurz best of luck in governing with the Greens and losing his popularity with ÖVP-FPÖ swing voters.

[Tender Branson]

Don't understand where the ÖVP thinks its leverage comes from. Not as if they have a majority with NEOS in the polls, huh? Wishing Kurz best of luck in governing with the Greens and losing his popularity with ÖVP-FPÖ swing voters.

The ÖVP is just being populist here, because a big majority of Austrians want the extremist Identitarian Movement banned.

That's probably what the ÖVP thinks is their "mandate" on this topic.

ÖVP-Greens-NEOS indeed seems to becoming more likely again after all the FPÖ troubles recently.

The leader of the Tyrol Greens (who herself is in a coalition with the ÖVP there) said today that she's open to coalition talks with Kurz after the election ... (after having concerns before).

https://www.derstandard.at/story/2000107518727/felipe-zeigt-sich-offen-fuer-koalition-mit-kurz

On the other hand, that will be good for the country and also good for you, David, and the FPÖ - because the party can regroup in opposition again ...

[Famous Mortimer]

If Generation Identity can be banned for being vaguely "extremist" without actually engaging in violence, what's to stop the Freedom Party from being banned for "extremism"? I guess just popularity but only allowing freedom of expression based on popularity seems like a bad idea.

[Omega21]

If Generation Identity can be banned for being vaguely "extremist" without actually engaging in violence, what's to stop the Freedom Party from being banned for "extremism"? I guess just popularity but only allowing freedom of expression based on popularity seems like a bad idea.

Hear hear!

If America has one thing right, it's freedom of expression.

We are not able to have the same level of freedom, as I would still support the ban on any type of Nazi glorification/Genocide denial and the ban on all forms of Nazi symbols (due to obvious, historic reasons), but I am for freedom of expression up to the point of what I just mentioned, or any calls to action.

[Tender Branson]

If Generation Identity can be banned for being vaguely "extremist" without actually engaging in violence, what's to stop the Freedom Party from being banned for "extremism"? I guess just popularity but only allowing freedom of expression based on popularity seems like a bad idea.

Hear hear!

If America has one thing right, it's freedom of expression.

We are not able to have the same level of freedom, as I would still support the ban on any type of Nazi glorification/Genocide denial and the ban on all forms of Nazi symbols (due to obvious, historic reasons), but I am for freedom of expression up to the point of what I just mentioned, or any calls to action.

Yeah, this.

The ÖVP wants to ban them as an organisation, but it doesn't mean it can be banned so easily. Registered organisations or associations in Austria (Verein) are being protected quite strongly under the law and constitution, so if there's not some form of violence or extreme hate speech, you will not find judges willing to ban them ...

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

I don't think the Identitarians should be shut down, but it's not like you guys were upset when Austria shut several mosques and expelled their imams from the country because of their Islamist leanings.  If Generation Identity is allowed, then it stands to reason so should the ATIB and MB.

[Tender Branson]

I don't think the Identitarians should be shut down, but it's not like you guys were upset when Austria shut several mosques and expelled their imams from the country because of their Islamist leanings.  If Generation Identity is allowed, then it stands to reason so should the ATIB and MB.

That's a bit of a different matter, because ATIB and the Muslim Brotherhood are directly steered and financed from abroad and act as an extended arm of a foreign country, such as Turkey, Saudi-Arabia etc. - which cannot be said of the Identitarians. Obviously, the IM needs to be closely monitored and banned if they engage in violent acts and everything related to political Islam needs to be weeded out as well. Kurz isn't completely wrong on this issue and has 80%+ of Austrians on his side. There needs to be a serious crackdown on these movements, so that it doesn't spread further. After all, political Islam + the Neo-Nazis are a cancer.

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

that's the thing: Islamism, Turkish nationalism and neo-Nazis are all cancers but I'm increasingly leaning towards a discomfort towards the use of state power to shut down organizations using legal sophistry. If an organization is directly encouraging and organising violent acts against people it should be shuttered, but I don't think merely holding terrible views is grounds for a legal ban.

[Tender Branson]

A few charts for the election:

[Keep Calm and ...]

The logo of Die Bierpartei looks like the former Logo of the german FDP (they used this logo between 2001 and 2013 and a very similar one till 2015)


Source: public domain
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Freie_Demokratische_Partei_%28Logo,_2001-2013%29.svg

[Tender Branson]

The logo of Die Bierpartei looks like the former Logo of the german FDP (they used this logo between 2001 and 2013 and a very similar one till 2015)


Source: public domain
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Freie_Demokratische_Partei_%28Logo,_2001-2013%29.svg

Yeah, I noticed this as well.

I wonder what percentage the Beer Party will get in Vienna, especially in the election district of Vienna-South, which is where their origins are ...

[Cranberry]

As the mosque closings have been mentioned, it should perhaps be added that every single measure taken there (closure of 7 mosques, expulsion of several ATIB (Turkish) Imams, closure of the (Saudi-financed) Arab religious community) has since then been rendered null and void by the courts, partially due to legal form errors and partially due to disagreeing with basic rights and freedoms. There is a very large probability that any hypothetical measures regarding the IBÖ would suffer the same fate. Incidentally, that is a very recurring theme when it comes to Sebastian Kurz's record in goverment (whether as foreign minister or as chancellor), so very fitting perhaps.

[Tender Branson]

With just 6 weeks to go until the election, the intensive campaign period has started today for the parties.

The SPÖ unveiled the 1st of 3 poster campaigns, focusing on the climate crisis and work and titled "Humanity wins.":

One of the more interesting proposals is a "climate ticket" for all public transport systems, worth 1€/day for one state, 2€/day for 3 states, or 3€/day for all of Austria.

And a minimum wage of 1.700€ per month, 14x per year - which is ca. 14.20$/hour in US-terms. Plus a 6th paid vacation week for everyone after 25 years of work (currently, this is only the case if you have been in the same company for 25 years).

https://www.spoe.at/2019/08/19/plakate-fuer-die-spoe-wahlkampagne-2019

[Tender Branson]

Molotov attack on FPÖ HQ in Lower Austria:

https://www.oe24.at/oesterreich/politik/Landbauer-Es-haette-Tote-geben-koennen/392662350

A young Afghan so-called "refugee" has been identified and arrested as one of the perpetrators.

The 4 suspects were caught on camera throwing the Molotov cocktails into the FPÖ headquarter, but one was so stupid and set himself on fire and later had to be treated at a hospital for burn wounds and he was arrested there. 3 remain at large.

The FPÖ is wild and Norbert Hofer demands his immediate deportation.

https://www.krone.at/1980170

Also:

Norbert Hofer (FPÖ) will be interviewed during the ORF's "summer interview" series tonight at 9pm.

https://orf.at/stories/3134215

[Tender Branson]

The "election cabin" with 26 questions for the upcoming federal election is online:

https://wahlkabine.at/nationalratswahl-2019/wahlkabine/1

My results:

[Tender Branson]

Here's a "vote cabin" analysis by Laurenz Ennser-Jedenastik, based on the party answers on the 26 questions and how much the parties have in common with each other combined (excluding the weighting feature of "important" to "not important" for each question):



https://www.derstandard.at/story/2000107542875/plattform-wahlkabinezur-nationalratswahl-gestartet

Example:

SPÖ and FPÖ have the same opinion on 50% of the 26 questions, without the importance of the questions factored in.

ÖVP and FPÖ have 81% in common (21 of 26 questions).

Greens and ÖVP have only 19% in common (5 questions), even lower than the 23% for FPÖ and Greens (6 questions).

Greens+Jetzt (NOW)+KPÖ+Wandel (Change) are virtually identical on the 26 questions and have between 81-92% in common.

[Tender Branson]

Norbert Hofer (FPÖ) will be interviewed during the ORF's "summer interview" series tonight at 9pm.

https://orf.at/stories/3134215

Hofer spent ca. 25 minutes talking about climate change („definitely man-made“) and renewable energy („I want to tax it less, so that Austria gets de-carbonized and more people switch to renewable energy.“), 20 minutes about Strache and various FPÖ scandals („We are proud of what Strache has done for our movement over the past 15 years, but under my watch he will not return to political office until all accusations are dealt with in court.“) and 1 minute about foreigners or immigration („everyone knows what the FPÖ stands for.“)

[Tender Branson]

The 1 minute Hofer talked about immigration in the 1-hour interview is creating the biggest buzz on Twitter right now because:

ORF-Moderator: „As you may know, asylum requests this year are down to 6.000 so far, compared to 90.000 in the year 2015. Is asylum and immigration still a big topic for the FPÖ today ?“

Hofer: „Of course it is. Everyone knows what the FPÖ stands for: low asylum requests and swift deportation of criminals, the protection of Austrian citizens. If I read newspaper reports about crimes being committed, I can often tell you the origin of the perpetrator. And that this perpetrator is certainly not from a random (insert Austrian) city, but from a foreign culture where the knife is sitting a bit easier.“

Twitter folks call the knife-comment highly racist ...

[Tender Branson]

An Austrian „summer TV interview“ of party leaders, with crickets chirping in the background:



A scene from „The Bachelor“:

[Tender Branson]

Over the next week, the final number of eligible voters (incl. all the registered Austrians abroad) will be released.

But based on the preliminary numbers it is already clear that the number of voters will slightly decrease for the 1st time since 1995.

In 2017, about 6.401 million people were eligible to vote - but this time it will be around 5.000 people less because of more Austrian citizens dying than being born, which is not compensated with enough naturalisations of foreigners.

I expect a total of 6.396.000 eligible voters.

[Tender Branson]

The "election cabin" with 26 questions for the upcoming federal election is online:

Nobody doing the test ?

PS: a huge 4x3 meter SPÖ-campaign poster (the one with Rendi-Wagner and the other people on it) has been put up in front of our company.

[bigic]

My results



BTW it's a shame that NEOS is the only Austrian party that supports the EU-Mercosur free trade agreement

[Tender Branson]

BTW it's a shame that NEOS is the only Austrian party that supports the EU-Mercosur free trade agreement.

Not really.

Mercosur is a pretty bad deal, which would wreak havoc on the small European farmers.

Besides it's an absolutely shi**y and counterproductive deal as well: Why should Europeans import South American meat, if the same can be produced locally from our small farmers and sold here without transporting the (often tainted) meat all the way from South America, creating tons of additional CO2 emmissions ?

I vigorously oppose this trade deal.

[LAKISYLVANIA]

My result, but i would vote KPO. Answered on 24 questions, except 2 i didn't understand.