This getting more and more fun in Germany

[MissHoneychurch]

all the parties don't want to govern with anyone. Those not with those, the others not with them .... just crazy. This ought to get interesting :popcorn:

[...of J.Temperance]

1. Unless someone...ANYONE...can form a minority government

Then there will very probably have to be a new election. I'm glad that this election that they had yesterday, has finally proven how unpopular Angela Merkel is.

A lot of the European media has been pumping her up something rotten for months...Hmmmm, sound like the actions of ANOTHER media that we know, pumping up an unpopular figure.

[MissHoneychurch]

2. I am glad about that too

it was and is just crazy. The people want rather Schröder than Merkel as chancellor but they are not too happy with the politic of the SPD the last years. I have the bad feeling though that Merkel is going to become chancellor after all. But you are right, there will be an election before 4 years.

[...of J.Temperance]

4. Gosh, let's hope not

I'm hoping that the German President has to step in. Because Merkel is so unpopular, and Schroder, for all his faults is still popular, the German President could ask Schroder to try and form a minority government.

However yes, with a year I'd say, there'll have to be another election.

[MissHoneychurch]

7. cool we are getting Italian proportions

:eyes:

if the parties keep up with those games, Köhler will have to step in. In Spiegel online they write, that some experts already call out for him.

[1932]

23. Now that Merkl is seen to be on a downward slide, she wouldn't win another

election.

Schroeder might have timed this election perfectly. He knew the media was exaggerating her support, but if he waited longer, they might have built enough support for her to get her elected.

He saw that if he called an election, it would be tight, but it would show that she was about 20% lower than the media was claiming.

Perhaps he knew that she would then be seen as being on a downward trajectory (rather than on the upward trajectory that she was really on, even if it was only upward from 20% to 35%).

Schroeder might have just pulled a major jujitsu move on the right wing and the media. He might have just turned the media lying on itself to destroy the candidate they were building up.

[europegirl4jfk]

3. I just watched the German TV special online

It's really funny. Schröder wants to stay chancellor and Merkel insists that she has to get the position now. They won't have another choice than to form a "grand coalition" and I really can't see Schröder and Merkel govern together. Could you imagine president Bush with vice-president Kerry or president Kerry with vice-president Bush? :crazy:

The real result of the election is that the Germans are fed up with both big parties and therefore a lot of people voted for the center FDP, the Greens and the new left party "Linke".

[MissHoneychurch]

5. yeah, but he is going to be our chancellor?

some experts call now for Horst Köhler (our president) to make a decision after talking to Merkel and Schröder.

The FDP doesn't want to be in a coaltion with the SPD
The SPD doesn't want to be in the government if Schröder isn't chancellor
Nobody is going to go in a coalition with the "Linke"

This is just nutz. Instead of thinking what is best for Germany (a big coaltion - and most people want that) they keep playing their party games.

[...of J.Temperance]

6. Well, Schroder has said

That he won't participate in a Grand Coalition if Merkel is in that Grand Coalition. Possibly if the CDU throw her overboard, they might get the Grand Coalition.

What a complete and utter mess.

[MissHoneychurch]

9. he said Grand Coaltion only with him as chancellor

Merkel can be part of it, just not chancellor.

What looks possible right now is CDU - FDP - Greens.

[europegirl4jfk]

19. CDU - FDP - Greens

Do you really think Fischer would play along with that? I would be really disappointed in him.

[neweurope]

8. There are different scenarios and most of them mean that we will

have to vote again. And then Schröder will win, I'm sure, and that's why he's looking like the cat with cream. The FDP will get less votes and so will the Left.

I do not like this constellation at all. Weimar started similarly. It'll stay interesting... we live in interesting times *sigh*

---------

Remember Fallujah

Bush to The Hague!

[MissHoneychurch]

10. "may you live in interesting times"

is a curse in China. Has something to it

What do you think about CDU - FDP - Greens?
It looks most likely right now. Or a minority government and we will have a new election in no time. Merkel even said before the election yesterday that if they won't win, there has to be a new election. :wtf:

[mazzarro]

11. Explain how Greens can be in coalition government with CDU?

Are the Greens not relatively far left of CDU (the conservatives)?

[MissHoneychurch]

13. yes they are

but if the CDU want to govern and not want to do it with the SPD, it is their only choice. And even Stoiber (more democratic right isn't possible) says the CDU should talk with the Greens.

[mazzarro]

18. Oh! I now remember Third-Way Politicians in the mold of Tony Blair!

How I hate politicians without strong principles. These Third-Way politicians - ie. DLC'ers of the Democratic party for instance, make me sick for the relative ease and willingness to sell out the average workers and citizens.

[neweurope]

12. CDU - FDP - Greens I would not like at all - but I'm sure the

Greens would go for it. Joseph Fischer sells his soul quicker'n anybody can say "Green". Just as long as he stays minister. He's the best politician the country has right now - and I dislike him immensely.

-----------

Remember Fallujah

Bush to The Hague!

[tabasco]

24. Thanks for the persepctive. My girlfriend voted SPD.

I'm glad the predicted CDU victory did not transpire. Your comments give me some hope that Schroeder will remain. I appreciate his position on the Iraq war and I am a US soldier.

[Joe Chi Minh]

14. I almost threw something at the TV,

when I heard an English CNN reporter asking/suggesting whether/that the German people were "afraid of change". You bloody idiot, it depends what the change is in favour of! In this case, WHO!

The German people have seen what's happened in the UK and the US post Thatcher and Reagan. They're not as daft as us.

His Nibs went on to say suggest they were afraid of any change that would be painful. Well I'll be hornswoggled! Imagine that, if you can! When the changes they have in mind, far from producing any benefit for the population, give power to the most avaricuous and least responsible in our societies. As La Thatcher famously put it: "Society stops at my front door".

But why can't those idiots ask themselves the simple questions, which would provide them with their answers, since they are so obvious - instead of casting cretinous slurs of pusillanimity/cowardice on the German public. We know the answer to that. And we know they will continue to insult our intelligence, with their tranparently infantile propaganda.

[MissHoneychurch]

15. what the politicians want

are elections without the people. How much easier it would be :eyes:

[Kellanved]

21. I read that a lot

It is a spectacular display of a lack of understanding of German politics.

All parties, with the exception of the structurally conservative "Linkspartei", ran with a reform agenda.

Schröder's Agenda 2010 is influenced by the Scandinavian model, Merkel took her ideas from the UK and Switzerland.

And while the Scandinavian model of a reformed welfare state seems to be viable, albeit not in the same degree as in the Scandinavian countries, it is worth to look at the performance of Merkel's proposals in other countries.

She demanded:
-A Swiss-like flat health insurance system with tax-based payments to fill the gaps. The major catch is that this moves the obligation of paying for heath care from being 50% employer/50% employee to 100% employee; i.e. a cut in pay by no small percentage.
-> In Switzerland the health costs quadrupled after implementing the system, further reducing the income. The Netherlands are having a similar experience.

-Raising the sales tax by two points to give tax breaks for the top income bracket (She claimed to use the sales tax money to finance her health system, but that's just a example of numbers being pushed around). Major inconsistency, as she blamed the low consumer-confidence for the economic trouble. Raising the sales tax is not exactly an accepted way to help consumer confidence.

-Reducing union influence. Worked great in the UK. All the car makers moved to the UK; the industrial blue-collar workforce grew... hey wait moment. That never happened, did it?

-long term goal: flat tax. Especially great with the flat health proposal, as it means screwing the lower middle class thrice (once by the sales tax, once by removing the low tax bracket and once by making them pay the same amount for health care as the top-earners)

...

Also, Merkel has an extremely weak standing in her own party, the conservatives aren't too reform happy (their record should be proof enough of that fact, almost all reforming happened under SPD-led governments).

[Joe Chi Minh]

33. Don't use their weasel- word "reform".

The correct word is "deform". Likewise, when they talk about "modernising", they mean "regressing".

Blair has always used this double Dutch to distort the truth and, of course, it has been routinely peddled by the media barons' myrmidons.
It does not make those and similar terms one wit less duplicitous.

[Joe Chi Minh]

36. Very informative Kellanved. Thank you.

Due to the flat taxes and all the other con tricks, I think the UK is in free-fall now, and can only get worse, as the people are increasingly robbed of what little spending power they retain. These psychos are too dumb to understand and put a stop to their rapine and pillage.

And my sincere apologies to any Dutch people who might have been offended by my expression, "Double Dutch"! It's just a childish thing we've inherited from the days when our empire was in competition with yours, the French and the Portuguese. The Portuguese seem to have got away unscathed.

We and the Americans (or our monied classes, anyway), I believe owe much of our economic development to our adoption of a stockmarket, which we learnt apparently from you Dutch. I just learned about it recently on cable. However, it has been a double-edged sword, in that we now have what Will Hutton calls a "rentier" economy with people living off share earnings, share prices being God, while the CEO's and directors are still able to plunder the companies (and by extension, the nation) shamelessly.

We and the French have a strangely ambivalent attitude to things French/English among oursleves. The height of "chic", here, is for a hairdresser to be called a "coiffeur". In France, I'm told, it's the other way round, and the same applies to a number of other words. Though when it comes to other items, notably, "stationery", the old xenophobic venom comes out!

Also, the toffs here feel it proper to pronounce "restaurant", not as "restoront", but "restaurong". Most English people cannot pronounce "an", and, sad old geezer that I am, for some reason it drives me mad! Also "onvelope", instead of "enveloppe", or better, the plain English "envelope".

But the British whatever inventive technical skills they may have had, tend to be exceptionally poor at pronouncing foreign languages. The "Infanta of Castile" applied to a certain quarter of London became, "the Elephand and Castle"! Olazabal, according to one commentator, "Olatharble"!

PS: I don't want to jump the gun, but it look theirs intended self-fulfilling prophecy of the right-wing woman winning, may have come unstuck, and Schroder may lead a coalition! Tee Hee!

[bemildred]

16. Does this mean Germany is a "failed state"? nt

[MissHoneychurch]

17. the foreign press seems to think so

[Joe Chi Minh]

34. Anything but!

Shops are closing down all over Britain; more than 300 UK firms fold each week; 50,000 are expected to fold over the the next 3 years. Consumers need a living wage, of course, in order to purchase goods.

At the height of the grotesquely false, credit-driven, Thatcher boom years, Will Hutton, economic columnist of the Guardian - I think it was - pointed out that it would take the UK 100 years to attain the current wealth of Germany.

But people must stop believing the vapid and transparently grotesque propaganda of the far right, that a country's wealth is measured by the aggregate personal fortunes of its wealthiest citizens, AT THE EXPENSE OF THE REST OF THE CITIZENRY, AND THE COUNTRY'S SOCIAL AND MATERIAL INRASTRUCTURE. It's not **** rocket science, for crying out loud!!!!

Nothing personal, bemildred. I'm not having a shot at you.

[Kellanved]

20. Unless the assclowns in the FDP come to their senses, we'll vote again

The FDP is ridiculous, they had their best, most effective, time during the social-liberal coalition. They never came close to a record that good with the conservatives, where they always were a colorless group of yes-sayers in a static government.
Westerwelle claiming that he wanted to change things, and thus is unwilling to join forces with the SPD is a bad joke. The one place where the FDP is guaranteed (not that they have any intention to do anything) not to change anything is in the opposition. :D

[MissHoneychurch]

25. Westerwelle himself is a joke

and didn't Merkel say something like that, that if she won't win there will be a new election?

[1932]

22. They have to do that so that the small parties are in a stong bargaining

positions.

I think it will be extemely unlikely if this doesn't end up with the three left parties working together with Schroeder as their leader. But before they get there, the two small partners have to make sure they get everything they want.

[JVS]

26. What's the breakdown?

If you could list the parties and who they don't want to govern with it would be very informative

[MissHoneychurch]

27. let me see if I get everything together

no one wants to govern with the "Linkspartei"
FDP doesn't want to govern with the SPD
CDU doesn't really wants to govern with the SPD
SPD olny wants to govern with the CDU if Schröder stays chancellor
Greens keep their options open

[JVS]

28. Does the PDS have herpes or something?

Why no coallition love?

[Kellanved]

29. well

1. They themselves have ruled out participating in / tolerating any coalition.

2. Indeed. They have political herpes. AKA former Dictator syndrome. In their cames it comes together with a case of protest vote appeal and a delusional program.

[JVS]

30. Cool

#1 Seems to show that 15 years later they are bringing down the BRD from the inside!


#2 Hey, somebody has to do the day to day operations required to run a Soviet satellite state.

[enigma-e]

31. The only real option is a tolerated minority government ...

... given the current party statements.

There are 5 major parties in Germany:

SPD (center left), CDU / CSU (conservatives), FDP (center right), Greens (left), Linke (far left).

The CDU won't form a coalition with the SPD, unless their candidate (Merkel) is made chancellor.

The SPD won't form a coalition with the CDU, unless their incumbent (Schroeder) is made chancellor.

The Greens won't form a coalition with the CDU.

The FDP won't form a coalition with the SPD.

Nobody will work together with the Linke.

Thus, the only option is that SPD and Greens form a coalition , while the CDU and FDP join and form a coalition of their own.

Then both factions put their respective to the Bundestag (parliament) vote.

There's no way whatsoever that the Linke will vote for the CDU faction proposal, so they will - in all likelihood rather vote for the alternative, thus creating a tolerated minority government.

[Yupster]

32. Thanks for this info

Any idea of which party will have how many seats, or is it too early for that?

[enigma-e]

35. Bundestag seats are as follows:

SPD: 222
CDU/CSU: 225
Greens: 51
FDP: 61
Linke: 54

The - albeit small- joker is the Wahlkreis (electoral district) #160 (Dresden), where a candidate died just before the election. They'll vote on Oct 02.

The mandate of this district went in the last years regularly to the CDU.

But if too many people vote CDU this time, the CDU will win a so called "Ueberhangmandat" (excess mandate). But due to the fact that the state of Saxony only can have three Ueberhangmandate, (and three are already spoken for), the fourth will be forfeited (this is due to the complicated German election system).

Also, if the SPD gets more than 90 % of the second votes, they could tie the CDU on nation level.

But the latter scenario is rather hypothetically.