Greens Gain in Germany, and the World Takes Notice

[pampango]

A string of Green Party victories and strong electoral showings across Germany, from the conservative south to the port cities of the north, are helping to redefine politics among voters who are increasingly losing faith in the more established parties.

“Nothing in our political science books has prepared us for this kind of party,” said Josef Joffe, publisher of the weekly newspaper Die Zeit, who noted that the Greens have won the culture war on the left over the rusty Social Democrats on issues like gay rights and the integration of immigrants. “I bet if you had a party like this in America, all my rich friends on both coasts would vote for it.”

The global surge has remained under the radar in the United States, for many reasons. In a system dominated by two parties, the Greens have no representatives in Congress or, for that matter, in a single state legislature. The party’s image and electoral success in the United States has been tightly bound to the ultimately doomed presidential bids of Ralph Nader rather than depending on the grass-roots methods used to build the Greens in Germany. The German Greens even have their own local chapter in Washington, and they have served as a model for their political cousins abroad.

The mass killings in Norway in July riveted attention on the strength of right-wing populist parties across Europe, but particularly in Scandinavia. Yet with far fewer headlines, the Green Party in Sweden won more votes in last year’s parliamentary election than the far-right Sweden Democrats, taking 7.3 percent of the vote compared with 5.7 percent for the nationalists.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/02/world/europe/02greens.html

[bbgrunt]

1. hope sprouts in the civilized world.

[glinda]

3. +1

[Odin2005]

2. Yay!

[WillyT]

4. Fantastic !!! - K & R !!!

:woohoo:

:bounce:

:hi:

:kick:

[tabasco]

5. I kind of relate the CDU to the pukes here in the US

and the SDP to the Dems.

The Greens are what we might have if we had a parliamentary system of government and not so many right-wing idiots.

[theophilus]

6. Oh for a Green Spring! n/t

[sfpcjock]

7. Beschmerkel fatigue? +R

[bluestate10]

8. What US progressives can learn.

Is that they can't win with out of touch standard bearers like Nader or Kucinich. German Greens built from the ground up and were patient.

[Bryn]

9. K&R

Yay!

[NeoGreen]

10. Yet here (DU) it is the ...

... "Party that shall not be named".