The first exit polls for the German federal elections are out
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Because this kind of coalition was the definition of stale, boring politics in the past. No innovations, mainly slight adjustments here and there.
During the last time that coalition said something like "Das Internet ist für uns alle Neuland." which means something along the line of "The internet is frontier land for all of us." Within seconds #Neuland (frontier land) became the hash tag for a shitstorm that still lasts to this day - after 12 (!) years.
The internet was already established and well in use everywhere for ~20 years. And now the politicians suddenly recognized a new form of communication. If it wasn't so funny I would have cried.That's why everyone is disappointed. Can't wait to hear what stupid shit this goverment will tell us. 🥱
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It would be extremist if they do that instead of just telling what they would like to do. Trump tells us he wants to annex Canada and Greenland. Does that make him an extremist too?
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No, more like if (somehow) George Bush and Trump ran against each other and Bush won.
Its far from a great result but its not as bad as it could've been and, from a European standpoint, it means there's strong opposition to Trump and strong support for Ukraine.
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We also got Russia and the US weaponizing social media to support far-right parties. The EU needs to get their shit together.
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It's not about fewer parties in elections, it's about fewer parties in Parliament and quickly having a stable government.
Your link is written by an idiot.
In Germany you can still vote for a small party. If enough people do, the party gets 5%, or about 32 seats, which are enough MP's to actually participate in the process without getting burned out.
We could also start in the Netherlands with 2%, which is 3 MP's.
I think 4% (6 MP's) would be better though.
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OK, if you're dismissing a source just because it doesn't fit your preconceived notions, even though it's written by someone who's literal job is to research the subject, and provides the numbers to back it up, then I'm not sure what we're doing here.
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Some people suck at their job.
It is what it is.
In any case, Germany will probably have a government within a month, two if things get crazy.
And that's cold hard facts.
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An extremely far right party in ireland got a lot of following on twitter, then in the election about 5 people voted for them. Guess Americans and Russian bots can't vote.
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Yeah that too.
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And their opposition to the law wasn't transphobic (in the strict sense) in the first place but regarded abuse potential,
Or maybe they just hide their transphobia behind a thin veil of reasonable-sounding, legal arguments.
and marijuana legalization for instance
They won't.
They will use that topic for diversion in a pinch. It's mostly meaningless to them, but they'll happily jump at the chance to play off unemployed stoners against the hard-working middle class.
Also they'd fail before the constitutional court as outlawing it back then was not scrutinised by the same standards the constitutional court would apply now.
That's genuinely somehing for a judge to decide. And it's usually years before unconstitutional laws are revoked.
[xenophoobic rhetoric] Merz picked that up in a (stupid) attempt to get AfD votes.
Merz is also, genuinely, a bigot. In all possible respects: toward women, toward foreigners, toward gender and sexual minorities, towards non-Christians, ...
And there are also all manner of attempts to divide non-Germans within Germany, one of these is:
- Good: "we paid for this person to come here and take care of that elderly lady".
- Bad: "this person is now caring for an elderly lady, but they're worthless because they came as a refugee originally, they need to go"
Don't forget that all the rhetoric of the past 3 months, from the right-wing parties in particular, but also from SPD, and even the Greens with their "deportations to Afghanistan and Syria, sure, but only to a rational degree" ideas have already spooked people living here. We're also bound to see right-wing attacks rise further.
Merz and CxU are also not paragons of rationality. Everybody knew, and they must have known that they would only strengthen the Afd if they went all in on "bad foreigners" as the primary campaign topic. Really, 100% predictable. But they did. They used a terror attack to start the discussion and executed just as Merz had wanted to for 20 years, in fact. And they indeed lost 4.5% since the polls in November and the election last weekend, much of it to Afd. Primo job!
The CDU is captured by lobby interests and the lobby wants immigrant workers. Loudly. Vocally.
One of the interests of that lobby is actually undercutting pay those employees. That's significantly easier when your employees don't know about their rights, when they're not working legally, etc.
You mentioned SMEs. SMEs are not that important to CxU, even less to Merz. But they look good as figureheads, so they get some breadcrumbs, and lots of mentions in speeches. And they're told to grow.
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Or maybe they just hide their transphobia behind a thin veil of reasonable-sounding, legal arguments.
That's paranoia, not analysis, also, the CDU is too big to keep such a conspiracy secret. It'd rather look like the AfD's attempts to not look fascist. Also, they'd be facing opposition from the churches to... capture a sentiment that doesn't really exist outside of a couple of rabid people noone will tear away from the AfD, anyway? To discriminate against one of the first groups of people the Nazis prosecuted?
They will use that topic for diversion in a pinch. It’s mostly meaningless to them, but they’ll happily jump at the chance to play off unemployed stoners against the hard-working middle class.
True, still those topics are a dime a dozen and first they'd have to actually desire a ruckus. Right now is the absolute worst time for that, they want unity and stability to a) face the existing geopolitical threats and b) look better than the traffic light and c) don't know whether they realise that but to weaken the AfD, which thrives on democratic parties bickering.
Everybody knew, and they must have known that they would only strengthen the Afd if they went all in on “bad foreigners” as the primary campaign topic.
And there was internal opposition! But CDU does as CDU does once Merz was elected leader, not so much because Merkel's wing would be weak but because the middle wing wanted to balance the scales, the rest of the party kept silent to only moderating slightly. They do that kind of thing all the time, shifting the external perception of the party by putting different people on the front. They might not be deep strategists but they know what strategy is and they have the internal discipline to follow through on it.
Side note did you notice Söder very much emphasising social stuff in the Union faction press conference. Fuck me if in the end it's the Bavarians causing a resurgence in social housing projects etc, actually combat the core reasons why the AfD surged.
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Promoting fediverse apps is the way
