2011 State Elections in Germany

[Franzl]

Special.

Only 3 parties would get seats.

Only 3 parties have seats now.

[republicanism]

So many polls and state elections in Germany where the FDP is down at the 2 or 3% mark. Are there starting to be articles appearing in German newspapers along the lines of "End of the road for FDP - can the party survive?"

Not that I wouldn't be the first one cheering when the FDP loses representation on the federal level, but the party has been in a likewise bad condition in the late 1990s. And recovered.

A very good source for older German polls is this site:

http://www.wahlrecht.de/umfragen/index.htm

Click on the name on the institute and you get all of the polls reaching back till 1998 in most cases, FGW even has data till 1994.

[Middle-aged Europe]

^^

The FDP still manages to hit new lows though.

Back then, they never dropped below 4% in polls. Most polling firms see them at 3% now.

[Tender Branson]

New Bayern poll by Forsa:

41% CSU
24% SPD
10% Greens
  9% Freie Wähler
  6% Pirates
  3% FDP
  1% Bayernpartei
  6% Others (Linke etc.)

Majority for SPD-Greens-FW-Pirates. Should be a funny election.

New Hessen poll by FGW:

33% CDU
32% SPD
19% Greens
  6% Pirates
  3% Left
  3% FDP
  4% Others

Strong 51-39 majority for SPD-Greens.

[Tender Branson]

Also:

In the new Emnid poll for Germany, the Greens dropped to a new low of 14%, which is their lowest level in almost 2 years (April 2010).

[Middle-aged Europe]

After only eleven days in office, Berlin's newly elected justice minister Michael Braun (CDU) has resigned today.

Allegations of unethical conduct as a lawyer in connection with real estate deals had already surfaced prior to his appointment. The leaders of the new SPD/CDU coalition showed bad judgement in appointing him anyway, but that's why it's also so entertaining, I suppose.

[minionofmidas]

So the Frankfurt SPD have selected their mayoral candidate.

Anyone but Paris 1057 (official ballot description: "Peter Feldmann")
Michael Paris 909

And the Green candidate looks good on paper except that nobody's ever heard of her, and the exceptions to that have heard of her under another name.
And at a embarassing-turnout members' meeting, the anointed new city party chair MdB Omid Nouripour came embarassingly closeish to losing to a random candidate from the crowd. And old family friend way back when, as it happens, and the face of the party in Harheim (lol) for, like, the past 25 years.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Any interesting details to either story?

[minionofmidas]

Any interesting details to either story?

Well Helmut pretty much got up and said "yeah well, I'm very disappointed at the low turnout here tonight despite record membership, especially when we're here to anoint the new party chair, and it just goes to show what's wrong with the party at present and how it's become like all the others, and therefore I'm standing against Omid as a counting candidate" and then he got almost 40% (out of 70 valid votes, plus abstentions - barely over half of those present voted for Nouripour).

The SPD were desperate for a candidate. It's no secret that everybody's best-known social democratic attention whore wants to run, has wanted to for a long time. It's also no secret that the powers that be, left and old right, agree that he's an empty suit they'd rather not be seeing around. That said, I'd wager a bet he has the best gross positive name rec of any Social Democrat in Frankfurt (bar Ypsilanti). He'd certainly have made a better candidate than last time's tired old bureaucrat, not that that's harder to do than to not do.
(Fun fact: When Jürgen Walter and Roland Koch were shopping around for two additional defectors from the SPD back in 2008, they appear to have contacted a small number of MdLs unsuccessfully before finding their people. Michael Paris is the only one to have outed himself, though.)
Of course, somebody does step up. Basically a more leftish, lesser known version of Paris (ie, another city councillor with a reputation for attention whoring and little "substance", and no administrative experience.) And they announce that they'll hold a few debates and then let the members vote. This is the result.

And yes, there is a highly amusing anecdote in the middle. Some taxi driver and rank-and-file party member figured out that Feldmann would probably win, and not on his own strength but just as being not Paris, and decided to enter as a third candidate. This was on the last day of filing. He was dissuaded in some half-hour one-on-one talk with Gernot Grumbach (is he still the city chair? I think he is. Very much top brass - he was in Ypsilanti's shadow cabinet - and very much a leftwinger, anyways) He had nice (non-ironic use here) words to say afterwards about Grumbach taking the time and listening to his grievances, though.

[Tender Branson]

No mention of this ?

...

Senior FDP Official Resigns - Merkel's Coalition Partner Falls Further into Crisis



A senior member of Chancellor Angela Merkel's junior coalition partners, the Free Democrats, threw in the towel on Wednesday. His resignation comes as a result of the party's deep split on how to approach the European debt crisis.

The euro crisis already has plenty of political victims on its conscience. Greek Prime Minister Giorgios Papandreou fell over his handling of draconian austerity measures in his country, and his Italian counterpart, Silvio Berlusconi, likewise couldn't stand up to the pressures of sovereign debt. Portugal, Ireland and Spain have also all seen governments collapse due to the problems facing the common currency.

Now it would appear that winds of change have begun blowing in Berlin. On Wednesday morning, Christian Lindner, the general secretary of Chancellor Angela Merkel's junior coalition partners, the business-friendly Free Democrats, announced that he was stepping down from his party office.

"The moment comes when one has to step aside to make a new dynamic possible," he said in a statement.

The move comes at a notably sensitive time for the FDP. The party is key to Merkel's hold on power in Germany, yet it has spent well over a year struggling mightily in public opinion polls. Furthermore, it has made very little headway in putting its stamp on Merkel's policies. Indeed, if elections were held this Sunday, a new poll shows that the FDP would receive a paltry 3 percent of the vote, not enough for parliamentary representation.

http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/0,1518,803660,00.html

[Franzl]

This government is good for entertainment. I'll give them that.

[Tender Branson]

2 new polls out today showing the FDP down to 2%:

Federal Forsa poll:

35% CDU/CSU
28% SPD
14% Greens
  9% Pirates
  7% Left
  2% FDP
  5% Others

Emnid poll for Bayern:

44% CSU
21% SPD
13% Greens
  9% FW
  5% Pirates
  2% Left
  2% FDP
  4% Others

Majority for SPD-Greens-FW-Pirates.

[Tender Branson]

So, is Bayern the only state left now with a majority for center-right parties ?

I think CSU, FW and FDP (55%) can be considered center-right, while SPD, Greens, Pirates and Left can be considered center-left (41%).

[republicanism]

So, is Bayern the only state left now with a majority for center-right parties ?

Saxony.

[Teddy (IDS Legislator)]

So, is Bayern the only state left now with a majority for center-right parties ?

Saxony.

Which one, aren't there 4 or 5 saxonies?

[Franzl]

So, is Bayern the only state left now with a majority for center-right parties ?

Saxony.

Which one, aren't there 4 or 5 saxonies?

Only one Saxony.

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

So, is Bayern the only state left now with a majority for center-right parties ?

Saxony.

Which one, aren't there 4 or 5 saxonies?

Saxony, Saxony-Anhalt, and Lower Saxony.

[JonBidinger]

State government in Saarland collapsed today. The CDU is trying to form a grand coalition with the SPD but early elections will be called if that fails.

[minionofmidas]

Wait, what? Lol.

[MaxQue]

I fail to understand what FDP is trying to do.

[minionofmidas]

The FDP didn't walk out of the Saarland government, it was kicked out.

[Middle-aged Europe]

Hilarious that it didn't happen because of CDU/Green friction like in Hamburg, instead it happened because of friction between CDU and FDP.

[republicanism]

From what I heard my f'ing stupid party is going to do f'ing stupid things again and is ready to join in as a junior partner in a Grand coalition, despite having the best chances to became the strongest party after early elections and for party leader Heiko Maas to become Minister president then (either in a SPD/CDU or a SPD/Left coalition).

Not to late to give up hope, but things sound bad.


Edit: As "Old Europe" pointed out I got the first name of the SPD-Saarland leader wrong.

[Middle-aged Europe]

From what I heard my f'ing stupid party is going to do f'ing stupid things again and is ready to join in as a junior partner in a Grand coalition, despite having the best chances to became the strongest party after early elections and for party leader Nils Maas to become Minister president then (either in a SPD/CDU or a SPD/Left coalition).

Not to late to give up hope, but things sound bad.

Is "Nils Maas" a hybrid of Heiko Maas and Nils Schmid?

[Jens]

From what I heard my f'ing stupid party is going to do f'ing stupid things again and is ready to join in as a junior partner in a Grand coalition, despite having the best chances to became the strongest party after early elections and for party leader Heiko Maas to become Minister president then (either in a SPD/CDU or a SPD/Left coalition).

Not to late to give up hope, but things sound bad.


Edit: As "Old Europe" pointed out I got the first name of the SPD-Saarland leader wrong.

Why do SPD insist on killing it self by being junior partner in grand coalitions? I makes very little sense!