2013 Elections in Germany

[Sozialliberal]

- Linke and Piraten will almost surely fall below the 5% hurdle, so it might be better anyway to vote Grüne and/or SPD (last time I splitted my votes between SPD and Grüne, which in Bavaria means real proportional vote splitting, differently from the federal case)

"Die Linke" will almost certainly be represented in the Bundestag after the coming election for two reasons. Firstly, they have their loyal voters in the east. Secondly, they could benefit from a special electoral law: A party is excepted from the 5 per cent hurdle if it wins at least three direct mandates. In German federal elections, you have two votes: The first vote is for an individual candidate who runs in your constituency and the second vote is for a party list. The seats that are won with first votes are known as "direct mandates" (Direktmandate) and the seats that are won with second votes are known as "list mandates" (Listenmandate). There are two constituencies in the east of Berlin that are safe seats for "Die Linke": Lichtenberg and Marzahn-Hellersdorf. "Die Linke" and their predecessor party PDS have held the direct mandates of these two constituencies since the 1990 election. Treptow-Köpenick, another constituency in the east of Berlin, used to be held by the SPD until the 2005 election. Gregor Gysi, one of the best known and most popular politicians of "Die Linke", won the Treptow-Köpenick seat in 2005 and again in 2009. They won 16 direct mandates in total in the last election. So "Die Linke" have a good chance of winning three direct mandates in this election. Interetingly, their predecessor party PDS has been the only party since the 1957 election that has benefited from that electoral law. In the 1994 election, they won 30 seats even though they only won 4.4 % of the federal vote. The PDS was excepted from the hurdle because they won four direct mandates. Unsurprisingly, they won all four of them in the east of Berlin.

[Sozialliberal]

- Linke and Piraten will almost surely fall below the 5% hurdle, so it might be better anyway to vote Grüne and/or SPD (last time I splitted my votes between SPD and Grüne, which in Bavaria means real proportional vote splitting, differently from the federal case)

"Die Linke" will almost certainly be represented in the Bundestag after the coming election for two reasons. Firstly, they have their loyal voters in the east. Secondly, they could benefit from a special electoral law: A party is excepted from the 5 per cent hurdle if it wins at least three direct mandates. In German federal elections, you have two votes: The first vote is for an individual candidate who runs in your constituency and the second vote is for a party list. The seats that are won with first votes are known as "direct mandates" (Direktmandate) and the seats that are won with second votes are known as "list mandates" (Listenmandate). There are two constituencies in the east of Berlin that are safe seats for "Die Linke": Lichtenberg and Marzahn-Hellersdorf. "Die Linke" and their predecessor party PDS have held the direct mandates of these two constituencies since the 1990 election. Treptow-Köpenick, another constituency in the east of Berlin, used to be held by the SPD until the 2005 election. Gregor Gysi, one of the best known and most popular politicians of "Die Linke", won the Treptow-Köpenick seat in 2005 and again in 2009. So "Die Linke" have a good chance of winning three direct mandates in this election. Interetingly, their predecessor party PDS has been the only party since the 1957 election that has benefited from that electoral law. In the 1994 election, they won 30 seats even though they only won 4.4 % of the federal vote. The PDS was excepted from the hurdle because they won four direct mandates. Unsurprisingly, they won all four of them in the east of Berlin.

Palandio is talking about the Bayern State Election, not the federal election.

Sorry, I overlooked that they meant the election in Bavaria. My bad! However, I think that these are interesting facts nonetheless.

[Sozialliberal]

Note that the interview with Steinbrück was not a normal interview. The "Süddeutsche Zeitung Magazin" publishes the interview series "Sagen Sie jetzt nichts" (Don't Say Anything Now) in which the interviewees don't answer with words but with gestures and facial expressions. I don't think you should take Steinbrück's middle finger response too seriously.

You can find the whole interview under (I can't post links ):
sz-magazin dot sueddeutsche dot de/texte/bildergalerie/40461/1/Sagen-Sie-jetzt-nichts-Peer-Steinbrueck#bild

1st question: Mr Steinbrück, you and your wife have been married for 38 years. Your tip for a long, happy marriage?

2nd question: Pannen-Peer (Mishap Peer), Problem-Peer (a reference to the "problem bear" Bruno), Peerlusconi – you don't have to worry about nice nicknames, do you? (Steinbrück gave the middle finger response to this question.)

3rd question: Only 28 per cent would currently vote for the SPD. Is it your fault?

4th question: FDP leader Philipp Rösler denies your ability to be a chancellor. Do you have a message for him?

5th question: A question of style: Do you wear an undergarment underneath your shirt?

6th question: On a scale of one to ten: How well does Angela Merkel manage the crisis? (1 = abysmally, 10 = masterfully)

7th question: How would you react if the Greens formed a coalition with the Union (CDU/CSU) for lack of alternatives after all?

[Sozialliberal]

FDP vote holding up surprisingly well in superposh urban precincts. Left holding up much much better in the city than in rural parts of the state.

Here's a precinct Al may remember... 441 08, the Platen estate

CDU 84 17,3 %
SPD 218 44,9 %
FDP 5 1,0 %
Greens 58 12,0 %
Left 84 17,3 %
Pirate 12 2,5 %
AfD 17 3,5 %

How come FDP is doing so miserably? Isn't they supposed to be the Liberal Party? Or have they become more far right? Are they considered to the right of CDU? I read somewhere that they were regarded as the (big) business party. Which surprised me as I thought that would be CDU? And normally liberal parties, or at least the European style social liberal parties, tend to be small business parties, not advocating the needs of big businesses, as that's the aim of the conservative parties, and to a lesser extent, the social democratic parties.

Or is the reason simply that their party leader is extremely unpopular? And why would that be? Does he simply lack any kind of charisma? Or is it his policy positions that are the problem?

I'm glad to see The Greens holding up fairly well.

Let me clarify this for you: The German FDP is not a social liberal party like Venstre in Norway. It's an economic liberal party. Well, the FDP actually used to be a social liberal party in the 1970s, but that was a long time ago. If you asked me what Norwegian party is most similar to the German FDP, I'd say DLF, though the FDP is more moderate and not generally sceptical about the EU. I'm glad they're gone now.

[Sozialliberal]

FDP vote holding up surprisingly well in superposh urban precincts. Left holding up much much better in the city than in rural parts of the state.

Here's a precinct Al may remember... 441 08, the Platen estate

CDU 84 17,3 %
SPD 218 44,9 %
FDP 5 1,0 %
Greens 58 12,0 %
Left 84 17,3 %
Pirate 12 2,5 %
AfD 17 3,5 %

How come FDP is doing so miserably? Isn't they supposed to be the Liberal Party? Or have they become more far right? Are they considered to the right of CDU? I read somewhere that they were regarded as the (big) business party. Which surprised me as I thought that would be CDU? And normally liberal parties, or at least the European style social liberal parties, tend to be small business parties, not advocating the needs of big businesses, as that's the aim of the conservative parties, and to a lesser extent, the social democratic parties.

Or is the reason simply that their party leader is extremely unpopular? And why would that be? Does he simply lack any kind of charisma? Or is it his policy positions that are the problem?

I'm glad to see The Greens holding up fairly well.

Let me clarify this for you: The German FDP is not a social liberal party like Venstre in Norway. It's an economic liberal party. Well, the FDP actually used to be a social liberal party in the 1970s, but that was a long time ago. If you asked me what Norwegian party is most similar to the German FDP, I'd say DLF (the one that was founded in 1992), though the FDP is more moderate and not generally sceptical about the EU. I'm glad they're gone now.

So what is/has been their reason for existence the last couple decades? Were they filling a political niche not reasonably covered by the CDU?

The CDU's ideology used to be social conservatism rather than economic liberalism.  However, the CDU has moved a lot towards the left under Merkel's leadership. The CDU doesn't have any real ideology currently apart from "Merkel is fantastic!". A lot of conservative people feel that the CDU isn't "their" party anymore.

[Sozialliberal]

Concerning the ideological disproportionality of the results, of course the FDP and the NDP would never work together, that I realize.  I was including them together as part of the non-leftist electoral majority that won something like 52.5 to 53% of the vote.  Is is plausible to include the Ecological Democratic Party on the right?  Seems like the are to the right on some issues.
    By my count I get about 45.3 % of the vote to leftist parties (SPD, Linke, Greens, Pirates, Animal Welfare, Marxist Leninists, Violets), and the aforementioned roughly 52.5 to 53% to non-leftist groups, assuming we can count Ecological Democrats, Bavarian Party, Alliance for Germany together with the bigger parties.  The 5% threshold law has worked its random and arbitrary electoral magic yet again.
    If voters could have a second choice to be used if their party didn't cross the threshold, how would Afd, Pirate and FDP voters have responded?  

I made the argument before that Animal Welfare might be considered Right just like Ecological Democratic Party should be considered Right.  Both are back to nature parties which I can argue has roots in the NASDAP regime.

I've read that libertarians don't like environmentalism, but that's just ridiculous. There were indeed nazis who were also environmentalists/animal welfarists, but the ideas of evironmentalism and animal welfare are much older than the nazis. Have you ever heard of the "Naturfreunde" (Naturefriends)? They are one of the oldest environmental organisations and they're social democratic. The organisation "Naturfreunde" was founded in 1895, long before the NSDAP was founded. The "Naturfreunde" organisation was banned in Germany after the NSDAP came to power. The ancient Greek philosopher Pythagoras had an even more radical stance on animal ethics than today's animal welfarists. He argued for a vegetarian lifestyle for ethical reasons more than two thousand years ago.