Polish Politics and Elections

[Grand Wizard Lizard of the Klan]

So, from the pathetic showing we’ve seen so far, is Biedroń’s career at national politics over?

It's really seems that at some point Biedroń and the Left simply stopped caring, and a lot of Left's voters, myself including, decided it'd be better to vote Trzaskowski in the first round already (I wouldn't have voted for Kidawa, unless there was a runoff).

Not to mention that Left three times changed person responsible for the campaign and SLD was not really interested in investing their own money and time into Biedroń.

And again, big shout out to Hanna Gill-Piątek, who kept trying to do things like organise rallies in the middle of the work day or hold press conferences out east on Sunday mornings while refusing to communicate with anyone on the ground.

If we want to be honest Trela wasn't much better tho.

I'm not sure he did anything. Lazy prick.

I realised the other day that the left of your voivodeship has given us Miller, Olejniczak, Joński, the RACJA PL cranks, and now those two. You're not sending your best!

Wait until I will be important politician (not going to happen, fortunately) - you will miss sensibility of Miller and ideological prowess of Joński.

[Grand Wizard Lizard of the Klan]

It's always funny to see candidates who managed to collect 100,000 signatures required to be on the ballot ending up with a negligible number of votes.

But how do they manage to collect so many signatures? Paying money for them? Getting help from a bigger party (in Serbia it's often alleged that the dominant party SNS collects signatures for smaller allied and/or spoiler parties)?

I don't really know. Never looked into this.

It happens every election (save for 1990). In 1995 three candidates received less than 100k. Four in 2000. Five in 2005. Two in 2010 and three in 2015.

AFAIK from people I know who used to work for political parties they have it from various sources:

sometimes bigger parties help, sometimes they use old signatures from different elections, starting to collect before the period you legally can do that is very common, I rarely hear about buying signatures - smaller parties do not have cash for that, bigger parties have enough goons to collect legally (although they also copy old signatures sometimes).

Fresh example: Unia Pracy candidate Waldemar Witkowski at the beginning got rejected by Electoral Commission because some of his 100k signatures were actually signatures of people who were dead at the time when Commission had announced the elections. Probably because they used old signatures.

[Grand Wizard Lizard of the Klan]

Exit poll by age



Interesting how the youth a much more radicalized in both direction which much stronger showings for both Hołownia and Bosak.

I wonder how many of the youth vote for Hołownia and Bosak will turn out in the second round.

One thing: Hołownia is anything but radical. I would say that his popularity in the youngest age groups is effect of "freshness" similarly to Kukiz few years ago.

[Grand Wizard Lizard of the Klan]

Exit poll by age



Interesting how the youth a much more radicalized in both direction which much stronger showings for both Hołownia and Bosak.

I wonder how many of the youth vote for Hołownia and Bosak will turn out in the second round.

One thing: Hołownia is anything but radical. I would say that his popularity in the youngest age groups is effect of "freshness" similarly to Kukiz few years ago.

I always figured the youth vote for Hołownia is the SJW vote.  Most likely I am wrong here.

No, Hołownia is rather moderate candidate, I would say even more moderate than Trzaskowski, at least in terms of narrative.

[Grand Wizard Lizard of the Klan]

Apologies if this has been asked and answered already, but is there any reason why USA Poles seem to be so much more fash than the rest of the diaspora? I can imagine reasons, but wouldn't want to make assumptions

Well, in terms of institutions, organisations, media etc. Polish diaspora in the USA is rather conservative, especially when we take into consideration those who are determined enough to vote and are engaged in cultural life of the diaspora. Generally a lot of Poles in the USA who are eligible to vote were mainly people who emigrated from Poland before 1989 - they often do not live there and they create their views on Poland from media outlets, chruch, etc. This is obviously changing and holds only when we are talking about Chicago diaspora, the biggest one. But for example Poles in Cali and DC voted mainly for Trzaskowski.

[Grand Wizard Lizard of the Klan]

How likely is it that Trzaskowski can pull off a win?

Somehow likely, but generally Duda have better position due to few issues:

1) More determined electorate, who is rather voting for Duda because he is Duda, he is representing certain platform and values which his voters support. Trzaskowski voters are mainly people who just do not like PiS more, supporters of various parties and political organisations from left to centre-right, or even right. They have weaker motivation to vote on Trzaskowski than Duda voters on Duda.

2) Even core PO voter base is less determined than PiS voters. PO electorate lives mainly in cities, they have various stuff to do without going out of home etc. Rural and elderly electorate of PiS which is serious part of it generally tend to move somewhere on Sundays (and I am not even talking about church, but for example family living in county nearby).

3) Any chances of Trzaskowski winning are based on young people and those who were not voting two weeks ago. So one group which is awful electorate (until this elections young people were very under-represented in whole group of people who voted) and second very unstable and unpredictable. 

4) Another group on which PO really want to get victory are people living abroad - due to some technical problems, coronavirus issues there might be some problems. And difference in the amount of votes between Duda and Trzaskowski probably will be not that big so every vote matters.

[Grand Wizard Lizard of the Klan]

Exit poll will show nothing. We will probably have to wait for all votes, even those from diaspora.

[Grand Wizard Lizard of the Klan]

Generally guys do not trust any "SEMI-OFFICIAL" information about turnout or results, they are most often bullsh**t.

[Grand Wizard Lizard of the Klan]

So, which time you guys voted? I voted around 1 PM.

12, after church. I had to walk really quickly to outmanoeuvre hordes of elderly ladies, to be able to vote before them. But there were no queues, fortunately.

[Grand Wizard Lizard of the Klan]

More turnout maps.

Who is this map good for?

TBH good and bad for both candidates. Although weak increases in Lower Silesia and Greater Poland are not really good for Trzaskowski.

[Grand Wizard Lizard of the Klan]

[Grand Wizard Lizard of the Klan]

exit poll by age

I thought the Polish youth leaned conservative and the old people were more left wing and not the other way around?

Those young right-wingers you are mentioning usually consider PiS more left-wing than PO.

[Grand Wizard Lizard of the Klan]

I was hoping the guy who isn't a Fascist dictator wannabe would win.  

Duda isn't really a fascist dictator wannabe. He is a rubber stamp President, doing whatever a real wannabe Orban tells him to do. This is why many call him "the Pencil Man".

As much as I hate Kaczyński for political reason, I do have some begrudging respect for him as a strong individuality. Duda has no individuality.

Also please, PiS is winning the elections rather fairly so any comparison of the to the fascists are just plain stupid. I wouldn't even compare them to Orban because they are at least pretending to be pro-labour and pro-social while Orban would do anything to appease German automotive companies, also destroying labour code. They are probably not the nicest party in Europe but do not use so farfetched comparisons. 

[Grand Wizard Lizard of the Klan]

One nice thing about this result: we won't have to go through the circus a special mayoral election in Warsaw would be guaranteed to turn into.

My ing God, I can't even imagine Kaleta or Jaki running now - sh**tshow guaranteed.

[Grand Wizard Lizard of the Klan]

Have seen several polls on Europe Elects now in which a Rafal Trzaskowski party was included. To anyone from Poland: Is this a legit thing or just a hypothetical scenario? Does Trzaskowski intend to break with PO?

Very hypothetical, this is as for now not a political movement, rather dependent on Civic Platform NGO and still not existing, yet

[Grand Wizard Lizard of the Klan]

Why did the Razem female chairman leave the party?

There is no such position and there haven't been any high-profile departures since 2019, what do you mean?

I meant Agnieszka Ewa Dziemianowicz-Bąk

Yes, that was in 2019. She left because she was much more enthusiastic about a Wiosna-Razem alliance for the European Parliament elections than most of the party (largely because it would have allowed her to become an MEP).

I would not describe her as a great loss to Razem, but I think I am one of about eight people on the Polish left who would say so, many activists seem to see her as a basically Messianic figure these days.

Me neither, that's nine.

[Grand Wizard Lizard of the Klan]

Finally, Poland has a new government.

- Kaczynski joins as Deputy Prime Minister in charge of 'national security', i.e. overseeing the Defence, Interior and Justice Ministers and settling disputes in the government.
- Jaroslaw Gowin returns as Minister of Development, Technology and Labour - Labour being split off from Family and Social Policy specifically so it can be given to Gowin, Thatcherite bastard he is. Oh joy.
- The Ministry of Education is merged with the Ministry of Science and Higher Education and is given to noted homophobic moron who became a university professor through blatant nepotism, Przemyslaw Czarnek.
- The Ministry of Agriculture goes to Grzegorz 'who?' Puda, who was apparently the government's point man on the animal rights reform.
- The Climate and Environment Ministries are merged (why the hell were they ever separate) under current Climate Minister Michal Kurtyka.
- The Ministry of Sport is merged with the Ministry of Culture under current Culture Minister and Deputy PM Piotr Glinski.

https://twitter.com/TerryReintke/status/1311232324844085248?s=19
I’m awaiting the complete collapse of Lewica.

As usual, you know nothing. Spurek was against the whole Lewica project from the start and quit Wiosna two weeks after the 2019 election for that reason. What she does has no bearing on Lewica, and even if it did she wouldn't be any great loss anyway.

why do Kaczynski not be prime minister do he prefer party leadership role more?

Because he is not getting younger and it is easier to keep political power without any real responsibility for governing the country.

[Grand Wizard Lizard of the Klan]

Apparently there has been four defections in the Sejm to the Socialist Party, who now have 5-6 MPs and have left Levica. Any idea on why and who these four MPs are? Anyone else leave the coalition?

They have quit, ostensibly in protest of Lewica 'collaborating with PiS' (read: saving the opposition from completely fycking embarrassing itself on one particular occasion), in reality because Tusk's electoral strategy for the last 18 years has hinged on marginalising the left and you can't teach an old dog new tricks, so a split needed to be manufactured. I understand the actual PPS grassroots* are not happy about being used in this way.

*note: there are about 50 of these people, and AFAICT none of them do anything but Post

As a PPS member, I can assure you that any activity "on the streets" of the PPS in previous few years, was done by the people who are against bringing new MPs (by the way against party rules and democratic procedures, what is funny taking into consideration that Rozenek and Senyszyn are talking about lack of democracy inside SLD) to the party.

[Grand Wizard Lizard of the Klan]

There are still some unknowns, which are kinda crucial:

1) what will be the configuration of oposition electoral lists, as there are still some talks, negotiations etc., if there will be two major lists or separate etc. - and that might be pretty important issue.

2) there are obviously internal factions, but without PiS they are unable to be succesful, they do not have much money, structures etc. - and without them PiS might loose that crucial 1-2% of votes, so they are kind of in constant state of playing chicken. I am kinda sure that Kaczyński will not repeat his mistake with genereous list composition from previous elections, where satelites got relatively a lot of good spots, but the question is how much he can cut them out.

3) we are still before the real electoral campaign and PiS still have some time - and they will work hard to once again assert their narratives as the dominant ones, their ideas as the discussed once etc.


As for now I am not really sure if PiS will win or lose tbh. Too early to call.

[Grand Wizard Lizard of the Klan]

There are still some unknowns, which are kinda crucial:

1) what will be the configuration of oposition electoral lists, as there are still some talks, negotiations etc., if there will be two major lists or separate etc. - and that might be pretty important issue.

2) there are obviously internal factions, but without PiS they are unable to be succesful, they do not have much money, structures etc. - and without them PiS might loose that crucial 1-2% of votes, so they are kind of in constant state of playing chicken. I am kinda sure that Kaczyński will not repeat his mistake with genereous list composition from previous elections, where satelites got relatively a lot of good spots, but the question is how much he can cut them out.

3) we are still before the real electoral campaign and PiS still have some time - and they will work hard to once again assert their narratives as the dominant ones, their ideas as the discussed once etc.


As for now I am not really sure if PiS will win or lose tbh. Too early to call.

What is the degree of closeness between PiS and Kon? Would they form a government together if PiS falls short of a majority? Is there a possibility of a joint list?

"Is there a possibility of a joint list?"

As for now zero chances.

"Would they form a government together if PiS falls short of a majority?"

To be honest I am not quite sure, as Konfederacja is still a bunch of nutcases even from the point of view of ordinary PiS voters, especially because of their, now a little bit hidden, Russophilia. This might be damaging even for PiS, although we are talking about a scenario where PiS is struggling to keep power, so they might try to "buy" few Konfederacja MPs. Still, coalition with PSL would be probably preferable (though not that possible).

"What is the degree of closeness between PiS and Kon?"

Small. Other thing is that Konfederacja is very fragmented alliance and when we are talking about some sort of ideological affinity there are some groups which are closer to PiS, and some which are hostile to the PiS (especially when we are talking about economic issues). Some nationalist groups around Konfederacja are close to the PiS, also on the political level. But I would not say that they are the most important group inside Konfederacja.

[Grand Wizard Lizard of the Klan]

Also, do you foresee any future government substantially changing the government's stance with regards to Ukrainians seeking refuge in Poland?

As for now not really - winter up to this moment have been much milder than expected, and there is no new refugee wave so any sentiments against refugees are not really that vocal as situation is stable and people are kinda getting used to it. Polish society is staunchly pro-Ukrainian and most of the Polish political parties also do not really feel to do anything against Ukrainians, Ukraine etc.

Although situation might somehow change after the war - so as for now we do not know when.

Do you think the most likely option (other than PiS majority) is some coalition between (potentially a subset of) KO-Left-PSL-Poland 2050? Or are the differences within those too large to be bridged?

Hunger for power in the PO, PSL circles is pretty strong, similarly in the Left coalition (especially if we are talking about NL, not the Razem party). Poland 2050 is already past its best moment, and for them co-creating any cabinet is the biggest risk, but still it is hard to imagine them becoming oposition party against minority PO-PSL-Left govt. There are multiple reasons, but in my opinion all of them are less relevant than chance to govern Poland after such long break (especially for the PO). 

[Grand Wizard Lizard of the Klan]

There are still some unknowns, which are kinda crucial:

1) what will be the configuration of oposition electoral lists, as there are still some talks, negotiations etc., if there will be two major lists or separate etc. - and that might be pretty important issue.

Update:

according to the semi-official informations from the PO circles, joint oposition idea is dead.

[Grand Wizard Lizard of the Klan]

PO-PSL-PL2050 with confidence and supply from Konfederacja will be suicide for "democratic opposition". This government wouldn't pass anything important and would be force to adapt unpopular right-wing economic decisions.

The only issue in that statement is that taking into consideration PO or PL2050 electorate economic views they are not that much different from the Konfederacja ones. Any sort of policies which would be an effect of Konfederacja-PO talks would not be unpopular per se.

[Grand Wizard Lizard of the Klan]

So Polish political scene has entered its traditional pre-election period of transfers, consolidations and other various shenanigans which mainly shows how spineless is Polish political class:

- Konfederacja "stole" from the PiS camp one MP, Anna Siarkowska. Although she was not a member of PiS, and rather satellite party member (in 2022 she joined Ziobro's party, Solidarna Polska) it is still first defection on parliamentary level from PiS to Konfederacja. Some of the most Korwinist sympathizers were very unhappy due to the history of voting for most the the pro-social legislation of current government, but she fits well to the nationalist component of Konfederacja, so dissent wasn't that strong.

- Also, after pretty long hiatus in Polish politics all Konfederacja necromancers, who apparently had something better to do than providing life support to Korwin, were able to summon Przemysław Wipler, former pre-Konfederacja times rising star of the Korwinist right. Mainly known for his legendary photos after drunk fight with the police and some financial frauds, but still symptom of spectacular returns due to the huge popularity of the right.

- Former main PiS satellite party, center-right conservative-liberal Porozumienie, after long road of very exotic alliances (the weirdest being the one with Agrounia, new emanation of anti-establishment rural/farmer party, which had some weird romances with left-wing economists, which are in Poland not that common) ended up in the alliance with PSL

[Grand Wizard Lizard of the Klan]

The narrative everyone's trying to push now is that these people are jumping off the PiS sinking ship and going to Konfederacja, but I think it's actually worse than that. Banaś senior was an LPR candidate in 2005, Siarkowska was a Ruch Narodowy footsoldier, and of course Wipler was supposed to be Korwin's successor until he ruined his own career. All the nationalists and Korwinistas who tried to use PiS as a flag of convenience are going home now that their natural party's doing well.

This is an actually important take - people in Poland are often forgetting that up until the great duopol era (PiS-PO rivalry), that more nationalistic, right wing component of Polish political scene was always there. ZChN, LPR and dozens of different parties, organizations etc. - always got noticeable following and support. PiS in the aftermath of their first govt and PO electoral victory in 2007 was able to basically siphon out any sort of other political right-wing movements electoral and political potential outside PiS (and Korwinism, which back then as an oddity) - they got the electorate, but also they've got most of the activists, local politicians etc. Now with Konfederacja strong poll results some of those people just trying to get more comfortable position.