Austrian Elections & Politics 3.0 - Parliamentary Election: Oct. 15

[Tender Branson]

God-Emperor and former Lower Austria Gov Erwin Pröll gave a final interview with the main public television information program which kind of escalated after the interviewer, the infamous Armin Wolf, asked about Pröll's handling of his private foundation.

A foundation which is TOTALLY LEGAL but the Lower Austria state parliament always handled it like the nuclear codes and contrary to other foundations, transparency runs against zero.

http://derstandard.at/2000054970923/Weingott-streng-im-AbgangErwin-Proell-bei-Armin-Wolf-in-der

Full Interview:
http://tvthek.orf.at/profile/Additional-Content/1670/Langversion-Erwin-Proell-OeVP-im-ZIB-2-Gespraech/13922825/Langversion-Erwin-Proell-OeVP-im-ZIB-2-Gespraech/14014802

Legal, but it's something that the opposition parties can use against the JML-ÖVP in the March 2018 state election, the first without God-Emperor Erwin Pröll as leading candidate.

The ÖVP is already expected to suffer huge losses with the new Governor, because it will be impossible to hold the absolute majorities that Erwin Pröll won for the party.

Plus, the FPÖ (which is traditionally weak in Lower Austria) is tactically positioning itself to benefit from this new situation by sending their frontrunner Walter Rosenkranz* (who's also an MP in the Austrian Parliament) into the Eurofighter investigation committee, which will start soon.

By having their "man from Lower Austria" in the committee as a key investigator, they will get positive coverage about transparency etc. and this committee will last at least until the state election.

http://www.oe24.at/oesterreich/politik/FPOe-mit-Rosenkranz-an-der-Spitze/275138568

* Walter Rosenkranz btw is not related to the infamous Neo-Nazi and failed FPÖ-presidential candidate from 2010, Barbara Rosenkranz, also known as "Reich-Mother".

[Tender Branson]

The intra-Green fight (see above) intensifies ...

The Greens have given the Young Greens an ultimatum until Friday to give up their rebellion, or their funding will be cut and they'll get kicked out of the party.

So far, the Young Greens have said that they won't give in to the demands of the mother party and Glawischnig and Co. also said that the rogue behavious of the Youngsters wouldn't be tolerated in any party.

http://derstandard.at/2000055012865/Junge-Gruene-treiben-Debatte-um-Parteifuehrung-an

[Tender Branson]

The latest federal elections poll by Unique Research for "Profil" magazine also has a turnout indicator:

73.6% of those polled say they are certain to vote in the 2017/18 federal election.

That is a really good turnout indicator months away from the election, because usually it's the certain voters + a few more who say they are "likely" to vote which make up the final turnout.

Final 2013 turnout was 75%.

If I remember correctly, a similar turnout indicator 2 weeks before the election in the Netherlands had 68% certain voters and final turnout was 82%.

https://neuwal.com/wahlumfragen/wahlumfrage.php?uid=1295

[Tender Branson]

It's really hard to say what turnout will look like because of the fact that sometimes turnout will be even lower than the percentage of people that say they are sure to vote  (Dutch referendum 2016) and sometimes a lot of people in the likely category show up (general election 2017). I usually expect people in the "sure to vote" category to turn out and only, say, 20% of the likely category (which is the socially acceptable answer for those who doubt they will vote), but due to fluctuations you can't really say anything meaningful about it. All the Dutch pollsters expected turnout to be about as high as in 2012, and the pundits expected an all-time low.

That said, across Western Europe we now see turnout is often higher than before due to the refugee crisis, Trump, Brexit, unrest in the Middle East, domestic policy and policymakers being more controversial, etc. It's hard to say anything meaningful about turnout in the next Austrian GE, especially while we're this far out of the election, but I would intuitively expect turnout in Austria to be higher.

Yeah, it's a long way to go until the next elections (even though early elections could be held in late November, according to some new speculations) and it's hard to predict the turnout.

I guess we need to wait if there's a significant uptick in turnout in Germany (and especially Bavaria) to see if this trend of rising turnout also continues in Austria.

And it will depend on the candidates running: Kern/Kurz/Strache-Hofer/Strolz-Griss would all drive up turnout I guess. Mitterlehner not so much. And the educated Greens always turn out to vote in big numbers.

PS: It seems the Young Greens are slowly giving in to the demands of the mother party, but could still be kicked out of the party, because they still want to run in the Graz and Linz university elections by backing rogue Green lists.

http://derstandard.at/2000055041399/OeH-Wahl-Gruene-Studierende-geben-nach-Druck-der-Mutterpartei-nach

[Tender Branson]

A NEOS member of the Austrian parliament will switch over to the ÖVP, after homophobic comments.

Christoph Vavrik said the following about the adoption of a child by a gay couple: "Future generations will look back at these deviant social behaviours with a sense of incomprehension, just like we are now looking back at slavery."

LGBT couples have full adoption rights in Austria, but "marriage" differs by about 20 points when compared with hetero marriage (in some points, the civil union law is better than the outdated hetero marriage law though).

NEOS immediately called on him to step down as MP by the end of March. But Vavrik now said he'll switch over to the ÖVP, "his former political home".

NEOS called the decision by Vavrik to switch parties "a big personal and political disappointment" and attacked their former MP for not honouring his commitment of stepping down and allowing the next on the NEOS-list, Daniela Schwarz, to take his seat.

NEOS also attacked the ÖVP: "The fact that the ÖVP is now the home of politicians with homophobic views, tells you a lot about the acting politicians there."

http://derstandard.at/2000055102113/NEOS-Abgeordneter-Vavrik-wechselt-zur-OeVP

The future composition of the Austrian parliament:

  52 seats - SPÖ (2013 election: 52)
  51 seats - ÖVP (47)
  38 seats - FPÖ (40)
  24 seats - Greens (24)
    8 seats - NEOS (9)
    6 seats - TS (11)
    4 seats - Indys (3x Ex-FPÖ, 1x Ex-TS)
183 seats - Total

[Tender Branson]

Breaking News:

The Austrian Greens are kicking the Young Greens out of the party.

https://kurier.at/politik/inland/gruene-bundespartei-trennt-sich-von-jungen-gruenen/255.292.544

This comes after the Young Green leader apologized to Eva Glawischnig today for calling on her to step down.

Still, all of this wasn't enough and the Young Greens now have to pay the price for their actions.

The Greens will build a new Young Green organisation instead ...

[Tender Branson]

Damn, that's pretty extreme. Are the young Greens that ideologically different, or is this solely because of their call on the party leader to resign?

No, it's much more than that: They were too frech (naughty) to the Green Party leadership and the establishment. But read more about it on top of this page and in the link to a previous post I made.

Generally, this confrontational behaviour cannot be tolerated by the Green Party leadership and they had to act. Otherwise they would not be credible anymore. The Young Greens are rather important to the mother party because they have 5.000 active members who are holding a ton of events all the time and have a big mobilizing force amongst the younger base. So, this situation hurts the Green Party as a whole. But they were acting really childish and the establishment had to pull the plug now. There's some time left to re-build the Young Greens until the next elections and limit the damage.

[Tender Branson]

Damn, that's pretty extreme. Are the young Greens that ideologically different, or is this solely because of their call on the party leader to resign?

I also have my fair share of problems with the Young Greens, especially when they started this silly campaign:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/junge-gruene/sets/72157631878917186

"Austria is only made-up."

Nope.

The country Austria exists.

The Green Party needs common-sense folks and not naive, rebellious children.

[Tender Branson]

Damn, that's pretty extreme. Are the young Greens that ideologically different, or is this solely because of their call on the party leader to resign?

the green party is - VDB's victory nonwithstanding - in general turmoil and split between fractions and since Eva's authority was weakened, she needed to put an end to this to prevent faymann's fate.

otherwise.....really stupid decision, imho......eva is part of the progressive left wing of her party and so are the JG.....this is cutting your own flesh and makes a new leadership even more important.

fun fact....the JG also protested against VdB cause he was too old.

I think it was a solid choice by Eva Glawischnig to kick these spoiled brats out of the party. There are certain rules within any party on the planet and one is not to support a rogue list in an election. This is treason. They can now lick their wounds and the party can re-establish the Young Greens with less hot-headed, alternative young folks and not alternaive children.

Also: the Young Greens opposed Van der Bellen not because he was old, but because they thought he'd be a reckless Neo-Liberal.

[Tender Branson]

A NEOS member of the Austrian parliament will switch over to the ÖVP, after homophobic comments.

Wow.

Another NEOS-MP announced today that he'll step down because of a private project that he'll start in April.

http://www.oe24.at/oesterreich/politik/NEOS-Abgeordneter-Niko-Alm-legt-Mandat-zurueck/275510026

He'll be replaced by Karin Doppelbauer, a Dell-manager.

[Tender Branson]

Eva Glawischnig (Green Party leader) and Flora Petrik (Young Green leader) will meet at 7pm:

http://www.oe24.at/oesterreich/politik/Junge-Gruene-warten-Gespraech-ab/275525616

I guess the Young Greens's last hope of remaining in the party is the total capitulation of the YG leadership (apologizing to Glawischnig for wanting to remove her, giving up on backing the rogue election lists in the university elections and the resignation of the YG leadership).

[Tender Branson]

The official portrait of President Alexander Van der Bellen (Greens) has been released today, which will be in every Austrian school and other public buildings.



It is the first one with an appendix at the bottom:

You must be logged in to read this quote.

[Tender Branson]

The guy still looks like a total creep to me.

Sounds like a bizarre overreaction for the Greens to kick out their youth wing. Isn't being ridiculously ideological rebels the raison d'être for all political youth organizations? I understand that extreme cases cannot be tolerated (such as the Sweden Democrats' youth organization's descent into Nazism) but for the most part political youth organizations can, are and should simply be ignored.

It's true that the youth organisations are mostly "ridiculous ideological rebels", but you also have to draw the line somewhere. And that is when the youth organisation is turning into Judas. As I have said no party on the planet would tolerate their youth organisation to back a non-party outfit in an election. And even after repeated talks with them, they didn't back down. And all this after the Greens managed to get their best electoral results under Glawischnig so far, being in 6 of 9 state governments and electing the first Green President. This was a step too far and Eva and Co. have all the rights to kick them out.

[Tender Branson]

In a new "Market" poll for the economic magazine "Trend", Sebastian Kurz outperforms Christian Kern on virtually all important qualities for a major politician:



* has high economic competence
* has a high reputation abroad
* has good ideas for solving the refugee/immigration issue
* has a good sense for social justice



* has assertiveness in the own party
* has assertiveness in the EU
* has good ideas for the Austrian business sector
* is personally compelling
* is likeable

https://www.trend.at/politik/politikerprofil-umfrage-kurz-kern-8054103

[Tender Branson]

The smoking age will be raised from 16 to 18 next year:

http://derstandard.at/2000055186961/Rauchverbot-fuer-Unter-18-Jaehrige-kommt-Mitte-2018

[Tender Branson]

More details about Greens vs. Green Youth (who got kicked out of the party yesterday emerged today:

http://derstandard.at/2000055212273/Gruene-Kritik-an-Parteispitze-nach-Rauswurf-der-eigenen-Jugend

The Green Party MPs, state politicians etc. are deeply troubled by the recent events, with some backing the leadership and others being critical.

Ingrid Felipe, Tyrolian Vice-Governor and Green-leader there apparently (unsuccessfully) tried for weeks to persuade the Young Greens to give up their rebellion and the backing of a rogue Green election list in the upcoming university elections. The Young Greens then even called on Eva Glawischnig to step down as Austrian Green leader, so that Felipe can replace her ... (she declined, because of next year's Tyrolian state election as a major reason).

Another Tyrolian Green, Georg Willi, said that the YG betrayed the old unwritten Green agreement from the 1980s (when the conservative "United Greens of Austria" merged with the progressive "Alternative List of Austria" to form the Green Party) that Greens shall never run against Greens anymore (otherwise the party would fall back 30 years in time when the movements started and were plagued by intra-party-fights ...

On ther other hand, many members are critical of how the GP establishment around Eva Glawischnig dealt with the YG, not being able to contain the explosive situation earlier etc.

I'm one of those Green Party voters who'd blame the YG on this and I see it similar to Georg Willi.

[Tender Branson]

The following is an example in a new reading book for Vienna's elementary school kids:



Notice anything ?

[Tender Branson]

New Research Affairs poll for Ö24 (n=600, March 29-31):

Without Sebastian Kurz as ÖVP-leader



With Sebastian Kurz as ÖVP-leader



Who would be the better Chancellor ? Kern or Kurz ?



Ranking of major Austrian politicians (= balance of "I have a positive impression" minus "I have a negative impression" of this politician)



http://www.oe24.at/oesterreich/politik/Absturz-fuer-Gruen-Pink/275747867

[Tender Branson]

Flawless beautiful dynamic Sebastian Kurz seems to be in full campaign mode ...

Yesterday, he was debating with 500 students aged 15-18 at the Linz Europagymnasium and despite getting really critical questions, he came along as a professional according to the article, took many selfies and talked privately with many students after the event:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p6o4egOWRvQ







http://www.nachrichten.at/oberoesterreich/Ruecken-Sie-ins-rechte-Eck-Herr-Kurz;art4,2527441,C::cme202287,1693045

[Tender Branson]

Today, the Upper Austrian ÖVP said "Goodbye" to their long-term ÖVP-Governor of 22 years, Josef Pühringer.

His last words were: "Long live the ÖVP, long live our beautiful state of Upper Austria."

The new Governor, Thomas Stelzer, was elected with 99.9% of the ca. 1000 delegates (1 delegate voted against him).

This comes after last week's ÖVP power transfer in Lower Austria, when Erwin Pröll (Governor for 25 years) retired.

Someone please tell Vienna Mayor Häupl (SPÖ) how to do this properly ...



Stelzer (center), Pühringer (right).



http://www.nachrichten.at/nachrichten/thema/Generationswechsel-in-der-Landes-VP-vollzogen;art180211,2527427

[Tender Branson]

March is now over, time for the April poll.

Plz vote on top of the page.

March poll: How would you have voted in the 1986 Presidential election ?

66.7% Kurt Steyrer (SPÖ) - (16 votes)
33.3% Kurt Waldheim (ÖVP) - (8 votes)

February poll: Do you support or oppose the introduction of a religion-neutral public full-face veil ban, with an initial fine of 150€ ?

53.8% Yes (21 votes)
46.2% No (18 votes)

January Poll: Will the SPÖVP coalition last until 2018 ?

75.9% Yes (22 votes)
24.1% No (7 votes)

[Tender Branson]

Local and state Greens are not really amused with the federal Green leadership and their decision to kick out the Young Greens and want them to re-start talks with them after Easter:

http://orf.at/stories/2386020/2386021

They fear that the expulsion will significantly weaken the Green electoral performances in the 4 state elections next year and the federal election. The Young Greens are reponsible for roughly 50% of the mobilizing force of the Green Party as a whole.

So, while the Greens are unlikely to drop from 13% to 6.5% in the next federal elections (most Greens will always vote Green, because of the lack of credible alternatives on the Left), they could still drop to below 10%.

Some Greens might switch over to the SPÖ, after Chancellor Kern made the party more attractive recently with Green Energy policies etc.

[Tender Branson]

Green Party leader Eva Glawischnig has been treated at the emergency ward of a Vienna hospital after suffering a major allergic shock:

http://derstandard.at/2000055386241/Glawischnig-sagt-wegen-Krankheit-Termine-ab

The cause is unclear, but the Greens decided to communicate this incident right away to prevent conspiracy theories ...

[Tender Branson]

New TrendCom poll for the state of Burgenland (n=800):

State elections

43.0% SPÖ (+1.1%)
26.0% ÖVP (-3.1%)
17.5% FPÖ (+2.5%)
  6.5% Greens (-0.1%)
  4.5% LBL (-0.3%)
  2.5% NEOS (+0.2%)

http://www.bvz.at/burgenland/politik/grosse-umfrage-rot-blau-im-aufwind-niessl-mit-top-werten/44.290.356

Federal elections

37.0% SPÖ (-0.3% compared with 2013 election in Burgenland)
26.0% FPÖ (+8.6%)
24.5% ÖVP (-2.3%)

http://www.bvz.at/burgenland/meinung/leitartikel-umfrage-regierung-im-aufwind/44.284.732

[Tender Branson]

Pretty shady how many local and state Greens are now trying to topple party-leader Eva Glawischnig while she's sick and in hospital.

The "Standard" now reports that Lothar Lockl might take over once she's dismantled as the Green leader.



Lockl was the chief campaign strategist for President Van der Bellen. He'd obviously be a good choice for future Green Party leader, but Glawischnig needs to stay on.

http://derstandard.at/2000055450633/Spekulationen-ueber-die-Nachfolge-von-Glawischnig