Re: Far-right AfD makes historic breakthrough in Germany
Frankly Merkel should look north to Denmark. She cant ignore the AfD and have to address some of their concerns within reason. Else you get a Danish situation, where the biggest right wing party is the Danish version of AfD (some what lite version), but no one wants really to work with them. So in Denmark you have strange situation where the second biggest right wing party is running a minority government with the backing of the biggest right wing party, aka the Danish peoples party.. but in reality works across the middle to get most things done as they dont want to bend too much to the racist fanatics in the Danish Peoples Party. Unfortunately it has meant that Denmark has become more nationalistic and racist, which is a serious problem in my opinion.
I'll be the first to admit utter ignorance on what goes on in Denmark so I can't really make any comparisons.
The thing that strikes me wrt Germany (as far away from it as I am) is that anybody trying to move to the right in order to crowd the AfD out, invariably suffers losses in elections.
It's basically the "well, might as well vote for the original" attitude.
What Germany has, as far as I can tell, suffered is the virtual absence of any significant parliamentary opposition in the last 8 years (if indeed not the past 12).
That's the essence of "big" coalitions (i.e. two biggest parties forming the government), it's the sure-fire recipe for inertia and it usually takes
just one period in power to piss most everyone off. And they've had three. One with the FDP which subsequently lost parliament altogether, and two with the SPD, now incurring the heaviest of losses.
Current joke I heard from a neighbor is that his 12 year old daughter told him that Schulz could never make Chancellor on account of not being a woman. It's kind of a spin-off from the times of Kohl when kids supposedly (for the sake of the joke) thought Chancellorship to be inherited and ending only by death of the holder.
There's a lot to be said for the two term regulation cross-pond, it certainly precludes self complacency taking root forever.
Don't get me wrong, the majority of Germans are well off by all one can see and that still reflects in Merkel having gained the most votes even now.
But a sizeable portion (especially in the East) feels left by the roadside and not all of them are suffering from victim-hood delusion, the fast lane for them actually IS blocked and has been for some time.
And where that is a happy hunting ground for the likes of AfD (incapable of addressing those woes even if given two centuries), not all that gave its votes to the extreme right are necessarily of Nazi persuasion. Many are totally aware of the fact that that's not where any solutions lie, they're just poking their fingers into the eyes of the establishment.
Which AfD also instrumentalizes in promising to drive everyone else before them to the point of dizziness.
And if the usual suspects allow themselves to be driven rather than develop some perspective of their own, they'll keep losing.
As just one example: people that have trouble paying their energy bills don't give a damn whether their electricity is from windmills or from nuclear plants. But if the "clean" juice actually costs more on account of the transition costs needing to be financed somehow, they understandably get annoyed.
I can afford to pay extra so, were I German and/or living there, I'd belong to the happy majority. As such I'd probably get incensed over the transition period (toxic to clean) being bridged by burning lignite (as is being done), but were I in a position where my money regularly runs out by the 20th of the month, I'd probably take the stance for them to darn well burn up politicians as a power source for all I care, as long as that makes my lights stay on.
That's just one example.
The European powerhouse ranks somewhere behind Colombia when it comes to internet connectivity out in the sticks (never mind speed). That's already annoying for people having to live there, the far more serious problem though is that it prevents companies from establishing plants or offices there, thus creating jobs.
Just another one but the list is endless.
And they've been shooting off at the mouth over it all in Berlin for years and have done absolutely nothing.
