German Social Democrats beat conservatives in vote to decide Merkel successor

[peppertree]

Source: Reuters

Germany's Social Democrats narrowly won Sunday's national election, projected results showed, and claimed a "clear mandate" to lead a government for the first time since 2005 and to end 16 years of conservative-led rule under Angela Merkel.

The centre-left Social Democrats (SPD) were on track for 26.0% of the vote, ahead of 24.5% for Merkel's CDU/CSU conservative bloc, projections for broadcaster ZDF showed, but both groups believed they could lead the next government.

With neither major bloc commanding a majority, and both reluctant to repeat their awkward "grand coalition" of the past four years, the most likely outcome is a three-way alliance led by either the Social Democrats or Merkel's conservatives.

Agreeing a new coalition could take months, and will likely involve the smaller Greens and liberal Free Democrats (FDP).

Read more: https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/germans-vote-close-election-decide-merkel-successor-2021-09-25/

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Social Democratic Party (SPD) leader Olaf Scholz waves at supporters after an exit poll gave him hopes of forming a government as Chancellor.

The SPD, which was last in power in 2005, boosted its share of the vote by 5.3 points to 25.8% - besting longtime Chancellor Angela Merkel's CDU/CSU Union, which saw its share drop by 8.8 points to 24.1%.

Germany's leftward shift was also seen in the second-tier parties: the Greens jumped by 5.7 points (to 14.6%), while the far-right AfD slipped 2.1 points (to 10.5%).

[yaesu]

1. Congrats to my progressive friends in Germany! America's crazy conservatives are scaring the hell

out of other countries & rightly so pushing them to the left, where they should be.

[lagomorph777]

22. +1 We need to keep moving left and out of the swamp.

[msongs]

2. when 74% of the voters don't want you... nt

[NurseJackie]

3. That puts things in a different perspective, doesn't it?

[rpannier]

6. I could point this out and place it in a different light

Euronews and the Guardian have both reported through September that between 41-47% of Germans would have voted for Olaf Scholz if the presidency were directly elected.
43% of the popular vote is what Clinton got in 92.

[rpannier]

5. But that applies across the board in this election

and 75% or more didn't want the other parties
Though, in fairness to the SPD candidate, depending on the day, 41-47% of people who voted said they'd have voted for him if they directly elected the President. So it wasn't 75% that didn't want him.
-- Clinton got 43% in 92. So even at 41%, he's in Clinton territory

[Pachamama]

16. Completely inaccurate way to describe the vote in Germany

The reality is that Germany is split 50/50 evenly between conservative and liberal but it is primarily democratic and there are just different degrees. If you look at the German vote yesterday, here is how is breaks down:

45.9% of Germany is more conservative leaning:

- 24.1% voted for the CDU/CSU (Christian Democratic Union and Bavaria's Christian Socialist Union)which was Merkel's party and are somewhere between our version of Moderate Republicans/Conservative Democrats)

- 10.3% are the AFD (basically right wing nationalist, anti-immigration, anti-vax aka the modern day version of Nazi's and the US Trumpists)

- 11.5% who are the FDP (Federal Democratic Party) who are essentially Fiscal Conservatives/Liberatarians and are like our Libertarians/Reagan Republicans with some socially liberal leanings like legalizing marijuana and not caring about who sleeps with whom. They are also in reality a lobbying group for Corporations and Business.


45.4% of Germany is more liberal leaning:

- 25.7% voted for the SPD (Social Democratic Party) who are progressive democrats and socialist Democratic Party and are be like our Democratic Party with a combination of progressive liberals and moderates.

- 14.8% voted for the Green Party (Die Grüne) and they are progressive democrats with a complete focus on the environment and climate change and socialist programs driven with green economics.

- 4.9% voted for the Left Party (Die Linke) which are basically leaning communism in a party that mixes messages from the other two (SPD, Greens) but they want to be out of NATO alliance while simultaneously being super pro-union/worker and have been losing their message and lost seats and votes this election as their base switched to the SPD and Greens.

8.7% of Germany is Other - with it split almost equally between left leaning and right leaning

Their system is different than the US because there are so many different parties and it is a parliamentary system that is built on coalitions that then choose the leader, usually the person representing the party with the majority vote - which in this case is likely to be the SPD's Olaf Scholz.

The question is who will the coalition be formed from.

My money is on it either being the SPD getting together with the Green Party and FDP (and Linke if they can with final votes reach 5%)

Or even ironically the SPD joining with the CDU with agreement of Olaf Scholz as the Chancellor.

I think if the FDP and Greens decided to go form a coalition with the CDU, it would cause a lot of a rift in Germany and there are so few that want Laschet the CDU candidate to become Chancellor and it would be chaos.

Baerbock of the Green Party and Lindner of the FDP are the Kingmakers. They will likely work out with Olaf Scholtz of the SPD some sweet power roles in the new coalition.

We shall see, it will likely not be known for months.

But please don't describe whether the SPD or CDU with their respective 25% and 24% of the vote are minority ruling with 74 or 75% of the electorate against them. That simply isn't accurate.

[Hav]

19. I'd be surprised about a SPD/Green/FDP coalition

The greens prefer the SPD while the FDP prefers the CDU. But for me it seems that the greens are closer to the CDU than the FDP is to the SPD which makes a CDU/Green/FDP coalition more likely in my opinion.

[Pachamama]

24. Lindner does not get along with Laschet and has issues with CDU

We shall see - as I stated in my comments, I think it would even be more likely of an SPD/Grüne/FDP coalition with also both Lindner and Baerbock getting some plum positions in the Scholtz Government.

[Mysterian]

21. When you fail to comprehend a true multi-party governmental system,

you embarrass yourself.

[nycbos]

4. I love the names for potential coalitions.

The SPD, Greens, and FDP is "traffic light"

CDU, Greens and, FDP is "Jamaica"

[cilla4progress]

7. 2 for 2

Counting Canada.

Bodes well?

[Elessar Zappa]

8. I didn't know Merkel was a conservative.

She proves there are decent conservatives out there in the world. But I’m glad the left has increased their majority.

[peppertree]

9. Well, by Western European standards

Here, that would put her somewhere between Biden and Bernie.

Our GOP, on the other hand, is to the right of even the most loudmouthed neo-fascist parties in Western Europe - AfD, Front Nationale, UKIP, Forza Italia, Vox, you name it.

[Elessar Zappa]

11. I think the GOP

is the most dangerous political party in the developed world. They’ve truly become full-on fascists, although they’ve been getting there since Reagan.

[peppertree]

12. +1

[Polybius]

14. Even by Europe's standings she's not very conservative at all

Tony Blair was to her right, and he was from a liberal Party.

[mathematic]

23. Merkel voted against same sex marriage in 2017, she's not to the left of biden

Can we all please stop with this "so and so would be right wing in europe"? It's simply not true.

Merkel and her party support things like the balanced budget, which caused the great recession to be much worse in europe than it was in the US. Her party supports abortion restrictions. Her party is the party of Traditional Values. Merkel is Susan Collins with power.

[roamer65]

13. I don't like these results.

A CDU/CSU, FDP and AfD coalition would be 369 seats.

A 3 seat majority coalition hard RW government.

Bad, bad, bad for Germany.

[muriel_volestrangler]

15. No-one's going into coalition with the AfD - they hate or distrust them

So of all the possible coalitions, the Greens and the liberals feature in the two that are most likely to form.

One is the so-called traffic-light coalition, made up of the parties' colours - red (SPD), yellow (FDP) and the Greens - or there's the Jamaica alternative, black (CDU), yellow (FDP) and the Greens.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-58698806

Provisional results:
SPD 206
CDU/CSU 196
Green 118
FDP 92
AfD 83
Die Linke 39
Other 1

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/sep/26/germany-election-race-to-be-next-chancellor-going-to-wire-as-results-come-in

AfD lost seats, and the Greens gained them.

[roamer65]

20. I hope you are right.

[greenjar_01]

17. FDP, meanwhile, is making noises that they will join the CDU/CSU coalition

They're going to repeat the dumbshittery/treachery of the British Liberal Party who thought it would be a great idea to stick it to Labour by joining with the Tories. Result: a decade of increasingly radicalized Tory rule and Brexit. Great job, dumbasses. But, yeah, of course the FDP is smarter than that, harrumph harrumph.

The usual Putinite trolls are gleeful about it across the internat, including, ahem, close to home.

[Hav]

18. Yes, the FDP will prefer the CDU

but that has nothing to do with sticking it to anyone, it's because they are closer to them and they were the natural coalition partner of the CDU for a long time.