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| Europe |
| Spengler: Lesson from the German elections |
| 2017-09-25 |
| [PJMedia] The implosion of Germany's Social Democratic Party in today's national elections is the big news from Berlin. With just 20.5% of the vote, a party that governed Germany intermittently since the Second World War has dropped off the political radar. SPD leader Martin Schulz distinguished himself from Chancellor Angela Merkel with one idea, namely fairer income distribution, and the voters shunned him. Merkel will take a fourth term as Federal Chancellor, almost certainly in a coalition with the small free-enterprise party, the Free Democrats, and the Green Party--a so-called "Jamaica Coalition" after the colors of the island's flag (Black for the Christian Democrats, Yellow for Free Democrats, and Green). ...All the respectable parties banded together to defend Merkel's "we-can-do-it" open door policy to Middle Eastern migrants, a million and a half of whom turned up on Germany's doorstep during the past year and a half. The whole exercise was a scam and a goof, undertaken as an exercise in collective do-gooding in a country that still hates itself for its crimes duringi the Hitler period. Tuvia Tenenbom exposed the fecklessness of it all in a recent book that I reviewed in this space Sept. 10. Germans who objected to the influx and its attendant social pathologies voted for the AfD to register a protest, knowing that the AfD had no chance to exercise power. The German Establishment will take note. |
| Posted by:g(r)omgoru |
| #14 Thank you for explaining, European Conservative. I'm very glad you found us. |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2017-09-25 22:02 |
| #13 Hat tip once again to EC. More political background information. |
| Posted by: Besoeker 2017-09-25 21:52 |
| #12 Antisemitism in Germany is only tolerable when the left does it ("We're just against Israeli politics"). A right wing party with antisemitic tendencies is dead on arrival as the media will totally shun it. Funny enough, the AfD started as an ant-Euro but also anti-Wallstreet party (and you could hear "Wallstreet Jews", conspiracy theories and all that). Then the "hard" right wing took over, but they were smart enough to direct aggression elsewhere. |
| Posted by: European Conservative 2017-09-25 20:56 |
| #11 @trailing wife The "pro Israel attitude" of the AfD is fake. Spengler manages to see through this. Many others don't. That doesn't mean that all supporters are nazis. |
| Posted by: European Conservative 2017-09-25 20:49 |
| #10 All the respectable parties banded together to defend Merkel's "we-can-do-it" open door policy Then don't be surprised if people turn to the "deplorable" parties for redress. "Some American conservatives cheered for the AfD, thinking it a Trump-like populist movement. It is no such thing. It is an America-hating ethnic nationalist monster crawling with Nazi nostalgia." In the future, everyone will be a Nazi for fifteen minutes. |
| Posted by: charger 2017-09-25 18:34 |
| #9 In Europe, voicing opposition to any form of socialism, progressivism, or communism will get you labelled "nazi". I've lived through it. |
| Posted by: si vis pacem, para bellum 2017-09-25 16:00 |
| #8 The AfD are not socialist! How can they be National Socialists? |
| Posted by: Bright Pebbles 2017-09-25 14:30 |
| #7 If AfD really are Nazis it's sad that they are the only ones interested in self preservation. But I'm afraid the word nazi has lost as much of its original meaning in Germany as it has in this country. I myself was called a nazi during the 2016 election campaign and I know damn well I wouldn't have gone along with Hitler's madness. Let's put it this way, I've always gotten along quite well with Jews. I think it's because they're civilized. I think civilization, free enterprise and basic civil rights are the key concepts that I expect people to embrace. If they can't do that I don't want to gas them, I just don't want them in my country. I don't think that makes me a racist or a nazi. |
| Posted by: Abu Uluque 2017-09-25 10:39 |
| #6 Somehow when Schulz says he wants fairer income distribution I don't get the feeling he means paying people according to the fair market value of their work. |
| Posted by: Abu Uluque 2017-09-25 10:30 |
| #5 If you're an European right-wing party, you can't no more avoid accusations of neo-Nazism than a man can avoid accusations of sexism and racism*. *Nowadays in USA you don't have to be white to be accused of racism. |
| Posted by: g(r)omgoru 2017-09-25 10:24 |
| #4 The rise of Germany's far-right: Its impact on Europe and Israel - AfD deputy chair Beatrix von Storch talks to JP. |
| Posted by: g(r)omgoru 2017-09-25 10:20 |
| #3 Thanks for your German political party primer from yesterday EC. Very thoughtful. |
| Posted by: Besoeker 2017-09-25 09:43 |
| #2 It's very confusing that AfD politicians as a group are strongly pro-Israel, support Bibi Netanyahu, and consider the BDS movement and anti-Zionism to be antisemitic, according to The Times of Israel. |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2017-09-25 09:23 |
| #1 "Some American conservatives cheered for the AfD, thinking it a Trump-like populist movement. It is no such thing. It is an America-hating ethnic nationalist monster crawling with Nazi nostalgia." I'm glad that Spengler pointed this out. |
| Posted by: European Conservative 2017-09-25 08:29 |