quote:

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Originally posted by Adam T:
This is the European 'version' of DailyKos: http://www.eurotrib.com/ It would be a good place to look. Even if you don't speak German, you can still follow the numbers .

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Speaking of which, the polls are closing in minutes.

JA JA LINKE.PDS!
JA JA LINKE.PDS!

(Actually, I prefer the Socialist Equality Party, given that it has a more Trotskyist heritage than the PDS, but the PDS is the best we can get in Germany...)

[ 18 September 2005: Message edited by: America is Behind ]

SPD: 212
CDU/CSU: 221
Green: 53
FDP: 65
Left: 47

quote:

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Originally posted by Stockholm:
Interesting that the FDP has done so well.

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[ 18 September 2005: Message edited by: Wilf Day ]

quote:

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No doubt due to great concern among CDU voters that their coalition partner might get less than 5%.

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Actually, I don't think that's it. In the past there have been elections where there were polls showing the FDP in danger of getting less than 5% and that was much discussed - but not this time.

quote:

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Originally posted by Stockholm:

Actually, I don't think that's it. In the past there have been elections where there were polls showing the FDP in danger of getting less than 5% and that was much discussed - but not this time.

I think that the big FDP vote is simply that the CDU by all accounts ran a dreadful cxampaign and Merkel was a flop. If you wanted a Black/Yellow gov't but you wanted to register a protest at how awful Merkel was - you vote FDP.

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Merkel's tolerable in a Helmut Kohl sort of way: It's Stoiber and the flat-tax wacko who scare me.

Incidentally, it was a very bad day for the CDU/CSU (They were expected to poll in 40% territory, but actually lost support from 2002, mainly at the expense of the FDP.), a very good day for Linke.PDS and FDP (both of which have met or exceeded expectations), a considerably less bad than expected day for the SPD (which didn't get the abyssmal mid-to-high 20s result that many were expecting), and a pretty good day for the Greens (who broke even in spite of being part of an unpopular coalition) based on my understanding of the 2005 results vs. both the 2002 results and what the various parties expected from polls.

Does that sound right to the rest of you lot?

Incidentally, why does the CDU/CSU use anarchist colours?

[ 18 September 2005: Message edited by: America is Behind ]

quote:

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Originally posted by Wilf Day:
Listening to BBC World, Joschka Fischer and the Greens are declaring victory for the Red-Green coalition, and the SPD seem to be doing the same.

This is quite logical, since the left clearly outvoted the centre-right. Sounds like they're not as dismayed at having to rely on the Left Party as they might have been.

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From what I hear, the Left Party (or rather, the PDS) has backed austerity measures while in state and local coalitions with the SPD. This result will ruffle Washington's feathers a bit, but it won't bring about much meaningful change in Germany.

[ 18 September 2005: Message edited by: America is Behind ]

quote:

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Incidentally, why does the CDU/CSU use anarchist colours?

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quote:

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Originally posted by Wilf Day:
I just heard Schroeder say he will remain Chancellor but will not talk to the Left Party.

Unless he can get the FDP to join his coalition, which they have been claiming they will not do, how can he do this?

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Does this guy have a fucking deathwish? I understand that the PDS pedigree of the Left Party is toxic in the former West Germany, but a grand coalition would lead to mass rebellion in both the SPD and the Union (Hell, Stoiber probably finds his own party too left-wing.) while a new election in the next few months will almost certainly lead to a right-wing landslide.

[ 18 September 2005: Message edited by: America is Behind ]

They would also seem to be the key player in the formation of a new SPD coalition government.

Although the FDP vowed to only join a CDU coalition, likely based upon their presumption that they would form a majority gov't and the 1st vote CDU, second vote FDP scenario, they haven't tasted power at the federal level since 1998

ZDF projects 217 CDU, 63 FDP, 213 SPD, 51 Green, 54 Left.

http://service.spiegel.de/cache/international/0,1518,375257,00.html

+++ Forsa sees SPD as the strongest faction +++

(9:23 p.m.) The Forsa Institute sees the SPD as the strongest faction in the German parliament. In a projection for the TV network N-TV it claims 223 seats for the SPD and only 220 for CDU/CSU.

[ 18 September 2005: Message edited by: knuckles ]

On one hand, a neo-Nazi has ceased to exist, which is never a bad thing.

On the other hand, we have to wait for final results of the election.

Furthermore...

Apparently, the U.S. isn't the only country with a Jesusland:

[ 18 September 2005: Message edited by: America is Behind ]

#60:
Dr. Margrit Spielmann, SPD 41.2%
Die Linke 26.3%
CDU 22.5%

#61:
Andrea Wicklein, SPD 40.7%
Die Linke 25.6%
CDU 22.1%

Similarly in the city of Halle, in Sachsen-Anhalt:
Christel Rhiemann-Hanewinckel, SPD 36.0%
Die Linke 27.4%
CDU 24.8%

[ 18 September 2005: Message edited by: Wilf Day ]

quote:

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+++ "Kirchhof will be a professor again" +++

(10:34 p.m.) Paul Kirchhof, the tax- and finance-expert brought into the CDU campaign by Angela Merkel, has called off his brief excursion into politics, according to the German news agency ddp. Sources within the party said on Sunday that Kirchhof wants to go back to economics.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Wilf Day:
[QB]Interesting results in some single seats of Brandenburg, surrounding Berlin:

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Excellent webpage "Wahlkreis" on http://www.election.de with colour-coded national map and clickable individual constituencies showing 2005 results compared to 2002 results.

They recently posted:

quote:

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The first official preliminary returns of the cliffhanger election showed that the CDU and its Bavarian sister party, the Christian Social Union (CSU) took 35.2 percent of the vote while the SPD followed closely with 34.3 percent.

Merkel's preferred coalition partners, the free-market liberal FDP had a surprisingly good showing, grabbing 9.8 percent of the vote. The Left Party, a alliance of disgruntled SPD members and former communists came in at 8.7 percent while the Greens clinched 8.1 percent.

According to the latest preliminary official count, the conservatives are also the strongest faction in parliament with 219 seats while the SPD has 213.

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So it's:
34.3+8.7+8.1 = 51.1% left
35.2+9.8 = 45 right

[ 18 September 2005: Message edited by: Paul Gross ]

quote:

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Originally posted by Centrist:
Excellent webpage "Wahlkreis" on http://www.election.de

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A plus for the Greens: they again won a local seat, their sole one, in the centre of Berlin, on a four-way split:
Green 31.6%
SPD 29.1%
Left 21.4%
CDU 13.0%

Not that this changes the overall result in any way, under MMP. It's just a nice touch of diversity for Berlin, where the Left won their three local strongholds in old East Berlin, the SPD won 7 local seats, and even the CDU won a seat in the wealthy southwest of the city.

[ 19 September 2005: Message edited by: Wilf Day ]

The SPD carried all but four southern states. However, the crushing CSU majority in Bavaria tips the scales. (A 24% margin, in Germany's second-biggest state by population.)

In three of the six east German states, the CDU came third.

[ 19 September 2005: Message edited by: Wilf Day ]

Shattered Merkel forced to seek coalition partner

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It was a result that nobody had quite predicted. After leading in the polls for months, Angela Merkel's Christian Democrat party failed to win a clear majority in Germany's general election, with the parliament hung and uncertainty over who would be Germany's next chancellor.
Even the most pessimistic polls had suggested that Mrs Merkel would win 41% of the vote. In the end, though, the party won 35.3% - three percentage points less than in Germany's last election in 2002 and one of its worst results ever. The upshot was to deprive Mrs Merkel of a clear mandate and leave no outright election winner.

For Gerhard Schröder's Social Democratic party, at 34.2%, the outcome completed a stunning comeback. Feted by supporters at the SPD's Berlin HQ, the chancellor said he had no intention of giving up his job. Instead, he said coalition negotiations would start today with all the other parties, except the new Left party

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quote:

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Originally posted by Wilf Day:
The SPD carried all but four southern states. However, the crushing CSU majority in Bavaria tips the scales.
[ 19 September 2005: Message edited by: Wilf Day ]

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larry elliot, the guardian's economics editor, thinks that the election is a big "no" to neo-liberal economics.

quote:

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Put simply, Germans don't buy the idea - touted by both Mr Schröder and Ms Merkel - that the way to safeguard Germany's post-war social democratic model is to dismantle it.

The scepticism is justified. Germany is the second biggest exporter in the world and runs a healthy trade surplus. Its strong manufacturing industry and well-trained workforce suggests that the supply side of the economy is in reasonable shape. But the economy has suffered from two serious macro-economic mistakes in the past 15 years - the one-for-one exchange rate for ostmarks and deutschemarks at the time of reunification and the mark's overvalued exchange rate at the launch of the euro.

Lafontaine has always said that Germany needs a more reflationary economic policy: yesterday's results suggest that people are now starting to listen.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Willowdale Wizard:
i haven't seen any discussion of a non-gerhard person within the SPD being able to be chancellor who's more favourable to forging a coalition with the left and the greens.

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"Rarely has a presumed election winner been so disgraced" is the word from Munich, whose CSU has never been sold on Merkel.

quote:

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Munich's Sueddeutsche Zeitung describes the result as a "catastrophe" for the CDU.

It signifies, the paper argues, "the end of Angela Merkel's chancellorship before it even started".

"Rarely has a presumed election winner been so disgraced," it adds, saying the defeat has hit the party all the harder because it was unexpected.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Willowdale Wizard:
all talk of the "grand coalition" involves gerhard getting the boot

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What I just heard on BBC World was that the CDU will give Merkel the boot. It was she who blew the campaign, not Schroder. She will not lead a grand coalition. Maybe the formula would be two years Schroeder, two years new CDU leader? I'm still betting against a grand coalition.

[ 19 September 2005: Message edited by: Wilf Day ]

quote:

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. . 9 percent of voters said they would have supported the CDU/CSU with a man from a western German state at the helm (as opposed to Merkel, who comes from the former East Germany)

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quote:

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Originally posted by Stockholm:
the big FDP vote is simply that the CDU by all accounts ran a dreadful cxampaign and Merkel was a flop. If you wanted a Black/Yellow gov't but you wanted to register a protest at how awful Merkel was - you vote FDP.

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quote:

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about 1.1 million CDU voters decided to cast their second vote for the FDP, giving the smaller party an unexpectedly high result: about 41 percent of FDP voters said they actually favored the CDU, according to polls.

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quote:

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9 percent of voters said they would have supported the CDU/CSU with a man from a western German state at the helm (as opposed to Merkel, who comes from the former East Germany)

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Of course three years ago, the CDU was led by a man from the west - Bavarian premier Edmund Stoiber - and they lost too. Germans tend to regard conservative politicians from Bavaria kind of the way that Canadians regard conservative Albertans - not to be trusted and too much of a stereotype.

quote:

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Originally posted by Screaming Lord Byron:
Schroeder seems to have settled in for a blinking match with Merkel - and I don't think he's going to lose it, the guy is a master of the political arts.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Doug:

While I can't say I'm a fan, I have to admire how he came back from what looked like certain crushing defeat to come within a few percentage points and seats of winning outright - and still might walk away with the prize, though what it will be worth, who knows?

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quote:

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The SPD is the German equivalent of the NDP.

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quote:

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Originally posted by josh:
The NDP may actually be closer to the Left Party.

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The SDP has a range of tendencies and factions: the Seeheim Forum, Frankfurt Forum, DL 21 Forum, and perhaps others. The range certainly overlaps Canada's NDP spectrum.

[ 21 September 2005: Message edited by: Wilf Day ]

quote:

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Originally posted by Stockholm:
The SPD is the German equivalent of the NDP. They pioneered the first welfare state in the world and they opened up ties to the east under Willy Brandt. If you think they are identical to the CDU then i guess you also think that all parties in canada are identical except thew Communist Party.

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At least the two major parties in Canada are 'identical', as far as the corporate agenda are concerned, except the CPC dares to say what it means, while the Liberals say one thing and then act as if they have a mandate to push the CPC agenda to sell Canada to the US. The NDP would have to get a chance to prove itself whether it would steer the country away from the current path of self-destruction, or continue the treachery of corporate servility against Canada.

Although fwiu, the Left Party might give un-official support to a continued SPD-Green coalition, without actually entering into goverment. If they were to do this they could avoid becoming "tainted" by the established parties, although to prolong the goverment they'd have to moderate some of their demands.

[ 20 September 2005: Message edited by: Vansterdam Kid ]

quote:

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i'm a bit annoyed by how the mainstream media is calling the "left" party the "extreme left." all that's happened is that the left has split into the "linkspartei" and the SPD, whilst the right, for decades, has been the CDU/CSU and the FDP, and no one calls the FDP, "the extreme right."

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The Links partie might have a minute amount of figleaf support in western Germany that comes from a handful of ex-SDP leftwingers - but realistically its just a new name for the PDS which in turn is the new name for the Communist Party of East Germany. most of their leading figures were Stasi agents in East Germany who had very privileged lives in the DDR for informing on anti-government dissidents.

I Europe it is ridiculously common for partioes of left and right to form coalitions. in Belgium and the Netherlands and Finland and Austria there are routinely socialist/conservative or socialist/Christian Democrat governments. The SDP did a grand coalition with the CDU in the late 60s in Germany - this is nothing new.

The Russian section is the most intresting.

quote:

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A columnist writing in Komsomolskaya Pravda draws the conclusion that advocating painful reform, as Mrs Merkel did, is not a way to win elections. "Carrying out reforms in the economic and social sphere is an absolutely thankless task, and sometimes (especially on the eve of elections) politically dangerous."

So the lesson [of the German elections] for Russia's government, he says, is that "this experience shows yet again that it is not advisable to talk endlessly about reforms and play them as a political card in elections. They simply need to be carried out".

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quote:

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He said he would step down from any leadership role in the Green party, and serve as a backbench MP, assuming his party was destined for opposition. He said his decision had nothing to do with the current political deadlock, adding: "For me this is the end of a period of my life lasting 20 years, and a new beginning." His conditional announcement yesterday appears to pave the way for a possible deal between the Greens and Mrs Merkel. On Monday, however, Mr Fischer and other leading Green politicians appeared to rule out a coalition with Mrs Merkel's conservatives and the Free Democrats (FDP), citing differences on nuclear energy, social policy and Turkey.

Bild, Germany's best selling tabloid, however, yesterday speculated that the "Jamaica" coalition might work, printing a front-page photo of Mr Fischer, Mrs Merkel and the FDP's leader, Guido Westerwelle, with dreadlocks. Mrs Merkel was also shown wearing a blue rasta hat.

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quote:

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Well, it's further to the left then Canada in an economic sense. In a social sense, I don't know ... especially considering the fact that they have viable far-right parties that have won 9% in their provincial houses.

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Germany has by far the smallest and weakest extreme right of any country in Europe. CVountries like Denmark, Norway, Austria, the Netherlands and France have neo-fascist anti-immigrant populaist parties that routinely win 15-20 percent of the vote. in Germany they never get nmore than 2% of the vote nationally.

quote:

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Count Carl-Eduard von Bismarck (CDU), a relative of the first Reichschancellor, won a seat in the northern state of Schleswig-Holstein.

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Growing speculation that Schröder is preparing a high-risk strategy that could see him stay in office:

quote:

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The new parliament must convene by October 18, when MPs will vote on a new chancellor in a secret ballot. Mrs Merkel does not currently have a majority of seats.

If she twice fails to win in the ballot of MPs, parliament will reassemble two weeks later for a third round of voting. It is at this point that Mr Schröder appears to be gambling that he will get enough votes to carry on as chancellor with some help from sympathisers in the Left party, and possibly even from a handful of MPs in Mrs Merkel's CDU.

"Mr Schröder will either get an absolute majority, which means the president has to appoint him as chancellor, or he will get a relative majority," Prof Jürgen Falter, a political scientist at Mainz University told the Guardian. "In this scenario the president will probably dissolve parliament and hold fresh elections in January. Schröder is a super campaigner. He is calculating that he will then win."

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quote:

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If a new chancellor fails to secure a majority in three rounds of voting, President Horst Koehler can appoint a minority government. That raises the spectre of an unstable government – and another election before parliament’s four-year term is up.

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[ 21 September 2005: Message edited by: Wilf Day ]

quote:

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Those who say proportional representation caused the stalemate

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That is fast becoming the meme on this, and it should be debunked whereever possible.

The Globe, for example, had a column by Jeff Simpson where he said that the German results show that we need to retain the old system of 36% "majorities".

quote:

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Originally posted by Stockholm:

Even in Canada, we saw in the 90s that almost 20% of us would vote for the extreme right (ie: the Reform Party)

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Stockholm, the point is that the Reform Party was not a neo-nazi party. There's a diffrence between being far right economically and socially conservative and being out and out nazi's.

[ 21 September 2005: Message edited by: Vansterdam Kid ]

quote:

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The prospect of neither the conservatives nor the Social Democrats being able to form a new government by the time parliament reconvenes in mid-October, has thown the spotlight back on to the only other way out of Germany's current political paralysis - a minority government . .

In these circumstances, the choice of chancellor would be subject to a parliamentary vote . . .

Four Left Party MPs abandoned the party's official line of no support for either candidate and said yesterday that they would vote for Mr Schröder if his party agreed to scale down its programme of social security and unemployment benefit cuts and raise taxes for the wealthy.

"If the SPD says it wants Schröder and it agrees to our conditions then we will vote for him," said Huseyin-Kenan Aydin, one of the four.

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quote:

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Five parliamentary candidates of German Turks were elected to the Bundestag in the elections Sunday: Lale Akgun from SPD; Ekin Deligoz from the Greens; Hakki Keskin, Sevim Dagdelen and Huseyin Kenan Aydin from the Left Party.

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[ 23 September 2005: Message edited by: Wilf Day ]

Several further Left Party parliamentarians said they too, could imagine their party tolerating an SPD-Green coalition:

quote:

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A minority government is an option," Sabine Zimmermann told news Web site Spiegel Online. She said that in light of Germany's high unemployment, something had to be done quickly and that she couldn't comprehend that the SPD ruled out any cooperation with her party. Parliamentarian Alexander Ulrich said toleration depended on the SPD and Greens ruling out deployment of the German army abroad.

On Tuesday, Oskar Lafontaine, the Left Party's designated parliamentary group leader, praised the SPD and Green party agendas and also implied that his party could possibly work with them.

"I could sign the Green's election manifesto as it is. It's not far from the party that I currently represent," he said on German public broadcaster ARD. "The SPD's revised agenda before the election had less to do with the actions of the past seven years," he commented. "If one were to orient oneself on the issues, there would now certainly be an exciting situation."

SPD deputy parliamentary group leader Gernot Erler stressed on Thursday on InfoRadio Berlin-Brandenburg that there would not be a coalition between the Social Democrats, the Greens and the Left Party, but that didn't mean that the 54 parliamentarians from the left were "air."

And the Green's Christian Ströbele, deputy leader of his party's parliamentary group, said that the leftists' rejection of a coalition with the SPD and Greens was a "big mistake."

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Alexander Ulrich is from the west. Another of Lafontaine's men, he was a founding member of the WASG and its chair in the state of Rheinland-Pfalz. A former SPD member, only 34, he has been a full-time union officer for 7 years, based in Kaiserslautern, the smallest of the 12 World Cup 2006 cities.

Spiegel Online reported that Left Party member Huseyin-Kenan Aydin had made clear he would prefer Schroeder over Merkel and would vote accordingly, even if this meant defying the Left's leaders.

"Trade unionist Aydin said he could "well imagine" a situation in the Bundestag in which the Left would tolerate a minority government of the SPD and the Greens.

"I even wish that would come about," he told Spiegel Online. The magazine named three other Left members who said they would back Schroeder."

[ 23 September 2005: Message edited by: Wilf Day ]

quote:

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Mrs Merkel's Christian Democrats (CDU) reacted furiously after senior members of Mr Schröder's Social Democrats (SPD) called for a change in the way in which the seats held by political parties are counted. The CDU won more votes than the SPD in Sunday's inconclusive general election - but only with the votes for the CDU's Bavarian sister party, the CSU, taken into account.

Leading Social Democrats argued that, as these were two separate parties, the SPD remained the biggest group in the new parliament, and could therefore nominate its candidate - the incumbent - for chancellor.

However, Friedbert Pflüger, the CDU's foreign affairs spokesman, said: "Just because the SPD can't come to terms with its defeat ... they are now using tricks." Mrs Merkel's enemies were using "putsch-like behaviour", he added - an emotive word in Germany since Hitler's unsuccessful putsch in 1923 in a Munich beer hall.

The row came as the chancellor met Mrs Merkel for talks yesterday for the first time since an acrimonious television encounter on Sunday. They discussed the possibility of forming a grand coalition. Later, Mrs Merkel insisted that she "had a mandate to form the next government", but the talks had been "constructive, given the circumstances".

Minutes later, however, Mr Schröder emerged and repeated his determination to stay in office. The pair are due to meet again next Wednesday for more talks. But until either Mrs Merkel or Mr Schröder backs down, the chances of forming a grand coalition seem slim.

Mr Schröder may be gambling on winning a secret ballot to become chancellor after parliament reconvenes next month - possibly with the support of the new Left party and even a few CDU rebels.

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[ 23 September 2005: Message edited by: leftcoastguy ]

quote:

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German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder's Social Democrats (SPD) floated an unprecedented plan on Saturday to rotate the top job in a bid to break a political stalemate after last weekend's inconclusive election.

The head of an influential SPD group said the party's parliamentary deputies favoured a power-sharing plan with the Christian Democrats (CDU) that would let Schroeder hold office for two years before handing over to the CDU at mid-term.

SPD deputy Johannes Kahrs said the job-share plan appeared to be the most promising way out of the logjam after the conservatives edged the SPD but fell short of winning a centre-right majority in a general election last Sunday.

"Schroeder must remain chancellor for the first two years," he told Die Welt daily. RTL television earlier reported Schroeder, 61, favours such a rotation modelled on a 1984-88 Israeli government led by Shimon Peres and then Yitzhak Shamir.

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quote:

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Gysi and Lafontaine stress remarkably clearly the intent of the Left Party to take part in the responsibility of government. . . "The Left wants to co-govern based on a clear program", says Lafontaine today. . . The central points are extensive corrections to "Hartz IV" and the renouncing of international missions by the Armed Forces.

Gysi and Lafontaine might know that they will not soon find a partner for this policy. They nevertheless rehearsed already today the song they may sing to the SPD in the coming months. The SPD cannot remain "the second CDU" in the long term. Luring and recruiting the left forces in the SPD was the operation of the two in the election campaign. Today it began also in the Bundestag.

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It's interesting that, in their election by the caucus as co-leaders of the Left Party parliamentary group, Lafontaine got 51 of the 54 votes, and Gysi got 50. Close, but some significant dissent.

quote:

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Originally posted by leftcoastguy:
Schröder may be gambling on winning a secret ballot to become chancellor after parliament reconvenes next month - possibly with the support of the new Left party . . .

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Hmmm. As noted above, Der Spiegel found four Left Party MPs who indicated they are prepared to do that -- the fourth was Karin Binder from Karslruhe in the west, another of Lafontaine's WASG founders, and another full-time labour officer -- while other Left Party MPs are (pretending to?) oppose the idea. Has the Left Party split already? Rather convenient that Der Spiegel found exactly the required number who have "split." Transparent, actually. So no one could accuse Schröder of holding onto the Chancellorship with "communist" support, since none of these four have ever been PDS members. So he has no excuse to back down from his line of refusing a grand coalition. So a grand coalition would cause much dissent in the SPD's left wing, and further divide the German labour movement, which the SPD cannot risk.

Chancellor-Poker:

quote:

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Ulrich, the officer of IG Metall, who turned his back on the SPD last August, stressed that he had no fear of contact with his former party: "I am a Social Democrat who was no longer at home in the SPD."

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quote:

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Originally posted by leftcoastguy:
Schroeder appears to be winning and has an interesting game plan . .

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SPD chairman Franz Muentefering said SPD would wait until after a by-election next Sunday before deciding whether to enter full-scale coalition negotiations with the CDU.

quote:

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Muentefering said he and Schroeder would hold a "sounding out" meeting with Merkel and CDU leaders on Wednesday but would not decide whether to move forward to negotiations about a coalition until after the October 2 by-election.

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Check it here:

http://news.google.ca/news?ned=de

For example Der Spiegel, though not the only one:

quote:

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Gerhard Schröder hat sich entschieden: Er werde alles dafür tun, dass ein Bündnis zwischen Union und SPD zustande komme, sagte er der ARD.

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http://www.spiegel.de/politik/deutschland/0,1518,376596,00.html

I've been disgusted by him for a long time and this does not look good for the poor in Germany

[ 25 September 2005: Message edited by: VanLuke ]

Youngest new woman SPD MP: Katja Mast, 34. In 1993 she became vice-chair of the SPD Youth Executive for the state of Baden-Württemberg. Placed number 17 on the state list, she also ran locally in Pforzheim (losing), since an incumbent woman had the nomination already in Katja's nearby home town of Offenburg. The SPD won 23 seats in Baden-Wurttemberg, only 4 of which were locally elected, so she was in. Even though she is not officially the local MP, she has moved 100 km from Offenburg in order to live in "her" riding. That's the way list MPs in Germany work.

[ 26 September 2005: Message edited by: Wilf Day ]

quote:

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Originally posted by Stockholm:
There was a grand coalition between the CDU and SPD from 1966 to 1969 under Kurt Kiesinger of the CDU and Willy Brandt served as Foreign Minister. I have yet to read anything about how that government went.

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Mainstream media across the world have been pointing to the German elections as producing no clear results, with no winners but only losers . . .

But, in fact, this interpretation has ignored the real victor in this election: the newly formed LinksPartei (Left Party) which came up from nowhere to get nearly 9 per cent of the vote, overtaking the Green Party.

This message from Germany comes quite soon after the results of the French and Dutch referendums against the ultra-liberal proposed European Union Constitution.

So it is evident that there is at the regional level a crisis of acceptance of neo-liberalism. Clearly, the ideas of social equity, solidarity and the welfare state are still deeply rooted in the European society. If this is an international phenomenon, this can only be good news for people everywhere.

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Angela Merkel, German opposition leader, yesterday set conditions for sharing power with her rivals: they include acceptance by the Social Democrat party of Gerhard Schröder that she replace him as chancellor ... Regardless of the result in Dresden, Ms Merkel's CDU will retain its small lead over the SPD, but the by-election could subtly tip the psychological balance of power between the two parties and influence the coalition talks.

The CDU hopes an additional seat in parliament could add to the pressure on Mr Schröder to step down. The chancellor has so far refused to concede, although the SPD won three seats fewer than the CDU at the poll.

Because of Germany's highly complex electoral system, the CDU could still lose a seat in parliament even if its candidate won the constituency. Even so, however, it would retain a lead of at least one seat over the SPD.

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[ 29 September 2005: Message edited by: Wilf Day ]

quote:

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The election puts Germany in line with most other European democracies where the left is represented by more than one dominant party, thereby allowing for healthy debate and competition . . Schröder skilfully turned the tables. He fought as though he were in opposition and she were chancellor. He exaggerated his differences with the CDU, promising to defend social justice and block her plans to make it easier for employers to fire workers. In spite of Germany’s allegedly powerful unions and its strong “social” state, the country has no statutory minimum wage. In this campaign Schröder took the Linkspartei’s line and promised to introduce one.

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In the two biggest unions, IG Metall and Verdi, one fifth of the full-timers sympathise with the new Left Party. The economics department of Verdi effectively drew the programme of the WASG.

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But perhaps not: the two top women on the PDS Executive 2004-6 are both in the new Bundestag: Dr. Dagmar Enkelmann and Katya Kipping. And the top woman on the WASG executive is Sabine Lösing who ran only as a local candidate, was not on the state list for Lower Saxony, and is not one of the two Left Party MPs from that state.

[ 29 September 2005: Message edited by: Wilf Day ]

quote:

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Originally posted by Erik the Red:
Does anyone else find it a bit disturbing that Schroeder would prefer to entertain the option of power sharing with the right rather than negotiate a more natural alliance with the Left party? Looks to me a bit much like the Israeli Labour party considering a "centrist" coalition with Ariel Sharon rather than simply taking advantage of the split on the right. Maybe when it comes down to the real issues the "Labour" elites still feel more in common with their traditional opponents than their traditional base.

---

quote:

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Both camps held their rallies at the same time, just 3 km (2 miles) apart. Schröder's camp, however, drew five times as many supporters as Merkel's. He was loudly cheered by an estimated 5,000-strong crowd when he accused Merkel of lacking the strength to stand up for peace if "powerful world leaders" were to try to pressure Germany into war.

"It's not just enough to have the will, it's a question if she's able to stand up to a powerful partner," Schröder said. "She hasn't and that's why she's not capable of leading Germany.

Schröder largely secured his 2002 victory by refusing to join the US-led coalition in the war on Iraq. His peace stance is a strong advantage for him in the formerly communist east.

---

And Reuters reports the SPD is playing hardball with Merkel over the chancellorship:

quote:

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The Sueddeutsche Zeitung reported that SPD deputies in parliament would not cast ballots for Merkel even if the leaders of the SPD were to agree to a grand coalition with her party. The chancellor must be elected by the parliament.

"The SPD deputies appear united in their plan to vote against Merkel no matter what happens," the newspaper said.

Ralf Stegner, SPD leader in Schleswig-Holstein state, said the SPD has other coalition options to keep Schroeder in office.

"There's no reason for the SPD to enter a government under a Chancellor Angela Merkel," said Stegner.

SPD general secretary Klaus Uwe Benneter said his party, which in theory has other coalition options, won't back down. "Merkel symbolises massive social cutbacks."

---

In the last election in 2002, the Dresden district elected a lawmaker from Merkel's party over one from Schroeder's party by a narrow margin.

In 2002 the result in Dresden I was:
Party, personal vote, party vote
CDU 33.8% 30.5%
SPD 31.3% 32.9%
GREEN 5.5% 7.9%
FDP 5.5% 7.0%
PDS 20.9% 17.7%
Others 3.0% 4.0%

Next door in Dresden II - Meißen I, this year's party vote swing was 1.9% away from the left, 0.3% away from the centre-right, 0.9% away from others, and 3.1% towards the right-wing NPD. The personal vote (for the local candidate) swing was 1.7% away from the left, 2.1% away from the centre-right, and 3.8% towards NPD and others.

Party, personal 2005, 2002, party 2005, 2002
CDU 35.2% 37.0% 29.7% 33.0%
SPD 24.7% 29.2% 24.2% 30.1%
GREEN 7.5% 6.0% 9.0% 8.8%
FDP 7.5% 7.8% 11.1% 8.1%
Left 18.8% 17.5% 19.4% 15.6%
NPD 4.3% ? 4.1% 1.0%
AGFG ----- ? 0.8% ----
BüSo 1.2% ? 0.7% 0.4%
DSU 0.5% ? ----- ----
PBC ----- ? 0.3% 0.3%
MLPD 0.3% ? 0.2% ----
PSG ----- ? 0.2% ----
REP ----- ? 0.2% 0.7%
Others ---- 2.5% ----- 1.9%

So the trend to the right is not encouraging.

[ 01 October 2005: Message edited by: Wilf Day ]

Although they won the local seat, that would have meant nothing if it had just been subtracted from their list seats. But they got only 38,202 party votes, down 6.1% from three years ago, while the FDP got 26,034 party votes, up 9.6%. If the CDU had gotten more than 41,000 party votes in Dresden, as they feared they would, then one of the CDU's list seats, when their division between the states was recalculated after adding the Dresden votes, would have moved to Saxony, and be lost there. Because in Saxony it would have been eaten up by the three "overhang seats" already existing there. That is, the CDU already has too many local seats in Saxony for its share of the popular vote, and can earn no list seats there. So the local CDU victory would have been offset by one less CDU list seat.

That didn't happen, but it would have if enough CDU voters hadn't got the message to vote FDP.

[ 02 October 2005: Message edited by: Wilf Day ]

quote:

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In the 60's and 70's the party was led by Socialists like Brand and Schmidt, who fought for the social system. Over the last 20-odd years the party has been transformed into yet another capitalist/corporatist Party, and it shows in that they would rather govern with the Conservatives than with the Left Party,

---

You better re-read your history. Brandt was Vice-Chancellor in the CDU led grand coalition government led by ex-Nazi Kurt KIesinger 1966-1969. he then formed a government in coalition with the Free Democrats where the rightwing FDP suppliued the Minister of Finance! He was really only interested in foreign policy and didn'ty do much domestically. Helmut Schmidt was even more conservative. he backed deploying cruise missiles in Germany and when Germany was in a deficit situation in the late 70s - he also went along with FDP demands for big cuts in social spending.

This idea Schroeder is the first moderate SPD leader is absurd. Almost as ridiculous as people who think that Tony Blair is such a rightwing labour leader - they have forgetten the welfare cutting, pro-Vietnam War Harold Wilson.

quote:

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Originally posted by Stockholm:

You better re-read your history. Brandt was Vice-Chancellor in the CDU led grand coalition government led by ex-Nazi Kurt KIesinger 1966-1969. he then formed a government in coalition with the Free Democrats where the rightwing FDP suppliued the Minister of Finance! He was really only interested in foreign policy and didn'ty do much domestically. Helmut Schmidt was even more conservative. he backed deploying cruise missiles in Germany and when Germany was in a deficit situation in the late 70s - he also went along with FDP demands for big cuts in social spending.

This idea Schroeder is the first moderate SPD leader is absurd. Almost as ridiculous as people who think that Tony Blair is such a rightwing labour leader - they have forgetten the welfare cutting, pro-Vietnam War Harold Wilson.

Plus ca change, plus c'est toujours la meme!

---

Hamburg's Schmidt, however, was on the SPD right on foreign policy and I recall him strongly in favour of permitting Pershing 2 missiles on German soil, even when his position was outvoted by something like a 3-1 margin at a late 1970's SPD party convention.

1. No right-wing FDP coalition partner as with Brandt or Schmidt;

2. Green Party coalition partner with Fischer as foreign minister;

3. Oskar Lafontaine as finance minister;

4. Schroeder was a product of the '68 youth rebellion;

Unfortunately, Germany's economic malaise post unification, the east's high unemployment rate(~17%), continuing high eastern financial transfers, German plant relocations to eastern Europe and other environs, etc. are a complete reversal of Germany's economic powerhouse period from the '50s to about 1990 resulting in their current attempts at reforms.

[ 03 October 2005: Message edited by: Centrist ]

quote:

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Originally posted by Willowdale Wizard:
bbc radio 4's today programme has a good summary of how a series of confidence votes for chancellor may play out.

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Perhaps the Left Party are being shy about saying so because they would actually prefer that Schroeder stand down and let SPD chairman Franz Muentefering run against Merkel, and let him win. Those whose real loyalty is to the German labour movement would prefer this. Those whose priority is building the new party would prefer Schroeder who has less credibility with labour, or better yet, let Merkel be chancellor and try to tempt the left of the SPD to cross the floor. In that case you could see the Left Party split three ways: some vote against both (to let Merkel win), some abstain on Schroder and vote against Merkel, and some vote for Schroeder (at least five more than voted against him.)

[ 03 October 2005: Message edited by: Wilf Day ]

quote:

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Almost as ridiculous as people who think that Tony Blair is such a rightwing labour leader

---

quote:

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Utterly unapologetic for the public service reforms that have so angered Labour left-wingers, Mr Blair said: "Every time I've ever introduced a reform in government, I wish, in retrospect, I had gone further."
. . . .

Labour delegates applauded Mr Blair's reference to nuclear power, to the controversial decision to impose tuition fees in English universities and even parts of his defence of the war in Iraq and his support for the US.

Far from allowing his more radical policies to bed down, Mr Blair told the conference that reform must go further and faster if Britain is to cope with the growing economic challenge of emerging powers like China and India.

"We have to change again," he said. "Not step back from New Labour, but step up to a new mark a changing world is setting for us. In the era of rapid globalisation, there is no mystery about what works: an open, liberal economy, prepared constantly to change to remain competitive."

He also made perhaps the most cogent attempt to date to defend his plans to introduce market-style choice into public services. Those policies enrage trade unions, are opposed by many of Mr Brown's Labour allies and may be defeated in a symbolic conference vote today.

"There is another myth: choice is a New Labour invention," Mr Blair said. "Wrong. Choice is what wealthy people have exercised for centuries. If you have the money, you buy better. I want decent, hardworking families to have the same power."

---

http://news.scotsman.com/politics.cfm?id=2003932005

And your comparison with Harold Wilson is far off the mark. Whatever else, Wilson never sent troops to Vietnam. And domestically, comparing Wilson to Blair is like comparing FDR to Clinton. In other words, no comparison.

[ 03 October 2005: Message edited by: josh ]

quote:

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It is not about my claim and definitely not about me. It is about my party's claim to the political leadership and that can only be decided by the party's executive. I will accept every decision that it makes.

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quote:

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"There is a (Bundestag) majority that's to the left of the CDU," said Social Democrat MP Sigmar Gabriel after the vote.

He was referring to the theoretical possibility of the SPD forming a government with the new left party - Die Linke - and the Greens.

"We are not using this possibility. We want to govern with the CDU, but the CDU must give us something in return. We say: Schroeder must stay chancellor."

Mr Muentefering had a similar message. "We are clearly the strongest political force," he said.

---

"We" -- hmm, the Left Party is included in "us" but not in "our coalition." So now they want the Left Party's external support for a grand coalition led by Schroder? Not plausible. So what are they saying?

[ 03 October 2005: Message edited by: Wilf Day ]

quote:

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Originally posted by Wilf Day:
The odd thing about Dresden is that this "CDU victory" is just the same as the supposed national CDU victory -- a chimera. The party vote split left (SPD/PDS/Greens) 54.7%, right (CDU/FDP) 41%, plus 2.6% further-right NPD, and 1.7% miscellaneous.

Again, a solid left majority.

---

What I find more perplexing about the MMP system was the potential voting impact of this seat on the national level.

According to election.de, there were 3 possible scenarios on the Dresden seat:

1. Normal expected outcome of a CDU win in the first vote (constituency) and a second CDU party vote *in excess* of 25% resulting in no change (225 - 222) at federal level;

2. If CDU voters voted tactically for the FDP on the second vote and the CDU obtained *under* 25% on the second vote, the CDU would win another federal seat (226 - 222); [What actually happened]

3. IF the SDP received an improbable 90% of the second vote the federal seat allocation would be tied (222 - 222);

quote:

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Originally posted by Centrist:
What I find more perplexing about the MMP system was the potential voting impact of this seat on the national level.

---

Curiously to Canadian eyes, the states do not have a fixed number of list MPs. The list MPs are calculated at the all-Germany level. Then each party's seats are divided between its state lists in proportion to the share of the party's vote that came from each state. If a state has a high turnout it can get an extra list seat, or more than one, and can lose seats by a low turnout. In 2002 when the PDS fell below the 5% threshold and the 3-local-MP threshold, a whole lot of east-German votes did not count, and the other parties' votes being low in the eastern states, those states ended up with fewer list MPs. This is not how anyone proposes MMP should work in Canada.

Then there are the "overhang" seats. If a party wins 86% of the local seats (43% of the presumed total for that state) with 40% of the votes that count (not counting votes for parties below the threshold), they have won so many local seats that they get no list seats, and in fact, they have won a handful of extra local MPs that were not justified by their party's vote. Rather than penalize other parties, the other parties get their proper share, but the number of seats from that state are expanded by the number of "overhang" seats. This is not perfectly proportional because the other parties don't get extra seats to counterbalance the "overhang" seats. If this was going to be a regular feature of the system, they would have added some further "balance" seats for the other parties. Some state legislatures actually do this. Federally, there have been only a handful of "overhang" seats and it wasn't worth the further complication, they decided.

Now, when the party votes in Dresden were added to the total, this raised the number of votes the CDU got in Saxony, and lowered the percentage of the CDU vote that came from the other states. This meant that the state that just barely rated its last CDU list seat -- Nordrhein-Westfalen, as explained on the second-last post here -- lost a CDU list member. Normally you would expect Saxony to have gained that list seat. The local seats are subtracted from the list seats, so their new Dresden local seat would have cancelled out their new Saxony list seat. The result would have been that they added a local seat in Dresden, but lost the poor list MP in Nordrhein-Westfalen, improbably named Cajus Julius Caesar as noted on the other thread. No overall impact, just as Centrist expected.

Now we get to the weird bit. The math happened to work out that Saxony was a long way away from deserving another of the CDU list seats. Somehow, the math worked out that Saarland, with only a few seats, was in a better position to gain another seat than Saxony, as long as the CDU didn't get too many votes in Saxony.

And that's what happened. So the CDU got an extra "overhang" seat in Saxony, expanding the Bundestag by one MP. And the list seats were unaffected, although there was a little lateral shuffle from Nordrhein-Westfalen to Saarland which had no impact on the total.

I don't know how many CDU voters realized this. They may have been voting FDP for a second tactical reason: to try to boost the FDP's share of the national vote high enough to give it another MP. If so, they failed on that point.

quote:

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Originally posted by Willowdale Wizard:
how a series of confidence votes for chancellor may play out.

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quote:

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both sides are bickering over which party has the right to claim this post.

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quote:

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An end to Germany's political stalemate seemed within reach on Wednesday as Angela Merkel and Gerhard Schröder said they would meet tonight to agree on who should lead the next government.

The surprise breakthrough suggested Ms Merkel, leader of the opposition Christian Democratic Union, was poised to become the first woman and east German to head the government.

"It's looking very good but we must still wait until tomorrow night," a senior CDU official told the Financial Times.

After a third round of exploratory talks between the two parties, Chancellor Gerhard Schröder of the Social Democratic party and Ms Merkel said they were optimistic their conflicting claims to the chancellery could be settled.

The CDU had threatened to walk away from the talks if Mr Schröder did not back down.

Wednesday's developments suggest the SPD may have agreed to enter a Merkel government as junior partner in exchange for senior cabinet portfolios and far-reaching political concessions.

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quote:

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If the SPD is getting "far-reaching" policy concessions and many senior cabinet positions then what's not to like.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Stockholm:
If the SPD is getting "far-reaching" policy concessions and many senior cabinet positions then what's not to like.

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Uh, maybe that there was a clearly better alternative available and he chose to ignore it?

Clearly, if he'd been willing to move a bit left (as in, govern by his campaign) instead of moving right, he could have formed a government with the Greens and the Left party, and instead of "getting concessions" on policy and cabinet positions, he would have been *setting* policy and forming a cabinet. Does it really amaze you that it bugs leftists that the hypothetically centre-left party is more willing to coalesce as a junior partner with the centre-right party than to form government with a party a bit further left?

quote:

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I certainly won't," Ludwig Stiegler, the SPD's plain-speaking deputy parliamentary leader said.

Andrea Nahles, another influential leftwinger, warned against the SPD giving up Mr Schröder's claim to the chancellery if Mrs Merkel made concessions in other key areas, such as policy, cabinet jobs and who becomes the new leader of parliament.

Last night one expert said the political crisis that has gripped Germany since the indecisive election almost three weeks ago wasn't over - despite days of speculation that a denouement was near.

"I don't expect a swift result," Nils Diederich, a professor of political science at Berlin's Free University, told the Guardian. "If the SPD voted for Merkel this would be tantamount to the party shooting itself in the foot. Some 4%-5% of the SPD's core voters would desert it. They would join the Left party instead. It is going to be extremely difficult for the SPD's leadership to sell Mrs Merkel to its own supporters."

. . Germany could be staggering towards a minority government or new elections.

Mr Müntefering said yesterday that the SPD would have to approve any grand coalition at a special party conference. The earliest this could take place was November he said - probably in the middle of the month during a party meeting in Karlsruhe.

---

Meanwhile the Bundestag will elect a speaker and start voting for Chancellor, rejecting Merkel. The plot thickens.

Leading Social Democrat MPs are adamant that Mr Schröder remain chancellor. Ludwig Stiegler, the party's deputy parliamentary leader insisted Ms Merkel would never become chancellor with the help of Social Democrat votes. "Merkel stands for policies which are an anathema to employees," he said. "She has not got a big enough majority to become chancellor and she won't get one."

quote:

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Christian Democrat leader Angela Merkel is set to replace Gerhard Schröder as Germany's next chancellor, in a political deal that will see the departure of Mr Schröder from the national political stage, senior members of the ruling Social Democrats have told the Financial Times.

Ms Merkel's expected victory in the battle for the chancellorship is likely to be announced on Monday, following a meeting on Sunday evening in Berlin between Mr Schröder and Ms Merkel, according to the SPD politicians, who spoke on condition of anonymity. The two leaders met on Thursday evening for four hours to agree the framework of a SPD-CDU grand coalition, but refused on Friday to disclose details. The talks also include SPD leader Franz Müntefering, and Bavarian premier Edmund Stoiber.

Officials close to Mr Schröder said the chancellor would not become vice chancellor and foreign minister in the coalition, despite pressure from within the SPD for him do so. "The chancellor has done what was necessary, to ensure the SPD is on an equal footing with the CDU in the coalition," one official said.

. . . .

Senior CDU politicians told the Financial Times that the party was willing to make significant concessions to the SPD to win its support for Ms Merkel's chancellorship. "We have to find a way of avoiding the SPD losing face," one leading parliamentarian said.

The SPD may be given an equal number of cabinet posts as the CDU and be offered first choice of ministries to control, the MP said. SPD officials said these could include the foreign, economics and family ministries.

In addition, the CDU is almost certain to give the SPD assurances - even ahead of lengthy coalition talks expected to start next week - that it will drop key elements of its more radical economic reform agenda, such as changes to job protection and collective bargaining rules.

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quote:

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Johannes Kahrs, the speaker of the SPD’s influential rightwing Seeheimer (German) circle, today said there was "sheer horror" inside the parliamentary faction at the prospect of Ms Merkel as Germany’s leader. "The CDU having the industry ministry and the SPD having the labour ministry is a recipe for total blockade," he said.

Other SPD activists said they would vote against the deal when it is put to the party at a conference to be held in Karlsruhe in mid-November. If the deal is approved, but only narrowly, there seems little prospect of Germany's new left-right government lasting a full four-year term. Indeed, the real winner from today’s announcement is probably Germany’s new Left party (German).

With the SPD occupying crucial ministries such as finance and labour, the Left party is likely to profit in the long run when disillusionment with the "grand coalition" sets in, as it inevitably will.

---

quote:

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The give and take of coalition talks, which are due to start next Monday, will prove more painful for the Social Democrats who lost the elections to the conservatives by just four seats, Wuest believes.

The Social Democrats also lost arguably their smoothest operator, outgoing Schroeder.

But in return for giving her the chancellery, they SPD won two ministries more than the Christian Democrats in an unusual division of power.

---

[ 10 October 2005: Message edited by: Wilf Day ]

While supporters of the FDP may be wrong about a lot of things, supporters of both the Union and the SDP are simply insane.

[ 10 October 2005: Message edited by: America is Behind ]

quote:

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Mit drei Stunden dauert die Parteivorstandssitzung besonders lang. Sieben Enthaltungen und zwei Gegenstimmen sind am Ende deutlich mehr als erwartet.

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quote:

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Even the SPD right is not happy. The chair of the conservative Seeheimer Circle, Johannes Kahrs, announces resistance in the Bundestag caucus against the allocation of departments. "This thing is not yet through", he says.

---

Well, if the SPD's right wing is not happy, this thing ain't over until the fat lady sings, so to speak.

I notice that outside of the chancellor's chair, the SPD will have 8 ministers opposed to the lesser amount for the CDU/CSU - 6.

In comparison, during the last grand coalition ('66 - '69) the CDU held the chancellor's chair as well as the majority of cabinet posts - 10 -while the SPD held 9.

In that respect, the SPD is getting a better deal this time around.

[ 11 October 2005: Message edited by: Centrist ]

quote:

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Originally posted by America is Behind:
Apparently, the U.S. isn't the only country with a Jesusland:

---

Those 2 southern "black" states (Bavaria and Baden-Wuertemburg) and the "black" southeastern state (Saxony) all speak Germany's strangest dialacts. Many other Germans can't understand them in a conversation.

It's gotta be that strange dialect that causes 'em to vote for the CDU (akin the the American South).

quote:

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Originally posted by Centrist:
Those 2 southern "black" states (Bavaria and Baden-Wuertemburg) and the "black" southeastern state (Saxony) all speak Germany's strangest dialacts. It's gotta be that strange dialect that causes 'em to vote for the CDU (akin the the American South).

---

After the German defeat in WWI, the revolutionary left seised power in parts of Germany, following on the recent Soviet Russian example. I imagine conventional Marxist thinking at the time was that the German working class was the natural leader of the world socialist revolution, and the Russian head start was a fluke.

And a lot of those parts were in the south:

In the course of the November revolution in Germany at the end of World War One, in Saxony workers' and soldiers' councils were established on 8 and 9 November 1918. They took over legislative and executive power and proclaimed the Republic of Saxony on 10 November. Chairman of the Council of People's Commissioners from
15 Nov 1918 to 21 Jan 1919 was Robert Richard Lipinski of the USPD (Independent Social Democratic Party, left-socialist). On 25 February 1919 the newly elected parliament was convened, which called itself "people's chamber". It adopted the preliminary basic law for the Free State of Saxony. Not until 1922, on October 23, did the German army occupy Saxony and crush what was left of the Soviet Republic of Saxony. (I can't figure out the details from 1919 to 1922.)

Next door, Bavaria was proclaimed a "socialist republic" 7 November 1918, led by Kurt Eisner of the USPD. After his assassination, on April 6 the "Bavarian Soviet Republic" was proclaimed. Initially, it was ruled by other USPD members. Their regime collapsed within six days, followed by the communists, led by Eugen Levine, sometimes characterized as a "potential German Lenin." He began communist reforms, that included expropriating luxurious apartments and giving them to the homeless, placing factories under the ownership and control of the workers, etc. He organized his own army, the Red Army, similar to the Red Army of Soviet Russia. In order to protect the revolution, thousands of unemployed workers volunteered; soon their ranks reached 20,000. The Red Guards began arresting known counter-revolutionaries and on 29 April 1919, eight men were executed as right-wing spies.

Soon after, on 3 May 1919, the proto-fascist Freikorps (having a force of 30,000 men), together with the "White Guards of Capitalism" (having a force of 9,000), invaded the Bavarian Soviet Republic and defeated the communists, after bitter street fights in which over 1,000 volunteer supporters of the Bavarian Soviet Republic died.

Even in Württemberg a "People's State of Württemberg" was formed on 9 November 1918 run by the SPD and USPD. On 12 January 1919 new elections confirmed it in office. But in June 1920 the left government was defeated.

[ 15 October 2005: Message edited by: Wilf Day ]

In today's era, it's still funny how the southern German states trend toward the CDU.

Even in the former east Germany, the southern state of Saxony is the CDU's strongest base and, while not as strong, the neighbouring southern state of Thuringia appears to also be the CDU's second strongest base.