Elections in Germany in 2006

It may sound stupid because as an ethnical German living outside of Germany I shouldn't probably "stick my nose" into German politics. But as what I consider to be really connecting me with Germany are not only my ancestors but also the German ideals: discipline and productive work (that means work not done in order to do work because it is compulsory but doing work at areas at which you are good in order to achieve something).

Therefore I have something to tell all Germans.

Please do not vote for SPD in the elections in 2006. That would mean allowing Gerhard Schroeder to rule for 4 more years and that must be prevented because Schroeder is a bad chancellor. Here's why:

- For some of the positions in the cabinet he nominates people who do not have appriopriate qualifications. For example for the position of the Minister of Economy and Labour he nominated Wolfgang Clement who doesn't have a degree in Economics. He has a degree in Law.
- He helped Poland to join the EU as quickly as possible and that was a mistake because Poland has shown ungratefulness.
- He wants the EU to cancel the embargo on delivery of weapons to China - a country which is ruled by a regime which breaks human rights and wants to conduct an aggression against Taiwan.
- He is helping Turkey to join the EU as quickly as possible. This way there will be 11 poor countries in the EU instead of 10. That will mean paying money to 11 poor countries instead of 10.

hi AtheiX,

this news from germany might be appreciated by you :

after todays really historic loss of the SPD in the state of northrhine westphalia ( after 39 years SPD, they got smashed..politically, quite significant to the upcoming general elections ) , chancellor Schröder has suggested to bring forward the general elections from 2006 to autumn 2005. this is not yet definite, but other political parties have already said, that they would support this move. at least democracy works over here, and politicians can stand to their mistakes and realize that they need the support of the population.

link : news.bbc.co.uk...

and to your criticism of Mr. Schröder, i can understand most of it, many people here in germany are very concerned about the current way of politics, in economics, unemployment, eu-questions and also "weapons to china".

but a lot of people give respect to the SPD + greens, for at least pushing unpopular reforms ( social reform ).

the real problem for me and many other young people, in the elections today and the upcoming elections, is that a lot of people don't see really better alternatives, the opposition has nothing more to offer than : you make all thing worst , but never gives plausible or financable alternatives. and then your left with choosing the "lesser" problem or a small party that will never play a role like the "german cardrivers party".

but one thing for sure, the neonazi, radical rightwing parties had no significance *opens a beer*

I wonder if it'll be another race to see who can be the most anti-American...

Originally posted by djohnsto77
I wonder if it'll be another race to see who can be the most anti-American...

wow !! yes we are all anti-american LMAO . thats a direct INSULT to all german sane people.

sorry djohnsto77, but i can't understand where you get this from.
the current administration did not support a illegal invasion of iraq, that's it. we are training iraqi security forces, we are one of the biggest military presence in afghanistan, and you call us anti american? we have in the last years, taken out several terror cells but of course you will not see it in us media or even here at ATS.
if you would actually take a look at both the administration and the opposition, you would, for example figure out, that the opposition (CDU / CSU ,conservative christians if this helps you lol ) would have gone to iraq WITHOUT a question and this party will most likely win the next general elections.
if you take threads serious like : most germans think the us gov was behind 9-11, or germany is building up to the 4th reich, then this is your problem, none of it actually reflects the opionion of ANY german or foreigner here i know.
but blablabla you are american we are just pesky liberal europeans.... no arguments, one sentence, wich is just a offense and nothing else.

edit: typos.......

[edit on 22-5-2005 by Hannah]

[edit on 22-5-2005 by Hannah]

Hannah, I don't mean to insult all Germans, but from what I understand, Schroeder was lagging behind in the last election until he really started to attack the U.S. and Bush.

Originally posted by djohnsto77
Hannah, I don't mean to insult all Germans, but from what I understand, Schroeder was lagging behind in the last election until he really started to attack the U.S. and Bush.

then you should make this clear in your post, and not post a one liner, that suggest that most german political parties are anti-american, which you did in my opinion.
a race on who is the most anti-american can only happen if you have more than ONE political party that is anti-american. and i can't remember mr. schröder to really ATTACK the US. he opposed an illegal invasion that is based on lies and this is not necessarily a bad thing. especially if you take the history of germany and europe into account, then it should not be difficult to understand that the majority of germans will not support a illegal invasion.

If you want to continue to believe that the Iraq war was illegal, go ahead, but just believing in something doesn't make it a reality....but that's a topic already beaten to death in other threads.

Originally posted by djohnsto77
If you want to continue to believe that the Iraq war was illegal, go ahead, but just believing in something doesn't make it a reality....but that's a topic already beaten to death in other threads.

yes this topic has discussed to death, and i don't want to repeat this discussion. i just wanted to point out, that in this case ( the opposing of a war) we have two different opinions, opinions in two different democratic countries.
these decisions have to be respected, the same way anyone outside the US has to respect the reelection of pres. bush ( just as an example before you freak out ). i'm simply fed up of the fact, that whoever critizises US politics will be labeled anti-american.

djohnsto77, despite what your USA-centric mind might think, bashing Bush is about the LAST thing on Schroeder's and our minds right now in Europe. We got better things to do.
Schroeder's success/failures have nothing to do with Bush. He is mainly criticized because of unemployment rates due to bad planing, and his success is mostly due to social reforms (actually caring about the underprivileged is important to us europeans).
Add to that the Constitution craze, new EU laws, education reforms, immigrant problems, the rise of right wing parties, etc, etc, we do not waste much time on Bush. He is quite irrelevant to Schroeders campaign, people actually care about the real current issues in Germany.

USA pops up now and then as a joke on comedy shows when bush makes a bushism, or as a cartoon in local newspapers.
Oh yeah, and as a place from which the cool TV series come from, like Lost, 24, Desperate Housewives, stuff like that

AS Hannah said, the alternatives to Schroeder and his SPD might actually be worse. I think that there is a sense of general apathy and disapointment in goverments all over europe right now.
It is quite chaotic here in Austria too. The party that ruled for the last 4 years recently fell apart, their leader decided to create a new party. The coalition is shaken very badly, the reforms are not going as planned... we got better things to do then to dwell on why we don't like Bush&Co.

Originally posted by paperclip
djohnsto77, despite what your USA-centric mind might think, bashing Bush is about the LAST thing on Schroeder's and our minds right now in Europe. We got better things to do.

Well let's hope thing like this end then, k?



From: David's Medienkritik Blog

[edit on 5/22/2005 by djohnsto77]

LOL!!

What the hell is the point of that???

Stern and Speigel are weekly magazines. A year has 52 weeks. So in the last 5 years Bush got 8 covers. Wow... we are really obsessed...

What are you trying to say?
That it is not good to have a different opinion on things? That we should accept everything without questioning it or thinking for ourselves? That criticism of goverment is a negative thing?

What is the deffinition of "anti-Bush" label anyway?
And what does a criticism of one member of goverment has to do with you personaly? Do you identify yourself with the president?

What the hell is your point??
And why are you changing the topic of this discussion?
We are discussing german politics and you are constantly throwing in labels here that have nothing to do with what we are talking about. We have pointed that out already.
The initial post doesn't even mention Bush.

Anyways, I would like to address one more point mentioned in the first post, the question of Turkey and EU.
The main objection to Turkey's admission in the EU is human rights issue regarding Kurds. I think that economicaly they are not that bad.
If we let eastern european countries in even though they are not on the level of Germany and France economicaly, then it is only fair to use the same standards for Turkey.
For that matter, we let Italy and Spain in, they are not doing so well either.
The same criteria should apply to all who want to join and that includes Turkey too.

I do not know what the view of CDU/CSU is on this matter.

Hannah, do you know more?

djohnsto77, are the spiegel or the stern papers state run magazines ? nope. does mr schroeder write for them or draws their covers? nö.
are these papers making a public election to decide what they write about ? again nope. should we now all search papers, articles and covers from any newspaper, magazine etc. around the world that is a bit off... ?

paperclip, i really can't figure out the "real" position of the CDU/CSU on the turkey question, that's my big problem with these parties, a lack of integrity and coherence. if (big IF, i have not the time right now to look it up...bed is calling) i remember right, they first opposed the admission of turkey in the EU, mostly for cultural (weak point in my opinion) and human right issues, but now they would support the admission if turkey complies to all necessary requirements. but who knows..i guess till this question really has to be decided they will change their opinion a few times

for me, besides the human rights issue regarding the kurds, another unacceptable thing is the role and treatment of women in general. while on paper they are working towards an equal role, i can still remember the pictures of policemen beating down male and female protesters on the "day of women". this was quite a horrible scene which sticks in my mind since i saw it. and this case is just a few months old, not a reaction on a protest i would expect.

in regard to economics, i agree, we led countries join, that are not yet on the same economical level then some european countries, but i don't see that as bad, we can give them a chance to develop further and faster and integrate in the EU. the same should be applied to any country that wants to join the EU in my opinion, including turkey.

I have something more to tell all Germans.

Not only Wolfgant Clement, but also other ministers of the Schroeder Cabinet lack appriopriate qualifications for their jobs.

Hans Eichel, the minister of finance, doesn't have any economic education. He has studied Germanistic (German linguistic), Philosophy, Politics and History.

Manfred Stolpe, the minister of transport and infrastructure, doesn't have any architecture or economics qualifications. He has studied Law.

Party = part of seats in parliament (part of voters)
CDU/CSU (christian conservatives) = 53%(49%)
SPD (social democrats) = 30%(28%)
Grüne (greens) = 9%(8%)
FDP (libertarians) = 8%(7%)
Others = 0%(8%)

Source: Forsa institute, 01.06.2005

I changed my mind. I think that people should choose Schroeder as their chancellor. The reasons for why I think so are:
1) Some of his ministers are well-educated people: Hans Eichel hasstudied 4 subjects, and Manfred Stolpe and Peter Struck have PhD titles
2) His government keeps good diplomatic relationships with the whole Western Europe.
3) Unemployment in Germany has been big anyway since the reunion in 1990, but his government lowered the unemployment rate.
4) He ordered the construction of the Baltic line of the Yamal Gaspipe, which will secure Germany's energetical security.

Originally posted by AtheiX
I changed my mind. I think that people should choose Schroeder as their chancellor. The reasons for why I think so are:
1) Some of his ministers are well-educated people: Hans Eichel hasstudied 4 subjects, and Manfred Stolpe and Peter Struck have PhD titles

Every one of the CDU/CSU and FDP have some academic titles, Angela Merkel, chancellor candidate is even a doctor in Physics

2) His government keeps good diplomatic relationships with the whole Western Europe.

So did the government before

3) Unemployment in Germany has been big anyway since the reunion in 1990, but his government lowered the unemployment rate.

no, the kohl government did in the end some reforms, it took some time, then in the governmental change time, unemployment sank down and stablizied by less than half of what we have now, those reforms were reversed by red-green as they said before of the election, as those reforms were too "unsocial", since that point the unemployment rised steady.

4) He ordered the construction of the Baltic line of the Yamal Gaspipe, which will secure Germany's energetical security.

A thing he already did... and who says the CDU/CSU+FDP wouldnt have done the same?

I have been reading about German politics and I have to admit that as an American who speaks very little German it's very hard to find information. From everything I can gather, Mr. Shroeder's party is in trouble due to the loss of manufacturing jobs and the economy. The CDU has Angela Merkel who has made some good moves and has improved the image of the CDU by distancing the party from the far right. The other smaller parties don't seem to have the charasmatic leadership that the SPD and the CDU have. It seems as though the more economically conservative parties have the edge but then again it's hard to tell if you don't read German and all your "German Political News" comes from the BBC and other outlets.

God I should have studied harder in German language class.

Chirac and Shrouder thought they were going to make a supreme Europe with them in charge, its backfired , nobody sees them as good politicians , just greedy men who are now has beens.

The CDU has Angela Merkel who has made some good moves and has improved the image of the CDU by distancing the party from the far right.

distancing from the far right????

Who ever said the CDU is far right?


The only thing they said to the immigration policy is, that they want to stop more immigration, to prevent germany of the "multicultural society" and that they want instead better familiy policy.

www.spiegel.de...

Originally posted by looking4truth
I have been reading about German politics and I have to admit that as an American who speaks very little German it's very hard to find information. From everything I can gather, Mr. Shroeder's party is in trouble due to the loss of manufacturing jobs and the economy. The CDU has Angela Merkel who has made some good moves and has improved the image of the CDU by distancing the party from the far right. The other smaller parties don't seem to have the charasmatic leadership that the SPD and the CDU have. It seems as though the more economically conservative parties have the edge but then again it's hard to tell if you don't read German and all your "German Political News" comes from the BBC and other outlets.

british foreign news is crap, I know this newspaper "Sun", they always spread hate about every other nation, I have seen never something similar xenophobic in other countries, as example when you read about a sports challagne between britian and another nation, you can be sure, Sun will insult the other nation on some way...


Every time I hear a british speaking about politics its highly on a tabloid-level!