[Peace-discuss] Fw: The Left Goes In, the Right Goes Out - or Does It?

[unionyes]

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From: <moderator at PORTSIDE.ORG>
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Sent: Monday, May 10, 2010 8:53 PM
Subject: The Left Goes In, the Right Goes Out - or Does It?


> The Left Goes In, the Right Goes Out - or Does It?
> 
> By Victor Grossman
> 
> May 10, 2010
> 
> Berlin
> 
> With 18 million people the state of North Rhine-
> Westphalia in the valleys of the Rhine and Ruhr is far
> and away the most populous German state. Once extremely
> prosperous, much of it is now in the Rust Belt
> category. But it still has key political importance,
> and was ruled for the past five years by the same two
> right-wing parties as those ruling the whole nation,
> Angela Merkel's Christian Democrats and the Free
> Democrats of Foreign Minister Guido  Westerwelle.
> 
> In Sunday's election, both of them took a beating. The
> ruling Christian Democrats, whose local leader, Jurgen
> Ruettgers, had hopes of following Angela Merkel at the
> top spot in Berlin, or even pushing her out, can now
> forget about it. His home state handed him and his
> party their worst defeat ever, a loss of over 10
> percentage points.
> 
> And yet, to the end, it was a nip and tuck battle
> between his party and its main rivals, the Social
> Democrats. The latter also lost voters, though not
> nearly so many (2.4 percent), and came out second best
> in the rivalry, not quite catching up to the Christian
> Democrats. The final result was tight, 34.6 to 34.5
> percent.
> 
> The difference between their two smaller partners was
> much clearer. While the other big business party, the
> Free Democrats, could only tread water, ending up with
> 6.7 percent, the Greens were the big winners of the
> day, almost doubling their number, with over 12 percent
> of the voters. They were understandably in a jubilant
> mood.
> 
> But what counts when forming a government in German
> politics (as in most of Europe) is not the number of
> voters but the number of seats in the legislature,
> where a majority is needed to form a stable cabinet. In
> this case that means getting 91 or more of the 181
> seats. And when all the counts came in during the
> night, the Social Democrats and their favorite
> partners, the Greens, ended up with just 90, ten more
> than their two old rivals, but still one seat short of
> victory.
> 
> The reason neither pair got over half the seats was
> because of the new addition, the Left. It made its
> debut in the state by squeezing past the required
> percentage with 5.6 points and thus getting eleven
> seats in the legislature. A wagon with four wheels can
> usually be steered; one with five wheels is far more
> skittish. For the Social Democrats to form a government
> they must either join up with their traditional rivals,
> the Christian Democrats, and fight over top positions,
> a very unpleasant and uncertain prospect, or else
> accept not only the Greens as partners but the Left as
> well, just to reach that magic number of 91. That too
> is anathema, however, especially since national party
> leaders in Berlin fear any similar opening for the Left
> on a national scale in 2013 and could try to prevent
> it. Some local Social Democrats are also so fierce in
> their rejection of this "formerly Communist" party,
> their term for the Left, that they might even rebel at
> any such three party solution and desert to the other
> side - as happened two years ago in Hesse (perhaps with
> some desirable temptations as incentives for the
> deserters).
> 
> To make matters even more wobbly, the Left in this
> state is allegedly the very farthest to the left in all
> the party. It has not only horrified many good citizens
> by calling for the legalization of marijuana, but also
> supported the nationalization of banks and major
> utility giants. The media like to call its leaders "
> chaotic" and have unhappily been supported in such
> attacks by some leaders of the Left in other states,
> who went so far as to say it is "incapable of holding
> government posts," statements seen by others as
> suicidal backbiting.
> 
> Thus, the future in North Rhine-Westphalia is still
> undecided. If the Social Democrats emerge as leaders,
> in one way or another, this would cost the central
> government its present majority in the national Upper
> House, or Bundesrat, where each state is represented.
> Without this majority, Angela Merkel's government may
> find it very difficult to get laws approved. In the
> past, of course, all four older parties, including the
> Greens and the Social Democrats, joined in supporting a
> nasty collection of reactionary measures and in
> approving military engagement in Yugoslavia,
> Afghanistan and other areas. Current more social or
> leftish sounds from their headquarters, which
> undoubtedly helped them in Sunday's election, have only
> been audible since they were forced into opposition.
> The Left was almost always alone in its consistent,
> continuous pressure on matters of domestic and foreign
> affairs.
> 
> Many questions remain as to what compromises, if any,
> the Left will make to get into the state government in
> Dusseldorf or, in 2013, into the national government in
> Berlin. Such matters will almost certainly be debated,
> perhaps hotly, at its party congress next week in the
> Baltic Sea port of Rostock. For a variety of reasons,
> therefore, the coming days and weeks may be very stormy.
> 
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