Here are the latest results from Germany as reported by Deutshe Welle:
CDU: 35.3
SPD: 34.1
FDP: 10.1
Greens: 8.1
Left Party: 8.5
The Bundestag seating division is:
CDU: 220
SPD: 212
FDP: 63
Greens: 50
Left: 53
598 Bundestag seats means 300 seats are needed to form a coalition. The reasonable theoritical combinations that get you there are:
1) CDU, SPD (432) <== the "Grand Coalition" for the lovers of the WTO.
2) CDU,FDP,Greens (333) <== Only if the Greens can't wait to be known by the color of American money!
3) CDU,FDP,Left (336) <== Can you spell "DYSFUNCTIONAL"!
4) SPD,FDP,Greens (325) <== The FDP has ruled out any coalition with the SPD
5) SPD,Greens,Left (315)<== Probably the next most likely possibility after a Grand Coalition.
I'd say the chances of the Grand Coalition look really good since the alternative is a much more left-leaning Germany in direct conflict with the US. I doubt German voters have the stomach to take on the US agenda with all that would mean. I guess it's a good day for the WTO and the New World Order.
Chuck
----- Original Message ----- From: "Marvin Gandall" <marvgandall at videotron.ca> To: "LBO-Talk" <lbo-talk at lbo-talk.org> Sent: Sunday, September 18, 2005 3:44 PM Subject: Re: [lbo-talk] German election: the markets won't like this
> Jim Famelant wrote:
>
>> Any chance that Schroeder or the other SPD leaders
>> could come under pressure from the Party's base
>> to do a coalition with the Left party rather than
>> a grand coalition with the CDU?
> -------------------------
> Maybe, and that would be good, but I doubt it.
>
> Why is a broad left coalition unlikely? Because Schroeder and the SPD
> leaders are closer to Merkel and the CDU than they are to Lafontaine and
> Gysi's Left Party.
>
> The SPD and CDU both favour the continuation of "structural reforms"
> which
> would scale back Germany's health, pension, unemployment, and welfare
> benefits, reduce corporate taxes and regulation, and weaken the unions and
> collective bargaining. They differ in how much the safety nut should be
> unravelled, but both parties have this as their goal. The social
> democrats,
> in fact, began implementing this program while in office.
>
> That's what led Lafontaine and the Social Democrats' left wing to bolt the
> SPD and to form the Left Party in alliance with Gysi's Linkspartie, which
> evolved from the old East German CP. The LP leaders have deep-seated
> differences with the SPD agenda, and one or the other party would have to
> effectively abandon their own program in order to go into coalition.
>
> Shroeder and Merkel, not surprisingly, tried to demonstrate they were very
> different from each other in their appeals to voters, but on the
> essentials,
> there seems to be enough agreement between them to force them into a
> "grand
> coalition" which could govern along the lines mentioned above. It happened
> before, in the 60s, when Willi Brandt, I think, was head of the SPD.
>
>
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