Parliamentary politics can be a little baffling to Americans. Most of the nations of Europe, including Germany, do things a little differently than we do; while we have coalitions formed within the two major parties before an election, the parliamentary systems of Europe may have one, two or three major parties and a number of smaller ones, and they tend to form coalitions after elections.
Germany does this. Not long ago, we reported on the election in the German state of Saxony-Anhalt, wherein the right-leaning Alternative für Deutschland (AfD, or in English, the Alternative for Germany) party did surprisingly well. But the AfD is still putting up wins on the board, this time in the state of Sachsen-Anhalt, where the AfD recently won a near-majority, and now after forming an alliance with the Bündnis Sahra Wagenknecht (Alliance for Social Justice and Economic Reason, or BSW), Sachsen-Anhalt is now the first German state to have Minister-President (more or less the equivalent of a state governor here) from the AfD.
The times, they are a'changing.
You’ll remember that last month, Sachsen-Anhalt elected a new Landtag (parliament), and Alternative für Deutschland received 43.8% of the vote – enough for 39 of 83 parliamentary seats. That is not quite a majority, but it is close enough to make the firewall against the AfD unworkable. Afterwards the Bündnis Sahra Wagenknecht (BSW), which has five seats, entered talks with the AfD. Thirty-nine plus five is 44, which you will note is a majority of 83. Lead AfD candidate Ulrich Siegmund announced that he planned to be elected Minister President, or premier, of Sachsen-Anhalt, at which point he would form the first-ever AfD state government.
There's that coalition-building, parlaying two parties into an outright majority. Now, that can come apart at any time, but for now, it's giving the AfD a significant victory - and a new Minister-President. The AfD, when the new state government, or Landtag, met, put forth as their candidate a real estate guy (sound familiar?) named Tobias Rausch. The first order of business was to elect the new Minister-President, and Herr Rausch won — handily.
The BSW had pledged to support Rausch’s candidacy, and as I said above, 39 AfD votes plus 5 BSW votes is 44 votes, which is enough.
Yesterday, however, Rausch did not just get 44 votes. Instead he got 48 votes, which means that four CDU members broke ranks and pissed on the sacred firewall to help the AfD into its first Landtag Presidency.
The CDU being the Christian Democratic Union, Angela Merkel's old party. That's a bit of a surprise, and a welcome one for the AfD.
So, is this the start of a wave? Maybe. Plenty of Germans are unhappy with the old order's free-and-easy policy on immigration, in which they will let in almost anyone for any reason, no matter where they come from or what they intend to do in Germany. That's cost them, literally, in lives. The AfD platform not only included a crackdown on illegal immigration, but reinforcing and strengthening German sovereignty, and on protecting German culture and the German people. That, of course, has resulted in the AfD being accused of everything from Islamophobia to kicking puppies, and even led to attempts to ban the party from German elections, but it's starting to look like that's just not going to be possible any more.
This is an interesting result. The next German national election is in 2029, three years away. Can the AfD continue to gain ground that long? And if they do, will they manage a working majority in the new national government?
It's too soon to tell. But the signs, right now, are enough to make one wonder if maybe it's not too late to salvage Germany, even as much of the rest of Europe collapses around it.
Editor's Note: The Democrat Party has been infected by socialism, and it's spreading FAST. Democrats are claiming there's nothing to worry about, but we know the truth.
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