Three Days to go

For the one and a half of you, my dear readership, who want me to continue to pursue blogging on the German election, here’s where things stand as of Friday morning, three days before the polls close at 6 p.m. on Sunday.

Remember, it’s all about clever color-coding. And it’s all about forming a coalition, in the end, since no single party has the numbers to go it alone.

A quick refresher: the parties line up, from left to right, this way:

• Far left - The Left Party
• Center left (holds greater appeal with the working class and trade unions) - The Socialists (SPD)
• Also center left (holds greater appeal with urban voters and the highly educated) - The Greens

• Center right - The Union Parties (CDU and CSU)
• Even more center right (appeals to the business-oriented, both large and small) - The FDP
• Far right: the AfD (Climate change? What climate change? Muslims go back where you came from) The AfD are not in the running in this election, since nobody wants to play with them.

For a more extensive review of the parties, click here.

So what is the most likely coalition that will run the German government in the coming years? Will it be:

• Traffic Light (Ampel): (1) red (SPD) and (2) yellow (FDP) and (3) green (the Greens)?
• Or R2G: (1) red (SPD) and (2) red (Left)* and (3) green (the Greens)?
• Or Jamaica (Jamaika): (1) black (CDU) and (2) yellow (FDP) and (3) green (the Greens)?

*as I indicated in a previous blog entry, this bizarre and confusing color coding is like a pothole in the road. The Left's color is officially magenta - and some call it purple. But since its origins are in the communist party of the GDR, the former East Germany, it gets to be called "the second red party" (besides the socialists) whenever coalitions are discussed.

This all means that two minority parties, the FDP and the Left, are getting a lot of attention these days: The FDP’s leader, Christian Lindner, is being called a Kingmaker because both the CDU and the SPD (one of them is almost certain to come in first in the election) may need him to form a coalition. In other words, two big questions are hanging in the air:

1. Who gets the yellows, the FDP?  This choice among the three possibilities gives Christian Lindner, the leader of the FDP an edge, obviously, since he’s got both the center-right CDU and the SPD for potential partners. Being right of center, he fits more easily with the CDU, but anybody in the know will probably call that an oversimplification.

2. The SPD has a more natural affinity with the Left, both being left-of-center parties, than with the FDP (yellows). But the Left wants out of NATO, and that’s too much to swallow for most Germans, so Olaf Scholz is walking a thin line. He’s trying to get the Left to soften its stance on removing Germany from NATO and at the same time won’t say the NATO stance is a deal-breaker. And his chief rival, Laschet of the Union Parties, is riding Scholz's fence-sitting for all it's worth, trying to scare the German public into believing if they don't vote Union, they'll be leaving NATO.

Those are not the only coalitions possible. There are two more:

• the "Germany" coalition: (i.e., the colors of the German flag): black, red, and yellow; and
• the "Kenya" coalition: red, black and green

But since the Social Democrats (SPD) have been in coalition with the Union Parties (CDU/CSU) for so long (their coalition has been called the “Groko" - die grosse Koalition - the “grand coalition") and they are tired of playing second fiddle and having to give up their socialist principles to play ball with Merkel’s party, now that she’s gone and the CDU leader, Laschet, lacks the Merkel appeal, these possibilities would seem to be not very likely. But again, we can’t take them off the table yet since national loyalties are so volatile and polls show German opinion fluctuates day by day.

When you listen to debates among candidates from all the parties, the first thing that hits you is the obvious - that all democracies have the same breakdown. The right maintains it’s in the best position to assure the they know best how to create wealth and manage it when they do. The left maintains that when the government is in the hands of the right, the rich just get richer and the poor fall through the cracks. The left stresses that the rich don’t pay their fair share; the right that taking more from the wealth-generators would only impoverish the nation in the end. Germany’s no different. The Socialists see themselves as the best party to represent the interests of the little guy, the right as the best party to serve the greater national interests more broadly around the globe.

And one shouldn't lose sight of the fact that while in Germany there are clearer lines between factions, and the factions are actually separated into distinct parties, we have the same coalitions in the U.S. Biden and Bernie Sanders, for example, fought bitterly over who would represent the Democratic Party in its effort to rid the country of the far-right wing of the Republican Party. But when Biden moved ahead in the primary, Bernie threw his weight behind him against the common threat and now they two run the Democratic Administration, along with others from the far-left, like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. At the risk of oversimplification, and without wanting to overlook important differences between German and American party politics, you might want to call the Biden administration a coalition of red-red-green (except that Biden is clearly center-right, not center-left, when viewed through a German lens).

And, to use the same German lens on the American right, it's as if the AfD, the Trump analogue, determined that it would demand the loyalty of all the center-right factions, moderate as well as radical right Republicans, and were able to scare them into caving to their demands, even though the signs are clear that American democracy could well implode in the process. In short, to the degree this left-right distinction still has meaning, the American middle is far to the right of the German middle. But that hasn't been news for a long time now.

The second thing that hits me is that democracy isn't holding up all that well these days. For a democracy to function as it should, its citizens have to be informed. But so many of today's burning issues require expert technical knowledge and people on both the American and European continents have lost faith in government. The climate challenge is clearly not being met, we are living in a pandemic, we seem to be entering a Second Cold War, and there's the sense that modern-day politicians are not up to the task. It’s one thing to urge maximal participation in government by the average citizen. But quite another to admit that there’s no way one can make sense of political parties arguing over whether the goal for getting rid of the combustion engine should be 2050, 2038 or much sooner. How the hell should I know?

If I listen to the left, we should already have done this years ago and the suggestion that we have no more than twelve years before the means to avoid the destruction of the environment become forever after out of reach means we've already failed. If I listen to the right, I hear the charge that the left is simply unrealistic and alarmist, and that we can’t fight climate change if the economy comes to a halt. Christian Lindner (FDP) insists we can count on the German people to continue being innovative and creative and somehow climate problems can be fought without raising taxes on the right. The left insists the current ruling coalition has demonstrated through ineptness that such faith is inappropriate. I want to believe the left is alarmist, but I can't help worrying they're right. Besides, how can I vote for political leaders (of either party) (speaking as an American now, not as a German, although something similar is going on in Germany) which enabled typical workers to earn only 12% more in 2019 than they did in 1978 while CEOs now earn 940% more?

A third thing that is obvious listening to political debates is the damage that Trump has done to the cause of international cooperation with European partners. Almost all the talk now is how to live in a world in which the U.S. can no longer be counted on. The recent decision by the anglo nations, U.S., the UK and Australia to screw the French and renege on their submarine deal only heightens that suspicion that the U.S. can’t or won’t be there in a crisis.

Sunday night we’ll know whether it’s Laschet or Scholz, the CDU or the Socialists, who get to form a coalition. But that will only be the beginning of the story. If you want to see what’s in store for Europe’s most powerful democracy, get ready for a whole bunch more talk about Jamaica, Kenya and traffic lights.