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After five months, Merkel finally assembles a shaky coalition in Germany
Hot Air.com ^ | March 4, 2018 | JAZZ SHAW

Posted on 03/04/2018 9:59:15 AM PST by Kaslin

It’s been almost half a year since Germans went to the polls and completely disrupted the old guard of politics in that country. The Christian Democrats party (CDU) of Chancellor Angela Merkel suffered losses across the board and also saw their former partners in the Social Democratic Party (SPD) split away from them. At the same time, Alternative for Germany (AfD) made major gains, largely based on growing opposition to Merkel’s open borders policy regarding primarily Muslim migrants entering the country. Since that time, Merkel has been unable to form a majority coalition and the nation has been effectively left without a fully formed government.

That finally ended this weekend, when the SPD completed a ballot by mail and agreed to reform the coalition with Merkel’s CDU after a number of compromises were reached. (CNN)

More than 460,000 SPD members were eligible to vote in the postal ballot on the coalition deal reached by the two parties last month.

A cheer went around the room of SPD headquarters in Berlin, moments before the official announcement from Dietmar Nietan, treasurer of the German Social Democrats…

Former SPD leader Martin Schulz had ruled out a new GroKo, but was forced into negotiations as the alternative prospect of new elections loomed.

Widely blamed for the turmoil within his party since the election, Schulz stepped aside last month. Andrea Nahles, a former minister of labor and social affairs, is likely to be confirmed as the party’s first ever female leader at a party conference in April.

The coalition deal means the far-right AfD is now the lead opposition party in parliament.

To be clear, this was not the compromise that Merkel was looking for initially. She basically wanted to ignore the rise of the AfD and maintain the status quo, but she’d lost too much leverage. An attempt to form a new coalition with the liberal Free Democratic Party (FDP) and the Green Party fell apart quickly, leaving her in limbo. But the SPD was making a number of demands to win back their support, including clearing out some of Merkel’s people from key leadership positions in the government and easing up on some of her policies.

Merkel stood her ground for a while, but if she couldn’t form a ruling coalition soon there would have had to have been a new round of elections. Given the mood of the voters just now and the continuing ascendance of the AfD, that was obviously too big of a risk for her to take so she had to swallow her medicine and take the deal on the table.

While the media didn’t pay nearly as much attention to them, many voters remained unhappy about having Merkel retain her position and took to the streets in protest in a number of cities. Voice of Europe captured some footage of the protest marches on their Twitter feed yesterday. Check out the video.

German media and YouTube tried to censor the anti-Merkel protests today! At least 4,500 people were present in Kandel pic.twitter.com/sOFjmmHmGB

— Voice of Europe (@V_of_Europe) March 3, 2018



TOPICS: Culture/Society; Editorial; Germany
KEYWORDS: afd; angelamerkel; coalition; europeanunion; freedemocraticparty; germany; grandcoalition; greenparty; nato; socialdemocrat; spd

1 posted on 03/04/2018 9:59:15 AM PST by Kaslin
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To: Kaslin

This too (Merkel) shall pass.

After we took a Huge chunk out of the Marxist Corp Income Tax, Germany and others are going to sit up and Smart from it as they lose Industries to us.

Time to dump Socialism, . . . planet Earth.


2 posted on 03/04/2018 10:39:25 AM PST by To-Whose-Benefit? (It is Error alone which needs the support of Government. The Truth can stand by itself.)
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To: To-Whose-Benefit?

Corp Taxes and extractions in Germany are slightly less than the US when one looks at total tax bite including federal, state, local, & property taxes, etc. etc.

plus Germany doesn‘t tax worldwide income. The IRS is the only taxing authority that still taxes all income regardless of jurisdiction earned. It’s a crazy complicate system that generates minscule revenue but allows massive gov‘t intrusion on corporate activities. It harms our competitiveness significantly.

The Trump tax reform is a huge step in right direction, but it’s only a first step.


3 posted on 03/04/2018 10:53:07 AM PST by vooch (America First Drain the Swamp)
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To: Kaslin

This childless bag of flab and bitterness is exacting her revenge on the pretty girls by importing their rapists.


4 posted on 03/04/2018 11:52:53 AM PST by Dagnabitt (Point at the Q-Tards and Laugh!)
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To: Kaslin

Germany is lost.


5 posted on 03/04/2018 12:02:26 PM PST by Savage Beast (President Trump LEADS the resistance! Vive la resistance! Pray for the victory of truth!)
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To: To-Whose-Benefit?

Now she will have the time to write her version of “Mein Kampf”.


6 posted on 03/04/2018 12:17:04 PM PST by 353FMG
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To: Savage Beast

Their choice.


7 posted on 03/04/2018 12:19:00 PM PST by 353FMG
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To: 353FMG

Yes. Their choice.


8 posted on 03/04/2018 6:13:59 PM PST by Savage Beast (President Trump LEADS the resistance! Vive la resistance! Pray for the victory of truth!)
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To: AdmSmith; AnonymousConservative; Berosus; Bockscar; cardinal4; ColdOne; Convert from ECUSA; ...
Alternative for Germany (AfD) made major gains, largely based on growing opposition to Merkel’s open borders policy regarding primarily Muslim migrants entering the country. Since that time, Merkel has been unable to form a majority coalition... this was not the compromise that Merkel was looking for initially. She basically wanted to ignore the rise of the AfD and maintain the status quo, but she’d lost too much leverage. An attempt to form a new coalition with the liberal Free Democratic Party (FDP) and the Green Party fell apart quickly, leaving her in limbo. But the SPD was making a number of demands to win back their support, including clearing out some of Merkel’s people from key leadership positions in the government and easing up on some of her policies.
Merkel's been pretending to care about the impact of her anti-Europe/anti-German policies just long enough to cobble together something. Thanks Kaslin.

9 posted on 03/04/2018 7:43:58 PM PST by SunkenCiv (www.tapatalk.com/groups/godsgravesglyphs/, forum.darwincentral.org, www.gopbriefingroom.com)
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