Random Thoughts (Political Edition)

SPD wins Berlin vote as Pirates celebrate

The centre-left Social Democrats (SPD) won Berlin?s state election on Sunday, setting up a likely coalition with the Greens. The upstart Pirate Party sailed easily into parliament.
:dance:

This could hardly have ended better: the F.D.P. (the national embarrassment I mentioned earlier) is out of another state parliament, the "Left Party" (a mix of champagne socialists, malcontents, lunatics and GDR-era communists) lost a substantial number of votes, the ruling centre-left SPD may yet be forced into a so-called Grand Coalition with the centre-right CDU and the "Pirate Party" has sailed into parliament for the first time ever. :D

:woot:
 
Harr, Harr. Liberals have walked ye plank, commies be scrubbing the deck!

I?m sorry. It?s just such a funny sight having the Pirates sail home over 8% of Votes (nearly 9% according to some polls). Maybe that will teach the other parties that they have to arrive in the digital age at some point and change their attitude towards stuff like the Internet and freedom of information. I don?t really expect anything from the Pirate Party itself, but if they can raise awareness on some issues, their work is done.
 
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Harr, Harr. Liberals have walked ye plank, commies be scrubbing the deck!

You're a day early, Talk Like a Pirate Day is tomorrow.


More on topic, current projections say 9.1% - if they keep rising like this they will run into a peculiar problem. They only had 15 candidates on their list, I believe 9.1% equals 14 to 15 seats. If they earn a 16th seat it will remain vacant.
 
Maybe that will teach the other parties that they have to arrive in the digital age at some point and change their attitude towards stuff like the Internet and freedom of information.
I think they have won some votes of people who might otherwise have voted for the FDP, if the FDP still stood for the values it once represented: personal and civil liberties. It's sad to see how they have turned into this "How deeply may we take it up the rear, dear corporations?" tragicomedy in this time where personal liberty and privacy are under attack from all sorts of entities. Alas, the folks who donate big money to the FDP are one of those entities... :(
 
I think they have won some votes of people who might otherwise have voted for the FDP

:no: Of those voting FDP in 2006 about 43% went CDU today, and about 23% stayed with FDP. The Pirates only received less than 10% of the former FDP voters, in absolute percentage points that's less than one percentage point.

Most Pirates votarrrs :lol: were former non-voters / first-time voters.
 
Most Pirates votarrrs :lol: were former non-voters / first-time voters.
I suppose so, however many of those voters might have gone for an FDP that's strong on personal liberty and privacy. But that party doesn't exist, so they went for the Pirates instead - bless them!
 
:nod: 8pm projections agree with my maths of 15 seats. That's a 100% success rate, every pirate candidate up for election was elected.
 
It is not satire to post that shit all over facebook memorial pages, where people go to pay their respects.

I honestly cannot believe that you are trying to defend this cretin, just because he did it on the internet does not allow him to avoid the laws of the country in which he lives.
Oh I am not insensitive to the possible distress felt by the relatives at his actions, I just think said possible distress takes a backseat in the overall scheme of things. I would not disagree with Youtube or Facebook removing his videos or content, after all the content is in violation of their TOS, and it would be suitable to leave it at that. This verdict can be missused in any number of ways given the nature of common law. Before you know it they'll use it to classify anything where anyone is the least bit distressed as trolling, and slap the punishment of "having to report all cell phones he buys to the police" around arbitrarily. Of course the future UK won't have an internet, it'll be shut down because someone might want to use it for rioting and because someone has to think of the children. Well children, to you I say, the world is a harsh place, deal with it.

Speaking of which, Pakistan wants in on that 1984-thing, and proposes to ban Google and Youtube because talibans might use it for googling. Not that there are any taliban in Pakistan, all crimes there are committed by jealous girlfriends and wives.
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/...-YouTube-in-Pakistan/articleshow/10027468.cms

:dance:

This could hardly have ended better: the F.D.P. (the national embarrassment I mentioned earlier) is out of another state parliament, the "Left Party" (a mix of champagne socialists, malcontents, lunatics and GDR-era communists) lost a substantial number of votes, the ruling centre-left SPD may yet be forced into a so-called Grand Coalition with the centre-right CDU and the "Pirate Party" has sailed into parliament for the first time ever. :D

:woot:
W00t indeed! And we're less than four hours away from talk like a pirate day! Wee!
 
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I think they have won some votes of people who might otherwise have voted for the FDP
I very much liked in a "now that is telling" way how the Tagesschau showed a detailed graphic about how much voters the Pirate Party gathered from SPD, Greens, the Left and the non-voters, but completely left out CDU and FDP voters in that examination. Not even a word about them being too few, just nothing.

And at least the Pirate Party lead candidate didn't embarass himself and his party at the Tagesschau interview. A very comforting sight, the usual after-election interview with all the lead candidates.... oh wait, only with those actually making it into parliament, so no one from the FDP was there. Too bad. :rolleyes:
I hope the Pirate Party faction will be intelligent about their role and raise the right questions, as is the duty of opposition in parliament.

So, as it is Monday right now.... Arrrrrrrrrrrrr!!!!!!! :)
 
I very much liked in a "now that is telling" way how the Tagesschau showed a detailed graphic about how much voters the Pirate Party gathered from SPD, Greens, the Left and the non-voters, but completely left out CDU and FDP voters in that examination. Not even a word about them being too few, just nothing.

They say 6000 voters moved from the FDP over to the Pirates. That's roughly 5% of the total Pirate voters, or roughly 0.5% of all the votarrrrrs.
 
You probably need to read Krugman's blog in a regular to semi-regular basis to get this joke but if you don't read his blog yet you should. Even if you don't agree with him you should. He does a great job of distilling complex economic problems into easy to understand language. When he posts something that is policy heavy and wimpish or technical he even gives a heads up about it.
c5dff8a2.jpg
 
:lol: Saw that last night. It's got to be frustrating for him, seeing all manner of politicians and bureaucrats ignoring nearly a century of economic thought. And the mounting evidence that austerity isn't helping anything. The beatings will continue until moral improves, right?
 
Fun fact, the FDP was almost beaten by the Tierschutzpartei (Party for the Protection of Animals).
There are much more animals than investment bankers, but on the other hand animals can't vote for their own protection party.
 
Fun fact, the FDP was almost beaten by the Tierschutzpartei (Party for the Protection of Animals).
That would be the party of people who "free" animals only so they can starve and freeze to death in the forests?
 
The party actually has a serious programme, otherwise they wouldn't have been allowed to get elected, but basically the voters are people who "free" animals only so they can starve and freeze to death in the forests, yes.
 
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