The BSW declared to never join a coalition with the AfD. Other than everyone else though they said to not decline every proposal from them but will consider each by it’s content.
If the CDU in Thuringia stick to never govern with the Left party, there is nothing left besides a minority government.
Call me interested but how do you feel about what happened in Thuringia and Saxony?
I probably could write a lot of rambling about this but I try to limit myself. 
I am not a little bit surprised but I am concerned. There is a growing ravine between certain citizen to which the traditional parties lose their touch.
Yesterday I again heard from… the Green or SPD, I am not sure, that they failed to get across their intentions to the voter. Or in other words, that the silly voters just don’t get it. Rarely anyone is doing self-criticism. Resignations are a thing of the past too it seems.
The traditional media is also focusing on the AfD being right-wing extremists. Rightfully so, don’t get me wrong, but if you don’t address the issues these voters have, even if they are not entirely rational, and otherwise also are rather friendly to the left/green parties as a supposedly Fourth Estate, it is no wonder the populist parties have plenty low hanging fruits to pick.
Polls indicate that people vote for the AfD because they believe they have solutions to the problems. Last time they said they mostly voted for them out of protest. They got very strong at workers. The traditional left parties like SPD and Left, who claim to be represent the workers, are very much not.
When the CDU, because there are no other options, decide to govern with left parties at these two states, more conservative voters will switch to the AfD.
On the bright side, these two states are known to favor right-wing parties, more than most other states. So I don’t think we see comparable success of the AfD elsewhere.
I have the rather unpopular opinion that I think it was a blessing that the BSW appeared. They are incompatible with the AfD while fishing for the same kind of voters. (1/2 of AfD voters still claim to not be right wing!) I expect that to prevent the worst outcomes. Hopefully the Left, where the BSW split off from, will get their shit together and rearrange to remain in the parliaments to further diversify the spectrum.
The FDP got not mentioned so far here and in HerbGamers post, because they got tiny and got kicked out of the two states, being seemingly unimportant to the grand scheme of things. However, they are part of Germany’s ruling coalition and it would not be the first time they drop everything to show they exist and still matter. I heard of at least two high-ranking FDP politicians calling for breaking up (kinda pulling a Macron here). If that happens, who knows where to goes from there. That might be the most destructive outcome from this weekend.
Thanks, I appreciate the perspective. In Australia the big European political experts seemed to say the same thing about the AfD winning former East Germany long before the election.
Ah well as Robert Indiana once wrote on Alabama: “Just as in the anatomy of man, every nation must have its hind part.”
Yeah I think such statements added to this result here. 
One does not have to forget to take extra care to keep one’s hind part clean!
At least right now in national polling it seems the FDP and Die Linke are in a fight just to stay in parliament as they are currently below the 5% threshold. Though the FDP is only down by .1% which is easily within the margin of error that they could survive. As for the Left they are in a much more uncomfortable position and have only been trending lower as time passes. Assuming an election was held today these are possible coalitions that could form. A new Grand Coalition between the CDU/CSU & SPD. A Black-Green coalition between the CDU/CSU & Greens. If the FDP manages to survive then they also could form a Jamaica coalition with the CDU/CSU, Greens, & FDP.
A detail regarding this, you can still get into the parliament with less than 5% if you got enough direct mandates*. For that reason Die Linke (I called them Left in my previous post) usually remains in the parliament because they have a few districts they are very popular in eastern Germany.
Not so much the FDP, for them getting below 5% usually means they are out.
* We have two votes in Germany, first vote and second vote. The first vote is for specific politician in your area, the second vote for parties. The second vote is more important as that one mainly determines how many seats a party gets. However, with enough politicians winning the first vote in their districts (direct mandates), they get into parliament as well, even if their party in the second vote is below the 5% threshold.Does Die Linke have any strong candidates to possibly win 3 direct mandates? While that helped them survive in 2021 I guess I’m not certain they could hold on with a party seemingly weaker than in 2021 and with the AFD & BSW rising in the Eastern states.
EDIT: Or might that be to soon? I wouldn’t be surprised if parties haven’t chosen candidates yet from the election is still a year away.
I don’t know, the “districts” for the first vote are larger at the federal election than at the state elections, which is why you can’t tell from how it went yesterday.
Looking up the three that got in 2021, I can at least say that Gregor Gysi is very very popular and I think, if two other direct mandates get in, only he decides when to not appear in the parliament again.
The other two had to fight more with SPD/Grüne and the BSW did not exist back then.
EDIT: One of the two declared to not candidate again, so there is that.
We have to wait for that until the elections, I don’t think polls will cover single districts.
Another note, this law that parties still join the parliament by direct mandates was about to be abolished. But our constitutional court luckily reverted that. I have the impression a few traditional parties will be glad now this remains.
Today the Thuringia CDU voted to begin coalition talks with the BSW and the SPD. Obviously talks would need to be successful but if a CDU-BSW-SPD coalition forms they would have 44 out of the 88 seats and keep the AFD out of government.
@Urben I was a little surprised. I honestly didn’t think the CDU would consider working with BSW or Die Linke. But I guess keeping the AFD in the opposition was a big enough pressure.
Well the last time the liberals of Germany refused to play ball with more staunch leftists in the face of an emergent far-right threat didn’t work out well for Germany at all if I remember correctly.
Please tell me that’s not what happened involving you-know-who before the start of you-know-what back in you-know-when. 
I mean I might be muddled on their exact politics but there are parallels.
The BSW, while it split off Die Linke, is way more open to reducing migration than Die Linke.
The CDU said in the past they cannot join a coalition with Die Linke but they did not do such a statement with the BSW. So they might fit together to some degree in Saxonia and Thuringia.
Nevertheless in Thuringia there is no path around Die Linke to form a government. But as the AfD lost their blocking minority there due a miscalculation of the seats, I think a minority government is more likely.
Well I wouldn’t call the CDU liberal. But I get what you mean.
Our newest ET fancies himself a Don O’Trump now.
And in case you’re wondering, no, he’s not particularly progressive:
I hope Ireland doesn’t have the same affinity for rapist clowns as the US does, but if they do, I hope his toughest opponent wears this suit:
Round 2, Lucky Charms?
Yeah, gonna love punching his number even more now, vicariously. Didn’t he say he wasn’t supporting that dipshit a while back, and now he is and he thinks he’s good enough to be a president now? Bet bringing Busey back doesn’t seem quite so bad now. 
This is exactly why I’m very critical of IO when they choose to work with this man. I will remain so.
You might not want to look up who Gary Busey endorsed in 2015 then…
