In a parliamentary system, this is a crushing defeat. You do not need a majority to make life almost impossible for the establishment parties.
Of course there's work to be done. The fact that even a single person would get out and vote for the establishment which has been destroying everything is sad.
They're stupid if they did that. The combined AFD+BSW vote is now greater than the AFD alone would have been. Hell, it looks like an absolute majority in Thuringia.
The BSW is against the regime on all the stuff that matters to them: immigration, wokeness, endless support for getting Ukrainians killed. They're left-wing on issues where all European right-wing populist parties are left-wing: economic issues.
I hope they try. The AfD will be refounded under a different name and reach new heights of popularity (see the Flemish party as an example). It would have been far easier to do this before the AfD became the formidable force that it is today, and they didn't do/try it then.
Why? Because it is against their interests. This will only damage the regime.
Too little, too late.
They're talking about 'deportations' of illegals, who aren't supposed to be here to begin with. To make any headway, they would have to deport all the people and their descendants whom previous German governments foolishly gave German citizenship.
I also think that they will exclude the AfD from a coalition, because the AfD has been demonized far and beyond any European populist party - and it's Germany.
Likely, CDU and SW (if they reach a majority) will have a coalition that will carry out the stuff that the AfD wants to take the wind out of its sails.
Second most likely is that they will say "the people have spoken" and flip-flop on not co-operating with the AfD like the parties in NL did.
Le Pen is actually 'the left' - she's to the left of the Socialists and Macron on economic issues.
Considering that our American friends keep calling everyone slightly to the left of Milton Friedman a 'Bolshevik' or 'Stalinist', it remains a surprise about how they like Le Pen. But even as she is to my left on economics (I'm already way to the left of the avg American), at least she isn't actively destroying the country.
The countries east of the Iron Curtain are now the reasonable ones. They didn't get their culture wrecked in the 1960s.
I keep being surprised that you think all or most of the BSW votes would go to the AfD.
In Thuringia at least, the AfD improved its result while BSW also got double digits.I find this very reasonable. A lot of people style themselves as being 'on the left' while also being reasonable on issues like immigration and culture, same as SW.
Again, people said all the same things you say now (and believe me, I don't begrudge you your pessimism living in Europe and Germany of all places) about the Netherlands, where there were also "spoiler" anti-establishment parties as you would call them. And now they have a new government including Geert Wilders.
At the very least, this is going to scare the living daylights out of the regime. In my judgment, they are less interested in flooding us with immigrants than they are in self-preservation.
The more parties they need and the more 'diverse' this coalition is, the more trouble they will have. It seems that you will need to include wither the AfD or the left-wing populist Wagenknecht league, which will be a serious headache for the regime.
Hell, the current federal government consists of the Social Democrats, Greens and Liberals, and even they have been engaged in non-stop infighting - despite their differences in actual substance if not posturing being rather minor, at least in my opinion.
So did the parties in the Netherlands.
Regardless, let's say she does co-operate with the establishment. She would then have to deliver, which is good, or her votes would then go to the AfD, which is also good. Worst case scenario is that she will be a gateway drug.
I'm just surprised that they can refuse to provide a service, for any reason, without offering a refund.
We have a similar issue in Europe, where airlines have to offer compensation for delays and cancellations. They often just claim it's the "weather" so they don't have to pay up. But even if it's the weather, they at least have to refund what you paid for. It'd be strange if they didn't. Seems like a great scam.
I know you don't like BSW, but she seems to be drawing more votes from the establishment than from the AFD. There are people who'd not support the AFD at this moment but who would support the BSW. It's good not to have all anti-establishment eggs in one basket.
I also just saw a tweet by her where she called for a Danish policy on 'refugees'. Now you might say that she's insincere and all that. It's similar to what people said about RFK. It turns out that he was very sincere.
Break the system and good things will happen.
In what way specifically?
Wait, they canceled flights and didn't refund customers? How is that even possible?
So what exactly is the American far-right?
Almost everyone in Europe supports some sort of welfare state, but in terms of immigration, I've never even encountered followers of the furthest-left party that support it. You may not have ever encountered a European if you think they've been "programmed" successfully.
The most obnoxious thing about Europeans that is somewhat mainstream is climate change alarmism.
Disobedience to establishment piety is far-right.
Four legs good, two legs bad!
Nobody seriously claimed that Ukraine is trying to regime change Russia. Kursk was a diversionary attack.
Well, it doesn't seem to be working - that is my limited understanding. Russia seems to be deploying conscripts against the invasion, while using its professional military to exploit the deficiencies in the Nulandistani lines that this action created.
So at the very least, they must come up with new reasons for this action.
Russia will not negotiate. (except perhaps for POW exchanges)
Reportedly, the youngest POW exchange was at parity rather than the lopsided margins that Russia gave into previously. Not sure what this means.
Always with the "oligarchs". Nobody talks about American oligarchs. Imagine Russian media suggesting Elon Musk or Jeff Bezos should start a coup against Washington DC.
The funny thing is that Putin cracked down on the oligarchs, who had mostly gotten their ill-gained wealth through positions in the Soviet state. They exchanged their communism for vulture capitalism from one day to the next, when it would benefit them.
Also in related stories: Putin will soon turn his war machine on Britain!
Britain isn't even worth conquering. This ain't the time of William the Conqueror.
This guy is a 'conservative' pro-Brexit fellow.
We cropped it out, so yeah, REPORTEDLY, bitch.
I'm shocked, shocked that this guy was arrested for domestic violence charges.
That little girl wasn't able to hold him off with one hand tied behind her back?
Almost as bad as red SUVs.
I can't get over the fact that when the perp of a given crime is white, they talk about his color, but when he's not, they talk about the color of his car.
Killer knives ye be warned.
In the UK, women have been getting raped on an industrial scale by immigrants for decades now. This shit didn't change.
This isn't Merkel's CDU, this is the CDU of a guy who called immigration a national emergency.
Worst case scenario is that anti-immigration sentiments are becoming even more mainstream politically, and a lot of CDU/BSW voters will defect next time to the AfD when they fail to deliver.