you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] 13 points 7 hours ago* (last edited 7 hours ago) (3 children)

Yep, same here. The ÖVP in Austria (a bit like "Republicans light" in the US, with a conservative view regarding social services and neolibs regarding economy, while mostly not being fucking grifters) are always trying to cut finances to the public health system, which makes the situation worse, and then they use the shit they caused as an argument to cut more services.

Good thing is, the old parties are on their way out because their voter base is dying out. Bad news is that instead of them we have a far-right party scooping up their voters. The Socialist Party, which is one of the old parties, is occupied with infighting similar to the democrats in the US between the left wing and the centrists, with the expected loss of voters because of the old people dying and the party utterly being disconnected from the younger generations, and the greens are occupying themselves with culture wars bullshit instead of trying to help the populace out. The communists are achieving local successes where they work to make sure that housing is affordable, while being utterly unvoteable on the federal level. And then we have a pure neolib party (NEOs) which is ÖVP light.

All of this makes me fear for the social peace in the country.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 3 child comments
  • [–] 5 points 6 hours ago* (1 child)

    It's similar in Germany.

    The CDU/CSU, our conservatives, huffed a bit too much of their own supply and had brilliant ideas like reducing the public deficit by reducing infrastructure spending to zero. When that somehow started costing them votes after bridges started to collapse they decided to lean wholesale into the culture war bullshit by "engaging" the hard-right AfD by copying their rhetoric wholesale. Oddly enough, all this does is legitimize the AfD and drive voters to them. Currently the chancellor is busy trying to find out how unpopular he can get before the government collapses, championing policies that would've instantly ended careers twenty years ago. (And yes, this includes cuts to the healthcare system and "cost-saving" measures that everyone agrees will drive up costs.)

    The SPD, our social democrats, have essentially purged all of their social democrat members and are now a business-friendly rump party with no discernible character or platform. The Greens have softened their ecological policies to the point of pointlessness. The FDP, our libertarians, were always ready to harm the country to help the rich; the last time they were in office they were so blatant about it they destroyed the governing coalition and are now deeply despised.

    The one traditional party that somehow moved in a positive direction was The Left, whose Russia fanboys tried to spin off into their own populist party, which then fizzled out. This, and the fact that they still somewhat care about what the label says, makes them the only ones who haven't fully enhsittified themselves.

    Then there's the new boy on the block, the AfD. Positioning themselves as a moderate conservative worker's party, their actual policies only don't declare foreigners (and foreign-looking people) to be second-class humans because that spot is already reserved for Germans who aren't independently wealthy. Foreigners are somewhere below that. Due to an inexplicably effective social media presence and the general fecklessness of the established parties they're rising meteorically.

    Notably, the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution only hasn't designated the AfD as a known extremist organization because they immediately sued and the designation must be withheld until the suit is resolved. Several federal countries have designated them as threats to the democratic order. The CDU/CSU insists the can't possibly be banned, at first because they were too small, now because they're too big.

    There are smaller parties that aren't yet self-serving empty husks but they generally don't have any chance of making it past the 5% hurdle because they don't have the weight of tradition or the equivalent of a billion Euro advertising budget behind them. I personally am somewhat partial towards the Humanists because they cite scientific papers for each of their policies. It's a nice break from the usual "our way is the only correct way because we say so". Too bad they'll probably never make it big.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 1 child comment
  • [–] 4 points 5 hours ago*

    At least you guys have Die Linke - we are sorely lacking anything of the sort, while the FPÖ (AfD for Austrians) is getting more and more public support, with the same inhuman rhetoric and the same inexplicably effective social media boost - US social media and their owners deserve the guillotine for messing up our societies.

  • source
  • parent