"Schröder will remain chancellor!"
Meaning: SPD will try to arrange for a traffic lights coalition.
That is also what my source from within the SPD (he is currently at a party with science and education minister Edelgard Bulmahn) tells me.
"There will be no cooperation with the Left Party."
but there were some social liberals (Darendorf), not just the national, economic liberals leading the party now.
They had at one time, some decent politicians, Leutheuser-Schnarrenberg f.e,
but most left, are silenced, or changed to the SPD, Verheugen f.e European Vice President used to be a FDP or F.D.P. member
I associate yellow meanwhile with yellow elephants and needed to ajust my wiring.
aeh
red, yello , green
SPD, Liberals - FDP, Greens
FDP is a neoliberal party, in permanent assault of any environmental issue that would limit business. *Lunatic*, n. One whose delusions are out of fashion.
On second thought, because you're an American, maybe you are misled by the US meaning of the nomer 'liberal'. But, it was only in the USA that 'liberal' became associated with Big Government and social programs like the New Deal. Elsewhere, liberalism remained to be focused on freedoms (especially where those weren't yet achieved).
In the seventies, US economist Milton Friedman et al, the so-called 'Chicago school' who 'helped' Pinochet, created the theory that 1) the smaller the state and the more private the economy the better ('markets regulate themselves'), and 2) economic 'freedom' should be there first, it will create political freedoms second. This is called 'neoliberalism' world-wide, but in the US, used less often. *Lunatic*, n. One whose delusions are out of fashion.
I am actually German, but have lost track with German politics big time since 1980. I apparently have no clue what the FDP is all about these days. I am lost. Also, from across the Atlantic, I couldn't get the divide between East and West Germans. I had to watch reunification on the TV set and have these days to host interns in their twenties from both parts of Germany, which made it clear to me that I have lost the capability to understand what's going on in Germany. I even don't vote anymore in Germany because of that.
I am a German too and the FDP is definitely NOT libertarian in the American sense. (Hmm, you could probably compare them to center to right-wing Democrats in the USA?)
Pro-market yes, but if they ran on a "libertarian" platform they´d be lucky to even get 5% of the vote.
1. The reason you are confused is because most people, and alsmost everyone in the media, gives inaccurate and incomplete labels and/or descriptions to the political/economic theories or parties.
Its absolutely inaccurate, very confusing and even foolish, to divide the political spectrum into left and right.
The ultimate question is the individual freedom vs. state control.
5. This site has the world's smallest political quiz - http://www.theadvocates.org/index.html
Look at the upper right portion.
(a) In essence there are 5 positions:
(1) the abolition of the income tax. On the contrary, 2 American parties have it in their platform.
(a) the Libertarian Party (b) the Constitution Party.
(b) the free trade.
(c) abolition of inheritance taxes, capital gain taxes.
(2) taking the state out of the education.
In sum, there are few libertarians, but no libertarian party. Of course, in France, there is Sabine Herold who is a libertarian and got 80,000 people to protest against the unions.
I have to admit that I don't like it. You can have restrictive (ie authoritarian) rules concerning taxes for example to ensure a fairer distribution of wealth among the population, which would end up in the best case szenario as giving more people more freedoms.
You have to defend freedom of press and freedom of opinion against authoritarian hate speech to ensure that everybody feels comfortable to voice their opinion and not be bullied into silence. These would be authoritarian measures to protect freedoms.
So, I have my doubts about the top to bottom kind of scale. A fundamentalist libertarian can allow freedoms to be destroyed for the sake of staying truely libertarian and that doesn't make sense to me.
3. You have to defend freedom of press and freedom of opinion against authoritarian hate speech to ensure that everybody feels comfortable to voice their opinion and not be bullied into silence.
(a) THere is an American Nazi party. Big deal. They can print hate speech. They can march and protest. Big deal. They are miniscule. Plus, once you have their opinions aired, you can debate them, show them how irrational or dangerous they are.
(b) same goes for the KKK.
4. Give me an example where your version of protecting against the hate speech provides more freedoms.
Cheers
There is no evidence taht the Libertarians do not want freedom of press or opinion. The question is (a) which method provides the most individual freedom; (b) which method is more productive.
However, there is no principled libertarian party in Germany.
(a) It appears to me that the most likely scenario is the SDP & CDU grand coalition. It means there will never be a radical economic reform in Germany. The concept of aboliting the income tax (the most hideous tax) is absolutely foreign to them. The next close thing was the flat tax, but that is nowhere to be seen either. So, they are left with (i) a complicated tax system, which probably is 14,593 pages (I am being sarcastic), which only tax lawyers and accountant can understand. So the little people are screwed, because they can't afford to hire tax lawyers and CPAs to find loopholes in the tax code, (ii) state spending a large portion of the GDP with promises to the future generation that the state will pay for the health care and pension (of course the state has to steal ...ooops tax the money from individuals to pay for the services), (iii) labor market which is not free, but regulated and encourages higher unemployment, (iv) taxes on capital formation, which discourages creation of jobs and business.
Its the same old, same old.
Q: Why would the FDP want to be associated with a failure?
(b) the second likely scenario is SDP/LP/Green coalition. See above, except with a much terrible outcome.
2. Maybe the FDP should sit and watch how Germany is slowly crumbling (low competitiveness, high unemployment, lower state benefits, lower economic growth, higher trade barriers, protectionism, more power to the trade unions, more strikes, etc).
Then, hopefully, either the CDU will adopt free-market, libertarian positions, or maybe (not likely) the voters will vote for the FDP and accept some austere measures for the sake of the future generation.
3. Full disclosure - the FDP has not paid me for this consultation (haha). They can hire Nobel Prize economists from the University of Chicago, or the CATO Institute.
(Sorry, it is a slightly snarky request, and I smirkingly accept, that you might be the only L voter in these rows)
(c) Sometime, in the past, I posted links that gave three different perspectives in favor of free trade (i) liberal (minority view, even though Bill Clinton signed and Dems voted for NAFTA), (ii) conservative (majority view, even though Pat Buchanan and others oppose it), (iii) libertarian (overwhelming view).
You can check back at my comments and find out, if you are interested.
(d) My short answer for free trade is simple: Let Africa and Latin America and Asia (large part) live in the industrial and agricultural age, and let's move to the information age (space, biotech, nanotech, genetic engineering, health care, internet, etc). Most people in these industries will make a lot more money than if they worked in metallurgy or meat factories.
It also means that education (and creative thinking) will become more important because we live in the information age.
Building and providing houses, pension, 13th Salary at Christmas, cheap holidays, sports facilities, medical facilities.
A tradition that used to be very strong in Germany - introduced not by the state, but by the industrialists themselves.
They could go on too long to confuse people. To me they are wolves in sheep clothes (or whatever you call it). And if the FDP falls for those theories I just think that they don't know what they are dealing with.
1. Read this book by Milton Friedman - FREE TO CHOOSE Its a fast read.
(a) He acts for his self interest - bake bread, make money, to support himself and his family. Its called the invisible hand. (b) I take the baker any time over any government bureaucrat.
2. When Bill Gates (or Microsoft) programs a software, he/she doesn't know you or me and doesn't do for our good. (a) He did it to have fame, or money, or success, or all of the above. Or maybe, he was a geek, and couldn't get a date, and now he can. The end result was a product or service.
(b) I take Bill Gates any time over any government bureaucrat. Or if you are an Apple fan, I go with Steve Jobs.
