Germany’s Social Democrats (the liberals) have the worst election results since WWII in Angela Merkel’s victory

Germany gets it, why doesn’t America? You’ve probably heard by now that Angela Merkel won the German elections, but what you might not have heard about is that the signifigance of the results, outside of Merkel’s win. The Christian Democrats (Germany’s conservative party) won 33.8 percent of the vote and the “Free Democrats” which is a liberal, but pro-business party won 14.6 percent. This percentages amount to enough for a majority of the seats in Parliament because 6 percent of the votes went to parties finishing below the 5 percent threshold needed to win seats, according to the New York Times (bet they hate this). On top of all this, The Social Democrats (The far left-wing of German political parties and socialists) took just 23 percent of the vote, plunging 11.2 percentage points compared with the last election four years ago. This was the Social Democrat party’s worst showing since World War II. More pain from the New York Times:

Mrs. Merkel will finally have the chance to enact the kind of liberalizing economic plans she proposed when she first ran for chancellor four years ago. She can push ahead on issues like tax relief, a simplification of the tax code and a possible extension of the time that nuclear power plants can continue to operate.

Ummm, “liberalizing”?

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September 27, 2009 · Filed Under liberals


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