Hillarysworld

Merkel coalition loses German state poll, upper house majority

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German state vote curbs Merkel's power

(AP) – 40 minutes ago

BERLIN — Angela Merkel's center-right alliance lost a key election in Germany's most populous state on Sunday, costing the chancellor her majority in the upper house of parliament and curbing her government's power, projections showed.

The state election in North Rhine-Westphalia — the first electoral test since Merkel's second term started last October — had loomed over European efforts to tackle the Greek debt crisis.

Merkel initially held out on agreeing to aid for cash-strapped Athens, prompting German opposition parties to accuse her of avoiding an unpopular decision in the election run-up.

Merkel's Christian Democrats won just over 34 percent of Sunday's vote, and their coalition partners, the Free Democrats, around 6.5 percent, according to projections for ARD and ZDF television based on exit polls and early counting. That left them well short of a majority in the state legislature in Duesseldorf.

The same coalition leads the federal government too.

"This is of course a warning shot for the governing parties, and the people should know that it has been heard," said Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle, a Free Democrat. "We must make an effort to win back lost trust with hard and good work."

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Good article and good summary there.

Some observations from me regarding recent events in Greece, the entire strong stance on Greece by Merkel and EU as an "emerging union".  European Union will go through some very tough years in the future as they try to truly unify these disparate nations.  Strong leaders like Merkel will suffer as more socialist countries like Greece that are withering away at the weight of their promises and entitlements make demands of their (and the EU) government to continue to have their cake and eat it too.. If you compare Germany and Greece, you see that while both have relative socialism, Germany has a very tight system with far less entitlement and far more expectation of many more years of work and far lower level of pension (almost half) as much as Greece.  Germany has been a more effective balance.   Looking at the troubles that EU is going through, I can see that USA had it relatively easy in forming the Union - or may be not! LOL We may yet have the states rearing their ugly supremism if they try to cesede from the Union for whatever reason - we will have similar issues. Anyway, what is happening in Greece is worth watching and learning from for many reasons not the least of which the impact of entitlements on a state's fiscal soundness.  What is happening in Germany is interesting from the viewpoint of impact of a true leader on taking stance on the ground of principles - a bit unexpected.


-- Edited by Sanders on Sunday 9th of May 2010 09:48:51 PM