I had been under the impression that the left/centrist candidates dropping out for the second round were really only trying to prevent an RN majority and that they were still almost sure to have the largest number of seats, them being pushed into third place is hilarious.

Bangladeshi PM Sheikh Hasina has resigned

So after the LEFT winning the elections in France, the LEFT putting forward their candidate for prime minister, including ones that might be a bit more center-left and acceptable to parts of Macron's coalition, Macron just goes ahead and appoints Michel Barnier, from the 4th-placed right-wing Republicans, as PM.

 

Acceptable to the center, and the right, and not censured by the extreme right is their strategy. Where's the left, idk, they're not important. God I hate Macron.

 

*gestures vaguely at the New Popular Front leading the election results, literally saving Macron from having a Le Pen led majority in his Parliament*

Germany will be going to the polls 6 months early after Scholz fired the finance minister.

 

 

The finance minister tabled economic proposals that were irreconcilable with the SDP and Greens and following the election of Trump the SDP and Greens have decided that a strong and decisive Germany is more important for Europe than the ego of the FDP leader and thus the German government has started a controlled collapse leading up to a vote of no confidence on Jan 15th

Germany about to come and start 2025 off early with a disappointing election result then huh.

 

But then nearly all of the German parties seem to have some deep problem in their psyche they need to work through and this cycle was screwed anyway. In the grand narrative of incumbents getting thrashed post-COVID/Ukraine, the CDU look like they managed to time their 2021 loss and wilderness recovery almost perfectly looking at opinion polls.

Not the only European country that’s fired the starting gun for an election this week either. On Friday the Republic of Ireland is expected to announce the date of their next General Election, which is expected to be 29th November. May create a new thread for that one when it is confirmed.

Confirmed for 22nd November!

Shocking news in Romania as far-right candidate Călin Georgescu wins the first round of the presidential election, with Elena Lasconi coming in 2nd. Neither of the two major parties have a candidate in the second round. :o

Interesting case in that he came out of nowhere as well, everyone was expecting a different far-right f***wit, the one endorsed by their official far-right f***wit party (AUR), to do well.

 

Hopefully the one candidate left opposing him can win the second round, honestly, looking into it between her (Lasconi) and the current PM (Ciolacu), Ciolacu seems like a corrupt incumbent turning a historic social-democratic party into an illiberal austerity generator (as ever) and Lasconi at least outwardly reminds me of Maia Sandu, who just managed to get herself re-elected over in Moldova and is pretty much keeping that country on the path to pro-Europeanism.

Irish election result so far this hour:

 

Seats at this hour, 102/174 declared:

 

Fianna Fáil: 28 (+4)

Sinn Fein: 24

Fine Gael: 24 (+3)

Social Democrats: 7 (+2)

LAB: 6 (+1)

INDIRL: 3 (+3)

People Before Profit: 1 (-1)

AONTU: 1

Greens: 0 (-10)

INDs: 8 (-5)

Edited December 1, 2024Dec 1 by Steve201

The Greens have now finally managed to win a seat. It has been a terrible result for them.

They were the small party in the coalition so we’re always going to be wiped out, however, they aren’t anything like the English or even NI Greens, they are actually quite right wing tbh.

They were the small party in the coalition so we’re always going to be wiped out, however, they aren’t anything like the English or even NI Greens, they are actually quite right wing tbh.

Yes, they have been hammered in the same way as the Lib Dems in the UK in 2015. It's all rather daft though. All political parties want to exercise some power. However, whenever a "non-traditional" party gets to exercise that power, they are punished.

I know it’s weirdly unfair like that, suppose people just return their vote to the party they are used to, in the LDs case they are like a protest vote if the party the person normally voted for isnt doing what they want. People just aren’t used to the Lib Dem’s being a party of government in the UK since Labour took over the old liberals in the 1945 election.

And if the Social Dems or Labour go into coalition with the two main parties FF or FG the same will happen in 2029!

And if the Social Dems or Labour go into coalition with the two main parties FF or FG the same will happen in 2029!

I assume they will worry about that. Forming a new government could be very difficult.

If the centre left parties don’t go in there’s plenty of centre right independents who will enter government with the big two who won’t be effected by the thought of losing their seats at the next election. Independents outside of the cities are generally focused on specific issues or generally centre right or even further to the right than the main parties. See the Healey-Rae’s empire in Co.Kerry - very republican, populist and right wing in their views.

Seats at this hour, 170/174 declared:

 

FF: 46 (+10)

FG: 38 (+3)

SF: 37 (+1)

SD: 11 (+5)

LAB: 11 (+5)

INDIRL: 4 (+4)

PBP-S: 3 (-2)

AON: 2 (+1)

GP: 1 (-11)

Redress: 1 (+1)

INDs: 16 (-5)

Martial law has been declared in South Korea by president Yoon Suk Yeol, stating it's necessary to protect the country from North Korea's communist forces. It's been blocked by lawmakers and protests occuring outside parliament, but military have maintained it is in place. I really don't know enough about the political context there to know how expected this was, but seems pretty scary stuff x

South Korea is the worst instincts of capitalism in a political system. You have essentially their Trump declaring himself the supreme arbiter of the law and the military have backed him, I wish it were as simple as the parliament saying no. Not got much hope that this has a happy ending.

 

He's not particularly popular but if anything they have a worse right-wing cult than America, if you've seen the stats on how South Korean men view feminism it makes for incredibly sobering reading.