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Germany’s no-emotion voting guide surges despite campaign of personalities

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Re: Germany’s no-emotion voting guide surges despite campaign of personalities

#161

Post by imtringued »

phreeza wrote: post #2

The biggest problem with Wahl-O-Mat in my view is that it only looks at what parties claim they will do, not their historical voting record. There had been some discussion around this topic this election cycle, so perhaps they will try to address it in future iterations.

There is a site (deinwal.de) that does what you said and it gave me the exact results. In fact, the wahl-o-mat and other sites merely mirror my own voting behavior. I bet almost nobody other than me actually reads party programs.

I have this simple strategy. I base my decision for who to not vote for based on the behavior of the parties and my decision for who to vote for based on their political program. It's not very surprising that the results were the same.

Re: Germany’s no-emotion voting guide surges despite campaign of personalities

#162

Post by imtringued »

fourtrees wrote: post #153
gurkendoktor wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The "hang Nazis" posters are from the previous election [1], while "hang greens" is a new slogan from this cycle [2]. If I had to guess, I'd say that the party was hoping for the "hang greens" posters to be banned so that they could whine about the "hang nazis" posters being unfairly allowed. Not AfD by the way, but "Der Dritte Weg", a party that I learned about through the Wahl-O-Mat. [1] https://www.welt.de/regiona…

Wow, I thought the AfD was the rightmost of the German parties. I wonder if the fascists (not being hyperbolic, Mussolini advertised fascism as a "third way", the others being communism and liberalism) are localized in Westphalia and Bayern or are more widespread. They can't be very popular. Hang the Greens makes me think this is a western thing. Wouldn't they be hanging Die Linke in the east? Anyway, a Red-Red-Green…

That's strange... facism as a third way... The first time I have seen the phrase "dritter weg" it was here.

https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freiwirtschaft#Weitere_Vertret...

>Aktion Dritter Weg/Liberalsoziale innerhalb der Partei Bündnis 90/Die Grünen, vertritt freiwirtschaftliche Ideen und veröffentlicht sie in der Zeitschrift Alternativen (siehe Georg Otto)

Freiwirtschaft is probably the most neutral/centrist "third way" possible. It's neither leaning toward either capitalism nor communism. Rather, the goal is a natural economic order.

Re: Germany’s no-emotion voting guide surges despite campaign of personalities

#163

Post by imtringued »

djbebs wrote: post #98
turbinerneiter wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a popular fantasy, but I don't think it is true. People today are already voting for parties that increase tax on them and decrease it for others. Many people vote for things that are not directly benefiting them or are even bad for them, both consciously and out of ignorance. I vote green/left, although they tax me higher, because I think climate change and social justice is more important than whether or no…

Given the amount of people arguing that the rich "don't pay their fair share" when the rich are the only ones actually paying income taxes, I would say your argument has already been disproven.

Instead of regressive taxes on work there should be taxes on monopolies like the location value of land.

Re: Germany’s no-emotion voting guide surges despite campaign of personalities

#164

Post by einpoklum »

_ph_ wrote: post #64
einpoklum wrote: post #42

Can someone post an English translation of the "theses" or questions in the Wahl-o-mat? When I hear about such initiatives I am always wary of this kind of polling manipulation: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G0ZZJXw4MTA

Here it goes, all are phrased as statements, to which you can agree, be neutral or disagree: 1: There should be a general speed limit on all Autobahn roads. 2: Germany should increase its defense budget. 3: Young adults at the age of 16 should be allowed to vote in federal elections. [current age is 18] 4: Subsidies for wind power turbines should be stopped. 5: Stronger legal limitations for the abilities of landlord…

First - thank you for the effort and upvote to you :-)

Now... more than a couple of these questions can be given the same answers from completely different perspectives. For example:

> 34: The constitutional limit on public debt should be unchanged

You can agree because you think the limit should be increased, decreased, abolished, or set to 0.

> 36: The minimum wage should be raised to 12€ in 2022.

You may disagree because you think it should be raised more; or raised less; or lowered. Or raised to the same amount, but this year.

> 25: Germany should exit the EU.

You may agree because you think Germany should split up into independent regional states; or because you feel the EU is an anti-democratic mechanism; etc.

Re: Germany’s no-emotion voting guide surges despite campaign of personalities

#165

Post by imtringued »

woodpanel wrote: post #30

It's really odd: In the previous election, you couldn't see/hear one news report about the election without mentioning the Wahl-O-Mat. This election-time it was some internet meme that reminded me it existed. After usage of it, it becomes apparent as to why it gets zero coverage: Almost everyone I've asked (migrant/unemployed/self-employed/postal-worker/cooks/farmer/cab-driver/...) experienced a stark surprise. The p…

I got my parties of choice on all tools I have used. The fact that I always got the same results made me bored of these tools. Maybe tell people to actually read the party programs before doing the Wahl-O-Mat?

Also, don't forget to actually activate all parties. Selecting 5 right wing parties and then being surprised that you don't vote for them is stupid.

Re: Germany’s no-emotion voting guide surges despite campaign of personalities

#166

Post by riedel »

bakuninsbart wrote: post #9

I hope not too many people base their voting decision on the amount of similarity they have in their answers with parties. The way questions are phrased do not always give parties a way to answer (Yes/No/Neutral) in the same way. As an example, 2 parties could both say No to a higher Co2-tax, but one of them does so because they claim climate change is a hoax, while the other one has a problem with it not being progr…

Wahlomat seems like yet another way of trying in to reduce complexities. The explanations given by Die PARTEI nicely highlight to that it might be good to look at the rationale behind the answers.

In general I find the current election campaigns and media coverage rather intellectually offending. I guess it hard to blame the wahlomat for choice topics, that appear throughout the party programs.

One fun fact is that according to a recent study by an economic think tank none of the major party programs if implemented would be enough to reach the Paris climate goals. I highly doubt if any combination or even worse compromise would.

Re: Germany’s no-emotion voting guide surges despite campaign of personalities

#167

Post by square_usual »

the-dude wrote: post #71
square_usual wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Some of my migrant friends joked that I should label them a right-winger now. I don't see how that's odd. Many migrants come from more conservative (in the Western sense) cultures. They can align with the progressive parties because they're afraid of the conservative ones due to their anti-immigrant stances, but that doesn't mean they are progressive.

I think you would be surprised how many immigrants have an anti-immigrant stance once they are in. I know a couple.

Oh, definitely, I have no doubt about that. There's a lot of immigrants who like immigrating is hard because they think it keeps out the chaff, so to speak. As an Indian, I've seen this in many in my own circle who've emigrated or spent significant time abroad.

Re: Germany’s no-emotion voting guide surges despite campaign of personalities

#168

Post by fourtrees »

imtringued wrote: post #162
fourtrees wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wow, I thought the AfD was the rightmost of the German parties. I wonder if the fascists (not being hyperbolic, Mussolini advertised fascism as a "third way", the others being communism and liberalism) are localized in Westphalia and Bayern or are more widespread. They can't be very popular. Hang the Greens makes me think this is a western thing. Wouldn't they be hanging Die Linke in the east? Anyway, a Red-Red-Green…

That's strange... facism as a third way... The first time I have seen the phrase "dritter weg" it was here. https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freiwirtschaft#Weitere_Vertret... >Aktion Dritter Weg/Liberalsoziale innerhalb der Partei Bündnis 90/Die Grünen, vertritt freiwirtschaftliche Ideen und veröffentlicht sie in der Zeitschrift Alternativen (siehe Georg Otto) Freiwirtschaft is probably the most neutral/centrist "third…

From a glance at Wikipedia, it looks like the "third way" has been used by organizations with wildly different ideologies all over the world for at least a century now (and I wouldn't be shocked if it could be traced back at least to the French Revolution). I guess I associate it with Mussolini because he was the first I read use it.

I wasn't familiar with Gesell and the ideas Freiwirtschaft. It actually sounds like a decent (real) third way, a lot like Georgism, and an idea worthy of debating at least.

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