Russian bots on Facebook were also in masses trying to meddle with the German election and supported the AfD. It's no secret putin invests millions in supporting the far right in Europe.

They are as Neo-Nazi as Trump...just saying.

The Republicans obviously.

(Excuse me for using multiple posts...copy pasting is a pain with my tablet.)

He's fine with it, which is the issue with Trump

Merkel has been one of the greatest European leaders in the last 50 years. Germany has one of the strongest economies in the world. Merkel will remain German Chancellor for a very long time.

Same with the AfD. A lot of former right wing CDU guys in there who weren't satisfied that Merkel's CDU moved more to the centre. Same with the voters... apparently they still are ok with sharing ranks with far right people, just like Trump.

Btw What is wrong with the poll?! People here wanting the AfD to win?! F'in trolls!

Good to have you Germans condescending to Americans politics and lecturing us about which party is evil and which is nice. Newsflash, there's only one party in the USA, corporatists and lobbyists run the show. Moreover, I'd take those so-called neo-nazis over Islam apologists/importers any day of the week.

Americans are lucky their immigration problems are mainly related benign Mexicans crossing their imaginary border, we'll see how "progressive" Europe become when Islamists stop being a "minority", which is happening sooner than anyone has predicted.

Rather than obsessing about banning parties because you think are bad?

Why not force supposedly good Parties to have engaging agendas to actually get more votes?

Imo hoping people dont like the right wingers to get votes, is a rather silly tactic..ask Hillary Clinton if that worked.

I can only speak for my own country. And here politics do not have the same attention as other entertainment and as such have not been degraded into the same circus like in the US. Politics here is boring, mostly because it's actually politics and also because we rarely elect clowns that make outrageous statements on a daily basis. Parties act upon their conscience and policy and not because they desperately need to win the next election. There are no hardened rivalries because the goal is driven by policies and not elections. Attack ads are unthinkable and banned anyway. For the past 8 years the two biggest parties in Germany have governed as one.

Politics in Germany is boring. It's boring because it functions exactly as what it's supposed to. Politics. And actual politics are boring, as they should be. Because when they're boring it means they're not doing stupid outrageous shit.

So please don't even try to remotely compare our democracy with the corporation owned circus that happens in the US. Sure, no democracy is perfect but what we have here is pretty much as close as it gets.

Yes. Nothing short of a revolution will help the US fix what's wrong with society and politics. It's not enough to change policy. You need to change the way people think about policy.

I read a recent article about Bernie's proposed single payer healthcare, i.e. the only correct way to do healthcare. It stated that it was most likely not possible to implement it right away because people and politicians need to be slowly convinced about it. So you would have to take one or more steps in between to arrive there. But that is already deemed to fail because a partial implementation of it would be quite sub optimal and leave people with a bad taste in their mouth, which would lead to not even attempting the actual plan. But proper healthcare cannot work if you don't go full hog right away. So it's pretty much doomed. Health care cannot be changed if you don't change how people think about it. Socialism is one thing that makes it so comfortable to live in European countries. In the US it has a completely negative connotation. That will have to change before you can even attempt policy.

Another example would be gun control. In the current climate it is simply impossible to enact a full gun ban for civil use(except sports). So you would have to introduce it gradually. But if you do it gradually you will not see any results, which will just give more fuel to gun activists. It's not just the ban on guns that makes other countries so safe. It's the way people think of guns. It's not a status symbol or a precious symbol of freedom. It's not presented as the only thing to protect yourself and your family. It's simply treated at what it is, a tool for killing, a last resort. In the US it's the former and unless you change how people think about guns you cannot even attempt to apply policy.

Of course things like these can happen gradually over time but in the US you have very active counter forces that will suppress even gradual change. So no, there isn't really much hope. Something big has to happen for people to change.

Germany has been a nation of war once and then became one of the most peaceful nations on earth, but only due to the trauma of war.

Really? With only ~4% of the EU population being moslems, that would take centuries to change.
Soon....lol