Can ‘Trump effect’ fuel far-right presidential win in Austria?

[webfact]

Can ‘Trump effect’ fuel far-right presidential win in Austria?

 

 

VIENNA: -- Taking hope from Donald Trump’s US election triumph, Austria’s far-right presidential candidate Norbert Hofer is eager to surf a tide of anti-establishment populism sweeping the West and win this Sunday’s re-run election.

 

For supporters of his independent rival, Alexander Van der Bellen, that is a worrying thought indeed.

 

Handing out leaflets in support of Van der Bellen on Vienna’s main shopping street, a young woman who gave her name as Berfin explained why she was volunteering for the left-leaning, former Green Party leader.

 

“There is a really simple reason for it. I fear for my future. Because I watched the US elections. I often think about what would happen if Norbert Hofer were to become president in Austria,” she said.

 

Potential voter Georg Delon, also in the Austrian capital, believes Hofer can benefit from ‘the Trump effect’.

 

“Van der Bellen is not welcome in America. He is not welcome in Russia. He thinks he is the best man to be welcomed abroad as Austrian president but he isn’t,” he said.

 

Britain’s vote in June to quit the European Union unleashed a populist tsunami that could transform Europe’s political landscape.

 

For political analyst Thomas Hofer, however, the trend can be looked at two ways.

 

“I think there could be a certain influence – but not as most people might expect it – which is that it helps only Norbert Hofer. The Van der Bellen camp can use it, too, because it is fuelling fears and increasing emotions and mobilisation towards a defence stance against Hofer. It is like saying that a situation such as in the US and Britain – given the Brexit vote – must be prevented from happening in Austria.”

 

Opinion polls put the pair neck and neck, giving the anti-immigration Freedom Party’s candidate Hofer a real chance of becoming the first far-right head of state in an EU country. Van der Bellen narrowly won the original election in May but that result was annulled due to counting irregularities.

 

 

-- © Copyright Euronews 2016-11-30

[bark]

Trump, the leader of the whole world. Next stop Mars.

[whatproblem]

I hope he wins ,immigrants have too many rights

[elgordo38]

8 hours ago, webfact said:

“There is a really simple reason for it. I fear for my future. Because I watched the US elections. I often think about what would happen if Norbert Hofer were to become president in Austria,” she said.

Get your friends and neighbors to help handing out pamphlets hurry!!!

[Saradoc1972]

She fears for her future? Because what happened in the US election? How and why is that? Because somebody won in a legal, democratic process? Just the wrong one? Yes, that's the Greens, the spearheads of democracy in Europe, along with their social-democrat and Left cronies. Someone doesn't see things the same way, you want them strapped of their vote or something because only YOU people know how to save the world.

 

Nobody knows how the Trump presidency is going to turn out, neither does anyone know how Hillary's might have turned out, both for the world and precious Europe, yet it's apocalypse now already. That must be the diffuse and irrational Angst everyone from the oh-so "populist" downright nazi racist camp is supposed to feel trapped in for having been "left behind". That is btw, what Holy Angie called her opponents quite recently, "losers of modernisation"; publicly and unashamedly. We've come pretty far when a leader of state calls dissenters that.

[dick dasterdly]

Its depressing that so many have had no resort other than to vote for parties previously known as racist parties .

 

Blame the politicians that allowed this to happen as cheap labour suited their (and big business) interests.

[Morch]

Holocaust survivor's heartfelt plea goes viral ahead of Austrian election

http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/holocaust-survivors-heartfelt-plea-goes-viral-ahead-austrian-election-1593901

 

Austria election: Holocaust survivor's appeal goes viral

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-38133209

[dick dasterdly]

9 minutes ago, Morch said:

Holocaust survivor's heartfelt plea goes viral ahead of Austrian election

http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/holocaust-survivors-heartfelt-plea-goes-viral-ahead-austrian-election-1593901

 

Austria election: Holocaust survivor's appeal goes viral

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-38133209

This appeal should have been directed at politicians pursuing their own (as opposed to the average/poor in their country) a long time ago.

 

Perhaps then we wouldn't have the extreme parties winning - or at the moment fighting with a good chance of success.

[Saradoc1972]

12 minutes ago, Morch said:

Holocaust survivor's heartfelt plea goes viral ahead of Austrian election

http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/holocaust-survivors-heartfelt-plea-goes-viral-ahead-austrian-election-1593901

 

 

I see where you're coming from, but I don't see how Hofer and the FPÖ are to do with the Nazis... 

What I see is that the pendulum has swung two far to the left in the last 25 years or so in western/northern Europe and it needs to go back or we are not going to recognise our own civilisation and culture any more. It's all bound to change over time, that much is clear with globalisation. But there is only so much change you can expect most of the people to accept, and there is change that best shouldn't happen. Talking, as always, about the growing Muslim population and what they are even now starting to impose on the rest of us either by criminal means or on the back of what we are told are human rights. Constitutional rights and human rights are a good thing, but they have evolved in a non-democratic process that needs some tweaking by an elected parliament now and then. And that, in my opinion, is where the so-called "far right" come in, the other parties having become too entangled in their narrative of multiculturalism. 

[Morch]

13 minutes ago, Saradoc1972 said:

 

I see where you're coming from, but I don't see how Hofer and the FPÖ are to do with the Nazis... 

What I see is that the pendulum has swung two far to the left in the last 25 years or so in western/northern Europe and it needs to go back or we are not going to recognise our own civilisation and culture any more. It's all bound to change over time, that much is clear with globalisation. But there is only so much change you can expect most of the people to accept, and there is change that best shouldn't happen. Talking, as always, about the growing Muslim population and what they are even now starting to impose on the rest of us either by criminal means or on the back of what we are told are human rights. Constitutional rights and human rights are a good thing, but they have evolved in a non-democratic process that needs some tweaking by an elected parliament now and then. And that, in my opinion, is where the so-called "far right" come in, the other parties having become too entangled in their narrative of multiculturalism. 

 

I agree that to an extent the current political swings worldwide can be construed as a reaction. That said, it is still regrettable, IMO, that in many instances this seems to lead to an over-correction. I'm also less assured than others with regard to the prospects of extreme right wing ideology being piggybacked by relatively moderate conservative view.

 

We would  also be in agreement with regard to parties "becoming too entangled in their narrative of multiculturalism", which also tends to result in certain moral contradictions. Forcefully shoving an agenda down people's throats is not wise, and had things occurred in a slower pace, perhaps it would have been for the best.

 

When it  comes to globalization, though, I'm pretty sure there's no going back. In the long run, that is. Not a whole lot of future in isolationism. The current reaction is more of a setback, but if history tells us anything, its that the general movement is toward greater and more inclusive frameworks.

 

I though that as there aren't many voices left from those times, her public appeal was at least a relevant reminder and a fair warning.

[dick dasterdly]

20 minutes ago, Saradoc1972 said:

 

I see where you're coming from, but I don't see how Hofer and the FPÖ are to do with the Nazis... 

What I see is that the pendulum has swung two far to the left in the last 25 years or so in western/northern Europe and it needs to go back or we are not going to recognise our own civilisation and culture any more. It's all bound to change over time, that much is clear with globalisation. But there is only so much change you can expect most of the people to accept, and there is change that best shouldn't happen. Talking, as always, about the growing Muslim population and what they are even now starting to impose on the rest of us either by criminal means or on the back of what we are told are human rights. Constitutional rights and human rights are a good thing, but they have evolved in a non-democratic process that needs some tweaking by an elected parliament now and then. And that, in my opinion, is where the so-called "far right" come in, the other parties having become too entangled in their narrative of multiculturalism. 

And yet its largely the ordinary left wing voter, or those that have been left behind, that has resulted in brexit and Trump?

 

Unfortunately, this has resulted in those left wing voters voting for anything that takes them out of the current situation.

 

Whether this is true or not in Austria, I have no idea.

 

In short - please give up on the left wing terminology.

[Saradoc1972]

On 11/30/2016 at 4:32 PM, dick dasterdly said:

And yet its largely the ordinary left wing voter, or those that have been left behind, that has resulted in brexit and Trump?

 

Unfortunately, this has resulted in those left wing voters voting for anything that takes them out of the current situation.

 

Whether this is true or not in Austria, I have no idea.

 

In short - please give up on the left wing terminology.

 

The "left behind" notion appears to be all the rage in Germany and Austria to explain away the fact that the PEGIDA protesters and the AFD/FPO voters (where AFD is rather moderate, aside from a few hardcore members) want things to change because they feel they have been moving in the wrong directing for too long, the refugee crisis -which is rather a government and democracy failure- being the final straw. Rightfully so. Our own fruitloop of the year, Katrin Göring Eckardt, faction leader of the Greens in German parliament, has recently admitted, some people were not simply unjustifiably feeling left behind, they in fact had been left behind, "abgehängt". As opposed to Saint Angela, who two weeks ago called dissenters "losers of modernisation" (Modernisierungsverlierer, literally). Now imagine that, it's a rare turn when the head of government of a democratic states calls her opposition losers. Unabashed, no public outcry in the mainstream media.

 

I don't think it's really to do with that, might come on top or be the root cause with some few individuals, I rather think people don't like what they are seeing and are acting in democratic self-defense. That's what the faction leader of Germany's fruitloop-party, the Left (Die Linke), conceded likewise two weeks ago. Remarkable girl, Sarah Wagenknecht... isn't at the height of her popularity in her own party over a spell of sensible comments like that now, but you actually can take her for real. Which is remarkable for someone in that party, of all.

[dick dasterdly]

16 minutes ago, Saradoc1972 said:

 

The "left behind" notion appears to be all the rage in Germany and Austria to explain away the fact that the PEGIDA protesters and the AFD/FPO voters (where AFD is rather moderate, aside from a few hardcore members) want things to change because they feel they have been moving in the wrong directing for too long, the refugee crisis -which is rather a government and democracy failure- being the final straw. Rightfully so. Our own fruitloop of the year, Katrin Göring Eckardt, faction leader of the Greens in German parliament, has recently admitted, some people were not simply unjustifiably feeling left behind, they in fact had been left behind, "abgehängt". As opposed to Saint Angela, who two weeks ago called dissenters "losers of modernisation" (Modernisierungsverlierer, literally). Now imagine that, it's a rare turn when the head of government of a democratic states calls her opposition losers. Unabashed, no public outcry in the mainstream media.

 

I don't think it's really to do with that, might come on top or be the root cause with some few individuals, I rather think people don't like what they are seeing and are acting in democratic self-defense. That's what the faction leader of Germany's fruitloop-party, the Left (Die Linke), conceded likewise two weeks ago. Remarkable girl, Sarah Wagenknecht... isn't at the height of her popularity in her own party over a spell of sensible comments like that now, but you actually can take her for real. Which is remarkable for someone in that party, of all.

So you think that some German people are pissed off as they realise more than a few were 'left behind' and abandoned a while ago?  Or because they think democratic principles were abandoned a while ago?