Is Germany's Left Party on the brink of collapse?

Deutsche Welle ^ | 8/31/23 | Anja Koch

[Redmen4ever]

The most left-wing party in the German parliament is in trouble: one of its most prominent and controversial figures, Sahra Wagenknecht, is threatening to start her own political movement.

[Redmen4ever]

Sahra Wagenknecht might be described as a left-wing populist, or even left-wing totalitarian. She combines socialist economics with nationalist and anti-immigrant rhetoric. She is anti-Israel, calls the end of NATO, and a new Russia-Germany alliance. Some polls suggest if she broke away from the Left Party, and formed her own, her new party could get 15 percent or more of the vote (in a country where parties receiving at least 5 percent qualify for seats in the Bundestag). (Other polls suggest her party would get 2 or 3 percent.)

Hey guys, this Wagenknecht girl, she's the embodiment of Katya from the Bruce Willis movie "Die Hard with a Vengeance." She'd make a great Bond villainess. Don't discount her ability to seduce voters.

[piasa]

What is her freeper name?

[Governor Dinwiddie]

I don’t get the anti-Israel angle unless it’s to get muslim votes. Surely the Germans aren’t Jew haters …

[Ronaldus Magnus III]

Is this the same Party that pushed getting rid of very CLEAN nuclear energy? Germany is now mining for more and more coal “until wind and solar can power everything.” I guess it means they will be mining for coal for quite a while.

[SauronOfMordor]

socialist economics with nationalist and anti-immigrant rhetoric.

She should most accurately call her new party the National Socialist German Workers Party.

The Nazis were a LEFTIST group.

[Jonty30]

Piasa.

We are on to you.

[Jaysin]

the left unfortunately never collapses, it just mutates and assimilates like "The Thing"

[Redmen4ever]

For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms. Eph. 6:12

[Qwapisking]

“All movements on the left come from deep in the bowels” L.Star

[Phoenix8]

Good analogy.

I’m not terribly excited about the news as I’m afraid the damage has already been done by the Communist Angela Merkel.

Maybe if it happened 20 years ago.

[PAR35]

She combines socialist economics with nationalist and anti-immigrant rhetoric.

So a Nationalist Socialist German Worker's Party type? Sounds like she might be Strasserite in her views.

[PAR35]

The Nazis were a LEFTIST group.

They were before Hitler sold out to the deep state industrialists and purged the Strasserites.

[Lonesome in Massachussets]

[She calls for a] new Russia-Germany alliance.

With Poland as an hors d'oeuvre?

[BobL]

Let’s see, she’s:
1. Anti-War (as the US was regarding countries near the Soviet Union all through the Cold War)
2. Supports talking to the Russians (as the US did all through the Cold War)
3. Anti-Immigration (as the US was all through the Cold War)
4. Anti-Israel (she is European, after all)

Also against Lockdowns and the extreme reaction to Covid. Says that the response should have been to protect the elderly...pretty much the consensus here, from what I can tell

I think the tough part for Germany is that if she does break off, they won’t be able to outlaw her political party as easily as they’re about to outlaw the AfD, as they won’t be able to make the claim that she’s the second coming of Hitler...and given her positions, particularly on Ukraine and Immigration, she’ll sweep up the AfD vote, once AfD is outlawed.

[butlerweave]

Not a Party but a political movement , her own political movement ,LOL

[BobL]

“I don’t get the anti-Israel angle unless it’s to get muslim votes. Surely the Germans aren’t Jew haters …”

LOL. Seems to be a European thing. They make Europe next to unlivable for Jews (after killing off half of them), so many of the remaining Jews leave for the Middle East and form a country there...then the Europeans bitch all day about that country, Israel.

[Fiji Hill]

Could she be related to Alfred Wagenknecht, a founder of the Communist Party USA?

[Fiji Hill]

The Left party is the old Socialist Unity Party of Germany (SED) which ruled East Germany back in the days before the Wall fell down. Here is their theme song, sung by the veteran Stalinist balladeer Ernst Busch in his southern German accent.

Das Lied der Partei (The Song of the Party)--Ernst Busch, with the Berlin State Opera (1950)

It has given us everything;
Sun and wind don't faze it
Where it was, was life,
It made us who we are.
It has never forsaken us;
When the world was cold, it gave us warmth.
The Mother of the Masses protects us
And holds us in her powerful arms.

The Party, the Party is always right,
And Comrades, it always shall be.
Those who fight for justice
And against lies and exploitation
Are always right.
He who harms life is stupid or bad,
But he who protects mankind is always right.
Inspired by Lenin, welded by Stalin,
The Party, the Party, the Party!

[dfwgator]

Heil, Heil East Germany
Land of vine and grape
Land where you’ll regret
Any try to escape

No matter if you take a running jump,
Or tunnel under the wall
Forget it, the guards will kill you—
If the electrified fence doesn’t first!

[Fiji Hill]

The Berlin Top 10--Dickie Goodman (1961)