Posted on 12/03/2016 7:40:03 PM PST by Mariner
Vienna (AFP) - Austria's long and ugly presidential campaign drew to a close Saturday, with the far-right aiming to emulate Donald Trump and Brexit campaigners by dealing a hammer-blow to Vienna's centrist establishment.
A victory on Sunday for Norbert Hofer from the anti-immigration and EU-critical Freedom Party (FPOe) would make him Europe's first far-right elected president since World War II.
The presidency is largely ceremonial but it would be another triumph for populist politics a month after Donald Trump's US election victory and barely five months since the British chose to leave the European Union.
The election comes on the same day as a high-stakes referendum in Italy and ahead of elections next year in France, Germany and the Netherlands where anti-mainstream forces are forecast to do well too.
"That a far-right candidate for a party founded partly by Nazis and with a history of anti-Semitism could be so close to power at the heart of Europe is self-evidently troubling," a Financial Times editorial said this week.
"But it should be a wake-up call to mainstream politicians rather than a cause for despair."
One voter, Helwig Leibinger, told AFP at Hofer's final rally in Vienna on Friday that "we hope that Hofer can ensure that our borders remain closed, that we have controls, that we have security.
"We want a commander-in-chief of the armed forces who can give the right orders," he said.
(Excerpt) Read more at yahoo.com ...
You can actually hear the bladders unloading in this editorial-posing-as-news.
This sounds like good news to me.
Another natural ally for Trump’s programs.
Because of a small country and its history, international globalises think they can smear and bully Austria. But they are where they were after Brexit and Trump victory. I hope Italy and Austria will deal dual blows to the international bullies tomorrow.
I immediately noticed the Nazi assertion, and that pretty much told me all I needed to know about which side was best for the country.
“...so close to power at the heart of Europe is self-evidently troubling,” a Financial Times editorial said this week.”
But the nutjob communist dictator in Belarus doesn’t bother him a bit.
Leftists SUCK. I’m so tired of the bias.
“Not unlike lies told in American elections.”
The US press amd other media inform us implicitly and explicitly that Trump is a nazi, fascist, racist, misogynist, etc.
Those who speak Austrian need to be eschewed. So sayz Hussein...
‘Hate’ seems to now mean, ‘anything other than the ultra-leftist orthodoxy’.
Does media everywhere call opinions that differ from their own members - hate?
Mmm, yup.
If you dig out their platform material....the Freedom Party is the anti-establishment party. There’s been some fair amount of frustrations building up over the past decade. The party wants more public referendums. They also want fewer ministries and to reduce the federal power Austria....so that states and local councils dictate alot of what the locals want.
In the last three years....they became the anti-immigration party. At least half the nation isn’t happy with the open-door policy of Chancellor Merkel. So that just added more votes.
How one might equate the Freedom Party to Nazis....would take an awful lot of creativity. If you go and read the Nazi Party platforms of 1932....it just doesn’t compare.
Nationalism and THE CITIZENRY trying to save ones country from invading hordes that are supported and protected by the very people elected to protect thier citizenry is now viewed as
“UGLY”
The correction is occurring. The winds of real change are upon us.
It’s finally happening, but we can expect some serious blowback from the libs. No matter. we will win.
Maybe they should restore the old Hapsburg dynasty as constitutional monarchs. Franz Ferdinand, please call your office.
My wife is Austrian, moved here when she was 15. Her Parents and extended family still live in Sankt Poelten and Vienna. With few exceptions they are all pro-Hofer, pro-American, and though at first anti-Trump, they have "come around".
These people are anti-Nazi (actually ashamed that Hitler was Austrian), but saw the Islamic immigration problem early on, as in decades ago. Hofer's party is the only place they could go. There are some fringe elements in and around the party, but the vast majority of voters are just like Trump voters here-fed up.
"Far Right" they are not. As a matter of fact, the pro-Nazi faction is quite leftist, very much socialist, so the Far Right designation is, as you say, just another lie.
In the European spectrum, the US Democrat Party would be labeled "center-right" to "right". Trump is off the ultraviolet edge of the spectrum.
...Vienna's centrist establishment [existing]...
...would make him Europe's first far-right elected president since World War II.
That a far-right candidate for a party founded partly by Nazis and with a history of anti-Semitism...
No bias here folks, move along, move along.
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