Descriptions of the AfD are usually a lot of wishy-washy talk around the real issue: This is the anti-"Wir schaffen das!" party. Their surge of popularity completely aligns with the 2015...
Descriptions of the AfD are usually a lot of wishy-washy talk around the real issue: This is the anti-"Wir schaffen das!" party. Their surge of popularity completely aligns with the 2015 immigration wave in Europe and Germany's (Merkel's) open doors policy and people blaming the rise of Islamic terrorism on that. Everything else is grew out of that. It's why we got all these right-wing governments in Europe.
I generally vote fairly left (and would never vote right, to make that clear) and it was frustrating to see left parties shovel their own grave as right-wing parties grew from nothing to 20%, 30%, which is a lot in Europe where it's normal to have 5 or more parties in the government. It's hard not to blame the left for that as well since they chose to absolutely ignore the problem of Islamic parallel societies shunning the very ideals of the left (women's rights, freedom of religion, freedom of the arts,...). Their answer was a "simple" one as well: "There are no problems and suggesting so is racist." IMO you can acknowledge and tackle these problems without going into racist stereotypes but if you leave it to right-wing parties to even mention it, well, you'll leave it to extremists. You can't expect a bunch of terrorist attacks on civilians in Europe to have zero political consequences. It could have been an investment in education, better laws to protect certain freedoms, stricter laws for religious extremism but instead it's "foreigners out!", now. Good job, left!
As a Russian, this is where I have to disagree. A lot of Westerners don't realise that you can't really talk about Putin without talking about Yeltsin. Yeltsin's participation in the dissolution...
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Putin
As a Russian, this is where I have to disagree. A lot of Westerners don't realise that you can't really talk about Putin without talking about Yeltsin. Yeltsin's participation in the dissolution of the USSR and his subsequent rule as President were so disastrous, that the only thing Putin needs to do to remain popular is be nothing like Yeltsin.
Westerners seem to like to think that only "babushkas" and "bydło" vote for Putin and pro-Putin candidates, but this is a very simplistic view. I've known a lot of educated middle-class people, who vote for Putin and Putin's people because they don't see a replacement outside of Putin's team, and it's not because the TV doesn't give them the ad time. (This is where I have to digress to say that the Russian "opposition", both "in-system" and "out-system" are a disgrace; they don't have a team and they couldn't play well with each other even if their life depended on it.)
I am not trying to protect Putin here. I think that a lot of the stuff he made after the year 2012 was very detrimental to the Russian people. But saying that Putin is popular because he is a populist who "claims that he can solve all of their problems" is just plain wrong and kind of insulting to Russians.
I really don't like discussing politics, but for some reason I felt like this is important.
Descriptions of the AfD are usually a lot of wishy-washy talk around the real issue: This is the anti-"Wir schaffen das!" party. Their surge of popularity completely aligns with the 2015 immigration wave in Europe and Germany's (Merkel's) open doors policy and people blaming the rise of Islamic terrorism on that. Everything else is grew out of that. It's why we got all these right-wing governments in Europe.
I generally vote fairly left (and would never vote right, to make that clear) and it was frustrating to see left parties shovel their own grave as right-wing parties grew from nothing to 20%, 30%, which is a lot in Europe where it's normal to have 5 or more parties in the government. It's hard not to blame the left for that as well since they chose to absolutely ignore the problem of Islamic parallel societies shunning the very ideals of the left (women's rights, freedom of religion, freedom of the arts,...). Their answer was a "simple" one as well: "There are no problems and suggesting so is racist." IMO you can acknowledge and tackle these problems without going into racist stereotypes but if you leave it to right-wing parties to even mention it, well, you'll leave it to extremists. You can't expect a bunch of terrorist attacks on civilians in Europe to have zero political consequences. It could have been an investment in education, better laws to protect certain freedoms, stricter laws for religious extremism but instead it's "foreigners out!", now. Good job, left!
As a Russian, this is where I have to disagree. A lot of Westerners don't realise that you can't really talk about Putin without talking about Yeltsin. Yeltsin's participation in the dissolution of the USSR and his subsequent rule as President were so disastrous, that the only thing Putin needs to do to remain popular is be nothing like Yeltsin.
Westerners seem to like to think that only "babushkas" and "bydło" vote for Putin and pro-Putin candidates, but this is a very simplistic view. I've known a lot of educated middle-class people, who vote for Putin and Putin's people because they don't see a replacement outside of Putin's team, and it's not because the TV doesn't give them the ad time. (This is where I have to digress to say that the Russian "opposition", both "in-system" and "out-system" are a disgrace; they don't have a team and they couldn't play well with each other even if their life depended on it.)
I am not trying to protect Putin here. I think that a lot of the stuff he made after the year 2012 was very detrimental to the Russian people. But saying that Putin is popular because he is a populist who "claims that he can solve all of their problems" is just plain wrong and kind of insulting to Russians.
I really don't like discussing politics, but for some reason I felt like this is important.