Last weekend Bavarians went to the polls to vote in the state’s regional parliamentary elections. The CSU, who have ruled Bavaria with an absolute majority for decades, were cut down eleven points to 37%, and the AfD (Alternative für Deutschland, Alternative for Germany) entered the state parliament for the first time with about 11% of the vote.
The video below is an excerpt from a town hall event from before the election featuring the Green Party candidate Katharina Schulze. In it you’ll hear Ms. Schulze bob and weave even more effectively than Barack Obama to avoid giving any direct answers to questions. The only questions she answered firmly were on completely innocuous topics.
MissPiggy has translated text and video about the event. The précis below is from Bild:
Election Campaign — final spurt in Bavaria!
The Green-top candidate Katharina Schulze (33) was at the BILD talk on the Bavarian election in the brewery Augustiner Klosterwirt on Monday morning [last week] to answer the questions of BILD readers. The question time was moderated by Anna von Bayern and BILD boss Julian Reichelt.
But anyone who hoped for clear answers was disappointed. Schulze, when pressed for a clear message, tried to talk her way out, which increasingly annoyed spectators who wanted clear statements. Just before the end of the program it became too much for a spectator. A man from the audience, according to his own words a Green sympathizer, railed against Schulze: “It reminds me of the student spokeswoman in the Max Planck Gymnasium!” He said, Schulze has “no battle plan”, and he could not understand why she just couldn’t say yes or no.
Many thanks to Vlad Tepes for the subtitling:
Video transcript:
| 00:00 | She asked a question and in response came a wave of machine gun-like multiple answers | |
| 00:04 | of something completely different, but NO answer to the question. | |
| 00:09 | Hold on. This table here seems to especially annoyed with me. —No, no, no. —That’s OK. | |
| 00:15 | You have good command of language and are not without empathy, but why do you avoid | |
| 00:19 | answering, for the umpteenth time, the specific question? | |
| 00:22 | What you’ve said up until now isn’t really convincing me, simply because it’s just ideological theory. | |
| 00:28 | What is being provided here, even though I am always some what drawn to the Green Party, | |
| 00:36 | it reminds me of my student class representative in the Max Plank high school, and nothing more. | |
| 00:44 | If someone that comes from a Maghreb country is found guilty of assaulting a homosexual, just | |
| 00:49 | for being homosexual, which is happening more often in Germany… —The courts must decide | |
| 00:54 | He doesn’t want to be persecuted for his sexual orientation. —There are clear laws for that. | |
| 01:00 | Is the Green Party for deportation in this case, to Tunisia, Algeria or Morocco? Or not? | |
| 01:08 | Because, as we have heard, your intention is to become interior minister. —Well, so, I would like | |
| 01:12 | to simply have a great Green election result — that’s the first point. — Answer the question! | |
| 01:16 | That’s obvious, that’s why you are here. —The second point is that we have laws for such a | |
| 01:20 | case and we have judges. —Yes, of course, please allow me. There are laws, fortunately, | |
| 01:29 | but there are also political positions, and your political position is what people here want to know. | |
| 01:34 | Do you stand for deporting violent criminals, or to make it easier for you, deporting them | |
| 01:39 | when they assault homosexuals? Yes or no? —Look… —Answer the question! | |
| 01:48 | OK. Excuse me. Allow me, very briefly. This table appears to be especially annoyed with me. | |
| 01:56 | — No, no, no. — That’s OK. That’s totally OK! But I would just like to make one this clear | |
| 02:02 | I believe that in this day and age, that we need to return to differentiating things better. | |
| 02:07 | And unfortunately I will have to disappoint you: there isn’t just always black and white. | |
| 02:12 | I have already clearly said… —Yes, but you must decide. —Yes, I just said, I just said we have the | |
| 02:16 | the rule of law which applies. —What is your political position? —We have a rule of law which | |
| 02:20 | applies. And when someone need help and protection, then he will be helped. —That wasn’t | |
| 02:26 | the question. —And if they don’t need it, then they should be returned. | |
| 02:30 | You said hatred and incitement of hatred, which are two very strong words. They are especially | |
| 02:35 | utilised often and willingly in your left-leaning spectrum with regard to political opponents. | |
| 02:41 | That’s very strong language considering the German history. Incitement is found in the | |
| 02:45 | constitution, as incitement of the people, and clearly refers to German history. What, | |
| 02:53 | specifically, do the CDU and Markus Söder propagate that you interpret as hate and | |
| 02:57 | incitement of hatred? For me at the moment, the most alarming thing is the increasing | |
| 03:02 | divisiveness in society. And that things are being said now, that a few years ago, wouldn’t | |
| 03:08 | have been allowed. I think it is awful, if we think of those images from Chemnitz, where | |
| 03:14 | a right-wing Nazi mob was hunting down people. A Nazi mob was hunting people in our | |
| 03:18 | country! That’s not acceptable! —That wasn’t what Markus Söder said. —That’s right, but there | |
| 03:24 | is a mood in our country that I feel. — But what specifically is the reason you accuse your | |
| 03:28 | political opponent of promoting hatred and inciting hatred? —Yes, exactly. —Can you give | |
| 03:32 | an example? For example, I find the language coarse within the CSU when Markus Söder | |
| 03:36 | spoke about people who fled from terror and war, he used the word “Asylum-tourists” to lump | |
| 03:41 | them all together. —That word originates with the SPD [socialists] actually. — That doesn’t make it better! | |
| 03:45 | — Yes, but it is not the CSU’s word and it is decades old. So, where has hatred and | |
| 03:51 | incitement of hatred increased because of the CSU or your political opponents? —I find it in the | |
| 03:57 | coarseness of the language. — But how is the CSU authoritarian? — I, so we, I have to clarify | |
| 04:02 | that too, the Green Party have entered this election race with the theme “Purely Green” and | |
| 04:06 | won’t categorically refuse a coalition. Except for the AfD, we won’t even talk them. OK? | |
| 04:10 | That’s our position, because we believe that in this day and age that we must exemplify firmly | |
| 04:16 | our message. So just days before the elections we are not going to exclude one or the other, | |
| 04:20 | because that wouldn’t be worthy of democracy or the electorate. | |
| 04:26 | What’s crucial is the question, how is the current government authoritarian? | |
| 04:30 | What is important to me and what I want to have is a pro-European, liberal and cosmopolitan | |
| 04:34 | Bavaria and that it stay that way, but at the same time evolves. —We want to try to establish | |
| 04:39 | what exactly is happening in our country and why the Green Party, for example, has answers. | |
| 04:44 | Who are our role models in this society? Who fits that bill? — That’s exactly what… — Is it | |
| 04:50 | Mr. Söder or the Bavarian Interior Minister? Name an example. Who is the person that | |
| 04:58 | bothers you and that you want to change? — Well, so there’s… — Is there one person? | |
| 05:03 | No, uh, sorry, but I am not going to pulled into a discussion with a baited question. | |
| 05:09 | The world isn’t like that. I just can’t pick some person out and say this person is to | |
| 05:13 | blame that the AfD is so strong. —No, but you said, I will try to quote you correctly, role models | |
| 05:19 | of society are beating the same drum. Which role models in society are doing that? —What | |
| 05:24 | I want to say is what I briefly said before, that currently we live in a society where certain things | |
| 05:30 | are being said that wouldn’t have been said in the past. —Who says these things? | |
| 05:34 | And… yes, there are people who make judgements about other people and say things | |
| 05:42 | that in the past would not be said. —But who? —Mrs. Schulze, who? Please just say one. When | |
| 05:46 | you claim that role models in our society are beating the same drum as the AfD. Please just | |
| 05:50 | tell us which role model does that? — Yes, the AfD is a large catalyst because their… — But they | |
| 05:55 | aren’t role models. —But for some people they are and then there are the colleagues… —Would | |
| 06:05 | you agree? —There are colleagues from other parties who have adopted the same choice of | |
| 06:13 | words. That’s a problem. —The best example is the H&M adverts with a woman in a bikini, | |
| 06:18 | at a bus stop. This is not an invented story. They are stolen or there are car accidents there | |
| 06:26 | regularly. In your own personal opinion, it is an example of sexist advertising which should be | |
| 06:30 | forbidden and banned in the city? —I can repeat my answer… —No, don’t repeat it. —Yes, look, you | |
| 06:38 | just asked me about the city council’s decision. And I agree with it. —Understood. —There will | |
| 06:46 | be rules about what is allowed to be shown and what not. —What is your our personal opinion? | |
| 06:52 | We are trying to figure out what you stand for in this election. Is advertising with bikinis, a woman | |
| 06:57 | dressed only in a bikini on a giant poster, sexist or not? —I am very sure that the citizens know | |
| 07:04 | that this is not the most important topic in this election or what they will vote about on Sunday. | |
| 07:08 | So, sorry, but this debate is a little… but you asked me. I believe it would be good if bodies of | |
| 07:12 | both women and men aren’t used for advertising purposes, because it is not appropriate for either | |
| 07:18 | to be reduced to that. That’s the basic principle, which I agree with and think it is good that the | |
| 07:25 | city council decided this, and we will now begin the process of implementing it. There will be | |
| 07:30 | rules and all that. We will watch how it works and if it works well, then other cities will do it too | |
| 07:35 | or not — every city must decide for themselves. | |
| 07:41 | She asked a question and in response came a wave of machine gun-like multiple answers | |
| 07:47 | of something completely different, but NO answer to the question. | |
| 07:50 | You have good command of language and are not without empathy, but why do you avoid | |
| 07:55 | answering, for the umpteenth time, the specific question? | |
| 07:58 | What you’ve said up until now isn’t really convincing me, simply because it’s just ideological theory. | |
| 08:04 | What is being provided here, even though I am always some what drawn to the Green Party, | |
| 08:12 | it reminds me of my student class representative in the Max Plank high school, and nothing more. |
Well, at least she is easier on the eyes than the former imposter-in-chief.
However, when the ideals she espouses do come to pass it will not matter that she is easier on the eyes because all will be hidden under the black bag of islamic garments. And in that time, the only time that she will open her yap again in the presence of men is if they demand it.
That’s the generation Germany have today , completely idiots , with no prospective and realistic plans for this dying country, people like Her ( snowflakes) will be finished this country quickly with a Merkel help , tragedy..
It really is hard to believe that people voted for this dizzy woman and her party.
She’s out of her element.
Those types of responses are best suited to tenured bureaucrats holding unaccountable power over mere citizens. Then, they can spout whatever nonsense comes to the mind, and who’s to challenge it?
But, in the case of a real election, with real and persistent questions, this proto-totalitarian can only glibly repeat the party lines, pasted together with platitudes and vague generalizations. This kind of dynamic is why leftists find real debate so threatening. They write position papers, incomprehensible to a non-party member, and compliment each other on their insight. It’s like the faculty of a gender-studies program: they have their own journals, review each other’s papers, hire each other, and select their students to have the same mindsets as they do. And react to ideas outside the reservation like Dracula reacts to garlic.
The really distressing thing is that decent people, albeit ones that don’t think too deeply about ideology and are motivated by a desire to place themselves outside the two-party system (in the USA, UK, Oz, etc, but, effectively, also in the Netherlands, Denmark, Germany), vote Green.