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Interesting that the three idiots presented as successors to Merkel aren't a prominent topic on the list. Unless of course that is captured under the "Politicia

Interesting that the three idiots presented as successors to Merkel aren't a prominent topic on the list. Unless of course that is captured under the "Politicians Overwhelmed" point which, however, doesn't capture the whole breadth of the issue the three candidates for the job as chancellor present.

wolframhempel 5y ago
As a German, I'll have to agree. The younger generation's view of the three candidates is very much what I imagined the US population felt when looking at the Trump vs Biden choice: "really - don't we have anyone else?" The problem - unfortunately - is that German politics and parties disproportionally cater to the older generations. They vote at a much higher percentage, so it's opportune for the parties to tailor their offerings to them. This in turn disenfranchises younger voters which thus turn up in lower numbers to vote thus giving even more weight to the elderly vote and so on. As a result we're stuck with an ever growing pension system, little appetite for innovation and three potential candidates that couldn't be any less inspiring, but are just non-threatening enough to be acceptable by the post-war generations...
- soco 5y ago
  Well Annalena could have been The candidate of choice exactly for those reasons, then ver(Baer)bock-ed it with all those unrelated stories... To your pensions point: there's a Swiss TV show called Arena where big politician names come into a debate with selected public as well. After the usual elderly senator bragged about saving the pension system for the next years, he was challenged by a young guy from the public "we're happy that you saved your own pension but how about ours in a few decades?" to which he had no answer, of course...
atlasunshrugged 5y ago
My guess is that was under "Politicians Overwhelmed" but with Merkel's retirement so close at hand and her outsized role in politics for so long I am surprised it didn't rank higher.
f6v 5y ago
> Interesting that the three idiots Political parties and the interests they represent remain the same. Also, Germany is a democracy. So “idiots” reflect the population.
- dna_polymerase 5y ago
  > So “idiots” reflect the population. That's what I fear the most.

wolframhempel 5y ago

As a German, I'll have to agree. The younger generation's view of the three candidates is very much what I imagined the US population felt when looking at the Trump vs Biden choice: "really - don't we have anyone else?" The problem - unfortunately - is that German politics and parties disproportionally cater to the older generations. They vote at a much higher percentage, so it's opportune for the parties to tailor their offerings to them. This in turn disenfranchises younger voters which thus turn up in lower numbers to vote thus giving even more weight to the elderly vote and so on. As a result we're stuck with an ever growing pension system, little appetite for innovation and three potential candidates that couldn't be any less inspiring, but are just non-threatening enough to be acceptable by the post-war generations...

soco 5y ago
Well Annalena could have been The candidate of choice exactly for those reasons, then ver(Baer)bock-ed it with all those unrelated stories... To your pensions point: there's a Swiss TV show called Arena where big politician names come into a debate with selected public as well. After the usual elderly senator bragged about saving the pension system for the next years, he was challenged by a young guy from the public "we're happy that you saved your own pension but how about ours in a few decades?" to which he had no answer, of course...

atlasunshrugged 5y ago

My guess is that was under "Politicians Overwhelmed" but with Merkel's retirement so close at hand and her outsized role in politics for so long I am surprised it didn't rank higher.

f6v 5y ago

> Interesting that the three idiots Political parties and the interests they represent remain the same. Also, Germany is a democracy. So “idiots” reflect the population.

dna_polymerase 5y ago
> So “idiots” reflect the population. That's what I fear the most.