Last Update: 14.09.2023 18:11 Uhr The Thuringian state parliament passed a tax cut by 46 votes to 42. The CDU’s bill was pushed through with the votes of the AfD and FDP. The red-red-green government criticised the CDU for giving the AfD influence over the budget. The opposition has pushed through a tax cut in Thuringia against the will of the red-red-green government. A CDU bill for a lower real estate transfer tax received a majority in the state parliament in Erfurt because, in addition to the FDP, the AfD contributed the decisive votes. The government factions of the Left, SPD and Greens voted against. The tax cut was passed by 46 votes to 42. The Red-Red-Green Party criticised the CDU for giving the AfD, for the first time in the Thuringian state parliament, the power to exert concrete influence on the state budget. The AfD in Thuringia is classified by the Office for the Protection of the Constitution as proven right-wing extremist. The CDU wants to reduce the real estate transfer tax in Thuringia from 6.5 to five percent. It points out that families purchasing their first owner-occupied home should be reimbursed the real estate transfer tax up to a certain maximum amount. According to forecasts by the governing coalitions, the state budget will thus be short between 48 and 60 million euros annually. It is unclear how this is to be compensated. More information coming soon.
Translated with DeepL
As always there will be a lot of wailing about how the CDU/FDP could violate their supposed principles of not working together with the AfD and very little discussion about how it can be that the CDU/FDP are the ones that repeatedly find themselves in situation of substantial political alignment with the AfD in the first place. Such a weird coincidence.
If we rightfully accept the AfD to be absolutely vile it’s about time the mainstream political discourse stops letting its closest political neighbours get away with some performative declarations of distance and start a discussion about how the rot sits right there are the policy level.
This is big, because the conservative CDU has ruled out priorly of working with the extreme far-right Alternative for Deutschland, especially in Thuringia where the party is the most radical
What’s the surprise? They have dealt with all kinds of fascists since Konrad Adenauer’s time - and back then they were protecting literal war criminals.
Since the CDU still refers to them self as a party with christian values, I wanna point to the story of Judas, who sold his Messiah&God for a few coins. I find it rather fitting, that here a tax cut is the reason for cooperation.
‘Let’s give up all democratic values, in the hope of a few bucks extra in your pocket.’ Fucking pathetic, especally since tax cuts benefit mostly the rich.
EDIT: Rebuttals are welcome, otherwise I have no idea what you are negatively reacting to.
The cordon sanitaire approach always had a definite expiry date. Once the excluded party grows big enough to be able to make or break majorities, it’s inevitable that they will use that power.
Then what? Do we say that we will withdraw any law proposal or bill that doesn’t have a majority without the excluded party? Then congratulations, you now gave them veto power over all legislation. They can set the agenda.
The goal of refusing cooperation was to deny them the change to grow bigger and win time to deal with them. If they grow bigger regardless, the strategy has outlived their usefulness. We need a new strategy.
As another comment says, the problem with CxU and FDP is not that they were seen to work together with the AfD. It’s than on many issues they have the same or similar policies to the AfD.
The problem with that stance is that there are always behind the scenes talk, before the actual parliamentary vote. So the CDU and FDP-Legislators didn’t just coincidentally voted the same way as there AfD colleagues. There worked actively together to let this law pass.
Through this they legitimises the Afd as just another party with a different ideological background, that can be worked with, if the situation requires it. The next logical step is to form a coalition to win the next administration, of course with the intend to control the minor partner AfD to prevent the radical stuff.
And we went through this exact sequence of events in the past. The OC Nazis rose to power the exact same way.
If you re in the minority you can’t always get what you want. Make yourself more attractive to voters, instead of colluding with Nazis to get your way. Negotiate & compromise harder with the other parties, instead of grabbing the get now & pay later with literal blood option.
But that is hard & working with Nazis is easy.
The problem with that stance is that there are always behind the scenes talk, before the actual parliamentary vote. So the CDU and FDP-Legislators didn’t just coincidentally voted the same way as there AfD colleagues. There worked actively together to let this law pass.
I will accept that perhaps this might be the case in the specific case, and then I agree with your judgement.
But we have seen the AfD exploiting this in secret ballot votes, from Thuringia for the OG fuckup all the way to the recent repeat elections in Berlin where they wanted to cast doubts on whether the CDU-SPD coalition was voted in by them in the end (and iirc, they pulled something similar with a Left mayor in one of the districts).
I stand by my main thesis, the strategy has an expiry date and it also hasn’t produced the expected results. AfD has grown despite this strategy. There needs to be an escalation of measures against them, because otherwise thinking that only refusing to vote the same way as them is enough to push them away verges increasingly on Aktionismus.