Elections in Poland, Liberals win

[Winner]

I am surprised there isn't a thread about this already, what happened to the Polish lobby on this forum?

Anyway, here's the obligatory article none of you will read:

Spoiler :

Poland re-elects PM Donald Tusk


Prime Minister Donald Tusk has become the first Polish leader to be re-elected since the end of communism.

Officials results, announced after 93% of votes had been counted, gave Mr Tusk's Civic Platform party enough seats to continue in coalition.

The centre-right Civic Platform took 39% of the vote, against 30% for its conservative challenger, the Law and Justice Party.

The leader of Law and Justice, Jaroslaw Kaczynski, has admitted defeat.

Civic Platform becomes the first Polish party to win two consecutive terms since communism's fall in 1989.

Mr Tusk, 54, appears to have been rewarded for presiding over four years of strong economic growth, since winning a snap election in 2007.

Poland has been the only EU member state to avoid recession, and this year its economy is forecast to grow by about 4%, the highest rate among the EU's seven largest economies.
'Poland first'

The electoral commission said Civic Platform's 39% would translate into 206 seats in the 460-member lower chamber.

Mr Tusk's coalition ally, the People's Party, won 8.6% of the vote, or 30 seats.

Law and Justice won 157 seats; a new liberal pro-secular party, Palikot's Movement, came third with 10%, giving it 40 seats; the Democratic Left Alliance was the fifth party to make it into parliament, taking 8.2% and 26 seats.

Mr Tusk said he would work on forming a governing coalition on Monday.

He is expected to renew his alliance with his current partner, the People's Party, which has said it is willing to team up with the Civic Platform again if an offer is made.

He campaigned on his economic success and also vowed to pursue a steady rapprochement with Russia, despite rows over missile defence and gas pipelines as well as the conduct of an inquiry into a plane crash that killed Poland's president last year.

"It is the highest honour for me and for Civic Platform that we will be working for the next four years for all of you, regardless of who you voted for today," Mr Tusk told supporters on Sunday.

"In the next four years we will work twice as hard," he said, according to AP news agency.

The Law and Justice Party's Jaroslaw Kaczynski is known for his mistrust of the two countries which invaded Poland during World War II, Germany and the USSR. He also attracts support from Polish Eurosceptics.

"I am deeply convinced that the day will come when we will succeed," Mr Kaczynski said. "Sooner or later we'll win because we are simply in the right."

The 62-year-old served as prime minister from 2005 to 2007, with his twin brother, Lech, as president. Lech Kaczynski died in a plane crash with 95 others in April 2010.

Jaroslaw Kaczynski competed in the snap presidential polls which followed, but lost to Mr Tusk's ally Bronislaw Komorowski.

BBC

A brief summary:

• Centre-right Liberals (Civic Platform, or Platforma Obywatelska) led by PM Donald Tusk won the elections, the first party to win two consecutive general elections in Poland since 1989
• Conservative Nationalists (Law and Justice, or Prawo i Sprawiedliwoś&#263 led by the Evil Twin of the late Polish president came in 2nd, and will spend the next 4 years in opposition
• The Left is still doing very poorly
• A new radical social liberal party (abortions, euthanasia, gay marriage, less religion in politics, and other mortal sins) did rather well, which signifies the continuing evolution of Poland into a modern liberal European country. There'll probably be a transsexual MP in the Polish parliament representing this party

Discuss whatever you want (regarding the topic, of course)

 

[aelf]

I am surprised there isn't a thread about this already, what happened to the Polish lobby on this forum?

Conservative Nationalists (Law and Justice, or Prawo i Sprawiedliwoś&#263 led by the Evil Twin of the late Polish president came in 2nd, and will spend the next 4 years in opposition.

They're in mourning?

 

[Winner]

They're in mourning?

I don't think any of the Poles here were supporters of that party.

---

The defeated Twin is calling for a "Budapest in Warsaw", probably referring to the regime Orbán is building in Hungary ( ).

 

[Tee Kay]

Tusk... coolest name ever.

 

[aelf]

Is that picture supposed to be centred on the guy or on the woman?

 

[Winner]

Tusk... coolest name ever.

It's not pronounced /task/, in case you think it is.

 

[anandus]

It's funny how the news coverage in the Netherlands was.

It seemed as there were only two parties:
* The centre-right liberal party of Tusk, decent, working hard for Poland's prosperity, etc.
* The very right-winged nutters party of whatshisname, the twin brother, who's paranoid about everything, think's Merkel is one of Putin's spies (or something) and wants to make Poland into an evil world empire (or something).

First off: There must be more 'big' parties? Where are the other center parties, the left parties, the niche parties, etc? Is see some mentioned in the openingspost.
Secondly: Is the party of this twin brother guy really as bad/weird as they paint him in the media?

PS. The 'radical social liberal party' sounds like most of the Dutch parties (apart from Christian parties, but that's only 15%-20% of the parlement).

 

[Winner]

It's funny how the news coverage in the Netherlands was.

It seemed as there were only two parties:
* The centre-right liberal party of Tusk, decent, working hard for Poland's prosperity, etc.
* The very right-winged nutters party of whatshisname, the twin brother, who's paranoid about everything, think's Merkel is one of Putin's spies (or something) and wants to make Poland into an evil world empire (or something).

First off: There must be more 'big' parties? Where are the other center parties, the left parties, the niche parties, etc? Is see some mentioned in the openingspost.
Secondly: Is the party of this twin brother guy really as bad/weird as they paint him in the media?

1) The two parties are clearly dominant, with shares of votes between 30-40%. The rest got 10% and below.

2) Yes. Europe really doesn't need Poland ruled by the PiS party, especially not right now. Its leader is a very conservative, assertive nationalistic populist who is anti-EU and likes to fan hatred and suspicion not only of Russia, but also Germany to gain support of the more ignorant voters. Basically, imagine a hardline American conservative transplanted to Central Europe

PS. The 'radical social liberal party' sounds like most of the Dutch parties (apart from Christian parties, but that's only 15%-20% of the parlement).

This is Poland - a country where abortion is illegal and the Church is still very influential. 10% for a party that's openly defending gay rights and secularism represents a small revolution in Polish politics, even though their programme wouldn't be that remarkable in Holland or Czechia.

 

[Ziggy Stardust]

It's funny how the news coverage in the Netherlands was.

It seemed as there were only two parties:
* The centre-right liberal party of Tusk, decent, working hard for Poland's prosperity, etc.
* The very right-winged nutters party of whatshisname, the twin brother, who's paranoid about everything, think's Merkel is one of Putin's spies (or something) and wants to make Poland into an evil world empire (or something).

Wait, what Dutch news have you been watching?

PS. The 'radical social liberal party' sounds like most of the Dutch parties (apart from Christian parties, but that's only 15%-20% of the parlement).

Psh! They're not even hard-core.

Have you noticed our government lately? it's those Christians and Liberals (the correct European use of the word, or right wing if you prefer that) condoned by the Loony Toon Party.

And why the Netherlands? Are you in here? Do I need to alert authorities?

 

[Hehehe]

[*]A new radical social liberal party (abortions, euthanasia, gay marriage, less religion in politics, and other mortal sins) did rather well, which signifies the continuing evolution of Poland into a modern liberal European country. There'll probably be a transsexual MP in the Polish parliament representing this party

Didn't they also want to legalize cannabis? I mean no party here in Finland is that liberal.

 

[Ziggy Stardust]

2) Yes. Europe really doesn't need Poland ruled by the PiS party, especially not right now. Its leader is a very conservative, assertive nationalistic populist who is anti-EU and likes to fan hatred and suspicion not only of Russia, but also Germany to gain support of the more ignorant voters. Basically, imagine a hardline American conservative transplanted to Central Europe

I'm imagining Wilders who's all what you said if you replace Russia and Germany with anything Muslim.

 

[Winner]

I'm imagining Wilders who's all what you said if you replace Russia and Germany with anything Muslim.

Imagine whatever you wish, it's your right Just so that we're clear, I wouldn't vote for Wilders if I were Dutch, so if this was supposed to be a snub, it didn't really work

 

[Ziggy Stardust]

No. Not intended as a snub at all.

I don't even see how it could have been one

 

[anandus]

Wait, what Dutch news have you been watching?

The usual.
(On tv the NOS and RTL, although the latter are worse in exaggerating the picture, on the web Pers, NRC, VK).
Although I might have put a bit too strong emphasis on 'nutter', 'paranoid' and 'evil' It's slightly my interpretation But there was obvious a 'good' party and a 'bad' party.

Psh! They're not even hard-core.
Have you noticed our government lately? it's those Christians and Liberals (the correct European use of the word, or right wing if you prefer that) condoned by the Loony Toon Party.

Yeah, it's a highly conservative government at the moment, I fully agree, especially now they're needing support of the fundamentalist Christians. And there is a de-liberalisation-trend in the Netherlands as well.
But anyway, this is about Poland

This is Poland - a country where abortion is illegal and the Church is still very influential. 10% for a party that's openly defending gay rights and secularism represents a small revolution in Polish politics, even though their programme wouldn't be that remarkable in Holland or Czechia.

Yeah, I know, Poland (begin Roman Catholic) is quite conservative.
It's interesting to see those developments evolving.

 

[Yoda Power]

Nice job Poland.

 

[Squonk]

There's not only a transsexual MP, but also first openly gay one (he's sort of handsome, but my opinion of him diminished after seeing him in a debate, he was extremly annoying). The transsexual one is nice, I think, I've read an interview with her some months ago.

I'm not completely happy, though. I'm not sure if the success of this ultra-liberal party would last. They're centered around their leader, who's rather a strange creature. He was actually very right-wing in the beginning, and only later turned liberal, because he found there's a niche he could fill. The good part is that the collapse of the left wing would mean change of their leader, who was really unfit to lead it (he was artificial, lacked charisma and brains, although they say he's a nice person). This ultra-liberal party has no chance of winning. Left wing could be treated as an alternative for the liberal party. Now it won't. Which means that ironically, this may postpone actual changes, not necessarily accelerate them. Because now the left wing party and the ultra-liberal will compete with each other for the left wing electorate, and liberals (who have everyone, from left-wing to very conservative politicians) will easily rule without any concessions when it comes to left-wing demands.
On another hands, left wing program was stupid... and their leader was not fine. And for the first time I wondered about voting for someone else.

 

[Leoreth]

Well, followed the elections only from a foreign-relation point of view, so I obviously wanted Tusk to win. Another legislative period full of Kaczynski-style European obstructiveness and easily-offendedness peppered with over the top claims would've been awful, both for Germany and the EU.

I don't know much about Polish domestic politics, so I use the opportunity for some questions:
- who is considered the left in Poland? Only the former communists, and isn't there any form of social-democratic/center-left party?
- what does liberal mean in Poland? Someone said it's equated with right-wing, which is not how I would define the term. Is it more the socially liberal, i.e. civil rights, angle, or economic liberalism?
- Squonk, does MP really mean member of parliament? Then, just wow.

 

[Riffraff]

This is great news, from a political perspective as well as for not allowing polish politics unecessarily dominate the international press - as seen during the reign of the twins...

 

[warpus]

Woo hoo the worse evil lost! (I think)

 

[Winner]

I don't know much about Polish domestic politics, so I use the opportunity for some questions:
- who is considered the left in Poland? Only the former communists, and isn't there any form of social-democratic/center-left party?

Democratic Left Alliance is a conglomerate of what was left of the former communists and other left wing forces. In the last two elections, it was almost completely wiped out of the political map of Poland, largely due to its own incompetence and corruption.

- what does liberal mean in Poland? Someone said it's equated with right-wing, which is not how I would define the term. Is it more the socially liberal, i.e. civil rights, angle, or economic liberalism?

Liberal in the European sense means just that, liberal. Both socially and economically, and also pro-European. The Civic Platform is, as far as I understand, a centre-right party.

- does MP really mean member of parliament? Then, just wow.

Yes. And yes

Woo hoo the worse evil lost! (I think)

It looks like pretty much everyone in Europe wanted Tusk to win a second term. Even the Russians