DALE McFEATTERS: A warning vote in Germany
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(SH) - Germany and before that West Germany seemed so stable and democratic it might have been too easy to take that state of affairs for granted.
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BERLIN - Voters in two states in Germanyâs ex-communist east go to the polls on Sunday, expected to hand bitter losses to Chancellor Gerhard Schroederâs Social Democrats and strong gains to far-right parties.
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German voters handed Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder a stinging defeat in elections Sunday in the small western state of Saarland, reflecting public anger over his drive to cut into the country's cherished network ...
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East Germans gave a strong boost to right wing extremists and the former communists in two state elections, punishing the countryâs biggest mainstream parties for the regionâs high unemployment and cuts in social programmes.
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STOLLBERG, Germany If Chancellor Gerhard SchrÃ¶der wants to understand why his governing Social Democrats will lose votes Sunday in elections in the eastern German states of Brandenburg and Saxony, he need only visit the small town of Stollberg.
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German voters handed Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder a stinging defeat in elections Sunday in the small western state of Saarland, reflecting public anger over his drive to cut into the country's cherished network of social programs.
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Text of report by Estonian newspaper Postimees website on 5 September  [Commentary by Rein Veidemann: "Media Circus"]  Elections make for fatty raw material to the free media. The supply of news and opinions is far greater than the demand.
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German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder&#39;s Social Democratic Party is likely to lose elections in four of Germany&#39;s 16 states this month as voters protest welfare cuts and rising unemployment, according to opinion polls.
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I spent much of this afternoon in a mandatory (for poll workers) four hour training class on the Hart InterCivic eSlate voting system, soon to be in use in elections in my home county. (Hart InterCivic is a privately held firm out of Houston, specializing in election equipment and in software products for county records offices). Contrary to my previous impression, the machines are not touch screen machines, although they share some similarities.  I went into the class skeptical; I have been a critic of what I percieve as an unseemly rush to adopt insecure electronic voting systems. I emerged guardedly optimistic; the systems appear, from what I can tell, to be reasonably secure against vote manipulation by people who are not part of the election staff, and they appear to provide approximately the same level of security against election office malfeasance that paper ballots do. At the end of the day, if the election staff wants to tamper, they can; but that was true with paper ballots as well. That risk can be mitigated by election office procedures intended to mitigate it; in San Mateo County's case, those procedures have in some important regards not yet been established, as I will discuss below.
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Former German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder warns plans for a European anti-missile system in the Czech Republic and Poland may trigger a new arms race.Comment
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By Tom ArmitageBERLIN - Germany's far right looks set to win seats in its third regional parliament on Sunday as discontent with Chancellor Angela Merkel's national government and depressed conditions in the ...
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Voters in two states in Germany's ex-communist east go to the polls on Sunday, expected to hand bitter losses to Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder's Social Democrats and strong gains to far-right parties.
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BERLIN : Germany&#39;s two main political parties wound up the losers in local elections at the weekend but Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder&#39;s Social Democrats (SPD) have taken heart by avoiding a new rout.
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Parties on the fringes of Germany's political spectrum have been given an eager reception in the depressed east ahead of state elections this weekend, luring voters with a mix of xenophobic standards and new complaints over plans to reduce much-needed benefits.
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"The SPD cannot close its eyes to the fact that 43% of all violent crimes in Germany are committed by people under 21 years of age and that nearly half of these are by foreign youths"  The German chancellor, Angela Merkel, today gave her backing to a controversial plan to introduce boot camps and "warning shot" spells in prison for criminal youths. via Surrey Hants Star
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Gains for a far-right party in a weekend   regional election are a wake-up call for Germany's ruling   coalition under Chancellor Angela Merkel, media said on Monday.
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Voting started in two western German  states on Sunday in elections widely seen as a test for  Chancellor Angela Merkel and her conservative Christian  Democrats (CDU) before next year's federal vote.