Victor Davis Hanson: Germany’s Election Results and the Marginalized Conservatives

Although the Elon Musk-endorsed Alternative for Deutschland garnered over 20% of the vote in the country’s recent elections, the “ultra-far-right” party will likely be blocked from joining a majority coalition in the parliament, further alienating an increasing number of concerned Germans who believe their country is no longer the “powerhouse” of Europe, argues Victor Davis Hanson on this edition of “Victor Davis Hanson: In His Own Words.”

“But here's my point, even though they have about half of the support of all German voters, it's likely that the Alternative for Germany will not be represented. And the seats that will comprise the majority will be made up by either a socialist party or the green party, or both.

“Here's my point, again, there's a populist, nationalist backlash, a counterrevolution to the craziness of Europe. And we know JD Vance has outlined that craziness: low fertility, high energy prices, bans against fracking, open borders, dishonorment, deindustrialization, etc. But the conservatives will not have a voice under their parliamentary democracy, even though they earned a voice. And that's only going to make them more polarized. …

“Mr. [Friedrich] Merz said in a speech that given the trajectory of America under Donald Trump, he's distancing himself and he doesn't really consider the United States an ally anymore, at least he said Trump's America.

“Think about that for a second. Now, I don't want to go through ancient history, but we fought two wars with Germany. And we defeated them both, but we also came to their rescue. I think we rescued them in World War I from kaiserism. And that allowed them to have a brief romance with democracy. And then we rescued them from Nazism. They paid a terrible price. But they did lose two wars they should have lost. And then we protected them in the Cold War. … ”

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