Dissatisfaction with the federal government has never been so great. If politics fails to get this country and the people through the crisis, then it’s not just the traffic light coalition that will shake, they will too, but then our political system will actually shake, then democracy will shake.
Poor poll numbers, growing dissatisfaction among the local population. We make it! Is the new star title. In it, political boss Nico Fried analyzes whether the traffic light coalition will really get us through the winter.
There is an odd contrast. The government says we are actually doing everything right in the crisis, but the polls are getting worse and worse. Dissatisfaction with the federal government has never been greater than it is now in August. That was the result of a survey. And that’s why the coalition is now asking the people a kind of vote of confidence. The government says: We are launching a program worth over 65 billion euros – and we have already given you 30 billion and are trying to winterize the country. And now we want to see whether you as a people don’t go along with it and whether you don’t say: Okay, we trust this government again that it will get us through the winter and through this crisis with some degree of safety. And now we have to see whether that will be enough in the coming weeks and months.
What’s your impression? Can they do it?
You have to make it. The coalition is doomed to succeed. Because if politics fails to get this country and its people through the crisis, then it’s not just the traffic light coalition that will falter, they will too, but then our political system will actually falter, and then democracy will falter. Because then people will say: You didn’t manage to protect us, to support us, but things are getting worse and worse for us. And then, sooner or later, you will ask the question: Why is it that the consequences of the war are having a more dramatic economic effect here than, for example, in Russia? Or why does it help the Ukrainians when the largest economy in Europe goes down the drain economically? Those are the questions people will ask if this government fails to secure energy supplies at affordable prices and protect people against inflation and help them cope with these high prices .
Is Germany threatened with the feared “anger winter”?
So the question of whether the winter will be cold in terms of weather and hot politically depends on whether the government will be able to protect the country against the dangers that threaten it. On the one hand, there is the question of energy supply: will the federal government succeed in bringing gas and electricity to this country at affordable prices? And on the other hand, it will succeed in protecting people from inflation, making it possible for people to still be able to buy their daily food at reasonably normal prices. If that doesn’t work, people will take to the streets. Then political tendencies will probably join forces in protest against this government, which otherwise do not necessarily belong together, i.e. right and left. And if the situation should become really dramatic, ordinary citizens who don’t usually take to the streets will also start protesting. But I don’t think we’re quite there yet where we really have to expect a fury winter for sure. And I think we should also be careful not to write it off by making the situation more dramatic than it is.