Yes, the AfD victory signals a danger to democracy, but not the way they tell you

The risk now is not one opposition surge, but how Berlin may answer it: with smears, lawfare and deeper contempt for voters Say what you will about ex-BlackRock bigwig German Chancellor and uber-grinch Friedrich Merz, but he has his moments of unexpected alertness.Currently, he is shocked, shocked! He has noticed that his party, the mainstream conservatives of the CDU are “in serious danger” after suffering their worst defeat in decades.Germany’s dark star of unpopularity was, of course, talking about the results of the regional elections in the state of Saxony-Anhalt. They have produced a landslide victory for the new-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party, under its shooting star Ulrich ‘Uli’ Siegmund. They delivered a colossal, devastating fiasco to the CDU and, of course, Merz personally: The AfD has scored 43.8 percent of the vote, the CDU 17.2 percent. When compared with the last state election, the AfD gained 23 percent, while the CDU lost 19.9 percent.Polls show that the AfD has massively siphoned off former CDU voters and also mobilized previous non-voters with unprecedented success. In terms of age cohorts, the AfD is dominating almost the entire spectrum except among ...