More democracy in action

On March 11th I get yet another chance to take part in the democratic process.

The mayor of Frankfurt, Petra Roth, is standing down early (retiring, nothing scandalous) and there is a special election to replace her.

The choice of candidates is the fairly wide, and needless to say I will probably end up voting for someone who will lose. My vote though is still under consideration. Anyone who can GUARANTEE ME A JOB IN LINE WITH MY TALENTS AND IS ADEQUATELY REWARDING I will happily support!

None of the American razzmatazz here though. No candidates rolling out their billionaire backers. Doesn't that anyway sound a teensy-weensy bit corrupt? I will back you to the tune of billions, and I won't benefit at all? Hardly likely!

No theme music for the candidates either (Obama chose his theme tunes for the election last week and did not include any salsa to appeal to the Latino vote .... Meanwhile I was thinking this morning that it would be appropriate - particularly given the close links between country music and the GOP - for Newt Gingrich to use the old Tom T. Hall / Bobby Bare classic "Lincoln Park Inn").

Meanwhile I may learn a bit more about German politics over the next few weeks. Like, for instance, what is the position of the Pirate Party on economic issues (they used to sound like a version of the awful FDP on this, maybe if they want to tap the youth vote they have to start sounding like the Occupy movement - which I imagine would be difficult for them)?

Meanwhile will it change my life much? I doubt it - the choice with politics for a generation now has been between the incompetent on the one hand and the really awful whom you would never support in the proverbial months of Sundays (see the party of mass unemployment in the UK, known as the Conservative Party, or the money for the mega-rich and huge debts for the rest GOP in the US) on the other, and there seems not much they can or want to do to deal with the issues that I consider important. It isn't quite like living in Greece yet, but it is definitely heading that way!