Germany calls for return to Democratic Socialism

The Wall Street Journal just cannot understand the resurgence of the SDP:

[...]

The introduction to the Social Democrats' new draft party program hails a commitment to the "proud tradition of democratic socialism." Ironic, since only yesterday Germany celebrated the 17th anniversary of the fall of the original "democratic socialist" republic, East Germany.

This push back to the future is partly a reaction to the rising popularity of the Left Party, an amalgam of post and not-so-post East German Communists and disgruntled West German Social Democrats. The Left Party's solution of more welfare and taxing the rich is particularly popular in the East, where unemployment is twice as high as in the West.

Full story...

The backlash is happening and it will accelerate as the vehicle of capitalist power, the US imperial military machine, looses strength. Already it is quite clear that among the popular classes in the developing world (Venezuela, Bolivia, Ecuador) and Europe (Germany, Spain, Italy) and even in the United States, the proponents of neo-liberal globalization have lost their credibility. Even the political classes are beginning to voice their uncertainty (see this and this).

They have had their chance to prove that naked capitalism is an effective system for the betterment of the world. They have failed and the people know it. The war machine combined with the police state is all they have that is left to enforce their corrupt doctrine.

2005 German Socialist Victory Anniversary

It is the one year anniversary of the Left Party victory in Germany. From Wikipedia:

In 2005 the Party of Democratic Socialism (PDS) formed an electoral alliance the Labor and Social Justice Party (WASG), a leftist faction of dissident Social Democrats and trade unionists, with the merged list being called the Left Party. In the 2005 federal election the Left Party received 8.7% of the nationwide vote and won 54 seats in the German Bundestag.

Wikipedia: Left Party Germany

The CWI is active in the WASG and has fielded several Trotskyist candidates through WASG.

However, when the WASG was set up last year, the party agreed not to participate in any coalitions or governments that carried out social cuts and privatizations. But the leadership is now proposing a merger with the PDS, which has taken part in regional coalition governments with the SPD in Berlin and elsewhere that have carried out major attacks on the working class. The PDS in Berlin has already declared that it intends to continue in a coalition with the SPD.

Justice: Fighting for Socialist Ideals Worldwide

Nevertheless, I think it is a wonderful and encouraging thing to see a socialistic party winning significant representation within a major capitalist power.