Poland Parliament elections in October 2011

I often insert "translated from (...link follows)", but this time I forgot about it.

Your suggestion of using qualified quotes is a good one.

Seems to me that we're finally seeing the civil war within PiS that I predicted would happen - they're facing electoral disaster (after this year, there's no elections of any sort until 2014 - I think?) - and a defeat now will condemn them to a long 3 years in opposition. I'm just surprised that it's taken so long for them to move - perhaps, as I said before - they've been deliberately manipulating Jarek into destroying his credibility in order to seize control of the party after the election.

In a sense, electoral humiliation here will be the best thing for PiS and Poland - they'll get rid of Kaczynski, they'll come back in 2014/2015 with a brand new strategy that will appeal to the voters - and Kaczynski will either retire or become the head of a fringe loony party that no-one cares about. His time has gone, definitely.

PiS started hanging their election posters.

Prime Minister Kaczyński

Jesus!

People, I deplore you, go to elections and stop that maniac from becoming a Prime Minister. It is true that Poland survived a lot: partitions, wars, occupations. But do we really need another disaster?

All hands on the deck!!
Poland politics

Help a brother out. What are those ladies (in berets) supposed to signify again?

Beret Commando, the most dangerous squad in Poland.

It roughly reads: They will surely go to elections. Vote so that they don`t overvote you.

by what moniker are they referred to po polsku?
are they also the Radio Maryja crowd?

it is some random picture, they suggest that RM Rydzyk and some unknown but older ladies is one bunch of primitive (religious and patriotic )loonies and are in liege (for left-overs and fools everybody who is not with them is against them and all are united - conspiracy theory ).

Divide and Win ... no understanding of civic and demarcating rules.

Everyone should post their election night predictions, whoever wins should get some sort of recognition.

PO: 45%
PIS: 28%
SLD:14%
PSL: 6%

Oooo, I like.

It's going to be hard to call, but this is my gut feeling :

PO : 41% (not a great result, and actually down very slightly from last time, but enough)
PiS : 30% (slight drop from 2007, but enough to put Kaczynski into retirement)
SLD : 19% (not a great night, but about as much as they could hope for)
PSL : 10% (usual better-than-expected performance)

PiS certainly won't win - the 'centre' voters that they won over in 2005 simply won't go near them now.

Really - the only two questions in this election are : how much of PO's support will go to the SLD, and how much of PiS' support will go to the PSL?

It's also worth pointing out that the PO/PSL/SLD "cordon sanitaire" will make sure that PiS cannot win this election. Even if they somehow win the most votes - it's certain that the other parties will be able to form a majority in the Sejm in order to make sure that PiS stay out of power. We already saw this happen on the local and regional level.

If they got that, that would be a really good result for them.


I totally agree with that. And thank God for that.

Here is the reason for my prediction, although the poles might indicate that the PO has got a big lead ahead of the elections, the media-just to keep things interesting, will make the contest closer than it really is-because you know how much the media hates boredom. Consequently what will happen is that the media will take a less critical stance towards PIS and use some ridiculous horse racing metaphors to indicate the supposed close nature of the contest, so mentally weak and unstable people-people who are determined to be sheep and part of the in crowd, will keep on changing their mind until through sheer probability PIS will get more votes than it deserves.

the lousiness of the oppostion (both PiS and SLD - SLD won't be a productive movement any time soon and Jarosław Kaczyński got rid of the brightest people he had in the course of recent years (by being clumsy and making idiotic political moves or statements and by straightforward dislike of too independent people - in 2005 PiS united a broad spectrum of people who wanted a postive change for Poland - people dropped from PiS mainly because of Kaczyński's apodictical ways


in a couple of years you will see a completely different yet much more dangerous squads running around the streets - and these will be the current youth of 12 to15 - raised without any authority except the media and peer pressure - you will see the effects - banditry and lack of tolerance - and I pretty much guess you will feel it very directly - you will then long for mohair grandma squads but there will be hardly any left till then


hhahhahaha hiiiiiihihiihihi hhahahah a regional leader hhahahah heheheh ooooooo LOL hehehehe

looks like you are a bit gullible delphi (or is it that what Mr President of the USA says you take for truth)


do you think selling Lotos refinery in Gdańsk is a good strategic move? I don't think so

PiS once blocked EU-Russia talks because the aim was to allow Russian buy-up of energy companies around Europe - PiS wanted a symmetry in relations between EU and Russia (EU capitals are mostly banned and shoved out of Russia's energy sector)


none - except for gays rights - they are pretty devoid of creative strategic thinking for Poland and what they only care for is their own welfare (sadly more and more PiS deputies seem to go in these ruts)


there wouldn't be people to work there for lower wages, pal - aren't their retirement privileges withdrawn already btw?


because they have no legal rights to the property according to Polish law? (mainly because of the inheritance law that was in place for decades only to be replaced very recently (and for pretty obscure reasons)

So what? That simply shows that Polish law must be changed. Just because something is legal doesn't mean it is right. By the laws in force in the place and at the time, both the destruction of Warsaw and the entire Aktion Reinhard were completely legal: does that mean that they were right?

So it's a choice between Kaczyński the lunatic, and 'Donald do nothong',let the markets decide. Not good.

Yes, the choice is limited.

Yes, the choice is limited.

I won`t vote PiS because they are maniacs obsessed with witch-hunts and tbeir leader is totally aberrated, just like his closest party companions.
I won`t vote SLD because they are post-communists and I vowed never to have anything in common with communists. Their anticlerical rethorics is unacceptable too.

I won`t vote PSL because I am not a peasant or farmer. Beside, they are descendants of former ZSL peasant party which supported communism in the past.

I won`t vote Palikot who is a little crazy and anti-clerical.
I won`t vote all other maniacs or sofa-size parties.

The only choice left for me is PO which has multiple drawbacks, but in comparison with the above they are OK.

That's why I like him. Seriously, though, I'm a bit worried that he will pick up a lot of the youth vote to the detriment of PO (I'm not a PO fan, but anything to keep JK out).

you are silly sod pawian


yes, definitely :)

Kto sie przezywa, ten się sam tak nazywa. :):):)

Latest poll from 13 July:

PiS are just doing nothing to bridge that gap - all those posters of "Premier Kaczynski" are scaring, not winning voters.

I quite like the SLD posters actually - simple and effective.

I only saw this one:


I also like him for funnily crazy style, but it was OK as long as he was a member of another party. Now he is trying to create sth own and that isn`t funny anymore.

the CBA (completely PO-run at the moment) is right in the footsteps of Palikot now - what PiS raised as serious offences by Palikot was hushed up equally by most media as well as by PO as long as Palikot was part of PO - I am guessing he is receiving a warning now should he have any success in promoting his political movement he would be then punished (in case someone does not know Palikot's parliamentary campaign in 2005 or 2007 was 'financed' by retired people and students who often paid 10 000 PLN - at the same time Palikot was hiding his fortune from his ex-wife and claimed to live off grants from some mysterious fund in Louxembourg - of course anyone less than completely naive would presume Palikot financed his parliamentary campaing from his own purse only hired people to stand for him in papers)

And herein lies one of the biggest problems in Poland - all this nonsense about institutions being "PO-run", or "SLD-run" or "PiS-run" - seriously guys....

seriously what - haven't you noticed that after Mariusz Kamiński anounced the scandal around gambling with the PO politicians in the main roles he was fired and replaced by some nice chaps who are friends with Mr Tusk? there were even more serious allegations against Mr Drzewiecki that the 'right' media completely distorted or ridiculed

Yes, this is nonsense but it happens every time the government changes in Poland. A new broom sweeps wide and clean. We still need to go a long way to reach British standards of civic duty.


Kamiński was replaced by nice guys but he himself was politically engaged as a strong PiS supporter. Did you forget his famous press conference in 2007?

He surely was as neutral civil servant as I am an Arch Bishop of Krakow.

Brilliant. I hope to see more polls like that in the coming weeks. Hopefully in some of them PO will reach
60 or even 80% of support (although, they might not push it too far - they have to be careful not to
make the con too obvious.)

This way the PO supporting lemmings will stay at home, as they will think that PO is going to win anyway
with such polls :-)

I am taking my wife and grandpa to elections. Remember - all hands on the deck!! We are in terrible danger:

I hope PO spin doctors are not reading this post - they would immediately add you to the next poll
(one percent of support for each person :D).

in terrible danger of what? be a bit more specific sometimes?

maybe we are in the terrible danger of these things? - youtube.com/watch?v=Qrl5yHPkjwU

:D

Classic. It's funny because it's so true.

Nope, these:

PiS` slogan- Take action, no more wonders.

To be honest - we're not. PiS are in such a state that even if they were to pull off a shocking win (let's say 2005 repeats itself) - they'd implode within months anyway.

It's bad for Poland - we *need* credible opposition. It certainly seems to me that Kaczynski is now realising that alienating all the decent people in his party has left him with a bunch of mercenaries who have no issue with pushing their own agenda at the expense of the leader.

Gumishu - truly, I hope that PiS are finished after this election. Maybe, just maybe - we can see a genuine "Catholic-socialist" party emerge, one that cares about history and tradition, but refrains from the kind of nonsense that has characterised PiS to date. Something similar to Kaczynski's 2010 electoral campaign would go down wonders - people in Poland are sick of "fighting" talk - and instead just want some decent good old fashioned Nordic social democracy.

It always surprises me that there is no real "right wing" in Poland.