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26 Sep, 5 tweets, 2 min read
First exit poll out as voting ends in #GermanElection2021, from Infratest-Dimap

⬛️CDU/CSU: 25%
🟥SPD: 25%
🟩Greens: 15%
🟦FDP: 11%
🟫AFD: 11%
🟪Linke: 5%

If these are accurate, it's disappointing for centre-left and encouraging for centre-right. But it's only an exit poll.
This is effectively too close to call, and leaves open the crucial question of who will come first and have the 1st mandate to try to form a government.

It's going to be a long night.
Not just a long night, but potentially a long several months.

This exit poll suggests that the result will be even more unclear than people expected. A tie or near-tie gives no clear mandate for government formation.

Means #Merkel may remain chancellor as caretaker till 2022.
More encouraging news for the centre-left from the ZDF exit poll:

🟥SPD: 26%
⬛️ CDU/CSU: 24%
🟩 Greens: 15%
🟨 FDP: 12%
🟦 AFD: 10%
🟪 Linke: 5%

Very much too close to call
Crucial question now is: which exit poll will be closer to the final count, Infratest or ZDF?

ZDF gives possibility for red-red-green coalition, Infratest doesn't.

Centre-left will be hoping ZDF is right. Centre-right will be hoping Infratest is right.

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Dave Keating Profile picture
27 Sep
Looks like Laschet's CSU rival Markus Söder was waiting to see if CDU/CDU could overtake or tie SPD before taking the knives out.

Now that it's clear SPD 'won', he says the Union has no compelling claim to government formation.
zeit.de/amp/news/2021-…
I think it's becoming clear that if we end up with another grand coalition (🟥⬛️) or jamaica coalition (⬛️🟨🟩) it will only be because the logical coalition of the election result, the traffic light (🟥🟨🟩) talks somehow failed.

Which is still a very real possibility.
Scholz agrees with Söder.

“CDU and CSU have not only lost a considerable amount of votes, but they also received the message from citizens that they should no longer be in government but should go into the opposition,” the SPD leader said at a press conference earlier.
Read 4 tweets
Dave Keating Profile picture
22 Sep
Another important line from the joint statement.

This is a tacit go-ahead from the US for EU defence cooperation *but* one that is "complimentary to #NATO".

NATO Sec Gen Jens Stoltenberg, who sees EU defence as a threat to NATO, won't be happy I think.
In the end, we won't know whether EU defence serves as something complimentary to #NATO or something that makes #NATO irrelevant until it exists.

So statements of intent now not to make NATO irrelevant can't be anything other than aspirational. Hence Stoltenberg's opposition.
This was a fairly significant concession by Biden on the language used about EU defence outside the context of #NATO.

I suspect US military circles won't be happy about it. Certainly the NATO bubble won't.

Big question is: will Europeans actually do it?
Read 4 tweets
Dave Keating Profile picture
8 Sep
Since I’m obsessed with invisible borders, I’m taking advantage of the brief spell of nice weather to cycle 🇧🇪 ➡️🇳🇱➡️🇧🇪➡️🇳🇱➡️🇧🇪➡️🇳🇱➡️🇧🇪 today.
Putte is a town divided between a Dutch portion and a Belgian portion.

The buildings on the right are in 🇧🇪, on the left 🇳🇱. The subtle flags at this intersection is the only sign of this though.
When Kasteel Ravenhof was built, it was in the center of the United Kingdom of the Netherlands.

Then after Belgian independence in 1830, the castle’s lands stayed in 🇳🇱 while the castle went to 🇧🇪. Today it sits directly on the border. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Ki…
Read 4 tweets
Dave Keating Profile picture
6 Sep
It begins.

Following the EU decision to ban unvaccinated Americans from entry, the big question was whether countries would put quarantine requirements for the vaccinated that make non-essential travel impractical.

🇳🇱 is imposing a 5 to 10 day quarantine eu.usatoday.com/story/travel/n…
It is really a shame that the Biden administration has been unwilling to come to an agreement with the Europeans on travel that could have established some clear reciprocal policies.

This is going to be a mess.
Americans thinking about getting around the Dutch restrictions by flying to another EU country and then flying to NL, think again.

If on the Dutch passenger locator form for your connecting flight you say you’ve been in US the past 14 days - quarantine required.
Read 5 tweets
Dave Keating Profile picture
3 Sep
Breaking: #AstraZeneca has settled the lawsuit launched against it by the EU.

The company has committed to deliver 60 million doses by the end of Q3, 75m by end Q4 and 65m by end Q1 2022.
reuters.com/world/europe/a…
The delivery isn't particularly relevant any more given EU is now amply supplied by other vaccine providers and EU countries aren't very enthusiastic about AZ.

The importance of this lawsuit was to demonstrate that a company must meet its commitments in contracts with the EU.
But EU health commissioner @SKyriakidesEU notes "there are significant differences in vaccination rates between our member states, and the continued availability of vaccines, including AstraZeneca's, remain crucial."

Eastern Europe still has a lot of vaccinating to do.
Read 4 tweets
Dave Keating Profile picture
13 Aug
Ahead of the expected onslaught against ‘EU English’ starting 1 January with the French presidency, I’d like to make a suggestion:

Continental European countries should stop teaching English as a ‘foreign’ language.

Hear me out (🧵1/8) languagemagazine.com/2021/06/09/fre…
Right now foreign languages are taught tied in with a country’s culture

So when I learned French in high school, textbook examples were all ‘Jean-François is buying a baguette in Paris’

When Europeans learn English it’s all ‘John Smith is preparing a cup of tea in London’ (2/8)
But why not teach English as something that isn’t ‘foreign’?

Why not teach it as a communication tool used to speak to people from the other countries in 🇪🇺 and beyond?

Dare I say it, why not teach it as a ‘federal’ communications tool? (3/8)
Read 8 tweets

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