This week we discuss whether Margrethe Vestager's Time As European Commissioner for Competition is actually good or not. Also why have a competition commissioner exactly?

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Show NotesNo Election Left BehindAustrian ElectionFun Kurz Corner

• So there was the thing about shredding hard drives... to help fuel conspiracy theories?

https://metropole.at/schreddergate-kurz-social-media-manager-secretly-destroys-hard-drives-at-reisswolf/

"But, instead of handing them over to the Reisswolf employees, he insists on (not just erasing but) “shredding” the data carriers himself. "

"He then collects all the shredded pieces and takes them with him. He doesn’t pay the bill of €76 as Reisswolf doesn’t take cash – and disappears."

"But a few days later, on May 27, one of Reisswolf’s employees recognized the same man on television, walking behind Sebastian Kurz as the former chancellor"

https://metropole.at/schreddergate-kurz-social-media-manager-secretly-destroys-hard-drives-at-reisswolf/
https://www.france24.com/en/20190721-austria-probes-ex-leaders-staff-over-shredding-evidence

• There are 3 weirdly complimentary biographies of Kurz - quotes from which seem super weird

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/09/28/world/europe/austria-election-sebastian-kurz-freedom-party.html?emc=rss&partner=rss

https://twitter.com/hashtag/50shadesofkurz?src=hash&lang=en (cool....)

https://www.politico.eu/europe-poll-of-polls/austria/ and https://www.derstandard.at/story/2000109137596/die-waehlerstromanalyse-wie-die-stimmen-gewandert-sind

• Similar to Greece media response is celebrating the defeat of the far-right ignoring the Kurz personality cult is much further to the right than they think and ignoring the history of FPÖ and ÖVP cooperation especially in the realm of islamophobic shit (right before the election FPÖ and ÖVP passed resolutions in the National Council against "political Islam")
• Majority of voters didn’t care about Ibizagate, Kurz did benefit from it the most, attracting the most “weniger” and up voters (39% of the ÖVP vote)
• SPÖ is at their lowest result in post-WWII Austria, still the second-largest party though
• Looks like our predictions were correct; he’s gonna get a coalition with a less powerful party whether it’s the Greens, Greens and NeOs or FPÖ again.
• Only 33% of Greens membership support a coalition with the Kurz party of chanting Kurz and bashing Muslims
• Kurz has stated he’s willing to work with any and all parties (but a GroKo is likely out of the question.)
• Jetzt Pilz List is kinda insane
• The Austrian Green youth was kicked out for being too radical (which gives you an idea about how the Greens function) and joined up with KPÖ (forming KPÖ+)
• Neither of the decent left parties in Austria got into the parliament (1.1% total vote).

CIARÁN PREDICTION: Kurz will hold talks with the Greens and they’ll fail so then he can form a government with a weakened FPÖ and appear like the other parties made him do it.

https://www.derstandard.at/story/2000109168988/wer-waehlte-wie-waehlergruppen-und-ihre-motive

https://www.derstandard.at/story/2000109126022/so-haben-die-gemeinden-bei-der-nationalratswahl-abgestimmt

https://www.derstandard.at/story/2000109137596/die-waehlerstromanalyse-wie-die-stimmen-gewandert-sind

Fun FPÖ Corner

They're under investigation for funding problems still... but I guess Strache is gone...

https://www.eurotopics.net/en/227948/how-will-strache-s-departure-affect-the-fpoe?pk_campaign=rss-en&pk_kwd=2019-10-02
https://www.dw.com/en/austrian-police-raid-on-agency-prompts-outrage/a-42960940

• Also there was the raid on the intelligence services taking evidence on far-right groups:

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/07/world/europe/austria-far-right-freedom-party.html?module=inline

• Their TV ad game is... woah

https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=1&v=2kIhX3uj7WE