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In an era of political upstarts, Germanys biggest election drama features a more traditional player: Christian Lindner, a young career politician based in Dsseldorf familiar with the national stage, is attempting to return his Free Democratic Party (FDP) to its customary role of kingmaker in German politics. If he succeeds, it could be a game changer for Germanys next government and provide a pathway out of the current comfortable but suffocating grand coalition between the conservative Christian Democrats (CDU) and the Social Democrats (SPD). Over the last several years in which the two major parties have been aligned, they have diluted their identities to meet in the middle. Although stable, the grand coalition has failed to inspire.

Lindners chances of achieving that goal will become clearer after Sundays state election in North Rhine-Westphalia, in which the FDP is expected to win well over ten percent of the vote. Combined with its strong showing in the Schleswig-Holstein state elections, the party should make its way back into the federal parliament and could join forces with Chancellor Angela Merkels CDU and, if needed, the Greens, to form a government.

Historically, the FDP, which adheres to economic and social liberalism, has been a pivotal player in Germany politics. It has worked as a junior partner to form governments with the CDU or the center-left SPD. Hans-Dietrich Genscher, the statesman who navigated German reunification in 1989, unfortunately saw his beloved FDP diminish in stature in the last few years of his life. The first sign came when the Greens usurped the FDP to establish a government with the SPD in 1998. The downfall was complete in 2013, when the party couldnt muster the five percent threshold to enter parliament, a crushing blow for a party that had been active in German politics for over six decades.

Today the German political landscape is highly fragmented. A record five parties (the Greens, the Alternative for Germany, the Christian Social Union, the Left, and

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The Return of Germany's Liberals - Foreign Affairs (subscription)

A Theresa May election victory would be a disaster for Britain. Photograph: Stefan Rousseau/PA

The election of Emmanuel Macron was met with relief by liberals and progressives across Britain. Not that they were necessarily in love with all the ex-bankers policies, but it meant that at least France, and Europe, was saved from a hard rightwinger whose election would have sowed division and inflamed tensions.

Given such a stark choice, the idea that some on the French left could have abstained or spoiled their ballot papers was, on this side of the channel, met with some bafflement.

So why do so many of these same liberal or progressive voters not use the same logic when considering their own vote in the forthcoming UK election?

With every passing day its clear we are facing a huge choice on 8 June. Theresa May has channelled her inner Dalek for the past three weeks; strong and stable; strengthen my hand; coalition of chaos. Shes maxed-out on the idea that this election is all about competence, and has virtually nothing to say on how shed actually run the country, or deal with the contradictions brought about by Brexit: access to the single market, the damage to the economy, the Irish border.

In these past few days, though, weve been starting to learn what shed do. Its a powerful reminder why a May election victory would be a disaster for Britain, even if she is obviously not as extreme as Marine Le Pen. She wants to reduce immigration to the tens of thousands, even though this would mean cutting off the supply of labour that has helped Britain recover from years of austerity. Where would the nurses, care workers, builders and high-skilled employees come from or the overseas students who bring in so much revenue?

Amid all the crises Britain will face over the next few years, May thinks its time to promise a vote on foxhunting. She wants more grammar schools even though its clear to anyone who considers the evidence that this does nothing for social mobility. The only liberal policy May has on energy pricing is one she nicked from Labour and was trashing only two years ago.

The prime minister says only she can get a good deal from Europe, but shes been making enemies across the Channel. Her scurrilous accusation that the EU is interfering in a British election will win her no friends, and no concessions, in Brussels. She may talk tough, and think it plays well in the UK to be a bloody difficult woman, but in Europe, where it really counts, she has set back Britains cause and could end up with no deal at all.

So why are so many progressives so keen to help her by instead of focusing on all the negatives of a future May government, directing their anger at Jeremy Corbyn?

Yes, hes flawed too; hes not a great performer, and so far the signs of him rescuing the party are patchy, to say the least. But on 8 June we have a simple choice. Itll be either Labour or Conservative. And in terms of policy theres only one of these two parties that any liberal or progressive could want running the country. The party of the rich, of the bankers, of austerity for the many and tax breaks for the few? Really? The party that leaves the NHS on its knees, cuts back on schools and access to universities, bashes the working poor and people with disabilities, demonises the jobless, and fuels fears about migrants?

And all of this in lockstep with its cheerleaders at the Daily Mail, which sees the party as a partner for its vile agenda of scapegoating minorities and taking Britain back to the 1950s.

Forget Corbyns personality and his problems of cut-through. What is it about his policy proposals that progressives can dislike especially now we have the leaked manifesto, with its pledges on rail nationalisation, workers rights and education? Many might prefer a Labour pledge to stay in Europe, but that would be electoral suicide given last years referendum result and where the partys working-class base is right now.

The Liberal Democrats would reverse Brexit which I would love too but a vote for this party, which made no progress in last weeks local elections, would in effect be wasted. The party will have a maximum of 40 MPs after the election (and even that seems unlikely) and will in no way be able to keep a Conservative prime minister in check.

On tax, Labour will not touch the 95% of the workforce earning below 80,000. But by taking money from those high earners, and corporations too, it will give a cash injection to schools and the NHS. It will also build a million new homes, introduce a real living wage, and protect pensioners (most of whom are living on the breadline rather than living in mansions, as the popular stereotype would have you believe). I could go on.

The next four weeks will determine who runs the country for the next five years. We all know its very likely to be Theresa May, but theres still a lot to play for no one can tell how big her majority might be. If its under 40 then an opposition can hold her to account and put pressure to get the worst aspects of her agenda off the statute books.

But if progressives sit on their hands, and spend the next month whingeing about why they want another Labour leader, May could end up with a landslide and her nasty, divisive politics will be embedded into our way of life. No, shes not Le Pen, but five years is a very long time; imagine spending that period having to listen to endless stories of public services being slashed, of the growing numbers on low wages and zero-hours work, of Britains isolation from our closest neighbours, seeing more of May cosying up to Donald Trump (that state visit is still planned for the autumn).

It boils down to what kind of future you want to see for your country. If you think itll be a tough choice on 8 June then just think of France. Really, in truth, its all very simple.

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Why Corbyn-bashing liberals must vote Labour on 8 June - The Guardian

Liberal groups reacted with anger to President Trump's choice of Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach to be a member of a presidential advisory commission on election integrity.

Kobach has been the leading advocate in the conservative movement for tougher laws to combat voter faud, including voter ID laws. He has reportedly been the source of Trump's claim that there was widespread fraud in the 2016 election, an assertion that the administration has not been able to prove.

Kobach has not officially been nominated to the commission by the White House, but Kobach's office tweeted Thursday that he would be co-chairman of the commission. Vice President Mike Pence will be the chairman. The executive order creating the commission was signed Thursday.

"We need to #StopVoterFraud and ensure the integrity of our election system," Kobach tweeted Thursday.

Kobach has used his Kansas office to make the case that fraud does occur but is usually overlooked by a legal system that doesn't police it properly. His office was given invetigatory powers by his state and has convicted nine people of voter fraud, including one non-citizen.

Civil rights groups have long contended that that there is no proof that widespread fraud occurs and that voter ID laws serve only to discourage minorities from voting. "We are deeply troubled by the inclusion of Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach as vice-chair of the commission. His discriminatory and regressive views on voting rights are well known and render him too biased to neutrally assess voting issues. While the commission may include Democrats and Republicans, it completely lacks the bipartisan credibility of past commissions," said the Leadership Council on Civil Rights, a coalition group.

The National Council of La Raza echoed the sentiment. "Today's appointment of Kris Kobach to head the Presidential Commission on Election Integrity is the equivalent of the fox guarding the hen house. Kobach has a long and undistinguished record of disenfranchising eligible voters, particularly minorities, in the name of preventing voter fraud, which every available research shows is virtually nonexistent."

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Liberals angered by Trump pick of Kobach for election commission - Washington Examiner

The Liberal government is reshaping the bench, appointing a substantial majority of women, even though they make up a minority of applicants. The approach is winning praise from some in the legal community, while sparking concern about quotas from others.

A year and a half after taking office, the government has appointed 56 judges, of whom 33 are women 59 per cent. Yet women make up only 42 per cent of the 795 people who have applied to be judges since the Liberals put in place a new appointment process in October.

Making federal institutions more reflective of Canadian diversity has been a theme of the Liberal government. Its cabinet has an equal number of men and women, and it announced a plan last week to ensure more women and minorities are named to federally funded research chair positions at universities.

Justice Minister Jody Wilson-Raybould says a more diverse bench will build the publics confidence in the judiciary. We are beginning to demonstrate how it is possible to have a bench that truly reflects the country we live in, she said in an e-mail to The Globe and Mail.

But some in the legal community question the governments commitment to the merit principle in appointing judges to federally appointed courts, which includes the superior courts of provinces, the Federal Court and Tax Court.

Im not really in favour of a quota system those are alarming discrepancies, Brenda Noble, a veteran family lawyer in Saint John, said in an interview, referring to the gap between female appointees and applicants. You want to have the best people in the job.

Ian Holloway, the University of Calgarys law dean, said it is hard to fault the government for increasing the proportion of women judges. Even so, he said he worries the government is putting too much emphasis on gender.

In the old days, it was offensive that people got judgeships just because they were Liberals or Tories. That helped breed contempt for the judiciary. What we dont want to do is replicate that in a different form.

But others say the government is doing the right thing.

Brenda Hildebrandt, a Saskatoon lawyer and governing member of the Saskatchewan Law Society, was pleased. Do I think its a good thing women are more represented on the bench? Yes, I do, and I would hope that those are qualified candidates and that the fact that theyre women is just one consideration, albeit important.

Rosemary Cairns Way, a University of Ottawa law professor who has studied diversity on federally appointed courts, supports the governments move as a way of achieving gender parity. When there is no shortage of meritorious candidates, it seems to me the government can legitimately choose judges who, in addition to being independently qualified, will fulfill other institutional goals such as a more diverse and gender-balanced bench.

When the Liberals took office, 35 per cent of the federal judiciary (full-time and semi-retired) were women, according to the Office of the Commissioner for Federal Judicial Affairs. Given a similar time frame to the Conservatives a decade in office the Liberals would ultimately put women in the majority among the full-time federal judiciary if they maintain the current ratio of appointments. The previous government appointed more than 600 full-time federal judges, 30 per cent of them women; women also made up 30 per cent of applicants during the Conservatives years in office.

The governments emphasis on creating a bench more reflective of Canadas diversity does not extend quite as much to racial minorities as it does to women. However, there are at least seven visible minorities among the new appointees two of Indigenous ancestry, three of South Asian background, one Japanese-Canadian and one Chinese-Canadian.

The Liberals have authorized the judicial-affairs commissioner to collect, for the first time, data on race, Indigenous status, gender identity, sexual orientation and physical disability of applicants and appointees. But the office would not release those numbers to The Globe and Mail for this story, saying it is still preparing the data and it intends to publish them soon.

The Globe asked Ms. Wilson-Raybould whether she has a numerical target for the appointment of women to the federal judiciary. She replied that the government appoints judges based on merit and the needs of the court. In assessing merit, I do not discriminate against applicants based on their gender, ethnic or cultural background, she said in an e-mail.

She acknowledged that the pace of racial-minority appointments is lagging and suggested the problem is a lack of minorities in the legal profession.

We know that more needs to be done to increase the number of visible minorities in our law schools. As that happens, the face of the profession will change and evolve to better reflect the rest of the population.

Rob Nicholson, a former Conservative justice minister, and the partys current justice critic, said his chief concern is that qualified people be appointed. If its 55-per-cent women and 45-per-cent men, as long as we get qualified people for this, he said.

Follow Sean Fine on Twitter: @seanfineglobe

Link:
Liberals reshape judicial bench with appointments of women - The Globe and Mail

After President Donald Trump abruptly fired FBI Director James Comey on Tuesday, Democratic leaders and media members pounced on the opportunity to condemnTrump for what they called a Nixonian move, some even calling for his impeachment.

However,not too long before that, the same lawmakerscriticizing Trump for a supposed abuse of power were calling for Comeys firing themselves, declaring that Comey was unfit to lead the federal bureau. The Daily Callercompiled media clips of the most blatant flip-flops, which include comments made by SenateMinority Leader Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) and Rep. Jarrold Nadler(D- N.Y.), CNN political analyst David Gregory, and Rep. Maxine Waters(D-Calif.).

The president ought to fire Comey immediately, and he ought to initiate an investigation, Nadler said in November as he urged former President Barack Obama to removeComey for his handling of failed Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clintons email investigation, which Nadler said very well may have cost her the presidential election.

Today, Nadler takes a much different position.

It is clear that the motive, that this firing was to stop an investigation that the president feared. History will conclude that this is the equivalent or worse than the Saturday Night Massacre by President [Richard] Nixon, Nadler declared earlier this week.

Waters made similar contradicting comments, saying after the election that Comey had lost credibility, yet criticizing Trump for making the move to fire him. When asked if she thought Clinton should have fired Comey, had she won, Waters had a perplexing answer.

If she had won the White House, I believe that given what he did to her and what he tried to do she should have fired him, yes, Waters responded.

Trumps firing of Comey raised questions for some Democratic lawmakers who said Trump should not be allowed to fireComey while the FBIwas investigating the Trump campaigns alleged ties toRussia.

Trump reiterated Thursday that he was not under investigation. However,acting FBI Director Andrew McCabe said Thursday during a Senate Intelligence Committee hearing on Capitol Hill that a highly significant investigation of alleged Russia involvement in the 2016 elections was underway and would continue.

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Watch: Video hilariously shows liberals flip-flopping over whether Comey should be fired - TheBlaze.com