No fresh elections in Austria

Austria's social democrats (the SPÖ) have suffered a major defeat in the state parliament elections in Lower Austria. Michael Völker writes that this decreases the likelihood of early elections at a national level because the SPÖ would be bound to lose votes: "And what theme did they want to use to fight their election campaign? That the Gusenbauer [SPÖ] government has failed, even though others are being blamed for this? ... The ÖVP [the conservative Austrian People's Party] likewise lacks a theme with which to fight a campaign. ... Even the media would like to be able to focus on content, but instead it's faced with politicians who are escalating the crisis on a daily basis without knowing what it will lead to, and then propose new elections. This is no media fabrication. The speculation about early elections is being greeted with such enthusiasm because it's difficult to imagine how this coalition can go on."

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