Ramelow on the high road to power NEXT weekend Germany celebrates the 25th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall. Yet a few days before that, Die Linke (The Left), the party that descends from the communists who ran the old East Germany, may take charge of one of reunified Germany’s 16 states (Thuringia) for the first time.The mainstream parties treat The Left as pariahs in the federal Bundestag. The party jeers from the backbenches and fights internal vendettas. It hates capitalism and wants to scrap NATO. In debates over Ukraine many Leftists have blamed America more than Russia’s Vladimir Putin. Their parliamentary leader, Gregor Gysi, refuses to call the East German regime an “unjust state”.In state and local governments in eastern Germany, however, The Left has become a home for many Ossis (Easterners), who tend to be apolitical and feel vaguely frustrated. They vote Left partly for reasons of “Ostalgie”. In Brandenburg The Left governs boringly as junior partner in a “red-red” coalition with the Social Democrats (SPD). But Thuringia presents a new…
