Portside

Twenty-five years after the fall of the Berlin Wall, the influence of the former German Democratic Republic is more than the united Germany wants to admit. In social policy areas such as health care, women in the workplace, education, youth football and recycling, the country has looked to the East.

For the very first time, the Left Party may lead a coalition -- by the narrowest of margins -- with the Social Democrats and Greens that governs a German state. But forming that coalition would require difficult compromise and reversals on the part of all the coalition partners.

Did East Germany fall because it was totally foul? Was it given an outside push or two? And did that downfall represent simply the glorious revolution of a folk yearning for freedom - or is the matter more complicated? This is still very relevant, for many similar uprisings have since occurred - and are still occurring.

In Germany heads fall - Lenin's head still needs to be kept buried, and Berlin's once-popular gay mayor bows out. Another head featured in the press belongs to a man who is certainly not gay nor a Lenin. Sadly, current references to Vladimir Putin, evoke all too sharply recollections of German language used against every Russian leader since the start of World War I a hundred years ago.

Might Thuringia, the land of Weimar and Jena and long the home of Goethe and Schiller, become the very first Left-led state in all Germany? This is a possibility; five years ago the Social Democrats rejected just such a solution - but later came to regret it.

Unemployment is growing throughout Europe. Sad to tell, rather than blame this on an economic model that puts profits before people, too many of Europe's "white" working class curse immigrants, people of color and others who are "different".

Unemployment is growing throughout Europe. Sad to tell, rather than blame this on an economic model that puts profits before people, too many of Europe's "white" working class curse immigrants, people of color and others who are "different".

In June Europe had to digest results of the European Parliament elections-and choke down some pretty nasty clumps. Far-right groups took alarming leads in France and Britain, came in stronger than ever in Austria, Denmark, Belgium, always building on hatred against immigrants, mostly Muslim immigrants. In Greece and Hungary outright pro-Nazi parties shot upward in votes and influence. Left-wing parties registered big gains in Portugal, Spain and Greece and in Germany ...

Bernd Riexinger, co-chair of Germany's Left Party, talks about socialist strategy in the twenty-first century.

Just watching staid Angela Merkel and stout Sigmar Gabriel trying to straddle the crevice - figuratively speaking - was quite a sight, no easy matter for the chancellor or the vice-chancellor, who is also head of the Social Democratic Party (SPD).