It’s Monday morning. I am on the train from Carinthia to Vienna and it’s pretty full. Maybe it’s because of yesterday’s elections, maybe not, in any case the result was deeply satisfying. The right-wing, xenophobic, populist and corrupt-to-the-bone party of late Jörg Haider, the regime that has plagued Carinthia for more than 12 years, has finally been ousted after a never-ending series of scandals. Their fall is the deepest of any governing party in any part of Austria since the beginning of the Second Republic after World War II.
There is a bitter twist to the story though. The biggest scandal of the last years, a case of corruption and illegal financing of political parties, was solved entirely due to the untiring determination of the local head of the Green party, Rolf Holub, and I would have fully expected the traditionally weak Carinthian wing of the Greens to soar.
Not so. The Greens won, more than doubled their share, but they didn’t get substantially more than the new party “Team Stronach”, a synthetic party entirely bought by aging Austro-Canadian billionaire Frank Stronach, who seemingly wants to crown his career as a politician.
The moral of the story? Working hard does not pay. Being honest does not pay. Money pays.
Nevertheless, it’s been a change for the better in Carinthia, that much can already be said, simply because it couldn’t have got worse.
The Song of the Day is “Deep Within The Corners Of My Mind” from Melody Gardot’s 2009 album “My One And Only Thrill”. I’ve already used the song for a different but in a way similar image twelve hundred posts ago. Hear the song on YouTube.