NY Times: At the Polls, Icelanders Punish Conservatives

[marmar]

At the Polls, Icelanders Punish Conservatives

By JOHN F. BURNS
Published: April 25, 2009


REYKJAVIK, Iceland — It is a tale of light and dark — of a small but rugged country far from anywhere that has suffered as severely as any in the developed world at the hands of buccaneering free-marketeers, but which is now slowly digging itself out from the financial wreckage.

An important milestone was reached on Saturday, when the country’s voters went to the polls to elect a new government, three months after riotous street protests over the country’s banking collapse forced the country’s conservative-led administration from office.

With about a third of the final vote counted late Saturday, it seemed that the country’s leftist caretaking government would be formally voted into power, with the Social Democrats projected to gain 22 seats and their partners, the Left-Greens, appearing to gain 13 seats in the 63-seat Parliament. The conservative Independent Party, ousted after a wave of demonstrations in January, was projected to gain just 14 seats with less than 23 percent of the vote, down considerably from its total in 2007. Final results are to be announced on Sunday.

The conservatives were one of the first governments anywhere to lose office because of the global financial crisis, and it seemed clear Saturday that voters in this country of 320,000 were imposing a further reckoning. ............(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/26/world/europe/26iceland.html?hpw

[Lorien]

1. Lets hope that both globally and here at home there's a mass awakening to

the fact that the ideas of the Right Wing are just plain bad for society, humanity and all life on earth.