Deutschland hat gewählt...

...ja, ja, und wie. Ich weiß schon. Henry Olsen's coverage is already linked and pinned up there somewhere. Vrouwe and I are sitting here watching the coverage from Die Welt online TV. The results, comparing Die Welt with Das Erste (ARD), currently read:

CDU/CSU: 28.4% (28.9% according to ARD)

AfD: 20.1% (19.9.% according to ARD)

SPD: 16.3% (16.2% ARD)

Grüne: 12.4% (13% ARD)

Die Linke: 8.8% (8.5% ARD)

FDP: 5.0% (4.9% ARD)

BSW: 5.0% (4.8%)

The FDP may be out of the government and the BSW (Bündnis Sarah Wagenknecht- leftwingers who were dissatisfied with die Linke) may not get into the Parliament. More later.

UPDATE:

Na, also: The FDP is out, unless something remarkable happens in the next couple of hours. Christian Lindner's political career is likely over. Olaf Scholz's career may be as well. There is already talk of replacing him as SPD chief with Defense Minister Boris Pistorius.

The next chancellor is officially Friedrich Merz. Trump posted on Truth Social to congratulate him already. The problem? His CDU/CSU has the second-worst results in the history of the Federal Republic. Their only possible coalition is a "Kenia" coalition (SPD/Red, Green, CDU/Black) with both the SPD (which got its worst results in the party's history) and the Greens. Commentators are calling this a "toxic" coalition because of the amount of bad blood between the CDU/CSU and the Greens. CSU head and Governor of Bavaria, Dr. Markus Söder, has said that he does not favor a coalition with "these Greens," meaning the current leadership from Robert Haebeck (Minister for Economics and the Environment) and Annalena Baerbock (Foreign Minister). The Greens, for their part, have stated vehemently and repeatedly that they don't want to build a coalition with the CDU because they secured legislation with votes from the AfD earlier this month.

And what about the AfD? They are the second largest party in the country now, and no one wants to form a coalition with them. The problem there is that sooner or later, if the trend continues, it will be impossible to form a government without the AfD. In Thuringia and Saxony it almost is so already, at the state level. Party head Dr. Alice Weidel was quite pleased with her party's results this evening. They nearly doubled their results from the national elections four years ago. Interestingly, polls show that a paper-thin 51% majority would favor a coalition including the AfD if that is what is needed to get a coaltion.

The biggest surprises to me were the underperformance of the CDU/CSU and the success of Die Linken. That the BSW may yet make it into the Bundestag is not a huge surprise, but not a good development, either. I quite expected the AfD to do well. What happens next? We see if the Greens and the CDU can work together.