Similar to here in CA, a lot of it is social pressure.  Even though the claim is that it is a society open to ideas and conversations, in reality if you have an alternative point of view, it is dealt with pretty harshly.

I know of a few people in Germany who are gun owners, and they asked me to never mention it at work or they would loose their jobs.  Pretty similar here in CA.  Of course smoking pot, a Federal crime is allowed, while smoking cigarettes or drinking a beer when you are 18 is a crime worthy of jail.

It all seems kind of crazy to someone who grew up around relatives that smoked and most of us drank modest amounts of beer since we were 6.

My grandmother had a keg on tap at all times and no one could leave the place without drinking a glass for risk of insulting her.

Except for when it's the absolute worst thing ever, which it almost always is.

> ..perhaps Germany needs a bit more of it.

¬_¬ Yeah, because who cares about 82 million deaths?

I think that this concept of "voting for a party" to be in congress and then the congress selecting the President was done in the US at one time.  It didn't work out that well, as the party bosses picked the president and the usual corruption was even worse than the current system of an electoral college.

The US is not fundamentally a 2 party system, that is just a result of crooked politics and crooked election laws that tend to push out smaller parties.

In CA it is perhaps even worse, because the election laws are written so that they take the results of the primary elections and only forward the "two top candidates in vote count" to the final election.  This resulted in eliminating not only third parties like the Greens, Libertarians, Independents, etc - but largely even eliminated the Republican party from many offices.

We get the pleasure of voting for one of two Democrats - which is pretty ridiculous no matter your political views.

I suppose the British, French, Spanish. US, Middle Eastern Countries never did anything regrettable in their history?

How many of these countries construct monuments to the evil of their past Monarchs and the millions who died from their attempts to conquer the world?

How many countries and regions of the world are messed up even today as a result of historical colonialism, and essentially rape of natural resources via slavery of the local population?

Am I personally responsible for some land developer in the 1800s bribing congressmen to confiscate native American tribal lands, to the extent that I have to go to confession every day and feel like I am a terrible person?  No way.

The reality is that nearly every country has done this at one time or another in it's past, and we all must learn to move beyond it.  

 

If you look up, you might spot what I'm saying flying way above your head.

> Am I personally responsible for...? No way.
>
> The reality is that nearly every country has...

You are not a country!

> ... we all must learn to move beyond it.

Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.

I know almost nothing about German politics, but it appears their coalitions are at least done with the major parties - not ones who had less than 1% of the vote - so have a greater chance of being somewhat representative.