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The party chairmen Annalena Baerbock and Robert Habeck are in a good mood.
Photo: Kay Nietfeld / dpa
Most of the time it is convenient to be able to choose the criteria by which to evaluate your own position.
Especially on an election night.
For the Greens, this means that if you look above all at the difference to the elections five years ago, it was an excellent day.
“This is a great start to the super election year!” Tweeted Federal Managing Director Michael Kellner shortly after 6 p.m.
Party leader Robert Habeck also spoke word for word about a “great start to the super election year”.
The Greens in Baden-Württemberg can look forward to a similar result as five years ago - more than 30 percent.
And about gains - around three percentage points - in Rhineland-Palatinate.
You are the winners of the election night, one way or the other.
Then the CDU also lost, all the better from the Greens' point of view.
"A black day for the blacks," said Jürgen Trittin happily.
But it's a little more complicated, of course, because the Greens are looking to the federal election and their goals there will not be achievable with smaller increases.
In the last general election, the party won 8.9 percent.
Now the Greens want to go to the Chancellery.
It is therefore a bit like climate protection, the topic that has given the Greens significantly new meaning since 2019: A little improvement is not enough, it has to be a transformation.
That is why it is not enough to look at the growth on this election Sunday.
The brisk claim to the Chancellery is in the world
In the election in Baden-Württemberg, the Greens always wanted to see whether they could keep the state.
Whether they will remain the strongest party.
Whether Winfried Kretschmann can continue to rule.
The Greens live a lot from the expectation of their success in the future.
Before the Corona crisis, they achieved poll numbers nationwide and thus a status that is neither covered by the size of the party nor the roots in the countries nor the loyal core electorate.
That is why it was so clever that Robert Habeck in particular was so aggressively claiming first place in the federal election last summer.
In the meantime, the statements have become a little more humble, but the bold thesis that the Greens can beat the Union is in the world.
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At regular intervals, the Greens, who have been doing very well in polls before elections in order to end up with the votes of their core electorate, apparently need a little megalomania.
They depend on Winfried Kretschmann not being regarded as an exception like the left-wing Prime Minister Bodo Ramelow in Thuringia, but rather as an example for the federal government.
It goes without saying that they are treated as the second force after the Union, at best even as the strongest possible force, as the Chancellor's party.
Anyone who has something to say is heard.
Who is visible is seen.
Whoever has is given.
Kretschmann is the best proof: ten years ago he got around 24 percent, significantly less than the CDU candidate, insignificantly more than the SPD.
But it was enough to be the first Green man to move into the State Chancellery.
To become the strongest force five years later.
To extend the lead once again.
Kretschmann's renewed victory this Sunday is therefore the necessary condition for the Bundestag election to be a success for the Greens, measured against the new standards, against their own ambitious goals.
If things had turned out differently in Baden-Württemberg, it would have been catastrophic for the party.
The Greens have already lost Stuttgart City Hall, they had to hold the State Chancellery.
Otherwise everything would have been wrong: the Greens would have gone from a party that is growing to one that is shrinking.
From a climber to a climber.
Failed in the highest government office in the state.
All of that has been averted.
Even more, the CDU can be beaten, the Greens are now formulating it in a mantra-like manner.
“The results of both state elections show that the Conservatives can be beaten.
A lot is still possible this year! «Tweeted Jamila Schäfer, member of the national board.
The sunflowers don't grow into the sky
The weakness of the CDU, after its one-year, remarkably stable corona high, is the second important result of the day for the Greens' projection plans.
However, the fact that the Greens do not seem to benefit excessively from this could also worry them a few.
Rhineland-Palatinate also shows that sunflowers do not automatically grow into the sky.
The Greens have grown significantly there and, unsurprisingly, they sell it as a success.
"In Rhineland-Palatinate we were able to significantly double our votes," said party leader Annalena Baerbock.
In fact, the Greens are much stronger than in the last election, at that time they only got 5.3 percent.
What the Greens understandably do not say: They are only about half as strong as in surveys a year and a half ago.
And about as strong as in the polls before the last election.
Back then, the bad result was quite a disappointment.
Judging by this disappointment, the result is now really satisfactory.
The result in Rhineland-Palatinate is a good result for the small opposition party, which the Greens no longer want to be seen as.
It reminds you that the survey high can be over quickly, even through no fault of your own.
Because it's always about projection: It is still unclear which coalition will govern Baden-Württemberg in the future.
Green-black would have a majority.
The traffic light from the Greens, SPD and FDP but also - that would remind everyone: Greens in the Chancellery, that is conceivable.
On the other hand, the Greens have already announced that they want to negotiate with everyone.
"Far-sightedness and pragmatism, that is what the Greens are supposed to do," said Robert Habeck.
So it can also mean that you continue to govern very pragmatically.
According to an ARD survey, your voters would also find it good.
But maybe even green-red is enough, then the decision should be easy.
In terms of content, it is difficult to draw conclusions for the Bundestag election campaign: the effects of the corona management, which is likely to shape the Bundestag election, can hardly be better assessed than before, based on the two results.
The union could have cost dissatisfaction with the federal government votes.
On the other hand, the Prime Minister won, i.e. those who are largely responsible for the increasingly erratic and disastrous pandemic policy.
Did the CDU candidate in Baden-Württemberg, the Minister of Education Susanne Eisenmann, harm her urge to open schools?
Would Kretschmann's result have been better, would he have contradicted her even more decisively?
Is there a longing for an opposition that is more cautious?
It is hard to say what that means for the federal election in six months.
Whether Kretschmann's hyperpragmatic ecology course of the past decade is also a model in the federal government, or whether more radicalism is needed to convince voters, not much more is known after these state elections.
The fact that key players in the so-called climate list in Baden-Württemberg withdrew shortly before the election, that parts of the climate protection movement are driving the Greens but would rather not harm them in the end, can give the party a little hope for the federal election.
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