Thank you very much for explaining. By better list alliances, do you mean adding them up and expanding them to rather 3 other parties than one?

I did not realise how difficult it would be for the SVP to select a candidate for the fabled second Bundesrat seat.

Seems to be a general lack of enthusiasm, I wonder why? some ideas below - please add or select your views/ideas

• want to spend more time with the family
• too much work for little reward
• wants to have independent views but cannot face the ensuing party conflicts
• fear of failure

Wouldn't worry too much - this seems fairly standard procedure before Bundesrat elections. Noone wants to stand out too much to early as generally "powerhungry" personalities don't go down too well in Switzerland (especially since the Bundesrat is elected by the whole parliament, not just picked by the party).

They'll present someone early enough...

About " fairly standard procedure before Bundesrat elections. "

Not my impression; seems more like a disorganised shambles. 5 weeks to go and no candidate; not even a short list.
About "Noone wants to stand out too much to early as generally "powerhungry" personalities ..." Also not my impression, the SVP pick their candidates on a party basis; individuals are not allowed to put themselves forward c.f Widmer-Schlumpf.

SVP selection does not seem to be moving forward except 2 possible candidates, Peter Spuhler & Roland Eberle, have already ruled themselves out.

According to the papers Blocher has sent out 100,000+ letters to car driving voters in the Zürich area saying something like "vote for me or petrol prices will rise to 4 CHF/litre". So he is still pushing his Ständersrat candidatcy. I did not get a letter but I guess that does not mean much; anyway I voted over one week ago

While the stance of business tycoon Peter Spuhler is fairly clear, I after having seen an interview with Mr Eberle can well imagine that man jumping forward at an appropriate moment. And let's not forget Mr Giezendanner, the "man of the reserve". The SVP management does not particularily love that man who is always up for non-SVP positions and would not be a Bundesrat easily to be manipulated by the party-leadership. Or Mr Blocher tries it again

About "Or Mr Blocher tries it again" - would not surprise me; I can imagine him saying "no better candidate came forward...."

To be fair, that wasn't Mr. Blocher - nor was it approved by SVP. It was Michael Dreher - wellk known nutter from Schaffhausen and founder of the "Car-party" (Auto-Partei) as an antipode to the greens (has long since dissapeared). The real question is where did he get the addressed from apparently all the car-holders of Zurich. Official government sources have quickly denied and investigations are currently ongoing as it is a clear breach of data protection. However, turns out that his "reliable, independant source" may not have been so ful of wisdom after all as over 400 letters have apparently been sent to dead people...

Hannes Germann (who?) is SVP Bundesrat candidate, seems harmless

He's been Staenderat for Schaffhausen for quite a while now and is quite respected there. He's on of the few SVO members who can get votes outside of his own party. He's also not nearly as right wing as most of the rest of his party. He does - for example - support the move away from Nuclear Power.

About "The real question is where did he get the addresses from apparently all the car-holders of Zurich"
Another good question is where did he get the money from? If he really sent 100,000 letters then it must have cost at least a quarter of a million.

Blocher has that sort of money available but he wasn't involved.

Do you think Mr Dreher has that sort of pocket money?

He does sound harmless then & likely to do as he is told