Word: pp
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...election were to held just a few months from now, let alone a year. Then, the economic outlook might have been much worse and immigration might have become an even more divisive issue. The twin issues at the core of the campaign would clearly have benefited the PP by eroding the Socialist base of blue-collar workers afraid of their mortgage payments and foreign labor competition...
Spain's electoral campaign has never been a decorous affair, but Monday night's nationally televised electoral debate between Spanish Prime Minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero and Popular Party (PP) candidate Mariano Rajoy was often downright nasty. For long stretches, it sank into a cacophony of insults, interruptions, and petty squabbling over who was the bigger liar. Yet in the end, Zapatero offered more concrete prescriptions for the next legislature, and that, it seems, persuaded the Spanish public to deem him the victor of this second debate, just as it had after the first, held a week...
...Socialists a slim 1.5-point advantage over the Popular Party. More recently, Metroscopia's poll for the liberal newspaper El País put the Socialists' lead at 4.1%. Either way, says University of Murcia political scientist Ismael Crespo, the Socialists have to hope for a high turnout. "The PP's ranks are very loyal; 80 to 85% of those who voted for them in 2004 will vote for them this time," he says. "But traditionally, about 20% of leftists abstain - they're generally disenchanted with government and only mobilize in times of crisis...
...opposition Popular Party's strategy has been predictably simple: Blame the Socialists. "The government has provoked a crisis of confidence," says Gustavo de Arístegui, the PP's foreign affairs spokesperson and a candidate for parliamentary reelection. "Their economic policies have been very risky, very irresponsible, and Spanish families are paying the price." The PP has also linked economic woes to what it believes is widespread anxiety over Spain's burgeoning immigrant population. During Monday's debate, Rajoy blamed Zapatero for 2005's mass regularization of immigrants, arguing that they "couldn't all fit." Borrowing a page from French...
...hostility with which the parties' candidates slugged it out on Monday night may prompt some voters to turn away and throw up their hands in despair. Yet that may be just the point. As PP senior strategist Gabriel Elorriaga recently admitted in an interview with the Financial Times, his party hopes to encourage potential Socialist voters to sit this one out. "Our whole strategy is centered on making Socialist voters waver," he said. "We know they will never vote for us. But if we can sow enough doubts about the economy, about immigration and nationalist issues, then perhaps they will...