About Nick Barlow

Nick is on hiatus from AFOE. A Brit who lives in Colchester. Member of the Liberal Democrats. More here. Writes What You Can Get Away With, also contributes to The Sharpener.

How Spain voted

Both Chris Brooke and Matthew Turner have raised the suggestion that the Socialist victory in Spain may not have been caused by an actual swing in the electorate from the Popular Party (PP) to the Socialists (PSOE) after Thursday, but rather by the attacks in Madrid inspiring more people to go out and vote. With the majority of these new voters trending towards the left and the PSOE, the argument goes, this meant that they can attribute their victory to these new voters, rather than voters who switched from the PP to the PSOE.

Curious about whether or not this is true, I took a look at the actual election results and there is evidence there to support this view. However, any conclusions from this evidence are necessarily tentative and speculative, as the evidence could be interpreted many ways.
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Great minds etc

Steve Bell’s If… cartoon in the Guardian today (and presumably for the rest of the week) is a little tale called For A Fistful Of Euros. However, it’s about the arguments over policy towards the Euro between Tony Blair and Gordon Brown, rather than an expose of us.

While the Guardian does make Bell’s editorial cartoons available over the web, If… doesn’t seem to be available. If anyone does know where it may be available online, then please let us know!