Bit of a damp squib then

We've got a General Election here on 20 November. Interesting date, anniversary of Franco's death. It looks as though the socialists, the PSOE, are going to take a right pasting at the hands of the conservative PP. Everyone is so sure that it's going to happen that I wouldn't be surprised if the turnout is pathetic.

Official campaigning in Spain starts a couple of weeks before the election date with no campaigning the day before. So midnight last night was the start line. The normal routine is that there are lots of photos of the big candidates pasting up an election poster somewhere as midnight strikes. No photos like that in my paper this morning. In fact I haven't seen any posters in the streets yet although the volume of political tweets and posts to my Facebook page has rocketed in the past few hours.

No, the only time that I noticed that we are now in full campaign mode was that there were a couple of political adverts on the radio as I was getting breakfast this morning. iU, an alliance that includes the old communist party, has jumped on the bandwagon of 15M, the popular movement of people who are fed up with the whole political-financial nexus, with a slogan "Rebel" but apart from that I remember nothing about the ads I heard. It's not surprising really. The PP leader, a bloke called Mariano Rajoy, so far as I can remember, has never had an original thought in his head - he just complains about the other lot. The PSOE candidate is someone who's been around for years, I think he looks a bit seedy. He's been a key member of the Government that has watched Spain teeter on the brink of financial ruin and given the country 4,978,300 jobless.

Always good fun though, the electioneering pictures of politicians looking uncomfortable in tailored jeans or out with the kids to feed the ducks.

Rubalcaba to the left by the way (where else?) and Rajoy to the right (idem)