Brazil Election - 5 October 2014

[buritobr]

If we ask a monkey who will be the winner, the probability of the monkey say the right answer is 50%

[buritobr]

Sensus does not work for PSDB. Sensus works for Aécio Neves.

In 2010, this institute had pro-Dilma biased polls.

[Paleobrazilian]

Also, the PSDB is usually underpolled nationally.

[Simfan34]

Also, the PSDB is usually underpolled nationally.

One can hope.

[Niemeyerite]

Also, the PSDB is usually underpolled nationally.

That may be true for the 1st round, but not for the 2nd.

[buritobr]

Also, the PSDB is usually underpolled nationally.

That may be true for the 1st round, but not for the 2nd.

Sure. Datafolha predicted 55-45 for Dilma in the 2nd round in 2010. It was 56-44.

[Paleobrazilian]

Also, the PSDB is usually underpolled nationally.

That may be true for the 1st round, but not for the 2nd.

Sure. Datafolha predicted 55-45 for Dilma in the 2nd round in 2010. It was 56-44.

In 2002 Datafolha missed by 3 points in favor of Lula. Then again, polling a runoff should be easier and polling institutes are under huge pressure after the 1st round misses.

BTW:

1 - Datafolha will be releasing a new poll Monday. The sample is of about 4700 people and the polling will be realized entirely on Monday, as they try to capture pretty much the perfect snapshot of the moment.

2 - IBOPE has confirmed they won't be doing exit polls anymore. Never again.

[buritobr]

Exit polls are not necessary anymore. Before the electronic vote, the time needed to process the results were five days. Nowadays, it is necessary only four hours.

[Paleobrazilian]

Actually exit polls helped showing if earlier polls had some sort of bias. The problem is, exit polls missed so much this year they've become irrelevant even for this.

[Paleobrazilian]

For the 1st time in this runoff, a palatable debate. It seems as if both candidates were satisfied with their internals. My opinion: this race is just not moving from the virtual tie it was Wednesday.

[buritobr]

Aécio Neves became a social democrat in the final days of the campaign. He promised to keep the labor legislation.

His party wanted to de-regulate the labor market in the late 1990s. PSDB economists consider that the labor legislation is the cause of the high labor costs.

Well, but this views are not good to win an election...

[Paleobrazilian]

Actually, Aecio was highly successful on rallying the older, center-left side of the party embodied by FHC, José Serra, Andrea Matarazzo, Barjas Negri, etc. In fact, I believe that, if Aecio is elected, some names from this faction will have key cabinet posts (Serra is a lock). He'll also explore younger names from this faction of the party, like yet another rising star, Floriano Pesaro.

[MASHED POTATOES. VOTE!]

Actually, Aecio was highly successful on rallying the older, center-left side of the party embodied by FHC, José Serra, Andrea Matarazzo, Barjas Negri, etc. In fact, I believe that, if Aecio is elected, some names from this faction will have key cabinet posts (Serra is a lock). He'll also explore younger names from this faction of the party, like yet another rising star, Floriano Pesaro.

Well, Aecio had to move toward centre-left in order to win the election.

Btw, who's Serra's Senate substitute?

[RodPresident]

Actually, Aecio was highly successful on rallying the older, center-left side of the party embodied by FHC, José Serra, Andrea Matarazzo, Barjas Negri, etc. In fact, I believe that, if Aecio is elected, some names from this faction will have key cabinet posts (Serra is a lock). He'll also explore younger names from this faction of the party, like yet another rising star, Floriano Pesaro.

Well, Aecio had to move toward centre-left in order to win the election.

Btw, who's Serra's Senate substitute?

Serra's substitute is veteran tucano congressman José Anibal, who had some clashes with Serra before. I think that Aécio believes that is better to keep Serra close than letting him to have his own side show on Senate.
Pesaro is a São Paulo's councilman who served in FHC government and got elected to Congress with Cardoso's endorsement at TV. He can serve in a social position of cabinet.

[Paleobrazilian]

As per yet another smaller institute, MDA, Dilma is ahead by 1% - 45,5% x 44,5%. Seriously, calling the election for anyone right now is just impossible.

PS: MDA was the institute that most overestimated Dilma and most underestimated Aecio on the eve of the 1st round.

[buritobr]

Rio de Janeiro - Ibope October 19th

Governor
Pezão 56%, Crivella 44%

President
Dilma Rousseff 56%, Aécio Neves 44%

Five days ago, Dilma was leading in Rio de Janeiro by 53%-47%. The State of Rio de Janeiro has 9% of the Brazilian population. It is showing that Dilma might has gone up and Aécio has gone down in the national poll. We will see in the next few minutes.


Today, Dilma came to Rio de Janeiro in order to visit campaign events from Pezão and Crivella. Both candidates are backing Dilma. Pezão's running mate Francisco Dornelles is backing Aécio. He went to Aécio campaign event yesterday in Rio de Janeiro. It is hard to understand the local politics of this state.

[Paleobrazilian]

It's over for Aecio. Can't see him recovering from this (Datafolha).

Dilma 46% x Aecio 43% (52% x 48% on valid votes).

Dilma's campaing hit Aecio absurdly hard for the last few days. It's sad, but that's how you win elections nowadays.

[Niemeyerite]

Will Ibope be released today, too?

[Paleobrazilian]

Will Ibope be released today, too?

Only Wednesday.

[buritobr]

There were many attacks against Aécio, but it was not different to other campaigns. Usually, the incumbent has the advantage of being the most known, and so, she is not vulnerable to attacks. The incumbent is judged only for the last four years. The chalenger is judged for the whole life. In 2010, Dilma Rousseff suffered many attacks from the Serra campaign. At that time, she was the most unknown, and, that's why, more vulnerable. Serra was not an incumbent, but he was more known by the Brazilian people, because he ran for president in 2002.

I'd rather see a campaign focusing on education, health care, infra-structure and the economy than on the biography of the candidates. However, everything about Aécio Neves' life presented by the Dilma campaign belongs to his public life, and so, the people have the right to know. If he has built two airports on municipalities where his relatives have land properties, if he has employed relatives in his cabinett during his administration, if he has refused to take the test about drunk driving, the people have the right to know. This kind of information is public. Discussing these issues in the campaign is not dirty.

On the other side, some of the attacks suffered by Dilma in 2010 were dirty. It is not fair to discuss if she is religious or not because this issue belongs to her private life. Other attacks were fair. For example, when it was told that she entered the university but did not write the thesis. Concerning this information, the voters have right to know. This issue belongs to her public life.


In 2014, Dilma is facing the same scenario Obama has faced in the USA in 2012. She is using almost the same strategy Obama used. Aécio Neves is commiting almost the same mistakes Romney did. Let's see if the result will be the same.

[Paleobrazilian]

You know what you're saying is not correct. Dilma used the internet to attack Aecio for supposedly hitting his wife (a false rumor created by a sportswriter with strong ties to the PT, the rumor was denied the same night by people who were in the place). Aecio never "employed" relatives, his sister worked at Minas Gerais' solidarity fund, for free (nearly all states and all large cities in the country have a solidarity fund, and the fund is almost always headed by the first lady of the state/city). Dilma shamefully created an ad saying Aecio voted no for a minimum wage increase to 535 reais, but refused to tell voters Aecio did that because he voted for a increase to 600 reais. Dilma said Aecio mistreated women because of sharp exchanges on debates against her and Luciana Genro, indirectly trying to accuse Aecio of making her feel unwell last Thursday (one of the most ridiculous episodes of victimization I've ever seen). She implied more than once that Aecio used illegal drugs. She lied about the use of funds of Aecio's government for health (she implied Aecio took money away from health, when what he did was using health's budget money on sanitation, something also done by PT governors such as Tarso Genro). And she started endorsing absurd rumors about the end of social policies if Aecio is elected, social policies that were started (albeit shyly, I know) by FHC.

I'm not saying Aecio is an innocent boy, hell no. Of course he had baggage, all of them have. But what Dilma did was refusing to debate ideas in order to destroy her opponent by twisting the truth and at times using blatantly false information. Serra never did that in 2010. IIRC, it was Dilma who self-inflicted damage on herself by making continuous contradictory statements on abortion. Serra was actually lucky for reaching the runoff with relatively strong voting despite running an awful campaign and looking so old and tired.

Dilma ran a campaign extremely similar campaign to the one of Collor 89 (not surprising the PT and Collor were together this time out! ), and the effect will be similar, but with one point that makes things even worse than in 89. The country is now hugely and bitterly divided between North-Northeast x South-Southeast-Center West; rich and middle class x poor; white x black; center-to-right voters x center-to-left voters. No matter who loses, there will be huge dissatisfaction, specially considering how tight it'll be, and this won't die on the election night. If Aecio won I'd be more hopeful for reconciliation because he ran a very centrist campaign and with people like Marina Silva he should have success getting most of the country to support him. Dilma, meanwhile, ran increasingly to the left and adopted a hostile speech to those that don't vote her. That's a dangerous thing. If she and her party don't make a move to reconcile with those voters (and my gut feeling is that they'll try to bury those voters as dead corpses and increasingly move to the left), I think there'll be an explosive reaction against her government. The vote against the PT is highly ideological. Plus, the economic scenario is souring each passing day and Dilma refuses to signal a move to more orthodox policies, and this make investments flee, inflation rise and growth stall. Finally, the huge, dark shade of the Petrobras scandal will be looming for the next 4 years and it's just a question of time until Dilma is personally dragged down to this scandal.

All in, I'm not optimistic about the future of my country today.

[Paleobrazilian]

No surprises as Bovespa loses over 4% in 20 minutes of exchange and the BRL loses over 1% against the dollar. Yikes.

[jaichind]

My understanding was that Rousseff was able to unleash a large media attack on Silva which now it seems to have worked, perhaps too well.  This seems only possible with a large financial advantage of the Rousseff campaign.  I wonder if she can replicate this against Neves.  What is the financial resource gap between Rousseff and Neves ?

It seems I, by pure luck, did manage to pinpoint what might take place.  What is interesting is where Rousseff and PT get the money for this media barrage especially when Neves is suppose to be the candidate of business and the wealthy?  It almost verifies to some extend the Petrobras allegations against PT or at least implies there might have been a bunch if quid pro quo between PT and powerful/wealthy interests.

[politicus]

On the other side, some of the attacks suffered by Dilma in 2010 were dirty. It is not fair to discuss if she is religious or not because this issue belongs to her private life. Other attacks were fair. For example, when it was told that she entered the university but did not write the thesis. Concerning this information, the voters have right to know. This issue belongs to her public life.

The religious beliefs of a presidential candidate are not a private matter.

[MASHED POTATOES. VOTE!]

On the other side, some of the attacks suffered by Dilma in 2010 were dirty. It is not fair to discuss if she is religious or not because this issue belongs to her private life. Other attacks were fair. For example, when it was told that she entered the university but did not write the thesis. Concerning this information, the voters have right to know. This issue belongs to her public life.

The religious beliefs of a presidential candidate are not a private matter.

Should be.