Brazil Election - 5 October 2014

[Zanas]

Kardecist?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spiritism

3% of the Brazilian population is spiritualist (or Kardecist)

That's pretty crazy.

Why is it crazier than believing there is a God ?

[Zanas]

According to internals Marina has now left Aecio Neves behind and in some polls is already statistically tied to President Rousseff.

Tactical voting will end up dooming Neves, probably. And in a runoff, Marina would be the favorite today. Who'd have thought?

Does that make her a murder suspect at all ?

I always thought François Hollande got away too easily for planting Diallo in DSK's room...

[Zanas]

Why are Brazilians apparently so keen on naming people by their first name only ? Lack of variety in family names ? But surely Rousseff is remarkable enough to stand out ? Is it Iceland in disguise ?

And since Silva's candidacy following Campos' death, several of you have predicted the end of her fad : are you sure it will end, and when would you estimate it will ?

[Zanas]

Adding further explanation for the question...

Brazilians like to refer to people using only one name. It makes our conversation easier. Journalists like it too, because writing only one name is better to use the space in the newspaper.
People can be called by the first name, by the last name, by a nickname or by an acronym. The decision of which name to use is spontaneous.

Presidents called by their first name: Getúlio Vargas is Getúlio, Jânio Quadros is Jânio, Tancredo Neves is Tancredo, Itamar Franco is Itamar and Dilma Roussef is Dilma

Presidents called by their last name: All generals of the military dictatorship - Humberto Castelo Branco is Castelo Branco, Artur da Costa e Silva is Costa e Silva, Emílio Gastarrazu Médici is Médici, Ernesto Geisel is Geisel and João Batista Figueiredo is Figueiredo. Two presidents after the redemocratization were called by their last names. José Sarney is Sarney. Fernando Collor de Melo is Collor.

Presidents called by nicknames: João Goulart is Jango, Luís Inácio da Silva is Lula

Presidents called by acronym: Juscelino Kubitschek is JK, Fernando Henrique Cardoso is FHC


Among the candidates in 2014, Dilma Roussef is Dilma, Marina Silva is Marina, Aécio Neves is Aécio and we don't know if Eduardo Campos would be Eduardo or Campos


Among the most important Brazilian politicians nowadays, the candidate for senator from the state of São Paulo José Serra is Serra, the governor of São Paulo Geraldo Alckmin is Alckmin, the mayor of São Paulo Fernando Haddad is Haddad, the mayor of Rio de Janeiro Eduardo Paes is Paes and the former governor of the state of Rio de Janeiro Sérgio Cabral is Cabral. So, all of them are called by their last names. On the other side, former governor of Rio de Janeiro and candidate in this election Anthony Garotinho is known as his nickname Garotinho. The governor of Rio de Janeiro and candidate to reelection Luiz Fernando de Souza is known by his nickname Pezão (Big Foot in Portuguese).
Senator Eduardo Suplicy is Suplicy. His former wife, former mayor of São Paulo and Minister of Culture Marta Suplicy is Marta.

Usually, when the first name is too ordinary, like José or Fernando, the politician is called by the last name. When the last name is too ordinary, like Silva, the politician is called by the first name.

Thank you very much for your input (and the others too), but that leave me with other questions (I hope I'm not hijacking the thread too much, it also helps me following this election better).

It seems to me from what you state that women are quite more likely to be referred to by their first names than men, in general, or is it just the examples you took ? I wouldn't be surprised if it were the case, it would be a classic case of patriarchal phallocratic paternalism. We also get it : one of the few recent French politicians referred to by their first name is Ségolène Royal.

Also, the thing about nicknames seems to go far, and even so far as to stick to Presidents even when elected. This is completely and utterly unimaginable in France and most of the dull European world I'm familiar with. Once again, where does it stem from ? Slaves that only got a nickname as an identity ?

To tie up loose ends, it seems from the latest poll you just posted that Campos is a goner, and Dilma can begin to seriously worry...

[Zanas]

Could the OP include this election's date in the thread's title, as is standard procedure around here nowadays ? Thx.

[Zanas]

Is it me or PT candidates seem to overperform their polling scores ?

[Zanas]

What's the threshold to make it into the runoff ?

[Zanas]

What's the threshold to make it into the runoff ?

The leader can't get more than 50%.

You mean that if no one gets to 50%, every one can run in the runoff ? It's not just the two leading candidates of first round, or anyone with more than 10% ?

[Zanas]

A near 6% of invalid votes and 4% of blank votes add up to just less than 10% spoiled ballots : a whole hell of a lot ! Is it always similar in brazilian elections ? Why is that ?

[Zanas]

I tend to forget that Bovespa is actually a financial indicator with ties to Dow Jones, Nasdaq and the likes, and not an RCP average of some sort...

[Zanas]

Well, all in all, good. Like Al said, Dilma's certainly not perfect, PT maybe even less so, but hopefully some very poor Brazilians can keep getting a little less poor, as opposed to hugely rich Brazilians getting even more hugely rich. That's always a pleasure.