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The Local |  Alliance pulls away with a week to go: poll

For the second successive Sifo survey, which is published by the Svenska Dagbladet (SvD) daily, the Alliance claimed an absolute majority with 51.7 percent of the vote, with the centre-left trailing with 42 percent, an increase of almost 2 points.

The Alliance has Sweden's female voters to thank for the boost, SvD reported, with the centre-right enjoying the backing of 52.8 percent of the female voters, to 43.9 percent for the centre-left, a reverse of the situation in the spring.

"Generally speaking women are interested in welfare issues, but the Red-Greens have not managed to get the election campaign to be about welfare," said Toivo Sjóren at Sifo to SvD.

Here's the story in Svenska Dagbladet:

Stark ledning för alliansen

Den borgerliga alliansen leder med nästan 10 procentenheter över de rödgröna, enligt SvD/Sifos mätning en vecka före valet. Socialdemokraterna ligger kvar på en historiskt låg nivå samtidigt som Miljöpartiet också tappar stöd. Även Centern backar, medan Kristdemokraterna har en säker uppgång.

This paragraph jumped out to me (apologies for the 'Swedlish'):

Generellt brukar kvinnorna vara intresserade av välfärdsfrågorna, men de rödgröna har inte lyckats få valrörelsen att handla om välfärden. Man har tappat kvinnorna i storstäderna och genom att miljöfrågorna kommit bort har även Miljöpartiet tappat en del kvinnor på slutet, säger Toivo Sjörén, chef för Sifos opinionsmätningar.- Generally, women are interested in the welfare issues, but the red-green has never had a campaign to be about welfare. It has lost the women in big cities and by environmental concerns have also been removed Green Party lost some men in the end, "said Toivo Sjoren, director of Sifo opinion polls.

Is this the most elementary blunder a political party can make?  Did they try to 'move center' to pick-up votes shedding a greater number from their loosely attached constituency?

One other thing to note.  In the US, and I'm going to assume it's the same in Sweden, hard right parties tend to poll lower than their actual vote; people don't want to 'out' themselves as a bigot.  Thus, they lie to pollsters.  IF this is true in Sweden, and we won't know for a week, the Sweden Democrats could pick-up as much as 2% and possibly even 3% - depending on how far Right the election swings -  over their polling numbers making them A Player in forming the new government.

She believed in nothing; only her skepticism kept her from being an atheist. -- Jean-Paul Sartre

by ATinNM on Sun Sep 12th, 2010 at 01:43:57 PM EST

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