The 'Abc', Hagrid Feijóo and Mini-me Colau

If electoral polls are already quite an indigestible meal midway through a legislative term, when elections approach their intensity becomes parodic. This Monday, three newspapers opened their front pages with a survey, with quite disparate data. El País sold a “comeback” for the PSOE and granted it up to 123 seats in the best of scenarios, while La Razón stayed between 99 and 101. It would be unthinkable for it to be the other way around, which evidences the arbitrariness of these narrative-creation operations that are polls. Since the content doesn’t deserve much more commentary than analyzing a roll of the dice, it is more fun to look at the semiotic details. For example, La Razón sorts the parties by number of seats, and this makes the red of the PSOE –the most striking color– occupy the center of the bar: they slipped up here. El País sorts the parties following the left-right axis. This allows one to see immediately the little piece missing for the socialists to aspire to a government majority and, above all, it sells the idea that the PSOE –the one of the non-repealed gag law, the one of the bogged-down housing decrees– is clearly left-wing. Looking at the data, by the way, I see that the vote percentages are not so disparate between newspapers: the kitchen of each editorial board must have steered the doubtful seats towards home, as it suited them.

However, the graphic disaster of the week –and I write this on a Monday– is the poll from ABC, who thought of placing the four candidates each with a size relative to the estimated voting intention. This allows them to include a Feijóo with gigantism, who looks like the cousin of Zumosol, next to a diminished Sánchez and Abascal. And much smaller and underneath, looking like it is emerging from the Vox member's jacket, one can see the silvery and tiny mop of hair of Colau, converted into a decapitated Smurfette. All the rigor that is supposed (ahem) to be in a poll went down the drain with this Lynchian image.