Too bad Mexico doesn't have a runoff election

[Wabbajack]

Would't the vast majority of PRI supporters have backed ALMO? It's sad to see the conservative "win" when over 60% voted for a left of center candidate. They couldn't have stolen it with such a large margin.

[adriennui]

1. everything falls into place

a somewhat conservative gov't in canada and now mexico. the fix is in for the chimp to take over the western hemisphere. (i think i'm joking).

[Adelante]

2. Maybe you can explain

You're thinking PRI's candidate Madrazo was what, center-left, I guess, so his supporters would have voted for AMLO instead of Calderon. Why? It was the PRI who stole the 1988 election from Cuauhtémoc Cárdenas, candidate of the center-left predecessor of the PRD. It was Madrazo who stole the Tabasco governorship from López Obrador in 1994. Nobody wanted Madrazo, including his own party, and probably most of his voters who were voting party line. However, Madrazo's voters were conservative, for the most part.

So I don't see that Madrazo's votes translated necessary to AMLO, more likely some would and most wouldn't, but a left of center candidate would not likely get 60% of a vote in Mexico in any circumstances. It's a mistake to lump all poor and working class Mexicans into AMLO's camp, for one thing, just because they're poor and working class, so they must be left. It's not true. Similarly, all of Calderon's supporters were certainly not only the wealthy class. Mexico's middle class expanded very rapidly in the past decade and those who were so fortunate, who were so recently poor or working class, may not want to take risks with their new found prosperity, which is how an AMLO presidency is viewed, rightly or wrongly.

The country is clearly split and even if we said half of Madrazo's vote would go to AMLO and half to Calderon, for argument's sake, it would still be split. My personal observation is, if anybody would have gotten 60%, it would have been Fox, if he could have run again. Very many Mexicans of all classes would probably have avoided this election if they could have, just to ward off the inevitable division and possible violence. Mexicans want jobs and stability in pretty equal measure, as far as I can tell.