Explosion in madrid

[Bernadotte 0]

I never said that it was the single decisive parameter.

No??  Then what was this?

I don't look at other parameters of the equation, just one and I can say that the terrorist attack parameter was decisive (all other parameters kept unchanged).

It's exactly what it says. Read it a couple of times more and perhaps you'll get it.

I read it a couple more times and you still seem to be saying the very same thing that you later denied.  If that's not the case then could you please be a little bit less like FSPilot and perhaps help me to understand the difference?  Thanks in advance.

It's not a simplification it's an encapsulation.

...however...

It's quite simple and very general.

...whatever.  

In this case a terrorist attack took place for reasons that I don't care about and I'm looking at how it affects the election results which are the output of another black box.

Why are you looking at how a terrorist attack affected the election result without any regard for the reasons of the attack?  It seems like an utterly pointless exercise given that an ETA attack of equal magnitude could very likely have produced an entirely different election result.

[turms 0]

Mr. Zapatero said that the troops will return UNLESS there is a UN authority in Iraq, and by doing so giving the spanish people what they wanted before the war. I would like to know about Zapateros opinions about Irak BEFORE the war...

[bn880 5]

Mr. Zapatero said that the troops will return UNLESS there is a UN authority in Iraq, and by doing so giving the spanish people what they wanted before the war. I would like to know about Zapateros opinions about Irak BEFORE the war...

You mean will NOT return UNLESS...

[bn880 5]

Bgnorway, I have friends in Spain. They have told me many things that you do not know. Maybe if you had friends they would tell you things about the world as well.

I do not try to quote the movie, I talk about how mafia is. I would insult you, but your ignorant remark insults you enough.

Spain is not confronting enemy, they are turning and running. Withdrawing troops, bringing them home. We will see if the new president can still battle terror. Maybe, maybe not.

The terrorists won the election. You can yell at me as much as you want. You will still be wrong.

What exactly have they told you? Just the other day I overheard some people from Spain talking (at college), and they were still explaining why they thought it was ETA in the first place. I guess the smart ones stay in Spain?

[Balschoiw 0]

I´m feeling more and more uneasy when I look at the threadtitle. Hey guys this thread is about the explosion in Madrid and it´s terrible results. Spain has lost over 200 people in this. I don´t think this is the right place to have a discussion about this and that. We all don´t know what made them vote the way they voted. We are not there. We are in a watchtower position while they are the ones who got attacked. I think it´s just not ok to judge spain´s people. We have no right to do that. All we can do is express the sorrow we share.

Would this be ok guys ?

[bn880 5]

Well, at least trying to look into the entire matter I think is a much better "serivce" to everyone in Spain than to mourn the dead and disconnect the context.

I'm all for discussing the nitty gritty details when a tragedy occurs, whether this particular thread is right I'm not sure, but do we need a second one to discuss?

[denoir 0]

I never said that it was the single decisive parameter.

No??  Then what was this?

I don't look at other parameters of the equation, just one and I can say that the terrorist attack parameter was decisive (all other parameters kept unchanged).

It's exactly what it says. Read it a couple of times more and perhaps you'll get it.

I read it a couple more times and you still seem to be saying the very same thing that you later denied.  If that's not the case then could you please be a little bit less like FSPilot and perhaps help me to understand the difference?  Thanks in advance.

This is getting beyond absurd. What exactly is that you don't understand?

Axiom: The Iraq war was a decisive parameter.

Theory: The bombing was a decisive parameter

Regardless if the bombing had occured, the Iraq war parameter would be the same. It is unchanged hence we don't have to look at it. We are interested to see if our theory is correct. We achieve this by keeping all the other parameters unchanged. We change the parameter we are interested in and observe the results.

Perhaps if I give you a simple boolean logic analogy, you'll understand.

A = B AND C AND D.

We know that A = true for B=C=D=true. Now we wish to find out if chaning C affects the equation. So we keep B and D unchanged (=true) and change C (=false)

A = true AND false AND true = false. Conclusion: C changed A.

Say that the initial conditions were A=false for B=false, C=D=true. Again we keep B and D unchanged and change C.

A = false AND false AND true = false. Conclusion: C did not change A.

The fact that we in our analysis keep B and D constant does not change the fact that they are decisive parameters. We're however not looking at them, we're looking at B.

In the same way Iraq was a decisive parameter, but here we're asking the questions if the bombing affected the results of the elections.

Quote[/b] ]

It's not a simplification it's an encapsulation.

...however...

It's quite simple and very general.

...whatever.

Black-boxing (or variation of parameters or sensitivity analysis, take your pick) is not a simplification, it's encapsulation. It is however a SIMPLE and GENRAL technique.

Quote[/b] ]Why are you looking at how a terrorist attack affected the election result without any regard for the reasons of the attack? It seems like an utterly pointless exercise given that an ETA attack of equal magnitude could very likely have produced an entirely different election result.

No, I'm not looking at a general terrorist attack, I'm looking at this specific attack. I cannot say anything about a generic terrorist attack as I do not have any way of knowing what effects it would have had. We know the results after this specific attack and that's what we're looking at.

[melkorjl 0]

I was reading this topic when I saw somebody wrote that spain is acting as a coward. Do you really think that the enemy is in iraq. I think that the terrorists are in spain and in every country that have terrorists problems.

I dont know how history will see this, for my history now is not important. But im happy that at least some governments and some countries can learn from their mistakes. When you make a mistake the right thing is to try to solve it, this is what makes us humans.

if you think that  spain is acting as a coward, i suggest you to think in the 12 milion people that went to the street ( this is most than a 1/4 of the spanish population) in a moment were anything could happen, like more bombs. where was the american people when the sept 11, they were all scared in their houses. i dont have anything agains the usa (i think that it is a great country) but i see a great difference between the the people that suffer terrorism every day of their lives and people that suffer it casually. Spain is nowadays the only country in the western world that say no to terrorism in the streets and the only country that learned from their mistakes to say no to anykind of violence.

I only say that to sent your troops to another country to make your people think that they are safer it is only a mistake. When you have one of this problems the first think that a country have to do is look at themselves and try to find why.

if all of this make us cowards, them im happy to be a coward because first of all im human.

happy to be Spanish in the good and in the bad.

[Holy Smoke 0]

hmm...

ETA has been killing people for more than 30 years in Spain and the death toll is over 800. ETA always tries to commit a terrorist attack prior to congress elections. Most times they succeed. Al-Qaida attacked the spanish interests in Morocco not long ago and, by the way, it seems the terrorists responsible of Madrid bombings had something to do. Al-Qaida or alike extremist group blasted a restaurant in Madrid in the mid 80s killing 11 americans and 3 or 4 spaniards...

...and we're feed up with that, I can tell. The only time I recall ETA having (indirect) influence in politics was around 10 years ago: It was made public that the government supported a group called GAL, created by some elements of the police and with goverment's knowledge, in order to fight ETA with the same weapons: killing them whatever the cost might be. It was a blackop, always denied. When this stuff hit public opinion through the press... well, like Walker already said electorates removed liars and in 1996 JM Aznar won the elections. Some moths before '96 elections, ETA tried to kill Aznar by blasting his car, but he survived thanks to the armor plates. It was discussed whether this fact had influence or not in the elections, and some conspiration paranoids made the sick statement that actually Aznar blasted himself to influence electorates. Anyway, if we have to analize the subject, I believe that being a victim of a terrorist attack had a positive impact on his public image, but I have little doubt that he won the elections because the outgoing goverment was involved in too much scandals and LIED to the people.

Now talking about the present, let me tell you I'm spanish, 27 yo, and this means terrorism it is a matter that "has been there" all my entire life. A lot of people has grown up with that in Spain. I don't get the point when I hear/read people say Spain won't be fighting terror or not confronting enemy. All democratic governments in Spain did it and will continue to do whatever the form terrorism adopts.

Enemy is the one that will try to kill you because you think/live/act in a different way. I do know how does it feel when he shows up, hurts you and tries to bring you on his ground long before the matter we are discussing here happened. Spain stands against the enemy, looks for him, brings him to justice and, finally, we see him end his days in jail.

Walker had a big point when he said that to fight terror you must bring it to your ground, and not going to his own. I already told what happened with the government preceeding Aznar's, but I will remind it: they tried to fight terror in they ground, failed, lied about it and lost elections. Understand please, once and for all, that most of the spanish people believes war on Iraq was a bad move consisting in fighting terrorism on their very own ground (and i'm not talking geographically here) and rules. You can agree or disagree (though better let's talk about this on Iraq threads), but saying we duck our head on this matter is false and shows little respect to the memory not only of the 200 in Madrid, but also with the 800 that ETA killed before.

Last, I wish to say (if anybody wonders) I did found none of the previous comments written here ofensive. As long as the discussion keeps civil, positive and avoids simplistic topics will be interesting and constructive. The bombings were discussed here and the consequences should be discussed here as well. I can think of no spaniard being offended by the later discussions taking place on this thread.

Regards

[Bernadotte 0]

Quote[/b] ]Why are you looking at how a terrorist attack affected the election result without any regard for the reasons of the attack?  It seems like an utterly pointless exercise given that an ETA attack of equal magnitude could very likely have produced an entirely different election result.

No, I'm not looking at a general terrorist attack, I'm looking at this specific attack. I cannot say anything about a generic terrorist attack as I do not have any way of knowing what effects it would have had. We know the results after this specific attack and that's what we're looking at.

I'll ask again.  Why are you looking at how this terrorist attack affected the election result without any regard for the reasons of the attack?  It seems like an utterly pointless exercise given that an attack of similar magnitude, but for a different reason (i.e. Basque separatism) could very likely have produced an entirely different election result.

[walker 0]

Hi Tanaska

You seem to have missed my previous post. So as your still on your pro Al-Qaida activities I thought I would repeat it.

Quote[/b] ]Your obvious support of Al Qaida must cheer them up. After their bombing failed to alter the spanish elections. Such statements as yours offer Al Qaida nothing but succour.

The Spanish have more courage than you

Quote[/b] ]The bombing sent voters rushing to the polling stations, producing at one point a 7% increase in turnout on previous elections,

http://www.guardian.co.uk/spain/article/0,2763,1170084,00.html They do not run from their democracy.

The Socialist believe the war on Iraq to have been a strategic error of monumental proportion as do I. All the evidence bears this out. I invite you to contribute to Iraq thread as to why the war was anything but stupid.

The Socialists have said they will pull out of Iraq and only if the TBA and TBA2 do not allow UN to run the situation. The Socialists will do this because the Iraq war was needless. The war on Iraq had nothing to do with the war on terrorism. The Socialists still support the war on terrorism

The spanish voted against the old administration because it lied.

The old spanish administration lied about Iraq.

The old spanish administration lied about who was responcible for the Madrid bombings.

The lieing about the bombing cost The old spanish administration about 4.5% of the vote.

The lieing about the Iraq war cost The old spanish administration about 10% of the vote.

A 10 percent shift in the US elections which now looks likely would be a landslide

Both The Bush Administration and The Blair Administration need to take notice.

Electorates remove liars.

Kind Regards Walker

It is very simple that your choice of words leads me beleive you are anti-democratic. You do not seem to want to accept the will of the people. It was the people who got rid of the liers not Al Qaida. Al Qaida dont have a political party and dont vote in spanish elections.

Nor do you seem to accept the obvious case that you can support the war on terror and be equaly and vehmenently againts the war on Iraq.

The war on Iraq was a strategic error of catastrophic proportions.

Attacking an enemy that was not there. There was no WMD. There were no links to Al Qaida. There was no support for terorism.

It squandered the international support for the war on terror. It reduced the specialist troops in afghanistan, thus allowing the taliban and Al Qaida back in to Afghanistan. It waisted masses of logistics. It waisted masses of money. Most importanly it killed and wounded tens of thousands. All Needlesly.

The war on Iraq gave Al Qaida back the support it had lost in the muslim world after 9/11. It may well have refilled the coffers of Al Qaida; Sadam's billions are still unaccounted for. It made world a more dangerous place or are the now monthly bombings my imagination?

In order to pursue this war on Iraq it apears the administration either lied or were stupid enough to follow or self manufacture wrong intel.

The voters can see this even if the administrations can not.

Aznar was the first to feel the effects of lieing to an electorate I think it probable George Bush Jnr. will be the next and unless the labour party rid their selves of him, Blair will be the third.

Voters remove liars

Kind Regards Walker

[brgnorway 0]

Good post Walker - it sums it up!

So what are the consequenses of the election besides Spain possibly pulling out of Iraq (if Iraq is not handed over to UN) ?

- Spain will improve it's relations with France and Germany.

- Spain change direction and join up in talks about the european constitution.

- Poland will have to follow due to being left alone in the opposition against the constitution.

- Italy will be pressured to follow as well

= which will lead to:

- Better integration of politics

- Better cooperation and strengthening of security

- Better integratin and a sole voice in the war on terror

Thus the terrible incident and the elections preceding it will lead to changes in european integration and a more effective campaign against terrorism.

[denoir 0]

Quote[/b] ]Why are you looking at how a terrorist attack affected the election result without any regard for the reasons of the attack?  It seems like an utterly pointless exercise given that an ETA attack of equal magnitude could very likely have produced an entirely different election result.

No, I'm not looking at a general terrorist attack, I'm looking at this specific attack. I cannot say anything about a generic terrorist attack as I do not have any way of knowing what effects it would have had. We know the results after this specific attack and that's what we're looking at.

I'll ask again.  Why are you looking at how this terrorist attack affected the election result without any regard for the reasons of the attack?  It seems like an utterly pointless exercise given that an attack of similar magnitude, but for a different reason (i.e. Basque separatism) could very likely have produced an entirely different election result.

If it had been an ETA attack, it would have been a different attack. We are talking about this and only this attack. This attack by AQ (or who it was), this attack that prompted Anzar to try to pin it on ETA.

Why am I not interested in the reasons? Because they already happened. The big news last week was the terrorist attack, not Spain joining the Iraq war. The question is "Did the bombing change the outcome of the election", not "Did the Iraq war result in the terrorist attack that changed the outcome...."

[brgnorway 0]

Quote[/b] ]Why am I not interested in the reasons? Because they already happened. The big news last week was the terrorist attack, not Spain joining the Iraq war. The question is "Did the bombing change the outcome of the election", not "Did the Iraq war result in the terrorist attack that changed the outcome...."

The point is that the spanish voters obviously saw that differently. To say that the outing of Aznar was only due to his effort of blaming ETA and not AQ is far too simplistic. There are diverse sentiments that lead to the actual election result - among them an overwhelming opposition against spanish engagement in Iraq. On top of it all you have the bomb - perhaps the decisive factor - but not the sole reason for todays change of regime.

[Bernadotte 0]

Quote[/b] ]Why are you looking at how a terrorist attack affected the election result without any regard for the reasons of the attack?  It seems like an utterly pointless exercise given that an ETA attack of equal magnitude could very likely have produced an entirely different election result.

No, I'm not looking at a general terrorist attack, I'm looking at this specific attack. I cannot say anything about a generic terrorist attack as I do not have any way of knowing what effects it would have had. We know the results after this specific attack and that's what we're looking at.

I'll ask again.  Why are you looking at how this terrorist attack affected the election result without any regard for the reasons of the attack?  It seems like an utterly pointless exercise given that an attack of similar magnitude, but for a different reason (i.e. Basque separatism) could very likely have produced an entirely different election result.

Why am I not interested in the reasons?

No.  For the 3rd time, the question is why are you looking at how this terrorist attack affected the election result without any regard for the reasons of the attack?  In other words, please explain the benfits you see in doing what you are doing?  It still seems like an utterly pointless exercise.

The question is "Did the bombing change the outcome of the election"

I'm not sure why you're still struggling with that question.  I and most others answered yes to that question days ago.  We're already seeking the implications of what happened.

[bn880 5]

Good post Walker - it sums it up!

So what are the consequenses of the election besides Spain possibly pulling out of Iraq (if Iraq is not handed over to UN) ?

- Spain will improve it's relations with France and Germany.

- Spain change direction and join up in talks about the european constitution.

- Poland will have to follow due to being left alone in the opposition against the constitution.

- Italy will be pressured to follow as well

Nice and well, but Poland will not take any logical steps, current leadership is filled with idiots IMO. Specifically Polish officials fail to realize potential in EU and Asia, while they focus on US relations, this is a method of thinking which is 30-40 years backward in terms of economy.

As an example South Western Poland lost bids to create automotive factories for Peugeot, then Toyota!, and lastly Hyundai. Not jsut because competition was tough, but because the administration didn't provide any incentives to the companies. If you don't know what this means: economic suicide for Poland continues. Poland was always a good manufacturing spot, back in the Commie days.

[denoir 0]

No.  For the 3rd time, the question is why are you looking at how this terrorist attack affected the election result without any regard for the reasons of the attack?  In other words, please explain the benfits you see in doing what you are doing?  It still seems like an utterly pointless exercise.

The issue is if the terrorists were successful or not. Why the attack happened in the first place is a completely different discussion and so is why in practice the Spanish chose a new government.

My overall point is that the terrorist boss that ordered the attack can be very pleased. They wanted Spain out of Iraq and through their mass killing of civilians they got their way. We're looking at the net effect here. And as I've said, this sends a very bad message. This could be a good motivation to commit such acts in for instance Britain.

Quote[/b] ]I'm not sure why you're still struggling with that question. I and most others answered yes to that question days ago. We're already seeking the implications of what happened.

I'm not struggling with that question, I'm struggling with explaining it to you. You're the one objecting all the time either that you don't agree or that you don't understand. My posts here the last few days were about convincing walker and you of the elementary principles of logic and logical reasoning.

I was going to write a long rant about this, but I'll just say a few words. I always thought that a complete denial of facts and empty rethorics were hall marks of the conservative right wing. I've learned now that I was mistaken. The hard liberals/lefties are just as blind to facts that don't fit their ideology. It's bad as their lack of reasonable reflection hurts all liberals. People with solid ideas get discarded as "Bush-haters" or whatever.

This:

. So as your still on your pro Al-Qaida activities I thought I would repeat it.

This is the equivalent of Fox-news loving people who called the war opponents for "pro Saddam".

I'm going to stop now before I really write my uncensored opinion and express my full contempt...

[Bernadotte 0]

The issue is if the terrorists were successful or not.

Everytime I think I'm on the verge of seeing some logical reason behind your approach, black boxes and all, you come out with a statement like this.  How the hell can you assess whether the terrorists were successful or not using an analytical method that disregards the reasons behind the attack?

[brgnorway 0]

Allthough I understand your point Denoir I have to say that you are reducing the outcome of the election to one incident instead of a chain of incidents. Spain was special compared to Britain because of an overwhelming majority against the war. That is also an element in the chain of incidents. To say that the outcome would be the same in England is also highly unlikely due to the english already having established a well thought out response system to terrorism. The british population are very used to this and cognitively they will not experience the same difficulties.

Having said that I would also like to repeat that to be shortsighted about the future and claim Al Qaida victory is a dangerous path. Why not look at it more positively and understand that this will put pressure on USA and England to handle more responsability over to the UN. This is not unlikely - especially if Spain withdraws it's troops - and would actually strengthen the fight against terrorism by inviting more nations to send more troops so Iraq can be stabilized in a far better way than it is today. If this happends (and I honestly think it will) Al Qaida will have to confront a larger, better organised opposition and you could very well say that the incident (spanish bombing) is an element in the chain to our advantage.

[denoir 0]

The issue is if the terrorists were successful or not.

Everytime I think I'm on the verge of seeing some logical reason behind your approach, black boxes and all, you come out with a statement like this.  How the hell can you assess whether the terrorists were successful or not using an analytical method that disregards the reasons behind the attack?

You're mixing things up. There are ovreall several steps.

1. Why there was a terrorist attack.

2. What consequences did the terrorist attack have.

3. Were the consequences compatible with the aim of the terrorists?

What we have been debating with black boxes and logic and so on is number 2). Did the attack induce a government change in Spain?

To decide if the attack was successful, you first have to see if the attack had any consequences. To that the reasons are completely irrelevant. Once we conclude that the attack changed the outcome of the elections then we can look at number 1) and number 3).

And it's far more simple. Assuming muslim fundamentalists were behind it then their motivation was Spain's involvement in the Iraq war. And we know that the the consequences of a government change were that Spanish troops will be withdrawn from Iraq. Hence we can conclude that through the attack the terrorist got what they wanted. To determine if the attack had made changes, we don't need the reasons for the attack. To determine if the attack was 'successful' we need to compare the 'before' and 'after' relative the aim of the terrorists.

brgnorway:

Quote[/b] ]Allthough I understand your point Denoir I have to say that you are reducing the outcome of the election to one incident instead of a chain of incidents.

The outcome of the elections are because of a number of necessary parameters that together formed a sufficient condition to make a government change. If Spain had not joined USA in its Iraq adventures, there would have most likely never been an attack. Had Anzar not lied about the attack, his party would probably still be in power etc The relevant event, that this thread is about is the terrorist attack, which was one of the necessary conditions and we're discussing the attack here, not Spain's decision to go to war with Iraq. Ok?

Quote[/b] ]Why not look at it more positively and understand that this will put pressure on USA and England to handle more responsability over to the UN. This is not unlikely - especially if Spain withdraws it's troops - and would actually strengthen the fight against terrorism by inviting more nations to send more troops so Iraq can be stabilized in a far better way than it is today

I think it's great that Anzar lost. I think it will be better for Spain, better for Europe and better for the world. I think however that the timing was very unfortunate and the fact that this change was forcibly induced through a terrorist attack. It is unfortunate that the terrorists will see this as further encouragement to continue with their violence. They got a maximum payoff in Spain, at least in the short term.

[bn880 5]

Every event as serious as that has _some_ influence on elections, we can't really prove that it actually put the elections over the top for socialists or not. That is, the best method to prove anything now is to have a serious poll of the population.

[brgnorway 0]

Quote[/b] ]

The outcome of the elections are because of a number of necessary parameters that together formed a sufficient condition to make a government change. If Spain had not joined USA in its Iraq adventures, there would have most likely never been an attack. Had Anzar not lied about the attack, his party would probably still be in power etc

Fine, we agree!

Quote[/b] ] The relevant event, that this thread is about is the terrorist attack, which was one of the necessary conditions and we're discussing the attack here, not Spain's decision to go to war with Iraq. Ok?

I hate to ask you this Denoir as I think you are one of the most reasonable persons on this forum - but are you moderating again? I sure don't see a set of rules in small print below the heading of this thread that says anything about a general discussion on the theme?

Quote[/b] ]It is unfortunate that the terrorists will see this as further encouragement to continue with their violence. They got a maximum payoff in Spain, at least in the short term.

I don't think it will change anything on behalf of the terrorists. I do however believe it will change a lot for us, our politicians, our policeforce and possibly for our traditionaly open society. It will force us to take precautions and possibly also make us swallow a few camels concerning the rights and priviliges we are used to.

[denoir 0]

I hate to ask you this Denoir as I think you are one of the most reasonable persons on this forum - but are you moderating again. I sure don't see a set of rules in small print below the heading of this thread that says anything about a general discussion on the theme?

You mean to say that I was unreasonable as a moderator?

No but seriously, I wasn't trying to tell you what to discuss, I just said that the important event here and the thing we are discussing in this thread is the terrorist attack. The Iraq war is a relevant side event, but we're talking about the bombing primarily. You misunderstood me, I was not trying to dicate the scope of the topic but to give a motivation to why I'm more prone to debate the terrorist attack and its consequences than other stuff. The big event was the bombing.

[jtec 0]

My thoughts go out to all the innocent people who die due to governments and Terrorists.

I was one who thought going to war with Iraq was wrong and i know we were lied to by our governments (nothing new about governments and their lies) But now see that things are (even tho still bombings happening every week) getting better. We must all remember the mass graves that Iraq hid, the chamical weapons Saddam did use on the Kurds, the war he caused with Iran, the way the people were forced to live *need i go on?*. I am happy that Saddam will face a trial and will get punished for the blood on his hands, i know it was wrong to go to war with Iraq but whats done is done and we must now rebuild this country and get a Iraq government in place as soon as possible. As for the recent bombings in Spain it is really hard to tell it is AQ, but alot of things point to them and the people who have been caught do have connections with muslims who hate everything the western world stands for.

This all adds up to Religion and is the most stupid reason to kill another person who you do not know. I think whoever are carrying out terrorist attacks are cowards and i really hope bad things happen to them as they dont deserve to breath. Its amazing how people can believe in something that they have never seen and has no prove of being here. Im so glad that my parents didnt force no religion on me and i have a open mind to see how pathetic these people are.

Peace out and i hope something can be done in future to make the world a safer more respectful place to live in...

[walker 0]

Hi Denoir

Why the very premise of your question is wrong

It is wrong because you have not established a causal link.

Your fundamental question was:

Quote[/b] ]Did the attack induce a government change in Spain?

My answere to that question is a resounding No.

Here are my reasons.

If the intention of the bomb was to change the government of Spain. The fact is, and this is incontravertable, more people came out to vote.

Their original intention was to vote for old the Spanish administration; this is confirmed by questions put to voters at the time of the big demonstrations. Where in all queries support for the Old administration increased.

If the old Spanish administration had not lied about the bombing blaiming it on ETA the old Spanish administration would have gained those votes all 7% of them. It would probably ensured Aznar a victory.

They did lie.

This ensured a backlash the very one that swept the old Spanish administration from power.

If the spanish had voted for the old Spanish administration despite the lies and in panic to ensure a "strong" (in my opinion stupid with no strategic sense on defence old Spanish administration) government then your question would be answered yes.

The Spanish did not. They bravely ignored the bombs and voted on the lies.

They kept to their democracy ignored the threats and voted on the issues right up to the very last hours.

If the lies had not happened and the spanish extra 7% had voted for the socialists in panic at the bombs then the answere to your question would be yes.

They were never going to do that. They came out in droves to vent their anger at the bombers and to support the old Spanish administration at the demonstraions against the bombing.

At the election what changed peoples minds was lies not the bombs.

Your assumption inherent in your question is that the bombing scaired the electorate (that was your causal link). I see like others you support the spanish in their hour of need. I ask you can you square that support with an asertion that esentialy says; they ran away from their democratic principles in fear?

With most kind regards and respect walker