It is not just the US that is holding elections. There is a Spanish general election on Sunday and the streets of Madrid are festooned with campaign posters.

Spanish political slogans have lost a little of their élan, since the civil war and the days of “No pasaran”. The main parties in this election have clearly run out of inspiration on the sloganeering front. Outside my hotel is a huge banner for the centre-right Popular Party, featuring its smiling, bearded leader, Mariano Rajoy. The line on the poster is “Clear ideas, with Rajoy it’s possible.” The main slogan being used by the governing Socialist Party translates as “We are the majority”. To which the obvious response is: well, we’ll see about that on Sunday, won’t we?

Actually, most political analysts are, in fact predicting a narrow victory for the socialist government of Jose Zapatero. At a panel in Madrid yesterday morning, four out of the five panellists predicted a Socialist (PSOE) victory; just one panellist thought that the PP might make it. This is hardly surprising since the PSOE have been ahead in every poll for months, even when polls are adjusted to take account for the reluctance of some conservative voters to own up to their political preferences.

If the PP do fail to make a breakthrough, they should kick themselves. There are plenty of things in today’s Spain that should work well for a rightwing opposition party: the economy is faltering and there has been huge illegal immigration. These themes have come to the fore in recent weeks. Who knows - they might yet produce a surprise on Sunday.