In Ohio, Mr. Romney leads by a slightly smaller margin than some polls called for, but the polling average was nevertheless very close.
And in Austria, Heinz-Christian Strache, leader of the far-right Freedom party, which is currently nudging the top of the opinion polls, called for the same.
Leftist Syriza, the antibailout party that surged into second place in last month's elections and is neck and neck with the conservatives ahead of the June polls, called for a "common front against neo-Nazism".
In France opinion is equally strained: after the deaths of ten French soldiers this summer in a Taliban ambush opinion polls called for all French forces to come home.John Hulsman, an American analyst at the German Council on Foreign Relations, predicts trouble over Iran at a first meeting between the German chancellor, Angela Merkel, and the next American president.
The opposition are boycotting the polls called for next month by Ms Yingluck, who leads an elected government that enjoys strong support in rural areas.
(Former Maryland Gov. Martin O'Malley, who trails Clinton and Sanders in the polls, called for marijuana to be downgraded from Schedule I to Schedule II in September).
Pidgley, who has given to the Conservative party in the past, put his name to an open letter from business leaders in the run up to the poll calling for voters to back the Tories.
But her performances, hectoring local workers not to allow the government to rig the poll, calling for an end to militancy, and invoking the legacy of her late father, were vintage Bhutto.
Nick Clegg has been at pains to emphasise the Lib Dem leadership supports all coalition government policies, but the former MP Evan Harris topped the poll, calling for the party to "distance ourselves from Conservative policies that have been imposed on our ministers".
