The first poll in which Nicusor Dan leads in front of George Simion

Nicusor Dan leads George Simion with four percent in voting intentions, according to a poll conducted by IRSOP ...

George Simion is the populist-conservative (and successor of Călin Georgescu), and Nicusor Dan represents the center and center-right.

While this poll shows Dan slightly ahead, the fact is this poll and other polls don't include the roughly half million Romanian citizens and dual-citizens in Moldova (who can be presumed to heavily favor Simion).

Simion outperformed the pre-election polls prior to the first round (two weeks ago) by something like 10 points; and, I think will wind up winning the run-off on Sunday by a "surprisingly" strong margin.

In a world that is actually quite complicated, Simion's position on Moldova is interesting. Simion's party favors the unification (or, re-unification) of Romania and Moldova. This is good news for pro-Romanian people of Moldova, but a possible threat to ethnic Russians in Transnistria. Possibly, some kind of accommodation of both pro-Romania and pro-Russia concerns is possible. At least, let's hope so.

There is only one poll that matters. Perhaps after what they did to the first populist-conservative candidate, the people are wising up to claim they are for another candidate now.

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