Costa Rica: Thumbs Up or Down to Campaign Ads · Global Voices
Adriana Vargas

Over the past few weeks, Costa Rica has been bombarded with political advertisements due to the proximity of the presidential election, which will be held on Sunday, February 7th, 2010. Because of this, the presidential candidates have been doing everything possible to attract more supporters with the main goal of winning the election. In response to this overload of media, the Costa Rican bloggers have been giving their opinions on the ads from the political parties, some of which have been featured here.
This phenomenon began when candidate Luis Fishman of the Social Christian Unity Party (PUSC), also known as “the lesser evil,” released an ad supporting pregnant women and their children The women in the ad insult their husbands who left them alone with their children, and which the candidate responded that he will help them with the pensions that parents should give their children. The announcement was described by ridiculous by some, as well as the blogger from Hell in Costa Rica [es], who published the video of the ad and wrote the following:
Saludos queridas almas: Les dejamos esta parodia del comercial de las embarazadas cantándole al menos malo. Disfrútenlo.
The only female candidate, Laura Chinchilla of the  National Liberation Party (PLN), has released a new advertisement about her trajectory from childhood to today, which seeks to demonstrate her firmness and honesty to Costa Ricans. Cristian Cambronero of the blog Fusil de Chispas [es]  also showed the ad and asked the opinion of his readers, many of whom say the ad is too boring. Cambronero provides his opinion:
Ahora sí, mi opinión: un spot sencillo, más racional que emotivo, formalmente conservador (ha sido el tono a lo largo de toda la campaña). Al igual que en el caso de los del PAC, yo habría esperado algo más “festivo”, pero no le veo nada malo como para destruirlo solo porque sí.
Finally, the candidate Ottón Solis of the Citizens Action Party (PAC) also showed new ad in recent days, inviting the youth to use their identification cards for the first time by voting for him. Solis has been trying to attract the votes of first time young voters and those who voted for him in previous elections so that he does not remain “así” (“like that” –  in other words, not victorious). Once again, Cambronero of the blog Fusil de Chispas [es] published the ads, and asked opinions from his readers. Rodrigo Garnier writes:
Está bien trabajado. Ottón se ve y se siente algo diferente. Sin embargo el peso de lo hecho durante años anteriores y durante la campaña creo que no le alcanzarán, se quedará en “así”.
Although the party candidate Otto Guevara of the Libertarian Movement (ML) showed new ads and showed more progress, according to society, he has seemed calmer than in previous elections. This ad tries to convince Costa Rican families that a positive change in the country means improving health care and education, but always in opposition to the National Liberation Party.
Wednesday, February 3rd was the last day for political advertising and now all candidates can do is wait.