Agnes T-H Jun 27, 2011:

I am sorry but I think you are missing the part of my comment where I say 'However, the 2nd part "reminiscent of the Stalinist era" really sticks to the French meaning."
I disagree with the 1st part of ur answer that does not convey the message of "artificially inflated score" So I'm not saying the contrary of what I am saying(!?!)

About the "taught" part of my comment; you are stating "artificially inflated is implicit in the Stalinist reference " Well... Unless one has been taught in high school AP (Stalin was born in 1878) what Stalinism is, there are very few chances that they know what the heck is Stalinism & whether Stalin was a crook or just some kind of crazy utopist (some might have learned by themselves but how many 1/10000?)
So election rigging is not THAT blatantly obvious in the non European English speaking countries.

Agnes T-H Jun 27, 2011:

@Helen How could I go against what I am saying since I did NOT answer this question?
Besides, assuming Stalin's "story" is being taught today the same way (or being taught in so many details) everywhere in the world, the way it is in the non communist Europe is a bit of a stretch! i.e Former communist countries citizens might not see Stalin as a crook. Or some readers in their 20s, who are so far from this (in time & place) that they could not possibly care less, might not be THAT aware of his reputation.
As far as I know, reading about the Gay-Pride in the newspapers is not some kind of privilege granted exclusively to those who are holding an academic diploma from Southern Europe.
Therefore what could sound "obvious" to you may not be that obvious for a bunch of your contemporaries (yet not less English speakers)

Laurette Tassin Jun 26, 2011:

Meaning an election score unusually high for any democratic country (e.g.90%) more often the tiype of score obtained by a dictator...