European Statistics

Here's a quote from Economist.com :

"Despite his renegade status, Mr Le Pen came second with 16.9% of the vote in the first round, not far behind Mr Chirac, who only managed to win 19.9%, and comfortably ahead of Mr Jospin, who received just 16.2%."

Huh? Being behind by three full percentage points is "not far behind", but beating someone by 0.7% is indicative of being "comfortably ahead"? Is this metric or something?