The esteemed Nate Silver has been arguing for taking Herman Cain seriously because, despite his low name recognition of only about 30%, he’s still polling at around 10%. But I have an alternate hypothesis: What if his relative popularity is not despite his low name recognition, but because of it?
Everyone recognizes that the Republican field this cycle, while very broad, is rather flawed. Is it possible that Republican primary voters, when polled, are saying “Nope, don’t like him… Don’t like him… Don’t like her…” to all the candidates they recognize, and then picking essentially at random from the candidates they don’t recognize (and therefore don’t know that they dislike)? If this is the case, then one would expect Cain’s (and the other low-recognition candidates’) support in the polls to drop, not rise, as voters become more familiar with them.
In particular, of course, we have to consider race. There are still a very large number of Republicans who would never support a black candidate. But since most of them haven’t yet heard of Herman Cain, they don’t yet know that he’s black. And even of those who have heard of them, at least some of them will only know of him from print lists of candidates and their positions, or the like, and might still not realize that he’s black. Once folks start realizing his race, any of the racist contingent that’s now saying they favor him will drop out of his camp.
I don’t know enough to comment about the popularity because he’s not recognized, though I’m skeptical. Presumably Silver has made a point of his popularity because it’s out of proportion to his name recognition, which suggests he might have comparative data about other unknown names.
After the first Republican debate (which I didn’t watch), a focus group gave Cain the “win” by a clear majority. Whether that would translate into a vote later, I dunno – and I also dunno whether they group was asked about actually voting. But the group watched the debate, and they know he’s black, and they didn’t dismiss what he said because of it.
So maybe an accompanying question to yours would be – if conservative voters have to choose between a black candidate who is perceived as more reliably conservative than a white candidate (Romney, I’m looking at you), who will they choose?
I think Cain is more “reliably conservative” than Cain. Cain doesn’t have Romneycare or the Affordable Care Act hanging over him, or even the flip-flop on abortion, or even Mormonism. Cain is a successful businessman and seems to put his thoughts together pretty well. He’s not well known, but I think he has some legs. Of course, he’s a pretty unknown commodity, so we’ll see if someone like Rick Perry, Sarah Palin, or Chris Christie come into the race and completely undercut his head of steam.
It’s likely the high esteem that the Tea Party has for outsiders and business successes. Whether either of those traits translates to successful governmental leadership is at best murky.
Yea, I think he’s just this years “outsider” candidate, especially now that Trump has made his inevitable exit. He’ll attract a bunch of motivated disatisfied voters, but their numbers will be a lot smaller then their enthusiasm, and he’ll end up fighting Bachmann for third place.
There are certainly some voters that won’t vote for a black candidate, but even amongst GOP primary voters I don’t think they’re that large a fraction, and concentrated in a few states in Appalacia and the deep South. Cain won’t come close to the GOP nomination, but it will be because outsider candidates never win, not because he’s black.
So how do you account for him being 4 times as popular as Huntsman, who according to that very same article has nearly the same name recognition as Cain?
I can only vouch for the relative quality of his pizza. Fairly 'Pizza Hut’esque. Nothing on a serious gourmet pie, but good for chain quality. Biggest complaint we have is that they skimp on cheese when you get a pizza loaded with toppings. Decent breadsticks.
I’m not sure where they are based, but there are several here in Portland, OR and I don’t ever recall seeing one in AZ that I noticed.
I think the most disturbing thing about his running is the idea that some might consider an unknown outsider to be the best option the party can put forward. It’s almost like they’re saying “Yeah, pretty much all of the other people in our party are universally known to be two-faced, brain-dead douches. Maybe we can bring in someone who most people couldn’t pick out of a lineup and who has no record to compare to; people are probably gullible enough for that.” Is there really not one eligible, long term republican candidate who actually can stand on their record and argue for they’re presumably long held beliefs?
I don’t know enough to say, since there are too many potential variables. Maybe people just liked his name better. Maybe the names were in alphabetical order and people picked the first one they didn’t recognize. Maybe some folks got “Cain” mixed up with “McCain”. Yeah, these are all stupid reasons to pick someone in a poll, but then again, look at the primary election that got Alvin Greene on the Senate ballot in South Carolina: A lot of folks who voted for him gave reasons that were just as stupid, if not more so.
Of course, the real answer is likely to be a combination of many factors, doubtless including some proportion who really are familiar with him, and think that his policies and ideas are the best available for the country, or that he represents the best chance of defeating Obama, or whatever. The question isn’t whether such people exist; it’s how significant they are, compared to the folks whose support is frivolous and will probably evaporate as the campaigns move forward.
I don’t know. As of today, he’s got my vote over anyone else except perhaps Fred Thompson. And during the days when I ate pizza, I would occasionally go to
Godfather’s. It was okay.