Deep, Independent Thinkers, You Are!

Thanks to everyone for participating in the third WWCP poll--a double edition.

Both parts of the poll pertained to celebrity and high-profile endorsements. The first asked, simply, how do they affect you?

As I suspected, they don't really affect you at all. Out of 30 total votes cast, a whopping 69% (21 votes) said that endorsements have absolutely no impact on them, with 46% (14 votes) saying, "They never affect me. I study the candidates independently and couldn't care less what 'big-name' people think." The other 23% (7 votes) clarified that endorsements don't affect who they support, but they "appreciate them because they can help my [their] candidate[s]."

29% (9 votes) said that endorsements do affect them. 3% (1 vote) pointed out that it depends on the endorser, and 13% (4 votes) further defined that position by stating that only "endorsers with credibility and credentials"--not celebrities--impact them. The remaining 13% (4 votes) noted that some endorsements make them less likely to support a candidate. Not one person said that endorsements "almost always affect" them--that they "put a lot of stock in a celebrity and high-profile endorsements.

The second part of the poll was very intriguing. In this part, I wanted to know people's specific reactions to particular endorsements. Here are the results:

10 people were less likely to support Obama because of Oprah's endorsement. 2 were more likely.

4 people were more likely to support Huckabee because of Chuck Norris' endorsement. 5 were less likely.

3 were more likely to support Mitt Romney after the National Review's endorsement. 8 were less likely.

1 was more likely to support Mike Huckabee after Jim Gilchrist's endorsement. 5 were less likely.

There were a total of 25 votes cast in the second part, yet the most reactions to any endorsement was twelve. How can this be? Well, 13 said that none of the endorsements they didn't check influence them one way or another. That still doesn't seem to be proportionate to the percentage which said, in the poll's first part, that endorsements has no impact on them. However, that seeming contradiction can be explained in two ways:

1) Different people voted in the different parts of the poll.
2) In the second part, you were recording your reactions--whether positive or negative--to an endorsement, rather than how they actually influence you.

Please vote in the new poll.